This Is Why There Is Evil in the World

0:00 Matthew chapter 13 today. Matthew 13. We want to ask an important question, a hard question, but an important question. Something can be hard and important at the same time, and this question is a hard and important one, and the question is, if God is good, why does He allow awful things to happen? If an all-powerful, all-loving, all-knowing God who's supposedly good is in control of the universe, why do terrible things take place? I was at a communion service once, and during the moment of prayer, a young lady asked me a question. She said, Pastor Levi, I was raped as a teenager. Did God allow that to happen? The title of this message is, This is Why There's Evil in the World.

0:56 This is why there's evil in the world. As we continue our series that we started last week, This is the Kingdom, we're trying to get our heads around what we are citizens of, what we're a part of. The Bible says if we've come to faith in Jesus, we are no longer citizens of this world, our allegiance, our citizenship, comes from our relationship with God that we've been born again into. Birth and death are citizenship-altering events. Agreed? I got a death certificate when my daughter died in the mail. Showed up in between bills and advertisements. They just mailed those suckers out. They sent out the certificate to let us know this is verifiable. She's not a citizen of this country anymore. And it's the same with a live birth. You get a certificate of live birth.

1:50 You're now a citizen because of this birth. And when we come to know Jesus, the reason we baptize is to show our identification with the death and the burial. Hold, hold, hold. And the resurrection. Some of you, we've got to hold you down a little longer. You know what I'm saying? Like, one, 1,000. You know what I'm saying? And they're like, they're not done yet. You know, it's like coming out of the grave, there's an identification with the resurrection of Jesus Christ. That signifies, do you realize what it signifies when we baptize you? You're dead. You died to sin. You died with Christ. And that death severed your citizenship to this world. Praise God that you're no longer a child of the devil. Can we celebrate that for a second? And you're no longer. So when your old man, when the old fleshly nature comes calling, you can be like, hey, Levi can't come to the phone right now because the old Levi is dead, right?

2:50 He died. He died. He doesn't have to live in any longer in the sin. I know you're still going to call, but I don't have to do what you say anymore because I died with Christ and I've been raised to walk in newness of life. I'm now a citizenship of a coming kingdom. Do you hear it? A coming kingdom. Do you realize how you're kind of in limbo then? Where are you a citizen of? Kingdom. Where's it at? It's coming. When is it going to get here? That's a great question, right? There's a tension to it. Because this is where we get. That's why it's so easy to fall back into our old ways, because it's everywhere. It's 14 impressions at a time. That's what they say it finally takes for you to buy a product or do a thing or know. 14 impressions. It's an attention economy. The world's trying to get your attention, to squeeze you into its mold, to get you to care what it cares about. And it has all of the screens. It has all the service.

3:42 It has all the smells. It has all the things that can allure us and pull us and tug at us. It's hard to live with an invisible kingdom that's not here yet. We're like, I promise it's there, though. And so our citizenship is as a part of God's household, his kingdom, which the Lord's prayer says that we're to celebrate. Yours is the kingdom. It's yours. It's a really good kingdom. Yours is awesome. It's a kingdom. But then he told us to pray, may your kingdom come. It's not here yet. It's not here yet. It's coming. It's not here yet. So I'm a part of something that's already and not yet. It's been inaugurated, but not consummated. It's been engaged, but not yet hitched, right? It's that kind of limbo, right? So that engagement is, OK, OK, OK. That's Christian life. And if you want to know, that's why it's challenging.

4:36 That's why it's complex. That's why there's some confusion to it. That's where we're at. So in the meantime, the best thing we can do is to give our imagination all the tools it needs for us to live like heaven really is real. And all those impressions at a time cause your imagination of this world to be unnecessary because you can just see it right there. But what we have to do is let his word color in our imagination so that we see and feel and are actually inspired to live for what is more real than this world. Because the things of this world are passing away. They are all exciting and bright and smell good, but it's all perishable. The flower of the field is beautiful, but then the wind blows on it, the season changes, it's gone. That's the things of this world. But God's word stands firm forever. So we have to use God's word to inform our imagination, to be reminded of and to care about and to think about and almost fantasize about God's kingdom so that we live more for it now while we're here.

5:43 So in this series, in this season between now and Christmas, what we're trying to do is using the red letters of Jesus, the red words of Jesus, to understand what his kingdom is. And he tells us again and again and again, using the phrase that appears dozens and dozens of times in the gospel, the kingdom of heaven is like. Now he has to use the word like because there's nothing that can properly be a frame of reference for us exactly because we haven't seen it yet. Eye has not seen, ear has not heard, nor has it entered into the heart of a man what God's prepared for those who love him. Imagine a baby in utero, and you're trying to tell them about life on the outside. There are skateboards and churros and bumper cars, and they're like, that sounds scary. You know what I'm saying? They've never seen it.

