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

Alright, I believe we're live on YouTube, thriving in the midst of civil and political unrest. It starts in 60 seconds. Hello, everybody. It's October 12th, 2020. It's 8 o'clock central. This is episode 54 of my weekly livestream podcast, The Sword of the Spirit. Benjamin Naim here, and I've got two guests. Not sure how I'm going to be able to control the both of them here at the same time to have a coherent livestream, but I'm going to try my best. Pastor Jonathan Shelley on the line with me from Steadfast Baptist Church, taking the time out. He made the mistake of texting me about my livestream on the day that I was doing my livestream. So I said, you know what? You're invited. Pastor Shelley, how you doing? Doing great. Glad to be here. I didn't know you were going to try and control me, but I say good luck, sir. All right, Cameron Hall, say hello to the folks. This is folks listening. This is brother Cameron Hall from Steadfast Oklahoma City and a great preacher there on the rotation and church member, Cameron Hall. How you doing? Howdy, how goes it? As far as controlling two people, it's going to probably turn into the presidential debate and you'll just sit there and we'll take over. So we've got this livestream thing down. Good luck. You will play the role of Chris Wallace and only interrupt one of you. Let's talk about... So does that mean I need you to interrupt me so that I'm not Biden? Because I'll go for that. Sure. So I came up with this topic because obviously this has been a crazy year. And I also came up with this topic because of a sermon that was preached at Steadfast Baptist Church where Pastor Shelley talked about thriving even if you're at a church that resembles the church at Sardis. And I kind of took that concept and extrapolated it to this country and what's going on really in the Western world as a whole and the civil unrest and political unrest that we've experienced up to this point and that we're going to experience in the future with the election coming up next month, November the third. There are going to be many people out there who eagerly go out and vote for their favorite candidate. I'm sure Pastor Shelley, you are gearing up and ready to go to vote for Donald Trump. Just kidding. But let's just right off the bat talk about the political and civil unrest. That is the premise of this entire podcast is as a Christian, how do we thrive in this environment? And obviously the premise of the show was that this environment exists, that there is civil unrest, that there is political unrest. Can you speak to that just to start off here in 2020? How crazy has this year been? And what have you noticed about the coronavirus? What have you noticed about the political divide in this country? What have you noticed about the unrest thus far? And how bad do you think it's going to get? Well, I mean, you know, I think that it's all relative first of all, because if we first take political unrest, I mean, if you watch CNN, political unrest is every day, 365 for the last decade plus, I mean, just virtually at all times we're at political unrest. The left hates Donald Trump and says our whole world's being destroyed and everything's going to, you know, basically be nuked off the planet because of Trump and everything's Trump's fault. From a political rest perspective, I think that that's hard to gauge how do you quantify that? Because according to the media, we're always at political unrest. I think obviously it's going to be magnified in an election year. And that's a lot of what people are talking about, thinking about as far as civil unrest, I think that you could quantify this year as being, you know, definitely more noticeable than other years in the sense that we've had a lot more riots, we've had a lot more destruction. Obviously for me, you know, I kind of, from that sermon that you're talking about, one of the connections I made was with COVID specifically and just kind of how that's kind of changed everybody's lifestyle and circumstances. But I mean, even for us in America, there's plenty of countries throughout this world where their political and civil unrest is far exceeding that which we've even experienced in America to date. I mean, some of these Muslim countries and some other areas, it's a constant struggle daily. If you live in the Middle East, I think you could probably speak to this. People are constantly afraid of bombs and all kinds of different terror threats that are going on. So really, I think we always have to take in consideration the entire world because political and civil unrest is just a day on God's earth virtually. I mean, very realistically, if we think about it, people have always been in all kinds of political and civil unrest. And so I think that for a Christian, we really need to get our eyes off of what's going on in the world, except that they're going to be in turmoil and constant pain and suffering and affliction and really just focus on our walk with Christ and trying to personally thrive no matter what the outward circumstances are. I mean, the apostle Paul went through all kinds of upheaval politically, civilly, yet he's able to continually thriving personally in his pursuit towards Christ and that of doing many great works for the Lord, setting all kinds of different churches up. Those churches are growing. He's seen many people saved and baptized. And so you kind of just see him as a constant success in his Christian life, even though the whole world is doing their thing simultaneously. So I think that when we're in these kind of pressure cooker situations where we feel like there's a lot more civil or political unrest, that we just need to realize that that's going to happen and it doesn't really matter as far as our pursuit towards being righteous or serving God. We can do that at any point in time, no matter what the circumstances are. I'll throw that back to you, Cameron or Ben, if you want to comment. Go ahead. Yeah. So, Pastor, hit it, you know, the nail right on the head, because here's the thing as far as dealing with political unrest, dealing with civil unrest, is that the plus side to that, of course, the topic being how to thrive in that. The reality is that the Christian life, the Christian mission, soul winning, you know, getting out there and doing those first works does thrive in that environment, because when everyone's comfortable and when everyone thinks everything's going OK, they don't really feel like they need a savior. They don't really feel like they need something to come in and and, you know, to give them a light at the end of the tunnel. So I know as far as like OKC is concerned with, you know, the covid stuff, with the, you know, election year coming up with just all the nonsense that's going on, it's easy to thrive if you just keep your eye on the prize. If you know, here's the trick is to, you know, for every Christian on how to not get caught up in the drama, pick up your TV remote and turn off the TV, turn off the news, turn off Fox News or CNN or whatever, because we wrestle not, you know, against the powers that be as far as our principalities. But we're wrestling rather against the devil. We want to save people from hell. The biggest way to waste your time is to try to fight, I think, the government, because you're fighting a losing battle. I mean, spoiler alert. The Bible kind of tells you what the end is, you know, and it's not like, hey, you know, we pulled it out, you know, like Mighty Duck style or something. It's you're going to lose politically. So you just need to win spiritually, I think is kind of the main focus. Well, if you're just tuning in, I want to do a quick plug here to keep viewers watching. At the very end of this live stream, I've got a special announcement about the next two episodes. So if you want to know what that is, you have to keep listening until the end. And I plan to go about an hour, maybe a little bit over an hour. So that'll be around 9 p.m. Central. So stay tuned for that. I want to share a couple of articles here, rapid