(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

Man, Luke chapter 11 beginning in verse number 1, the Bible reads, And it came to pass that as he was praying in a certain place, when he ceased, one of his disciples said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples. So just from this one verse, we can see the importance of prayer, because it's something that Jesus himself did. John did it. John taught it to his disciples. Jesus is teaching it to his disciples. So it's something that all believers everywhere are to participate in. The Bible commands us to pray without ceasing. Now first of all, you say, you know, why is Jesus praying? He's God in the flesh. But Jesus, when he prayed, was not going through the motions, or going through an exercise, nor are we going through the motions, or going through an exercise when we pray, but rather this is the Son praying to the Father, because they're two different persons. Amen? Right? The Trinity. So this is two different persons. That's why Jesus prays in the Garden of Gethsemane and says, Not my will be done, but thy will be done. Right? Two different wills. Why? Because Jesus is the Son of God, because the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost all compose God. God is made up of, and has always been made up of, and always will be made up of, these three. The Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. And so this is the Son praying to the Father in heaven. And it's definitely not an exercise when there's sweat coming off him like drops of blood as he pleads with the Father. If it be possible, let this cup pass from me. He's not just doing that to give an example. He clearly feels it very deeply, and he's actually very sincere in his conversations with the Father, and when the Bible talks about the Father loving the Son, and the Son loving the Father, it's actually a real relationship there. Okay, so it says in verse 2, And he said unto them, When ye pray, say, Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. And he goes into what we know as the Lord's Prayer. Hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth. Give us day by day our daily bread, and forgive us our sins, for we also forgive everyone that's indebted to us, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. And then he moves on and begins to talk about the parable of the three loaves. But first of all, let me say this. This prayer is not meant to be chanted. Now if you would, keep your finger there and flip over to Matthew 6, because a lot of people have misinterpreted when Jesus says, When you pray, say, and they think they're supposed to say those exact words, and chant them over and over again, and repeat that over and over again. Now the Roman Catholic Church will give this as an assignment. If you've committed sin, then you go to the priest and confess. He'll say, You need to do five Our Fathers. And he's saying to chant this five. Hey, ten Hail Marys and ten Our Fathers. And that's what they do when they pray through the rosary. They go through this, they go through the Hail Mary, and they go back and forth, and they count it off on beads. That is what the Bible condemns as a vain repetition. Go if you would to Matthew chapter 6. It says in verse number 7, But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions as the heathen do, for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking. So right there, that goes to show us that to be heard, you don't have to pray in huge quantities. You don't have to say things over and over again. You don't have to go on and on for hours. The Bible says you're not going to be heard because you said a lot. That's what the heathen thinks. Be not ye therefore like unto them, for your Father knoweth what things you have need of before you ask him. After this manner therefore pray ye. So he's saying pray in this way. This is a pattern prayer. This is a sample prayer to pray like this. And he gives the same prayer, Our Father which art in heaven hallowed be thy name. And so again this is not to be a chant, but it's rather a pattern. So go back to Luke chapter 11 and we'll go through this. First of all it says, Our Father which art in heaven hallowed be thy name. The first thing that we see is that when we pray we should be very respectful to God. We should give him his proper respect. Hallowed be thy name speaks to the fact that we should give God the glory, praise, reverence, honor that he deserves. So we say, Our Father which art in heaven hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, as in heaven so in earth. So when we pray we should pray for God's will to be done. We don't always know what the best outcome is in any given situation. The Bible says in Romans 8 that we know not how to pray as we ought. And therefore the Spirit maketh intercession for us with groanings that cannot be uttered. I can't even count how many times I've gone to the Lord in prayer and I just didn't even know what to say. I knew I needed to pray about a certain situation, but the situation seemed so messed up or complicated I didn't really understand what was needed to fix it. And I just pray, God let your will be done. But whenever we pray we should always keep God's will in mind and try to pray according to his will. Because the Bible says that if we ask anything according to his will he heareth us. And if we know that he hear us whatsoever we ask we know that we have the petitions that we desired of him. So if we pray according to God's will we're guaranteed to get our prayers answered. So we want to try to get our