6:34 They can't comprehend. They can't fathom it. Neither can you. We cannot fathom what it's going to be like to be in God's kingdom, but Jesus, using simile and metaphor and allegory, can help us to get a sense of what it's like. This, he says, is what the kingdom of God is like. Matthew chapter 13, he continues. If you weren't with us last week, he told this story about people who got hired at 6 a.m. and people who got hired at 5 p.m. when quitting time was 6. Some of them worked all day and got paid the exact same as some who worked only an hour. He said, that's what the kingdom of heaven is like. And you're like, oh, it's not fair. And he goes, trust me, you don't want what's fair. You want grace, which is what I want to give you. Amen? That was a good one. All right, so then he continues on, and he's going to tell us why there's evil in the world. Why does God wait to come back when he could come back right now and deal with all the bad and root it all out and deal with it?

7:30 OK, he's going to tell us that. Because if you've not thought that, you're not thinking. Another parable he put forth to them, saying, the kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field, but while men slept, the enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat and went his way. But when the grain had sprouted and produced a crop, then the tares also appeared. So the servants of the owner came and said to him, sir, did you not sow good seed in your field? How then does it have tares? He said to them, an enemy has come and done this. The servant said to him, do you want us then to go and gather them up? But he said, nah, lest while you gather up the tares, you also uproot the wheat with them. Let both grow together until the harvest. And at the time of harvest, I will say to the reapers, first, gather together the tares, bind them in bundles to burn them. Gather the wheat into my barn.

8:31 And then the disciples came to him because they had questions, just like you have questions. Hearing that, they were like, okay, great, awesome. I'm going to need you to explain. And I, for one, am so grateful for their honesty because just what Jesus was hoping for. He told the parables to tease out faith, and some went their way and were like, oh, that's a stupid story, or okay, well, that's great, but what am I supposed to do about that? But what he wanted them to do was to dig deeper. What he wanted them to do was to use faith and to ask and to press in, and that's exactly what he got. In between, he uses some Old Testament prophecies that talk about how there was a hardness of heart of the nation of Israel, how even hearing him, even getting what they wanted. They rejected it. And so they were fulfilling prophecy by not understanding what he was talking about. He came to his own. His own received him not, right? And then look at verse 36. Here's some good news. Jesus sent the multitude away, and he went into the house. Which house is this? The house of Peter. Why did Jesus go in Peter's house? We're told specifically Peter invited him, right? So he would often go there because Peter's like, hey, man, and come to my house, right?

9:40 And then all sorts of awesome stuff would happen in that house, right? One day, Peter's mother-in-law got sick, and Jesus happened to be there, so he was able to heal him. Here's the point of the story. Great things happen when you invite Jesus into your house. Have you invited Jesus into your house? Have you invited Jesus into your life at work? Have you invited Jesus into your marriage? His first miracle was done in a wedding. Why? He invited Jesus into the wedding. I love baby dedication. and it invites Jesus into how you approach raising your child. There's a great power in just the invitation. God, it's been said, waits to be wanted and to be welcomed. Could it be so simple? Could it be that we have not because we ask not? That we're walking around with human wisdom. When he's got divine wisdom, he's just waiting for us to go, hey, God, I'm dumb. You're not.

10:31 Please help. Right? That's the prayer. That's the prayer. I need your help. I need your help. That's me praying every day leading this church for going on 19 years. Lord, I need your help. Would you give us wisdom? God, I don't have what it takes. We don't know what we're doing. God, if you're not coming, we're not going, right? We need God. So they invite Jesus into the house. I love this. Look at this. It's verse 36. They said, explain to us the parable of the terrors of the field. They're like, that one was weird. We need an explanation. He was happy to give it. He answered and said to them, He who sows the good seed is the Son of Man. That's Jesus' favorite nickname for himself. He could have used Son of God. That was true too. But Son of Man shows his relationship to us, that he wants to come near. I'm one of you. He's been through what you're going through, and you don't have to do it alone. You can call on Jesus, the Son of Man. The field is the world.

11:26 Someone say, the field is the world. What's the field? The field is the world. Okay. The good seeds are the sons of the kingdom. This is God's children. If we're in crisis, it's us. But the tares are the sons of the wicked one. The enemy who sowed them is the devil. The harvest is the end of the age. And the reapers are the angels. Therefore, as the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of this age. He's saying this is how the world ends, OK? The Son of Man will send out his angels. They will gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, all those who practice lawlessness, all those basically who do whatever they want to do, not what God has said to do, right?