fire style, so I don't take up all the time. But I think it's important to just lay this out on the onset here. Let me make sure I have the right screen queued up. And I do. So let's do this rapid fire. This is Daily Mail revealed Antifa gunman, 48, who shot dead a Trump supporter in Portland, was armed with a handgun and fired up to 50 rounds during shootout with U.S. Marshals before being killed. As witnesses say, it was like a scene from a video game. The left likes to claim that Antifa has never been responsible for violence ever when we have not just this example, but even another one in which they actually shot a member of the Patriot prayer group. Anarchist groups tied to riots in four U.S. cities. That's September 16th, 2020. That number's gone up since then, in fact, because things just never seem to settle down. Antifa riots may be part of Democrat power grab. That's what this political analyst is ascertaining. Here we have a study from the Federalist. Up to 95% of 2020 U.S. riots are linked to Black Lives Matter. This is the Marxist, communist, anti-nuclear family group that claim to be all about social justice when in reality they're about violence and they're about faggotry and bullying people. It says, contrary to media narratives, 95% of this summer's riots are linked to Black Lives Matter activism. There's also that famous CNN screen grab of the CNN fake news reporter literally with a building on fire behind him. The lower third says, mostly fiery, but mostly peaceful protests. Well, they're not peaceful and Black Lives Matter is not a peaceful organization. A polarized America, how the partisan divide grew over decades and white liberals and conservatives just can't get along. I talked in the past about the ever-growing chasm between the left and right in this country and that just is growing larger and larger. The fear of coronavirus is changing our psychology, so when you compound the violence going on on the streets, you compound the election coming up across just around the corner, now you have also in addition to all that, a pandemic that's pretty much been raging since March. And so people have talked about how this is affecting people's psychology, that they're afraid to walk out the door, everyone's got their masks on, everyone is afraid of getting this virus. How citywide protests surges in violent crime could affect the 2020 election. If Donald Trump gets re-elected, then it's possible you're going to see some violence on the streets, consequently because, like Pastor Shelley alluded to, those who are firmly entrenched in Democratic Party policies, they believe he is at fault for everything. And then we have this, the country's lost its mind, polls warning of civil war, violence shows deep partisan chasm over election. Are we on the brink of civil war? I mean, some people have hypothesized that perhaps that's what's coming next, that there's going to be civil war in this country. It seems like, and Pastor Shelley, you've got some experience obviously paying attention to things like this. Are we more divided as a nation today than we've ever been, or is this just another election cycle? Obviously, no one can predict the future. I think when it comes to party divisions, I mean, when it came to Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump in 2016, it was a very close race. I mean, we're talking, you know, from a marginal perspective, I mean, very similar race numbers in many states. I mean, many states were decided by less than 1% when it comes to the votes for those states. And I know that she won the popular vote. So I think that, I mean, really, it's kind of been 50% Democrat, 50% Republican for a while. But I think, you know, what we've kind of seen as a shift more so is that everything has just been kind of tugged into the direction of the left, and less morality just in general. But he's just been kind of drug into a very anti God, anti the Bible, anti morality type direction. And so I think that most, I think a lot of people are kind of unified in that. And I think also the media hypes up the partisanship that truly exists. I think that there is a vitriol for Donald Trump. And I think there's a vitriol for, you know, Biden. But I think that that's really just the most is the most outspoken people and it's kind of hyperbole on both sides, how much division there truly is, I, you know, I believe that most people honestly, just don't care. I think most people are super apathetic. They're not that interested. They really just want things to kind of just go away. They just want them to stop, you know, infringing on our rights and whatever. And I think they honestly, most people, if you had said, Well, we'll get rid of all the COVID stuff and all the mandates and the mask and all the government restrictions. If you know, if Trump's elected, then I think 90% of our country would just press that button. And if it was like Biden 90% of people would press that button, like I think that most people honestly just don't care at all about politics, and they're not that enthusiastic about that particular candidate. And so I think that the media really just overhypes and I mean, these articles are written by the notorious liars and fags and all kinds of evil, wicked people in the media. And so, you know, I don't believe their storylines or any of that, even if there was a war, many times wars are fabricated, and they kind of try to deceive people into buying into these narratives. I mean, you look at some of these major wars, the governments have to initiate false flag events to try and persuade people even go into war, and then they draft people against their will. I mean, it's kind of hard to like, you know, see the country really wanting to go to war, people don't really want to go to war typically, that, you know, people don't enjoy just fighting and killing and seeing that kind of a bloodshed for the most part, and that kind of scale. So I think there would have to be some type of an event. And you know, the Bible talks about in Matthew chapter number 24, that there's going to be wars and there's going to be rumors of wars. And I think really, it's just a rumor of war to just kind of is a fear tactic to be used politically or to gain some kind of narrative or achievement. I mean, you know, you could look at the rumor of war with terrorists and the Middle East is a good way to pass the Patriot Act and pass more security measures and try to kind of just further their agendas. But I don't know that really, you could have foreseen that I would never foreseen 9-11 happening and then them convincing us we need to go to the war in the Middle East. And then that was kind of just out of nowhere, right? Pearl Harbor. Obviously, people knew that there was, you know, wars and these type of things, but the country was not wanting to go to war was not wanting to get involved in World War Two. But then Pearl Harbor happens and all of a sudden, you know, it shifts the tide and everybody wants to now go to war and they support the effort and they kind of want to defend. So like, a lot of times these wars just come out of nowhere, as far as public interest is concerned. I don't think it's real easy to just kind of foresee like the Civil War, you know, a new Civil War or whatever. And I don't know what would really benefit I mean, how do you have a civil war when in my neighborhood, half of the people are Biden supporters and half the people are Republican supporters. I mean, it's just gonna literally be an all out just battle on the streets, every man for himself, just kind of like, it's not like the north versus the south. It's a really, it would be a really interesting battle, when everyone's just so mixed, and it's really an ideological struggle or fight that that kind of permeates all this political uprising. And so I don't think that's gonna happen. I think that that's just something that some talking point, I mean, they got to sell newspaper somehow, they got to get click clicks on their article somehow. So they just, you know, point to war, and they just stretch the truth. And, you