prayers in tune with the types of things that God wants and what we believe to be his will. And also the Holy Spirit will make intercessions for us with the things that we forget to say or the things that we don't understand to say. So he's our prayer partner that will help us get the right prayers across to the Father in heaven. So we should pray that God's will be done. Thy will be done as in heaven so in earth. Give us day by day our daily bread. Now this is most notably referring to our physical food. We should pray that God will provide our physical needs. Now notice he didn't say give us our daily filet mignon or our daily surf and turf or our daily caviar. Obviously we can't expect to always wine and dine in the lap of luxury. But God does promise to meet our needs and he'll give us the food that we need to sustain us, bread and water. And whatever he gives us above that is a bonus, is a blessing. And he does bless us with a lot of good food in this country. So give us day by day our daily bread. We could also pray for the bread of God's word because man does not live by bread alone but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. And so we could pray open now mine eyes that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law. We could pray for God to feed us physically and from his word. The Bible says forgive us our sins for we also forgive everyone that is indebted to us. Now in Matthew chapter 6 he goes into this in a little more detail. He says forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. But then a few verses later he says for if you forgive men their trespasses your heavenly father will also forgive you. But if you forgive not men their trespasses neither will your father forgive your trespasses. Now that's a pretty important thing to keep in mind. When it comes to forgiving other people is that however you forgive other people that's how God's going to forgive you. So be careful because with what measure you meet it shall be measured to you again. So when people do you wrong you better be quick to forgive them. You better be quick to let things go. You better be quick to turn the other cheek and to let things roll off of you. Don't be a person who's bitter and holds a grudge because if you do just expect God to chasten you fully every time you make a mistake. Now I don't know about you but I want God to look the other way on some of my mistakes. I don't want God to cloud up and rain on me every little thing that I do wrong. Okay but if I'm the type of person who clouds up and rains on the people around me for every little thing that they do wrong that's exactly how God's going to treat me. So if every time somebody makes the slightest mistake I jump down their throat I get mad a week later I'm still thinking about it I'm still talking about it three weeks later I'm still mad then that means that when I sin God is still going to be mad three weeks later God is going to jump down my throat at the little I'd rather that he gives me more grace so then I'd better be quick to give other people around me grace. So if you're great at forgiving people then God's going to be lenient with you and we all make mistakes we all sin we all do wrong things and so we need that grace because if God were just strict with us to the point where every single time we do something wrong he just brings down his scourge on us boy we're in trouble big trouble. Now this is exactly how it works in a family I mean think about it if we have children that are just exacting every error from their younger children how do you think that we as parents are going to discipline that child? We're going to come down on them and you know we deal with this in real life people because we have nine children number 10 is on the way so we've seen this play out many times and you know sometimes an older sibling just wants to hold the younger sibling to account for every little thing that they do wrong and come run and tattle on them and tell on them and get them busted but you know when we see that happening we don't like that as parents. We like it when they are kind to each other and forgiving of each other and when they let things go not when they just come running to us for every little infraction of he did this she did that you know and there's a thing it bothers us it irritates us and that child who comes to us and wants to take their sibling to task for every little thing guess what we're ready to just find an excuse to punish them to show them and often we'll say to them you know well I can either spank both of you or neither and usually they walk away saying do neither because you know if you want us to be that strict with them well here's what you did wrong okay so shall I discipline you both but this is exactly how it is for us even as adults even as God's children that if we are not gracious and forgiving and long-suffering then God's not going to be gracious forgiving and long-suffering with us because he can either punish us at the drop of a hat or he can let things go now how many examples are there in the Bible of God letting things go a lot of examples right I mean how many times did he say well you know in the days of this king they worshipped in the high places but nevertheless his heart was perfect before the Lord is God well they made this mistake they did this wrong they didn't purify themselves the right way they you know but the Lord was gracious to them you know God says nevertheless their heart was I mean there were a lot of people in the Bible that got away with a lot of things why? because they had a