12:19 To say, who are you to tell me how to live, right? And he will cast them into the furnace of fire. There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth, and the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears to hear, let him hear. And God, I pray we would have ears to hear. You speaking through your word to change our lives. We need you. In Jesus' name, we pray. Amen. I was thinking about the time when I was in high school that I impersonated a police officer and could have gotten in big trouble for it. Let me explain.

13:10 It was a time of stupidity and toilet paper, all right? That was the big news on Friday nights was often toilet paper, right? So you had these girls, you had the guys. They would TP each other's homes, which is against the law. Let's just point that out. That's an act of vandalism and trespassing. All right? So we found out there was this group of girls that were going to have a slumber party. And while they were at their slumber party, they were going to toilet paper a bunch of the houses of guys who were on the soccer team. OK? So it was like, and we found out about it because they were stupid and didn't keep it quiet. Everybody in the school knew this was always going to be a great night. And so someone was like, you know what would be funny is we can kind of figure out which houses they're going to go to, and we can be waiting at one of them and scare them, right? And that was how it started, right?

14:03 It's probably how it should have stopped. But then it was like, we know it would be even funnier than that is if they thought they were getting in trouble. And someone offered the use of a strobe light that was red and blue. I can't remember who. Someone else had a white Chevy Blazer. and someone else said, I've got this crazy bright flashlight, and we could put it on the left side above the side view. And then someone's like, well, I got this walkie-talkie with a speaker. And all the pieces were assembled of our stupidity.

14:36 And we kind of waited at one of the houses, and sure enough, they showed up. And we let them throw their toilet paper over the tree and over the house, and they thought they were so funny. and that's when we just lit them up with these lights. You know, stop right there. We see you. And then they would freeze. You know, they were like deer in headlights. So one of them started crying. You know, it was like, one of them was like, I've never been in trouble before. Like, they were like confessing all the things they've ever done wrong. You know, the time they shoplifted in fourth grade. And then we was like, oh my gosh, we are in charge right now. This is wonderful. It was like, lie down on the ground. Start doing snow angels. They were just complying to everything. You know, then we were just busted up laughing and all came out and they were, you know, so mad and, you know, and we were laughing ourselves silly driving home. And then somebody said, but isn't it illegal what we just did? You know, and it was like, it was like dawned on all of us, like, oh. And so, you know, I did some research and it turns out it's a misdemeanor offense to impersonate a police officer. If you do it a second time, it's actually a felony. All right. So I swore off from that day forward.

15:44 That was my life of crime. That's the whole story. But I think back just how merciful God was that we didn't get. That's grace. We didn't get. And I actually don't think I ever told my parents that story. So if you could keep that just between us, that would be wonderful.

16:05 There weren't pranks like toilet paper in your neighbor's house in Jesus' day, but in an agricultural society, there were acts of vengeance to get, you know, even if there was a vendetta with the farmer next door that apparently was so commonly done that it had to be outlawed in the Roman Empire, right? And maybe disputes over borders or, you know, grazing rights. You know, you could think Catfield-McCoy stuff just breaks out because people are people. But one of the things that Jesus references that tells us something important about his kingdom, and more specifically, good and evil side by side in the space between now and when he comes back at the end of the world, and how we're to understand that, how we're to reconcile that, how we're to deal with that difficulty, and understand how to process that, comes from the illustration involving a man who had sowed good seed in his field.

17:09 and was expecting wheat to be grown that could then participate in the answer to the prayer we pray in the Lord's Prayer. Between now and your kingdom coming, we're going to need some bread, right? If you're not coming back right away, we're going to need to eat something. We're going to need some tortillas, right? So when we pray that prayer, we're praying that someone would be a farmer, right? Do you realize that you are participating in an answer to someone else's prayer, no matter what part of the supply line you're a part of, for the logistics and shipping? And you're praying someone opens up a grocery store and someone drives a long haul truck driver. All of the details involved, someone would actually plant the wheat into the field that could grow. Someone comes in with a combine. Someone has a mill and can grind it. All of that is in there when we're praying, give us this day, God, our daily bread. And so this farmer goes out and on his land, he has good wheat sown. The seeds are there.

18:02 But when things start popping up, which it's not right away, it takes some time. There's always a space between sowing and reaping. His team was disturbed to find out something had been perverted that was causing not wheat, but weeds to show up, not exclusively, but commingled in the crop. And he went, drats, farmer Fred's at it again. He immediately knew. You know, he's like, ah, this feud, you know, with the farmer across the, he had over-sown my field. He had set at nighttime, you know, his team out to sow his, see, it's called Darnell, Darnell. Bearded Darnell, apparently, is what he's referencing here. And it's basically imitation wheat.