know, as much as I dislike the left, and most people that I hang out with dislike the left, none of us really want to go to arms, none of us are trying to round them up. And most of the left is scared, you know, they're just big talk. They're not really, they don't even like guns. How are they even going to go to war? I mean, I don't know what they're gonna do to fight us. They don't have guns or any way to weaponry. I mean, if no, I don't buy that there's going to be anything like that now. Could tomorrow there be some false flag event, where some American ship is basically sunk in the Pacific, and they claim that China did it and all of a sudden, we're in a war with China tomorrow. Yeah, it could happen. But again, I don't, I don't think you can predict those type of things and and really see the writing on the wall, per se, there's always going to be wars and rumors of wars. And, you know, Jesus Christ said, See that you be not troubled, for all these things was come to pass, but the end is not yet. So Jesus even said, like, there's going to be wars and rumors of wars. Don't worry about it. Don't even care. Don't be troubled. And he said, that's not even going to be the end. So some people point, they're like, Oh, look at all this turmoil and look at all this stress and this war reward, Jesus said that that's not even the end necessarily. So you know, and if we were at the time of World War One or World War Two, we'd all be thinking like, this is it. I mean, the anti crisis here, you know, it's probably Hitler and, you know, look at look at that. He talks mean in German, and they don't even know what he's saying. And I mean, so like, there could be a whole nother World War, and it's still not the end. And really, here's the thing, no matter what the world's gonna do, I can only control myself. And so to me, I think the most important thing is just to personally thrive for Christ. You know, I can still read my Bible, I can still follow God's commandments, I can still go out and preach the gospel. And whether Biden's in office, or Trump's in office, or, you know, the man of sin, Michelle Obama, I can still go out the gospel. And so, you know, nuts to whatever else is going on. I'll let you I talk too much. So there you go. Throw it over to Cameron. Yeah, verse that came to mind just with what the pastor was talking about, of course, Jesus Christ, again, speaking in John chapter 16, says, These things have I spoken unto you that you might have peace in the world, you shall have tribulation, but be of good cheer. I have overcome the world. And it's interesting that you can look at that verse and see that he's saying, Hey, I'm writing this so that you can have peace. Because in the world, you're going to have Madison, right, you're going to have that right that that tribulation, all right, that's on screen right now. So it, it's interesting that Jesus put those together. And a lot of times you'll see that in God's Word that you find something that's like, you know, horrible is going on. And yet there's a way for the righteous remnant to prosper. There's a way that it brings glory to God. But you know, putting on my, you know, MAGA hat, and, you know, being first in line for the polls, I'm not doing anything to glorify God. At that point. Now, if we had massa hats, then maybe, you know, there you go. So but yeah, there's not really a lot more than I could add on to that. Except that people want two things I can think of one is that some people just inherently want to focus on the negative. They want the drama. And so that's where you're kind of getting this, this loud vocal minority for the extreme left and extreme right. And frankly, it's not really left and right anymore. It's like radical left and then somewhat moderate, because I wouldn't consider anybody that's in or running for office right now to be conservative, because most of them are like lenient on, you know, abortion to an extent, you know, as far as because they'll say, Well, I'm anti abortion. And they put all these different criteria in, well, it has to meet this criteria that well, if it's in this range, it's okay, you know, and then everybody pretty much is soft on the fags. I mean, find me one candidate that's going to stand on what the Bible says, matter of fact, find me any candidate who stands on what the Bible says on virtually anything. It's all just a feel good, you know, well, this is what you know, my dad and grandpa did as far as the conservative side goes, which there's nothing wrong with that. But when you're basing it off tradition, rather than basing it off the Bible, you're just going to fail, you're just going to stick to weird ideologies. And look, man's word and man's policies aren't what's going to last forever and give you that, that, you know, strong, profitable government, it's God's Word. So that's kind of where we need to be focusing as far as people, you know, the media portraying things as as divisive as they are, when in reality, it's not, you know, I went to the grocery store with my wife today, and I don't remember any Molotovs being thrown, or, you know, looters all, you know, I didn't have to dodge gunfire as I went into Aldi, okay, to buy my groceries. But I think it's like a monkey see monkey do type scenario, because the media wants to be divisive as it can, it wants to cause you to be as far from whatever that middle ground would be, whether that be and you could insert any reasoning into that, is it, you know, purely political? If you look at it from a pure political standpoint, of course, you're going to want people to either be all in on Biden, or all in on Trump, you're not going to want these people sitting in the middle undecided. So you're going to try to polarize them one way or the other. Or is it spiritual, you know, which, of course, that's what I believe. I believe, obviously, they're working hand in hand. But even if someone wanted to argue and say, No, I don't think it's spiritual at all. You still have to realize that the media is controlled, what you see, what you're consuming is controlled. And you have to stop and think, why, what's the purpose? What's the point? Okay, what are they trying to accomplish? They're not giving you just factual, you know, Oh, here you go. Here's just the facts for you, you know, no bias, you know, at all. So you just need I think, one of the main things for people is to just be aware. I mean, aside from putting your faith in God, and not in princes, putting your faith in the Bible, you know, donning the armor of God, the whole armor of God. Aside from all that, just logically, be aware of what's going on, think, you know, stop for a second and use some common sense, which is less and less common today. Well, I want to get into four points here. And then we'll close it out. The first point that I wanted to touch on with respect to this subject is the importance and you guys have already touched on this a little bit, but the importance of not getting distracted by the carnal fight, because right now, if you're somebody who's passionate about the election, that's a battle that you could get sucked into. If you're somebody who's passionate about COVID-19, you know, there are a lot of mandates out there that some would deem to be unconstitutional or a violation of our civil liberties. Many people aren't happy about the masks, you know. I don't like having to wear masks very lightly, it's stupid. And Pastor Shelley, you even had a really funny story about when you walked into a 7-11 and the guy behind the counter was freaking out, even though you did make an effort to cover your mouth, you could tell that story if you want a little later. But I think there are so many different battles, especially with what's going on right now with current events and geopolitically, that Christians can get distracted with. Let's talk about why that would be the wrong move for them to get distracted by those battles. I'll just share this scripture, let's dive into the Bible, Colossians 3, it says, If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth. And right now, I think more