godly forgiving heart toward others and so God's going to treat them more leniently but if you want to be really strict with everybody around you and especially unforgiving because the main thing here is forgiving if you forgive not men their trespasses against you your heavenly father is not going to forgive your trespasses either so if you're still holding a grudge about something from a week ago or two days it's time to just let it go not be bitter in your heart against your brothers and sisters in Christ now obviously this has nothing to do with heaven and hell you see my children will always be my children no matter what they say or do but there's still a big difference between me forgiving them their trespasses and me coming down on them and punishing them to the full extent of what they've done every single time they do it so if you would back there in Luke chapter 11 it says we forgive everyone that's indebted to us and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil so we should pray to God that we would not be led into temptation that we would not be put in situations where our flesh will cause us to sin now he goes on to give this story he said unto them which of you shall have a friend and shall go into him at midnight and say unto him friend lend me three loaves now the reason the friend is capitalized some people have made a big deal about this friend being capitalized here the reason that the word friend is capitalized here is because this is the beginning of a quotation the Bible does not use quotation marks in the King James Bible no quotation marks so every quotation is marked by capitalizing the first letter so it says that the friend will say unto him here's the quote of what he says friend lend me three loaves for a friend of mine in his journey has come to me and I have nothing to set before him and he from within shall answer and say trouble me not the door is now shut and my children are with me in bed I cannot rise and give thee I say unto you though he will not rise and give him because he's his friend yet because of his importunity he will rise and give him as many as he needed and so this is a parable about prayer and what he's saying is that if you go to your friend's house at midnight and start banging on his door I need to borrow three loaves of bread your friend's not going to like that he's going to say hey the door's shut buddy my children are now in bed with me I cannot arise and give thee leave me alone what are you doing here at this hour but here's what he's saying if you kept bugging that friend and just kept not look I need three loaves you know he's not going to do it because he's your friend but he might just to shut you up right just here take it get out of here leave us alone right isn't that what it's saying so what the bible is saying is that if we go to the lord and ask him and continually ask him he will answer us because of our importunity because of just coming back and he gives another story where there's the woman and the unjust judge so there's a crooked judge he does not judge righteously and this woman needs justice and she goes to the crooked judge and she asks him for justice and he just ignores her he ignores her he won't give her her day in court he just keeps throwing out the case and throwing out the motion he won't even rule on it but then the unjust crooked judge finally says you know what I don't fear God and I don't fear man but I'm just sick of this woman bugging me so I'm just going to do what she wants and God's saying look if that's what the unjust judge did how much more is God going to avenge his elect which cry unto him day and night so I mean it you're saved you're his child and he's not a crook he's not an unjust judge don't you think he's even more likely to answer you than that judge was what's the bible saying the bible is saying that God wants to answer your prayer he wants to he's ready to answer your prayer he wants you to ask and that's why the bible says in jade 4 you have not because you ask not if you ask you shall receive so prayer actually works prayer actually changes things prayer is not just an exercise or just a going through the motions but it's really a way to get God to intercede on your behalf and sometimes we need to ask for things multiple times not chanting not a vain repetition but just continually going to the Lord and bringing those needs before him until we get an answer that's what the bible teaches now I remember I worked at round table pizza when I was a teenager and I still love round table pizza every time I'm in California I go there we don't have one here but there was this guy and he had brain damage he had tons of major seizures and so he was very slow had brain damage he was a really nice guy but he just had issues and this guy wanted a job at round table and he came in and applied and the assistant manager was there and he said told the guy no sent him away and said I'm not going to hire this bleeping retard you know he's just blankety blank idiot you know because the guy was a big jerk this assistant manager at round table the guy just kept coming back every day trying to get hired and the assistant manager is treating him bad rude telling him no well the the main manager was a really nice guy and so he ended up coming in on a day where the main manager was there and I mean he'd been they said this guy's been coming in he's been in 15 times so they're just like just give him a job I mean he keeps coming just give it to him just give him like you know the something mundane have him do something easy just