18:56 Also, I did a little digging this week into Darnell. If your name is Darnell, I apologize. But it has a nickname. I hesitate to say it on stage as a reverend. I never call myself reverend, and you're not allowed to either. I was listening to one theologian. He said the colloquial name on the street, it rhymes with pastor, okay? But it's an illegitimate son not born in wedlock, okay? So it's not weed. It's pastor wheat. That's what they call it. It's pastor wheat, all right? And this darnel, or bearded darnel specifically, is a kind of rye grass. And it's the only species of the grass family that has poisonous seeds. And if you were to ingest any of this grass, it would lead to nausea, violent vomiting, could lead to convulsions, diarrhea.

19:52 If you eat enough of it, it actually could kill you, OK? So but here's the crazy thing. Bearded darnel, when it first comes out of the seed form, it looks exactly like wheat. Almost indistinguishable. You can't tell the difference. So you'll notice in the parable, Jesus actually says that he didn't notice it until it had sprouted and produced the crop. Then the tares were revealed. See, until the head of the grain started to show up on the good ones, there was no way to know. Because at the first, they looked the same. In color, like literally, you'd be like a botanist and not even know the difference. Until it came time for the wheat to produce their heads. And the Darnells couldn't do that. And that's when the team came to their master. And they said to him, to the landowner, what the heck? Didn't you plant good seeds?

20:44 What did you give us to plant? Why is this happening? And I love that it's like his problem. He's like, you're the ones who did the sowing for me. There's a problem. Problem in your field. Problem in your world. And Jesus says, this is the kingdom. The kingdom of God's a lot like that. And you're like, what do you mean? Well, what I mean is he's telling us about the origin of evil. Really important first heading to jot down, to be aware of. What's the origin of evil? And what Jesus says is the origin is that it did not come from God. He said, I didn't do that. And they came to go, why is there evil in your world? Why is there now? now? Why is there this poisonous thing masquerading as we in your field? Just like we come to God, God, I thought you were good. Why is there evil in your good world? It's this problem we have when we see pain, when there's suffering. We say, God, where did it come from? He goes, I didn't do that.

21:43 I made a good world. Read how many times the word good is used in Genesis 1 and 2. God, make something, it's good. Make something, it's good. Good world, good relationships, good birds, the whole thing's good. The land, the gold of the land was good. People say money's the root of all evil. No, no, no. The love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Before there was sin, there was gold. Before there was sin, that gold was good. It was blessed by God. There was goodness all to this world. What invited the evil in? The answer is the devil. Jesus says, while they slept, the thief showed up. While they slept, the thief showed up. And he's the one who sowed the seeds that could bring about this evil. And then when he explained it, he said that thief is the devil. John 10.10 tells us about the devil.

22:36 The thief does not come except to steal and to kill and to destroy. He says, I, on the other hand, am a good God. I came that they may have life and have it more abundantly. We need to remember, God, whenever we see evil, God did not cause it. That evil did not come from God's hand. I told that young lady on that day, God did not want you to be raped. God did not cause you to be raped. That was not God's idea. God created a world where there was goodness, okay? So when we experience tragedy, when we experience loss, we have to remember, this did not come from God. God created a good world. Where did the sin come from? The sin came from us being willing to choose lawlessness lawlessness in response to the devil who tempts us that he might steal from us and destroy us and murder us ultimately. And that's why he tells lies and warps our thinking and says, this won't happen. You don't have to worry about that. It's not such a big deal. He's sowing the seeds to bring forth not wheat, but weeds that will lead to further death and only further make you sick. Because whenever we choose to sin, listen to me, we always choose to suffer.

23:46 But there's a space between sowing and reaping. And that space between, when it comes to sin, can be a lot of fun. Some preachers, the way they talk about sin, they make it sound like it's no fun. I'm like, you just haven't done it right if you haven't enjoyed it. The Bible says there's pleasure in sin, but for a season. If sin wasn't fun, no one would do it. There's a reason. and it's like the bait that attracts the fish. They're not thinking about the hook. They're not thinking about the frying pan or the filleting knife. But you should when the devil entices you with the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life, or like I like to call them, the ego, the dinero, the libido. When he tries to entice you with sin to come away from God's good plan for this world, what happens is we invite suffering into our life when we disobey God, but the consequences is someone else always gets hurt. You never sit alone. There's always an aftermath. There's always collateral damage. So in the case of a sexual assault, that's somebody dishonoring and disobeying God and choosing to do what they want. And as a result, someone else is getting hurt. So why did that happen? Because God gave us the space to choose. God gave us the space to make our own decision. He didn't make us automatons. He didn't make us robots. In the garden, people say, why was that tree there? If I could just go back and delete that tree, Adam and Eve would still be running around naked having a good time, you know, getting frisky and walking with God and naming stuff. You know what I'm saying? No, no, no, no. They never could have loved him. It wouldn't have been pure. They might as well have had a string on the back that God could have pulled, and they would have said, I love you, God. They had to have the choice to be able to give them the middle finger. They had it just like you do. Okay? Now, we don't like it when other people's sin hurts us, but we need to remember our sin has done the hurting too. Our sin has hurt other people. This good world has been spoiled and broken because while we were sleeping, the enemy