than ever, there probably is the temptation to set your affection on things that are here on the earth. And you might be worried about your economic future. With coronavirus now, more people have found it difficult to, or have found it to be difficult to try and find a job or, you know, they might have lost their job, they might have lost their opportunity to provide for their family and they're worried about that. Instead of trusting in the Lord, they're nervous and anxious about that particular situation. There are a lot of things that can distract us, there are a lot of battles that we can engage in. You know, you could, instead of going soul winning, you could join your local political action group fighting against masks and do something about the civil liberties being trampled on every single day by an overzealous government which purports to be trying to stop the coronavirus pandemic. You can get involved in all these different groups and you could forsake soul winning, you could forsake your Bible reading, you could forsake going to church for all these things but, gentlemen, how important is it, even with everything going on, even with the civil unrest and the political division that we sort of hinted at here and who knows what's going to happen in the future, right, I mean, obviously things could get a lot worse, they could get better, we don't know, but I think all of us would agree that 2020 has been an eventful year in this area. Talk about the importance, I know we already touched on it a little bit, but just how important it is not to get distracted with all that stuff because I think especially if you're somebody who's come out of the truth movement as it's called, which, you know, Jesus Christ is the truth, it should ultimately lead you to getting saved, but people who've come out of that battle against the new world order establishment, the globalist puppet masters controlling this planet, the temptation is there to just go right back into that and then forsake their Christian life. What do you think? Yeah, I mean, obviously we kind of keep hitting the same nail down and deeper, but honestly, I mean, if you look at the Bible, the Pharisees and most of the Jews, they were concerned with the Romans and you want to talk about political and civil unrest, the Romans were taxing them that they didn't agree with, the Romans were oppressing them with laws and restrictions that they didn't agree with, they felt like their worship of the Lord was restricted based on the government policies, yet Jesus Christ never went around crying and complaining about the Roman restrictions on following God's laws or God's commandments, but rather just got to work and serve the Lord the best that he could in his capacity. And I think if we just compared our time to Christ, you know, it's reasonable to believe or to assume that the Romans were probably oppressing the Jews more than were being oppressed in America. And so again, I think it's all just perspective and I think that you get sucked in the wrong fight and you know, I'm not willing to be crucified for being Barabbas, you know, for political unrest, for causing insurrection, for murder, or sedition or any of those type of things, I'd rather be crucified for standing up for Christ and for things that are biblical. Otherwise, you know, it's just, it's obvious that the devil uses so many different tactics to distract us or cause us to be concerned with the not the right thing. And I think there's just a temptation in the flesh to just really get consumed in this stuff. But I mean, paying attention to the news and the media and all that stuff. It's never satisfying. I never feel like satisfied. You never watch it, look at it, listen to it and think like, Oh, now I feel good. Now I feel better. Now, you know, it's kind of this insatiable spirit. It's like drinking. Some people describe lemonade. They say they don't get it's like never satisfies their thirst. They still are thirsty after drinking it. And so you know, I love lemonade, though, but at the end of the day, like, there is no satisfaction in these things. And it's obviously a clear distraction. I don't want to just keep harping on that point. But I think if you compare it into the scripture, you see a lot of people wanting to get into that carnal fight, and it never goes well. And so we just need to make sure that we're fighting with that flesh. That's the real fight that we need to get to and try to walk in the spirit. Yeah, so I'll add on to that a little bit. There's a verse that I have another one that I pulled up here. It's Ephesians chapter number five in Ephesians five, verse 15. The Bible says, See them that you walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time because the days are evil. So how are we going to be wise? How is it that we can have that wisdom? How is it that we can walk forward? Well, it tells us in verse 17, which is right after it says, Wherefore be not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is. And here's the deal, the will of the Lord is not to get wrapped up in the, you know, politics wrapped up in the, you know, sensationalism. Another verse that I had, I pulled up here that I wanted to read off that came to mind was in Psalm 146, Psalm chapter number 146. Starting in verse three, the Bible says, Put not your trust in princes, nor in the Son of Man, and whom there is no help. And sometimes when you read things out of the Bible, you're like, Well, why? Well, here's the deal. Just keep reading the Bible. God tells you verse four, it says, His breath goeth forth. Remember, we're talking about the Son of Man, the princes, where there's no help. Verse four in Psalm 146 says, His breath goeth forth. He returneth to his earth in that very day, his thoughts perish. Look, it doesn't matter who you're going to trust, if it's a human, whose ideologies you're going to get behind if it's man, if it's Trump, if it's Biden, because you know what, as soon as they die, or as soon as they're out of office, those ideals die with them. So why don't you do something that's that's eternally redeemable, like, you know, focus on being more like Jesus Christ, focus on being free to thrive, focus on going soul winning every time you can be in the church every time the doors are open, sing praises of the Lord, you know, pray fervently, as opposed to, you know, what circle did you fill in on the ballot this year, and four years from now, you know, just what actually makes sense? What is actually worth your time? Absolutely. I want to say this, you know, we're talking about thriving during a period of turmoil, if you want to thrive when things seem to be crumbling in this country, go soul winning. Because I personally think, and this is the second point I wanted to bring up, I think people tend to think about their own mortality more during economic crisis or political upheaval. And right now, the coronavirus pandemic, I think is a good example of this because I've heard so many people talk about how soul winning has actually improved for them. Now you do have the odd case of an individual getting upset because you don't have a mask on or they think that you shouldn't be out door knocking and preaching the gospel because they're afraid you'll spread the virus to somebody or they're afraid of talking to you, whatever. I mean, you do have those odd cases here and there where that happens. And I do remember actually one specific case in which I've actually happened twice now where somebody yelled at me and my soul winning partner. But I do think that's rare. I think in general, people are more likely to think about eternity and what happens after this life when it's not going so well, when the economy isn't doing well, when there are people out on the streets rioting and looting and destroying private property. And you don't want to see that obviously, but we could perhaps take advantage of that to get a lot more people saved. And the Bible says in Titus chapter three, put them in mind to be subject to principalities and powers to be magistrates, to be ready to every good work. So