give him a three hour shift give him 12 hours a week or whatever and so they eventually hired him and he worked there for years I worked there side by side with him and I mean this guy just the persistence paid off and I mean other people they throw in the towel like they oh I can't get a job I I don't know what to do I mean even this guy got a job and this guy did not have the skills to pay the bills but yet he was hired because of what his importunity so sometimes we have to be persistent and keep trying and keep asking God so the bible says in verse number nine and I say unto you ask and it shall be given you seek and ye shall find knock and it shall be open unto you and it's pretty easy to remember that verse because ask seek and knock actually spells the word ask right ask starts with an a seek knock a-s-k ask and it shall be given you and it says in verse 10 for everyone that asketh receiveth and he that seeketh findeth and to him that knocketh it shall be open now I think this is a great verse also to apply to salvation because I believe that what this verse teaches also carries over to the idea of salvation that people who are really seeking after God they're going to find him the bible says in the old testament they that seek me early shall find me and the bible says seek the Lord while he may be found and so those who ask and seek and knock at that door it's going to be open to them and if there really is some sincere person out there who wants to know the Lord who wants to know the gospel who wants to be saved who asks God to show them the truth he will answer them he will show them they they can find the Lord if happily they would feel after him if they seek him they will find him and then also to us as Christians if we ask we shall receive if we pray we will receive blessings from God if we don't pray we will have not because we asked not and we shouldn't just get this fatalistic attitude that for example the Calvinists have just that everything's foreordained everything's predestined and that nothing can change I don't believe that for one second we have free will and every day we make decisions and when we don't pray we miss out on blessings when we do pray God's blessings are available to us and it matters whether or not we pray he said if a son verse 11 shall ask bread of any of you that is a father will he give him a stone or if you ask a fish will he for a fish give him a serpent or if he shall ask an egg will he offer him a scorpion if he then being evil know how to give good gifts unto your children how much more shall your heavenly father give the holy spirit to them that ask him now in Matthew this scripture states in Matthew chapter 7 it says that your heavenly father will give good things to them that ask him here he says that he will specifically give the holy spirit to them that ask him and again you could apply this two different ways obviously the person who calls out to the Lord for salvation the Bible says whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved it says of course how then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed so obviously you have to believe first but if you believe on him and call upon him no matter who you are you shall be saved the Bible says that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus and shall believe in thine heart that God has raised him from the dead thou shalt be saved for with the heart man believeth unto righteousness and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation so in that sense he will give the holy spirit to them that ask him if we ask for salvation in faith in Christ we shall receive it but not only that this is specifically though in context saying if you then being evil know how to give good gifts unto your children so this is even God's children praying to him for the holy spirit now you say well why would the child of God need to pray for the holy spirit we already have the holy spirit right i mean if Christ is in you the hope of glory and the Bible teaches that if any man have not the spirit of Christ he's none of his so the holy spirit indwells every single believer if you are saved the holy ghost is in you the Bible teaches you are permanently indwelled but that's not all there is to the holy spirit because the holy spirit's ministry goes beyond just the indwelling of the believer for example in the old testament believers were not indwelled by the holy spirit permanently they did not have that indwelling of the spirit that's why in john chapter 7 it says this spake he of the holy ghost he said the holy ghost was not yet given because that Jesus was not yet glorified after Jesus rose from the dead he breathed on them and said receive ye the holy ghost so the indwelling of the holy spirit did not begin until the new testament but in the old testament you still have the holy spirit coming upon them right prophets and warriors all throughout the old testament over and over again the spirit of lord came upon him and he did x y and z well we still have that same phenomenon in the new testament so the old testament spirit of lord upon you was not replaced by the indwelling of the holy spirit but it was an add-on so now in the new testament we have both the permanent and dwelling of the holy spirit which guides us into all truth the comforter the holy ghost from heaven that will lead us into all truth but then we also have still the old testament phenomenon of the holy ghost coming upon us and we see that throughout the book of acts where the holy spirit comes upon them in mighty power keep your finger here