25:57 came in and we chose to listen to him and all of us, like sheep, have gone astray. No one of us have done all good. No one of us have done all righteous. All have fallen short of the glory of God and chosen to sin. And all sin is lawlessness. That's where evil came from. The servants wanted to bring it to the owner. You did this. He goes, no, no, no. I made a good world. And we need to know that about our good God. The origin of evil did not come from him. And interestingly enough, Whenever we argue, and it's worthy of discussion about the merits of God's goodness, when there's evil in the world, and if he has power, when he should use it, right? And a lot of us have a lot of thoughts about that. But it's interesting to think that when we're entering into that arena of thought or dialogue, we are actually making a profound argument for the existence of God, which is so fascinating considering many would say the reason they can't believe in God is the pain. But C.S. Lewis himself at one point, an ardent atheist, why? Well, he admits it's because he wanted to have fun sinning. And he realized if there was a God, he'd have to listen to him. And so he found it much more convenient to just say there is no God than he could do whatever.

27:25 He was being very honest with that. But then he experienced pain and loss and difficulty. And he hated the difficulty, hated the pain, and hated the loss. And that made him angry that the world wasn't just. And then here's what he said next. This is crazy. A big part of his conversion to believing in God, and this is a guy who's a professor at Oxford, OK, was this. He said, my argument against God was that the universe seems so cruel and unjust. But how had I got this idea of just and unjust? A man does not call a line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line. What was I comparing this universe with when I called it unjust? A man feels wet when he falls into water because man is not a water animal. A fish would not feel wet.

28:19 My argument against God collapsed, for the argument depended on saying the world was unjust. He wanted to continue to do what he wanted to do, but also be angry when the world wasn't what he deep down inside knew it should be and was capable of being. That's because on the inside, we know what water is. We're not fish. we have a humankind memory of life before sin spoiled the world. So it's hardwired. It's baked into us. Eternity set into the human heart to know how God made things to be. If there's no God, do you realize the strong eats the weak? We should go, awesome, right? Someone takes and steals. And if there's no God, we should be like, well, that's just how it is. Sucks to be you. Too bad I didn't think of that first. Deep down, our craving of how things should be indicates it's baked into us what the straight line is.

29:18 And we're reacting against the crookedness of it. So to walk away because life's not fair, to walk away from God because it's not how it should be, is actually you fighting against evidence that's his way of saying, I did make this good world. And I have a plan to do something about it. So that's the origin of evil. Well, we're going to let you get back to this incredible message from God's word. But first of all, we wanted to ask you to prayerfully consider how you could be a part of this year-end offering and a part of this vision series, This is the Kingdom. Yeah, that's right. For everybody who gives and prays and believes in and supports this ministry, we're endlessly grateful to partner with you in this way. We've sent out to everyone who we have an address for these little kits that will help you get inspired and be praying about your part you can play, as well as these reminder cards, these declaration cards with little stand just to have these around the house, reminders of the kingdom of God, what it's like, what it's about. And I love just the chance for us to see these on our desks or the counter and just be reminded.

30:24 But if you didn't get one for whatever reason, maybe you moved and we don't have your address or you haven't begun the journey of support through what you're receiving from this ministry, you can request one at the website address on the screen. And then anytime between now and the end of the year, you can do what we are going to do, what everyone who's a part of the church is praying about. And that is the part that you can play in expanding the reach of what God's doing here at Fresh Life through this year-end offering. We're thankful that you would take the time to hear us out, to be praying about that. Make sure we can send this to you. And we're just excited to see what God's going to do.

31:15 All right. Well, let's get back into this teaching from God. Enjoy. We also need to talk about what Jesus moves to next. God's patience with evil. because really that's where we have the hard time with it, is that God seems to be far too patient with evil when he watches it happen and does nothing seemingly about it. Why are you letting that continue? Why don't you just swoop down in on your lightning bolt, you know, and zap them? That's what we're saying. And you know what's funny? Whenever we say that, it's never about us. That's the weird part. I want God to do with all the awful things that you've done. I want God to deal with all the awful things in other people. And God would say, what about yours? You know, if I come down to deal with it, like I'm going to, when the Son of Man comes with the angels and the power of God's glory, when I come down to deal with it, that would be you too?