regardless of the environment that we're living in, we should be ready to every good work and we should be prepared for battle. David's mighty men were prepared for battle and first Chronicles chapter 12 verse eight, it talks about them. It says, and of the Gadites, there were separated themselves into David into the hold to the wilderness men of might and men of war fit for the battle. And so right now, instead of getting bogged down with what's going on in the news, if you actually go out soul winning, you're going to see more people willing to listen to the gospel, I think. Is that something you guys have experienced and do you agree with the assessment that I made there in the sense that when there are periods in which turmoil is increased, whether it's with respect to political division or whatever's going on with this coronavirus pandemic, when there is unrest, more people think about eternity. Is that true? And have you noticed it lately? I mean, you know, obviously it's anecdotal probably to decide that, uh, some kind of turmoil causes some people to respond and some people not, I mean, you know, from a biblical perspective, I don't think that that's always the case. I mean, you could really look in the book of revelation where, uh, it's pretty much the most undeniable wrath coming from God. It says they still didn't repent of their fornication. They still didn't repent of their idolatry and their false gods and their grain is. So like, yeah, to some degree, I mean, even, uh, with a lot of other turmoil, I mean, the Egyptians, it's not like they all got saved, even though they get to see the most wonderful plagues ever poured out on mankind, especially up to that point. Um, you know, you constantly see God's hand and all kinds of judgments. I mean, the Canaanites, they heard about what happened to the Egyptians and they had the Israelites knocking on their front door, yet none of them still got saved. And so, you know, I think when it comes to the guy that was wearing the mask and got all freaked out about you coming, he probably wasn't going to be receptive anyways. And really the people that were receptive probably are going to stay receptive. And you know, the Lord works in mysterious ways. I think for some people, um, this distress tribulation or turmoil can give them a change of heart. I've, I remember running into a person who had said that he recently got in an accident and he thought he almost lost his life and it really caused him to really kind of evaluate where he would die and go, and he was just seeking the Lord. He didn't even know what to be looking for. And I found him in a bookstore looking for a Bible and I just pulled off a King James off the shelf and said, Whoa, can I show you how to go to heaven? He was like, yeah. And he was super receptive and he got saved. So like from for him, for him, you know, some distress or turmoil in his life did cause him to seek the Lord. But unfortunately, I don't know that that's, uh, I think that it's just kind of anecdotal. I mean, even in my soul winning, I don't, I don't really think that during COVID I've seen a major shift in receptivity. Uh, I think that there's been more people home, which is good, but less people answer the door too. So it's kind of like, it almost offsets to some degree and you know, but I think that soul winning is still very effective. I haven't had anything, you know, I don't think there's anything negative that's come about from this. Um, you know, I think one thing that I would like to see is I would like to see all these people that have walked away from these liberal garbage mega churches to when things get back kind of normal to start maybe trying an independent fundamental Baptist church, you know, maybe we can steal away some of those people. Um, and maybe they'll kind of wake up to how evil and wicked our society is. I think that, um, as the world continues to get darker, our light is going to shine brighter and seem more appealing to some, um, and it won't, it'll stand out more in comparison to other churches. But as far as the gospel, I mean, the gospel is what is the power to get people saved. And I think, you know, whether they're in a good or bad life circumstance, you know, it's going to have about the same effect. And really what we just need to do is go out and preach the gospel. Ooh, I thought I was muted, but I wasn't. So I just remuted myself. Yeah. So as far as like, and that is a good point, uh, that, that even during revelation, you know, and, and the plagues, there are going to be people who, you know, the wicked and adulterous generation show the sire a sign, you know, but under them, there'll be no sign given. Right. And there are so many people that will say, well, if God just, you know, if I just saw a sign, if I just saw this and literally, I think that there are people who could see, you know, a miracle happen in their life. First of all, Romans one says that creation is enough to understand that there is a God, that there is a creator and to seek him. Right. So they're comparing, you know, the creation and the evidence that exists with a mild level of discomfort. I don't think there's going to be anything that some people who are just totally against, you know, getting saved. It's not like you're going to have a magic thing happen where it's like, oh wow, well the gospel didn't do it, but, you know, turning, you know, water to wine, you know, boy, that just got that guy. But as far as just anecdotally, I've noticed a lot more groups of people out now that are actually out and about. I think people are starting to get like stir crazy. And so I remember this Saturday, Brother Fur, Brother Tanner Fur and I went out soul winning and we park in the parking lot and get out and there's this couple and we walk up to them and immediately they just both get saved because they're just out. People are out. They're getting stir crazy. They don't want to be at home. You know, they're starting to get out. I've had Brother Ben when you and I went, you know, we ran into, you know, one door, there were two people that got saved and then there were the group of three boys that are out playing. And of course, some of that is being summertime. People are going to be out more. But I think having this like, you know, oh, you're locked down, you got to stay in. And now people are finally starting to shake free of that. You've got a good chance of grabbing people who have been in so much isolation that they would literally entertain like a Mormon or Jehovah's Witness. Right. Which is bad for that case, but good for us because it's like, hey, let's get in there. Give them the truth, you know. And as far as like people being, you know, way too mask happy at the door or anything. I had never until yesterday had an issue with, you know, people with masks. No, I'm sorry. It was it was Thursday because it was brother Brent Southern and I went out and we were hitting some houses and never had this happen before. But hit a house, hit a door, knock a door. Lady comes up. I'm trying to talk to her. Of course, she reveals that she's Church of Christ, which that'll be fun for your upcoming segments. And so I knew kind of that I was already in a bad spot. So as I try to say, well, hey, you know, more importantly than we're going to church, I'd like to show you how easy it is to be saved. She's like, well, you're not wearing a mask. And I said, like, I have one. I just pulled it. I said, I can put one on. She's like, no, you've been here long enough. You know, like the damage is already done. So we leave. But then these people come out. This lady comes out and we're down the street, brother Brent and I. And she comes out and she's standing at the end of the street. And again, this is just like an anecdotal story, you know, some some comic relief. And she's going, hey, hey. It's so great. Like looks at me. So I turn around and I and I've had before where people are rude and then they apologize. And so I was just like, hey, let's think positive. So I was just like, yes, ma'am. You know, yes, ma'am. Can I help you? Is there