in luke 11 and go to acts chapter 4 acts chapter number 4 in acts chapter number 4 we have an example of praying and the holy ghost being poured out upon them look at acts chapter 4 not only that but the bible admonishes christians to be not drunk with wine were in his excess but to be filled with the spirit now if you have to be commanded to do it it's not automatic now the indwelling of the spirit is automatic upon salvation we're sealed by the holy ghost under the day of redemption he will never leave us nor forsake us but the power of the spirit of god upon us is something that is temporary that's why david said take not thy holy spirit from me why because when saul sinned the holy ghost was removed from king saul and an evil spirit from the lord troubled him and then the holy ghost rested upon david from that day forward david didn't want to lose that anointing of the holy spirit that outward manifestation look at acts chapter 4 great verse verse 31 a great verse to memorize and when they had prayed the place was shaken where they were assembled together and they were all filled with the holy ghost and they spake the word of god with boldness now what's interesting is that these are the exact same people who were filled with the holy ghost in acts chapter 2 but notice even though they were filled in acts chapter 2 they needed to pray again in acts chapter 4 and be filled with the holy spirit once again in chapter 4 and what was the outward manifestation of being filled with the holy ghost did they roll in the aisles and bark like a dog and laugh hysterically and and and blabber and spit no the bible says that they spake the word of god with boldness so a great evidence of the fullness of the holy ghost is speaking the word of god with boldness you know when you see a preacher get up and preach the word of god boldly that's a manifestation of the fullness of the holy ghost when you see someone out soul winning and just boldly preaching the gospel and i look i've seen some people that are not likely candidates for being a good soul winner people that are shy people that are really quiet but then when they get out soul and they do great why because of the fullness of the holy spirit they can preach with power they can preach with authority they can speak the gospel with boldness why because of the holy spirit in their life and so when the bible talks about giving the holy ghost to them that ask him you know we should pray that god would give us that boldness right i mean paul gave it as a prayer request in ephesians chapter 6 pray for me that utterance may be given unto me that i may open my mouth boldly to make known the mystery of the gospel paul wanted them to pray that he would have boldness we should pray for boldness we should pray for the power of the holy ghost to come upon us we should pray that we would be filled with the holy spirit and not to just be content with the the well i've got the permanent indwelling well i want the fullness i want the holy ghost power resting upon me and it's not a one-time prayer it's a prayer that's prayed over and over again and he will give the holy ghost to them that ask him why because just as we give our children the things that they ask us for now if our children ask for bread we're not going to give them a a stone if they ask for a fish we're not going to give them a serpent if they ask an egg we're not going to give them a scorpion but what if they come and ask us for candy what if they come and ask us for dangerous weapons when they're small children what if they come and ask us for things that are just ridiculous superfluous unnecessary expensive dangerous harmful unhealthy are we gonna give all that to them well look the heavenly father's the same way so if i was saying ask and ye shall receive that means if my son comes to me and says dad i'm hungry i'm ready to provide him with nutritious food bread a fish an egg and by the way give eggs a break all right because eggs are good for you as evidenced by this parable and by the way the bible is not into veganism the bible doesn't even teach vegetarianism and people and look all all the comments i get on this the youtube comments from all the vegetarians and vegans look if you think that the bible promotes vegetarianism of any kind you are severely lacking in biblical understanding now look if someone wants to be a vegetarian just because they want to be a vegetarian for whatever the reasons that they think it's good for them or whatever if it's a health thing or you know some people might have special uh health situations where they need that you know that kind of a diet or whatever you know i'm not look i'm not gonna judge you and i'm not worried about it and look just let me get this straight if i go out to eat with people that are vegetarian i don't try to trick them into eating animal products i help them order right paul remember paul's been with me when we were in the presence of a vegetarian and what i do i said here let me help you i go here all the time i will order you something that's vegetarian i know how to order here i help people out with that i don't jump down their throat i'm not look i'm gonna preach about it because this this pulpit right here is where i get up and preach the whole bible that's where i preach everything in the bible but i'm not gonna go to people and badger them and neither should you don't pick on people because they eat a weird diet okay or a vegetarian diet or a vegan diet don't pick on them be nice to people okay amen be nice if somebody says hey i'm gonna order vegetarian sure