32:15 it's like when the Pharisees used to always say to Jesus when he would hang out with a prostitute or hang out with a tax collector they'd be like why do you go to eat with sinners right and Jesus said I'm a doctor doctor doctors can imagine like if you went to your doctor's and you're like oh these people here in the waiting room are sick what's wrong with you he'd be like uh well what brings you here oh well so sick's always other people yeah sick's always someone else If I was Jesus, then it's good I'm not. When they said that, why do you always eat with sinners? I would have said, because I don't want to have to eat all my meals alone. You know, like, who do you think I could eat with? And of course, when they said that, they weren't including themselves in the sinner's category. But it's never, listen, this is the kingdom. It's never sinners like them.

33:10 It's always sinners like me. Sinners like us. Okay? So God's patience with evil, we should be grateful for. Or we would not have had the capacity to repent and to receive grace and to receive forgiveness. God was, we were glad that he was merciful and held back the elevator doors so we could get in. But it's a funny thing once you're in that elevator, you're like, shut, shut, shut, shut, shut. If you see someone coming, you're like, hope, hope, hope, hope, hope, hope, right? We treat God's kingdom like it's our own personal elevator. And once we've gotten in, the doors can shut. And now every other floor it stops on is a nuisance to us getting to where we want to go. But God's patient and wants there to be more people coming in. God wants more. There's room for, come on, we got to shove aside. We got to remember, we were the distraction for someone else. And we want to now say, hey, come on in. Come on in.

34:01 Come on in. Come on in. Hey, come on in. Come on in. Hey, we didn't deserve to get here. Hey, hey, we didn't deserve it either. Come on in. That's God's patience with evil. 2 Peter 3, 9, the Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some count slackness. But he's longsuffering toward us. Look at him, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. Why doesn't God just come right now? Will you now restore the kingdom? Will you now root out the evil? Will you now deal with it? Because he knows there's still some more people he wants to reach. And the gospel of the kingdom's got to be preached to the ends of the earth. And then, and not sooner than that, will the end come. And if we get that, if we're a part of that program, our heart beats for that to be extended, while, of course, simultaneously grieving for the atrocities and the evil that are still in his kingdom, side by side with all the good.

35:00 And also think about this. And I watched. I watched after the question was asked. And I prayerfully said the best thing I could, which for me, in the moment when the question was asked, was God, did God allow me to get raped? I had to sidestep that for a moment and just say, I can tell you that when my daughter died, I know it wasn't God's will for death.

35:27 God didn't want that. That's why he told Adam and Eve never to take from the tree in the first place. He didn't want death to come into his good world. And I also know he could have stopped it. Because I know God can, and sometimes does, choose to act miraculously in a moment. But I know where the death came from. I know where the sin came from. and then I watched something as my sister in Christ with the communion elements in her hand chose worship and chose to take communion and worship God with tears coming down her face chose to worship Him anyway I was raped this was evil, this was hard and then I watched her worship that's the good that gets to grow in the kingdom side by side with the bad. And had he rooted on all the bad, there couldn't be worship like that.

36:26 I was in awe watching someone who had every right to be bitter and angry and mad say, I choose to worship you. If he took all the bad out right now, there wouldn't be the chance for us to go, God, I'm side by side with evil. I'm riding shotgun with some unpleasant things. but I'm keeping my eyes on you. I'm going to worship you. If he dealt with all those things that you want him to deal with, there wouldn't be that space for that defiant worship to grow. To say, God, I don't know why you allowed it. I don't understand what's going on. It doesn't even seem like you're hearing my prayer anymore. But I choose you. I worship you. And until I find out you're going to be patient, and I'm going to be patient, I'm going to, that, That gets ended the moment our faith gets turned to sight.

37:21 Once you see him in heaven, once you see him in glory, he won't take that. There won't be that beauty. Do you realize the space between the already but not yet, the kingdom engaged but not consummated in that way, is the only time we're ever going to get to be here right now engaged to Jesus, betrothed to Christ, in the mix of it, in the filth of it, in the mire of it, right there, shoulder to shoulder with pain, but choosing to raise our hands up and worship him. and honor you. You'll never get this chance again, but here it is now, the opportunity to grow with all the evil roots of the weeds all wrapped around you, but you still saying, though you slay me, I'm going to honor you. I don't know where you were when my daughter died. I don't know why you chose to raise Jairus's daughter back to life, but not mine, but I love you, Lord. I don't need to understand you. I don't need you to be my puppet. I don't need you to do what I want. I just am going to worship you because I'm grateful to have a God.