something I can do? And she was like, if you see my friend out, you better not preach to her. Well, joke's on her because we already did. So I said, well, I don't know what she looks like. And she said, it doesn't matter what she looks like. You know, you're not wearing a mask. Well, irony of irony is this lady has come out of her house to yell at me that I'm not wearing a mask and she doesn't have a mask. And in the flesh, I couldn't help myself. And I said, I don't think you're wearing a mask either. That's interesting. And then, of course, we left and then they just yelled at us as we were going on not to preach to anybody. So all that to say, you're going to have the groups of people that are out that are receptive and you're going to have the blue haired Karen who's going to chase you down the street for not wearing a mask. That's going to happen, whether it's coronavirus, that's going to happen, whether it's not. That's going to happen, whether it's a thousand year reign and people are still not getting saved and some people are still getting saved. You just have to go out and preach the gospel. It's not like in the Bible, Jesus says, hey, wait for this, you know, really bad thing to happen. Then go. I don't remember that caveat. I remember Jesus Christ saying, go ye, therefore go into the highways and hedges, go and preach the gospel to every preacher. Not well, hey, wait until there's a little bit of tribulation. Hey, wait until it's a little more receptive, because, look, you don't know if when you're preaching that you're getting someone saved or if you were, I would argue, equally as important if you, if God's using you to be someone's last chance and they're going to reject you for the last time and God's going to be done with them and move on and not waste his time sending people to preach to those that are going to keep rejecting him. So again, keep the main thing, the main thing, keep your eyes on the prize and don't get wrapped up in, well, I don't know, you know, I don't want to, you know, I don't want to go waste all my energy now if we could wait for a crisis, you know, hey, one in the hand, two in the bush. All right. And worry about the particulars later. Well, yeah, he made me think of whenever the rich man's in hell and he's like, well, someone came back from the dead, then they would believe. And it's like even that circumstance is not going to change people's mind. I think minds are going to be made up when they hear the gospel being preached. And so our goal is not to really care about the climate. It's really just to preach the gospel. The gospel is what has the power and that's what's going to change men's hearts. You know, fortunately for the Philippian jailer though, when the whole, when he's faced with death, he does kind of look at those circumstances a little bit differently and asked to be saved. But you know, who knows if Paul walking in and asked him if he wanted to go to heaven, he might've been interested in them too. So I think that, you know, the circumstances are hard to measure. I mean, yesterday I literally knocked on 70 doors virtually straight with nobody interested in a very receptive apartment complex, just like generally speaking, but like just no one wanted to be interested just door after door. I ran out of invites, atheists and people that hated the word of God and just like, I was pretty discouraged, but then I finally ran into a kid from Congo and he wanted to get saved and his brother and sister both got saved. And so, you know, after two hours of just failing miserably, had a great minute, you know, last door and got a few people saved. And so I think it's about quantity. We just need to go out there and just knock as many doors as we can and just try to reach the people that are receptive. Well I want to plug a sermon real quickly here. Pastor Shelley, this is your YouTube channel, Steadfast Baptist Church. For those of you who have not subscribed yet, make sure you search for this on YouTube, hit the subscribe button and also click the bell so you can get notified whenever a new video is uploaded. Soul Fishing, the Sunday morning sermon from this past Sunday I thought was very helpful. I'm trying to make my soul-winning presentation more efficient. I'm trying to make it frankly shorter. I'm still trying to trim the fat and I thought that this sermon was very helpful. For those of you who might be in that same boat, you're tweaking your presentation, trying to make it better. I think we should always be trying to make our soul-winning presentation better and never say to ourselves, oh, I've made it. You know, let's not go bull ballard on ourselves here and just, oh, you know, I'm the best soul-winner. No, okay. 75% of the soul-winning. Hey, here's the thing, everyone needs to watch that sermon by Pastor Shelley because it doesn't matter if you've been soul-winning for a day, a week, or if you've been soul-winning for a year, five years, because I've been soul-winning for not a super long time. I've not been saved for a super long time, only about two years. I've been soul-winning since I started going to steadfast in early 2019 and it's really easy for people, including myself, to get the feeling that, hey, I'm good, I know what I'm doing. You need to make sure you watch sermons from good pastors that are giving you good information that know a lot more about soul-winning than you do. And look, here's the thing, while I'm not soul-winning right now, okay, well, watch it anyway, because when you do eventually get out and go soul-winning, you're going to have that knowledge already. You're not going to have to start out, look, let's just admit some faults here, okay? I was trained to soul-win by Bo Ballard, okay? I know what it's like to sit as the silent partner and watch someone argue about the Shroud of Turin for 45 minutes at the door. Look, that doesn't have to be you. You can just watch a video, you can learn how to soul-win from other people that actually know what they're doing and not run people away when you're sitting there literally talking about how it was folded. It doesn't even exist. There is no Shroud of Turin, okay? We're not getting the image of a long-haired queer-looking Jesus from some fake Catholic artifact. Why are we even talking about that at the door, okay? All that to say, avoid being a babe that much in Christ and look and learn from those that you can, you know? Have a heart to seek out the information, especially when it's on YouTube and it's really easy for you to access. Go watch that sermon, Soul Fishing, by Pastor Shelley, because I learned a lot from that. Some partners will learn a lot from that. People who just started talking will learn a lot from that and people who have been soul-winning for 15 years, 20 years I'm sure, will learn from that. And here's the deal. If you watch it and you just know everything already and it's so great, one, check your heart and two, though, it's at least a refresher, right? Iron sharp enough iron, okay? So just, yeah, that's definitely like one of the top must-watch sermons for anyone who's even partway serious about going out soul-winning, whether you're a speaker, a silent partner, or anything. Yeah, Pastor Shelley, could you just speak to that for a moment here before I move on to the next point or talking point, whatever you want to call it for the podcast as we are going to wind down soon, but, you know, I thought that that was very helpful. What motivated you to decide to go ahead and preach that sermon? Is it because you had seen things lately that you thought needed to be corrected or was it just simply a matter of, hey, time to preach a soul-winning sermon? It's been a while. Well, you know, honestly, preaching a soul-winning sermon to a soul-winning crowd is actually a little bit intimidating because, you know, you don't, sometimes I feel like I'm preaching to the choir a little bit, but having gone soul-winning with, I try to go soul-winning with as many different people as I can from, you know, every church. And I feel like I have gone soul-winning with dozens and dozens