let me help you you don't have to be a jerk about it okay but but when i'm preaching i want to make things clear because if i don't make things clear from the pulpit if i'm at all unclear people don't always get the message one thing i've learned you know after preaching for 12 years is you have to make things really clear or the message doesn't get across to most people because people are only picking up like sometimes half or three-quarters of what i'm putting down so i got to make things clear so i'm going to get up here and be super clear about this but in our personal lives we need to be kind unto the the vegetarians and the vegans out there although they are misguided and i'm not going to get up and lie to you and say that i don't believe that they're misguided because i believe they are misguided but look if somebody wants to be vegetarian or vegan for whatever reason okay great but if you're gonna say it's because god wants us to that's a doctrine of devils that's right because the bible says that a doctrine of devils is commanding to abstain from meats so we need to be careful of that so look so if a vegetarian starts commanding me to abstain from meats that's why i'm going to say hey get thee behind me satan now if a vegetarian says hey i'm gonna abstain from meat okay you're welcome to abstain from me but when they start imposing that on us saying hey this is what god tells us to do this is what god wants us to do that you need to do it too you know what they're preaching false doctrine i mean that's that's a doctrine of devils now let me just put this thing to bed once and for all it was impossible to be a vegetarian in the old testament and be right with god could not do it impossible you cannot obey the commandments of god in the old testament and be a vegetarian how because you must eat the passover and the passover is not a tofu passover it was not a soybean passover it was not uh you know some kind of a veggie burger passover the passover was meat and you had to eat it in fact aaron got chewed out by moses why didn't you eat this meat and aaron said whoa i couldn't eat it because i was unclean and i did the right thing by night he's like okay but when you're cleaned up you better eat it buddy look priests part of their job was to eat meat every day that's their job to eat meat to eat meat to eat meat daily every day but even just joe israelite or even joe ethiopian who wants to join the nation of israel he has to do what he's got to be circumcised he's got to eat that passover oh i'm vegetarian eat it and if he refused to eat it he's not obeying the bible so to sit there and say hey god kind of allows us to eat meat because he knows what barbarians we are but that you know his perfect will for our lives is that we get to this higher level where we're eating a vegetarian or a vegan diet that is false because the most righteous men in the old testament are eating meat all day long they're commanded to jesus christ himself ate meat first of all he ate it in genesis 18 he ate beef in genesis 18 when he appeared unto abraham in the in the heat of the day but not only that we know that he kept the law on this earth so he did what he ate the passover so we know he ate lamb not only that we have evidence of him eating fish on multiple occasions now some vegetarians will say well fish isn't meat and they'll make an exception for fish and on meatless friday the catholics still eat fish that's why even to this day every restaurant has clam chowder on fridays so if you love clam chowder like i do you know that you can only order it on a friday right at most restaurants so the the point is here you know these good things that that the father gives the children are things like fish and eggs amen good things okay and by the way nobody has ever eaten a vegan diet their whole life because you'll die as an infant if you don't eat animal products or you have to drink your mother's milk which is milk which is non-vegan right it's not some woman tried to feed her newborn a vegan diet and the baby died and she was charged with manslaughter negligence because she's trying to give this newborn baby you know it needed milk that it may grow thereby and she refused to give it milk because she wanted it to be a lifelong vegan but i'll tell you what this veganism is it's a substitute for biblical morality it becomes save the animals morality god doesn't take care for oxen friend he cares about us we're made in his image let the youtube comments roll in you bunch of bunch of vegans and vegetarians bring it on but look i know people do mistreat vegetarians and vegans and it isn't right it isn't right and look i'm against it i'm hardcore against it but i don't mistreat them and the reason i know they're mistreated because occasionally i'll order a vegetarian item at a restaurant not because i'm a vegetarian but just because it looks good or just because i start feeling like i man i didn't eat enough vegetables i start feeling guilty so i'll order some and i mean my wife sometimes she looks at me like my i ordered some vegetarian we were on vacation i ordered some triple veggie lasagna or something and my my wife was just like even my wife was persecuting me i'm like what's the problem she's like is that really that's what you're going to order really i'm like yeah that's what i'm ordering so then i don't know if this was just her plan she didn't finish her food and then i ended up finishing that and then i ended up getting all that meat from her plate so then she's like all right you know you're not you're not scaring me anymore but