38:14 I'm grateful to have a Savior. And God creates these opportunities. I don't know why or how he chooses to trust us with our trials, but you've been trusted with your trial. And this is the kingdom, a kingdom with weeds wrapped around you that could make you feel like you're going to be strangled. But with your last little gasp of a breath you got, you choose to say, Jesus, Jesus, and lift up praise and lift up beauty. And then you watch God redemptively do what I told my sister. I said, but I know for a fact, even though God didn't want that to happen, he's got a plan. And if he allows what we wish he wouldn't, it's because he has a plan to use it. Like Goliath's sword that cut Goliath's own head off. And I just pray that you would see in your situation, whatever the devil wanted to do, God wants to rain it back down on the devil's head to where he wishes he was never dumb enough to ask for that to come your way.

39:14 Oh, I wish I had a church that believed that God's still cutting the head off some giants today. And he'll use their own sword to do it. Feel the Holy Spirit on that for somebody today to help you see and understand. If God allowed it, he's going to use it. If God allowed it, he's going to use it. He's going to convert it. He's going to turn that pain into power.

39:37 How about the end of evil? Can we talk about that for a second? Because that's pretty good. He's like, hey, don't you worry. Harvest time's coming. And he's going to trample out the vintage where the grapes have rather stored. He's going to unloose that mighty, fierce, terrible swift sword. Oh, his truth is going to come marching on. Oh, glory, glory, hallelujah. The end of the age is coming, and he's going to give the word to his reapers, the angels, and they will go through all of humankind, and they will sort into two piles. My kids and I once got separated. Lennox and Clover got on one escalator going down, I got on the other, and we just assumed they were both going to the same level. They were not. I stopped at one level. They went on to God knows where. And it took us some time to find each other because those two escalators were going to two very different places. And such is this life because the tares, they all get pulled out.

40:32 The tares are bundled and put in a fire. And the wheat gets to go in the barn. In my Father's house, Jesus said, are many mansions. I go to prepare a place for you. So the everlasting life is what's coming for the sons and daughters of the kingdom. But everlasting condemnation and shame and death and fire, where their worm does not wither, where the fire does not fade, where there's weeping and gnashing of teeth, this is what is coming for those who do not choose Jesus, who choose to persist in, I can do what I want to do. This is the end of evil that has God waiting, that has God holding back, because he does not delight in the death of the wicked. and the only, listen to me, the only ones of us that are going into the barn are those who know the dirty little secret of every son or daughter of the kingdom.

41:39 We started out as weeds. We were weeds once too. We were by nature children of wrath. We fell short of the glory of God. We were weeds once too. The only reason we're going into the mansions, the only reason we're going into the barn, hello, is because Jesus went into the fire. Jesus chose the fire. And I haven't been able to stop thinking about the question. Did God allow it? Could God have stopped it? And in our hands was the answer. The cup. The bread.

42:23 I just kept going, oh, you could have stopped it. You could have stopped it. You could have stopped it. What? You could have stopped it. What? You could have stopped it. What? I could say one word to my father, and he would send 12 legions of angels. He could have stopped it, but he didn't. so he could take what hard things have been put into your hands and use them for his glory. And when we remember, I was a weed. I've been turned into a seed. I've been made a son. I've been made a daughter by the Son of Man who went into the flame, who endured the cross, who despised its shame, who had weeping and gnashing of teeth, who cried out, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me, who felt like he had been ignored by God, though he should have been treated as though he never did anything wrong because he never had.

43:16 He chose the cross so we could have a life in his home. And when we remember that, when we think about the end, it's going to motivate us for the final category we close here, our role as long as evil remains. Our role. What is our role? What is our job? If we are 5 p.m. hires, and we're just, we can't even believe we're getting paid the same. We're going in the Father's house. And we know that there's technically nobody who's a 6 a.m. hire. We're all just saved by grace. If we remember that rightly, our role, as long as evil remains, is going to be to do what? To reproduce and to help some more weeds convert to wheat. How? Well, technically, it's impossible. You can't, but God can because he does the impossible. It was impossible for us to get saved.

44:11 He did that. So now we trust him by doing what a wheat does. It waits, it grows. And somehow the mechanism for reproduction is right there because God made everything in his beautiful world to reproduce after its kind. So you will duplicate what you are. So having life in you, there's the power to reproduce already entrusted to you. And we can see many sons and daughters brought to glory. if we remember I was a weed once. To the degree that you get so used to being saved that you forget that, you will be of little or no value in reproducing more of you. Because you'll think it's all about you.