of different people from our churches. I just know that, you know, there's a lot of variants and a lot of things that I've seen that, you know, I just feel like could potentially be improved upon. And you know, I myself am not the most experienced soul-winner in the world. I've been soul-winning for maybe about five, six years. And so there's, people have been doing it for decades and, but just over those years and just kind of going soul-winning, you know, at least a couple of times every single week for several years, I've definitely tried to fine tune things myself and make improvements, pick up things from other people. And so I try to be real efficient. And one thing that's just kind of frustrating as a soul-winner is seeing someone who's pretty receptive and someone's kind of struggling to do a real efficient gospel presentation. And then they get caught away with their brother, sister, mom, dad, or whatever. And you kind of just feel like, if someone was just, you know, being a little bit more skillful here, maybe that person could have gotten a little bit more information or could have possibly even gone all the way to getting saved at that point in time. And so, you know, it's, it's an important job. I mean, if you go out to battle and you're watching your brothers and sisters in Christ die in battle, you're going to want the rest of the troops at home to be trained better. And so, and obviously when we got soul-winning, we're not dying physically, but it is a spiritual battle and I think that people should be as skilled as they possibly can. And so it just kind of just having seen inefficiencies, seeing things that could possibly be improved upon, it motivated me once I saw enough of it to just feel like, you know what, I don't know that I've really taught on this recently or really gone into some detail and I'd like to put it out there. I also want to just encourage people that aren't soul-winning or haven't done very much soul-winning, you know, give them some more information. I feel like my sermon, the goal is actually to kind of maybe foster beginner soul-winners a little bit more. And I feel like it almost was like, like intermediate or like advanced tips. And so I'm thinking about maybe making a supplementary video where I get Dylan saved again and at the door and just kind of go through a real, yeah, just basically just basically just go through a straightforward gospel presentation where I'm not giving commentary. I'm not necessarily like talking about all the mechanics, but rather just kind of go straight through to give people the opportunity to see a pretty thorough gospel presentation in practice. And that way, you know, they have a good model. I know that Pastor Anderson had made a video a long time ago where he got Pastor Burson saved and at the door, and it really, a lot of people liked that video. A lot of people learned how to, I learned how to go soul-winning from that video. I watched that video. I took notes on what Pastor Anderson said, and I formed a gospel presentation and I looked up a few other verses. I kind of tweaked it a little to make it my own. And then that's what motivated me to then end up going out and getting someone saved. So I feel like as many resources as we can put out there that make it easy, clear and understandable about how to go soul-winning is really vital and really important for our churches to do. And so I'm wanting to continually improve that process. So I've put out on both of our websites, pre-worsbaptist.com and sbckjv.com. I have on our soul-winning tab, a simple gospel layout where it's really just the verses. It's not necessarily the dialogue between the verses, but it's just kind of just a simple layout that people could print out. And I have tweaked a few things since then. So I'm planning on making an updated one this week, putting it out there, doing a gospel presentation video to kind of show and illustrate, and then maybe even making another follow-up video to kind of talk about a few different hypothetical situations and how people can kind of employ them just so we can continually improve on our soul-winning and really be an efficient army. And as a pastor of a church, I take personal responsibility for the soul-winning that's going out there. And so I know that people have had 10,000 instructors in Christ, but I want to make sure that the instruction they're getting is as sound as possible. Yeah, I came from the school of go ahead and spend five, 10 minutes explaining what the word wage means. Oh, a wager? Like at a casino? That's an incentive. People didn't get that. You're quoting it now. Yeah, people didn't get that joke, but I got it. No, I definitely see where you're coming from there, Cameron, in the sense of getting instruction from a complete bozo. And so it was great to have new leadership come in and help me unlearn some of the things that I had learned, get rid of some bad habits, and hey, I'll just admit it, I ripped off large portions of your presentation, Pastor Shelley, and I did it just without hesitation. So I'm sure that was the point, though. Well, I ripped other people off, so therefore I'm just a vessel by you ripping it off. It's kind of like lime wire, gaza-ware. Spiritual lime wire. I steal the music from someone, and then you steal it from me, and so it's just this vehicle of ripping off. Yeah. Specifically, I like that this is how you believe in order to set up calling on the name of the Lord, the verbiage there that I use. In fact, I did a stream last week where somebody actually in the chat room asked, how do you believe? And I gave them that explanation. They didn't really, for some reason, some people in the chat were arguing with the way that that was worded, but I like it. I think it makes perfect sense. But anyway, let me move on here. Let's get these two points in. The next thing I wanted to talk about is in terms of obviously thriving in an environment where there is some violence going on in the streets and with the pandemic and everything like that. I think there's a tendency for people to get demoralized, for example, because their church is shut down. COVID-19 has caused churches not to meet, and some churches have decided to go live stream only. Now, if there is somebody who was zealous for the Lord and they see perhaps that their zeal is waning a little bit because they're stuck at home rather than with God's people at church, do you have any advice for them if they're in a situation where they're being directly impacted because of coronavirus or something else crazy that's gone on this year? What's your advice to those who are, we'll start with Pastor Shelley, then Cameron, just jump right in after he's done, but do you have advice for somebody getting demoralized when they look at the news and they see what's going on and they've been impacted, and specifically what I mean by that is their church is doing live stream only right now? How do they stay fired up in that situation? Well, I mean, first of all, there's going to be times in which there's highs and lows. I think that's normal. So I don't think, you know, we should at least embrace the idea or concept that there's going to be points in your life where not everything is on cloud nine and that's okay. You know, there's a time to weep and there's a time to mourn and there's a time to dance. And so there's going to be highs and lows in the Christian life. Obviously, if you can't go to church for any reason, that could be a low. I love going to church. I enjoy the fellowship. But whether you're sick, whether you're pregnant or giving birth or whatever, there's going to be other reasons perhaps why someone could not go to church. And whether that's COVID or anything, it doesn't really matter. If you are feeling low, the Bible to me, remedies that through reading the scripture and through singing Psalms, you know, that's going to give you joy. But if you're feeling sad legitimately, sometimes you just need to be sad. And you know, the Bible gives us verses about if we're sad that we're supposed to pray, you know, if we're joyful, we're