look i i like i like to run and if you eat meat right before you run bad idea doesn't it's not good for running for some reason just the way it's digested so if i know i'm going to be running sometimes i'll get a vegetarian burrito at chipotle where you get the guacamole instead of the meat for the same price amen no no amens on that this is a meat loving church i don't see what i mean you don't get a single amen so i'm empathizing right now with the with the vegetarians of this world yeah so here's the thing yes to meat all meat you know dog cat whatever but all meat is acceptable but but we need to make sure that we're not unkind to people about what they order at a restaurant you know if they want to or you know and i've experienced this myself even in my own family amen no i'm just kidding i'm just joking my wife and i were just kidding about that but we basically just need to make sure that we're nice to people if they want to order a vegetarian option or whatever just humor them they'll eventually get around in their bible reading to that part or if they look if they want to eat that way is no skin off your chicken amen so i'm there's no way i'm going to get through the whole chapter tonight uh so i'm just going to close on that i mean that's a great place to end the sermon right there amen because everybody's hungry now myself included i'm hungry you're hungry all right beef it's what's for dinner and you know what's funny i and i didn't plan this i ate a vegetarian meal before church tonight and i didn't even plan it my wife's nodding her head but this was approved by her because she cooked it we had these burritos that were rice beans corn and salsa and you know that's a good way to save money too is every once in a while do some vegetarian meals all right it doesn't make you any less of a man all right to eat a vegetarian meal a couple times a week all right so i ate one right before church tonight all right but maybe i'll squeeze in a little meat before uh bed tonight but anyway uh we want to make sure that and look sometimes this is just something that people don't understand the difference between preaching and one-on-one dealing with people there's a difference people you don't you think i go and it's so funny when i meet people they're like wow surprised by how laid back and easy going you are because they just expect me to just get in their face and tell them how it is it's like they don't understand that there's a difference between behind the pulpit and in person you know when i'm on an airplane with somebody i mean i i've sat with an obama supporter for three four hours and got along with them great the whole time you know i'm not a jerk don't shake your head at me i'm not a jerk you know i can sit out i can talk to people i can be reasonable and talk to people and be not you know being nice to people being kind trying to get along these are virtues especially when you're out soloing we're not out to fight with people and badger people and get in their face and some people it's like they're just acting out their fantasies of preaching in their one-on-one dealings with people yeah you need to save that for the pulpit now a lot of people need to get meaner in the pulpit amen and then a lot of people need to get nicer out of the pulpit why and it's not but it's not being uh it's not being a hypocrite or too it's just different wait but why because when you're talking to 300 people it's not just as offensive to them personally because they can either take it or leave it if the shoe fits they can wear it it's less direct than to just go to that person and tell now look sometimes people do things that are really bad and yeah they need to be rebuked strongly to their face but that's pretty rare usually we should be nice to people right and i i i'm constantly being told by people like i was just so i went soul winning with you as your silent partner and i just couldn't believe how nice you were to everybody it's like what do you think i was gonna do what did you expect i mean they think i was gonna knock on the door you're catholic let me hear turn let me show you something revelation 17 about the great whore that's your church buddy you know do you think i'm just gonna just jump down their throat and just be like you're catholic the pope is the vicar of satan you know obviously that's not gonna work as a soul winning method i've never been that way you know there's a difference between preaching generally to hundreds of people or thousands of people or 20 people or 50 people and when you're just one-on-one talking to somebody usually shouting is not going to be called for usually so there's a time and a place for things but you know usually it's about being nice right so be sure to keep those things straight especially when dealing with your vegetarian brothers and sisters let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer father we thank you so much for your word lord and thank you for prayer that we have the availability where we can just pray and ask for things and you'll give us good things just like we would give our children eggs or fish or bread or whatever nutritious food they need lord you'll give us what we need and if we ask you for junk you're probably going to tell us no lord and thank you for telling us no and withholding junk from us that we don't need and lord i just pray that you would help out all of us lord myself included to be faithful in praying and asking for the things that we need and lord give us wisdom to pray according to your will and it's in jesus name that we pray amen