44:58 It's interesting, the heavier laid in a stalk of wheat gets, the lower it boughs. because where there's actually fruit, there's humility. So the mark of really knowing, I don't deserve this. I was a weed. I was brought into the kingdom because Jesus went into the fire and he's going to work all things together for my good, for his glory. I can just trust him. That's going to cause you to be more humble. And the more humble you are, the more grace God can give you because he gives grace to the humble, but he humbles the proud. So we're not standing tall. That's what Darnell does because it doesn't have anything. When we're truly laden down with reproducing fruit and wheat and the actual head of grain, there's going to be a humility and a gravitas and a desire for others to know.

45:47 And such were some of you. That's what Paul said to the church of Corinth. Because they all had their list of people in their mind that deserved God less than they did. And so he rattles off this list. This is pretty great. He says, you guys know that the unrighteous are not going to inherit the kingdom of God. Do not be deceived. Now, the fornicators, just wince on the inside when he gets to your sin. Now, the fornicators, idolaters, that's all of us, adulterers, homosexuals, sodomites, thieves, covetous, drunkards, revilers, nor extortioners, will inherit the kingdom of God. And then we're all uncomfortable because we're like, oh, well, that's pretty well got all of us there. And then he says, and such, look at this, were some of you. You're not a weed anymore. Birth and death are citizenship-altering events.

46:41 That's not who you are. It might be what you were, but that's not who you are. Because you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God. And so what should your obsession now be? The field is the world. the field is the world. If you're not thinking, this is too good to keep to myself, it's got to go to the ends of the world. You're not thinking like Jesus, who wants the whole world to become a part of his kingdom. Guys, our job is not to be weed whackers, but world reachers.

47:22 For so long, the church has just been obsessed with whacking weeds. Our job is to sow seeds and reach the world. He said the field is the world. God wants the whole world to come to know him. And we get to be a part of it every time we gather generously in Jesus' name, allowing this to happen. Because you hear me gather and I go, hey, everyone say hi to people in Paulson and White Vision Billings, as far as I can remember them, right? Deer Lodge and so like. And you hear me say it to our church campus every week. But then you also hear me go like, hey, and everyone joining online, right? Podcast Live Church. So this week, just as an experiment, I said, hey, could you just give me a list of not outreach partners we touch with, right? But just our Fresh Life digital missions as these messages go out each week on our channels. And I said, could you just tell me a list of the countries we get to touch? Here's the list.

48:17 This is who we're preaching to right now, Fresh Life. We are reaching the world. The field is the world. And God wants the gospel to go to Slovakia and Saudi Arabia and South Africa and Egypt and El Salvador and Germany. And we're reaching it right now. Come on, we're doing it right now. We're sowing seeds to other weeds, saying there's room in the barn. You don't need to go to the fire. Jesus did. I don't care what you've done or where you've been. He'll save you. He'll give you grace. We'll scoot over. There's room in the elevator for you. And he said the gospel goes to the world. then the end comes and we get to participate in what he's doing. So God, help us to never get used to it. I close with this. It was a friend's birthday, and he booked a fishing charter, deep sea fishing charter. He said, will you come? Fish would be in for my birthday. I said, for sure. And I was amazed.

49:09 The whole thing was a great experience. I caught a shark. I'll tell you about that sometime. but the experience that most marked me was the captain his name was Jody Jody was so passionate about fishing he kept muttering to himself and I was close enough to hear what he was saying and he would say things like this like when when a big fish was about to be caught or missed he would go calm down Jody it's just a fish calm down calm down Jody it's just fish and then he would be like, but it's a really good one. I haven't seen one of those in years. And then we'd get a fish on, and he would go, wahoo! Like, with a great, like, he was like a miner catching gold from the mines. And calm down, Jody. Calm down. And I said, Jody, how long have you been a captain? He said, just 40 years.

50:02 Calm down, Levi. It's just fish. I said, God, could you help me to be as passionate about souls as Jody is about catching fish? God, could you help us as a ministry care as much about soul? So Lord, would you do it? Would you do it? would you do it here now? As we're praying with heads bowed and eyes closed, if you're here and you've not trusted Jesus for salvation, I have told you the bad news of where you're headed. Do nothing. The escalator will take you to flames. Do nothing. The last stop is wrath. But that's not what God wants for you. Hell was not made for man. It was made for the devil and his angels. You can choose to worship. You can choose to put your faith in Jesus.

50:56 You can become a wheat today in his name. If that's you I'm describing, and you say, I want to come to know Jesus, I want to walk with him, follow him, I want him to do the supernatural work of salvation in my life today. I'm going to pray a prayer. I want you to pray it with me. I'm going to ask the church family to pray it with us. And no matter where you are in the world, God will save you here and now. Say this. Say, dear God, I know I'm a sinner, and I can't fix myself. please come into my heart make it your home thank you for new life I give you mine