supposed to sing. But I've noticed it's really hard to sing praises to God and to be sad or to be upset. Like it just has a reversing effect. And so even if my church was meeting, quote unquote, live stream only or something or whatever, just sing the songs as loud as you can at home. And you know, that can help change your spirit and your mood, especially we're singing hymns and spiritual songs, which actually have lots of good content. I believe that that is going to kind of, you know, help you change your attitude. In James five, the verse I was thinking of, it says in verse 13, is any among you afflicted? Let him pray. Is any Mary, let him sing songs. Is any sick among you, let him call for the elders of the church and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. So the Bible gives you, you know, kind of a remedy for certain different situations. It says, if you're afflicted, pray, you know, pray that the Lord will allow your church services to resume or pray that the Lord will help you with your spirit. And I think as you pray and you think about the Lord, you know, another thing you can do is count your blessings, sing the song, count your blessings, and then literally do it. And those types of things can help you change your attitude, change your mindset, thinking about the positive, trying to encourage yourself in the Lord, strengthening yourself in the Lord. Many people that went through difficulty like David, there's a certain passage where he is about to be stoned by his own men. And he's at the low of lows and he strengthened himself in the Lord. The apostle Paul strengthened himself in the Lord. The Lord Jesus Christ goes and he's in great affliction. He goes and prays and the angel strengthens him. So we have a consistent theme. We have Elijah praying and telling God, you know, I'm not better than my fathers and an angel comes and strengthens him. So I think that the consistent theme throughout the scriptures is when you are going through difficulty and struggle, pray more and sing more songs. And really you should be trying to be more spiritual, not less in times of distress and difficulty or even, you know, I liken this in a sin, you know, if you get backslidden or you're, you're feeling very sinful or you, you make a mistake or you cause some kind of error, uh, that more than ever, you need to plug yourself back into the Bible and force yourself to read it and force yourself to pray and force yourself to sing Psalms and force yourself to get back plugged into church because you know, that battle with the flesh, if you give in too much, you can get to the point where you just have no desire for the Lord. You just want to only feed the flesh that you just completely apathetic to the things of God. And I think we see that in our country today where most people are very apathetic and we have to do is you have to just force yourself to start being spiritual. And then the more spiritual you force yourself to be, the more you're going to gain and build that desire. Just like with food, you force yourself to eat certain things. You can end up, start liking them and desiring them and even wanting them. And you know, the power of suggestion is real. You know, as you think about the Lord, I mean, there's been times where I don't want to go soul winning at all. Like there's zero desire to go soul winning. There's zero desire to preach the gospel. But as soon as I just get out there and as soon as I knock on a door and as soon as someone's like, I do want to hear and I kind of start going and I can tell this person's soul's on the line, just something happens inside of you that's like, you know what? I really want to be here and I really want to be preaching this person the gospel and I really want to make sure that they get saved. And so, you know, just doing things that are spiritual can cause you to have that right desire. But it would be unrealistic to have this Joel Osteen prosperity gospel type idea or message like every day is a cloud nine and I just have a smile on my face and I just always want to serve the Lord and I never sin and I never do wrong and just everything's good. You know, that's just not realistic. Paul said, I'm carnal. And so, you know, that's, that's my advice for your question. I don't know if I answered it thoroughly, but I'll let Cameron chime in where he thinks he's fit. I'll give you a pass. Yeah. Past you kind of took my points that I was going for there. You know, as far as the people who are maybe not saved and want encouragement, I know Joel Osteen has a little quote cube that he's selling now I saw on his website, but more seriously, the Bible, you know, if I like singing, okay, and singing hymns is a great way to get filled with the spirit if you're feeling down. But there are some times where I understand that people are like, I can't even sing right now. I'm so down that I can't even Well, here's the deal, pull them up on YouTube and play them on repeat. You know, Pastor Anderson has the like a playlist of them all that, you know, from the soul stirring songs and hymns. There's only so long that you can have those hymns playing on repeat in your house before you start inadvertently humming them and then singing them. And that's a way that you could lead yourself into it or force yourself to do it, force yourself to go out, soul winning, force yourself to go to church when you don't want to, you know, wake up and go on Saturday. Look, this Saturday, I did not want to wake up. I was I had been up late hanging out with some other buddies from church. And I, you know, Saturday morning rolled around and I was like, No, I'm gonna sleep in but I forced myself to get up. And I didn't have my, you know, Bible that I normally use, which probably seems like a weird thing. But you know, everyone has their weird ticks, I guess. And I was like, No, I'm not going without my Bible and my wife had gone to, you know, another town to visit family and I'm just like, so I just went and got a Bible that I don't normally use. And I went soul winning anyway, and we got, I was at three people total safe. And so it's like that it just all is worth it. Once you force yourself to go out, you'll have no greater joy than to serve the Lord. You know, the the verse just to quickly wrap this part of it up, because I don't Ben doesn't want to go for two or three or four hours, Ephesians chapter number six, where it's talking about not wrestling against flesh and blood, but against principalities, powers and rulers of the darkness. Verse 13 says, Wherefore, take unto you the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all the stand course, it goes through the different parts of the armor of God. Verse 18 says, praying always with prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and watching there unto with perseverance and supplication for all saints. See, if you're not ready to sing, put on the hymns, you know, lead yourself into it. But on another note, if you're not ready to think about it for you, Ephesians chapter number six talks about praying with all perseverance and supplication for all saints. Maybe it's time for you to think about somebody else. Maybe it's time for you to sing for someone else. Maybe it's time for you to pray for someone else. And there are some things that maybe you'll have to force yourself to do in order to come around to it. One that I can think of is beans and chili. And I know that there's this false doctrine going around that it's not good, but if you just force yourself to eat beans and chili, you're going to realize that it's better. And so that's a carnal example of a spiritual application there. Well then once you grow up and you're no longer a carnal babe and you don't desire, you know, just the milk of the word, you get the strong meat of the word and you realize that meat is better. And so you replace those terrible bites of beans with meat and then you, you finally grow up and you become a man. And when you're a man, you put away childish things. So yeah, but didn't want to David's mighty men literally like fight on a field of lentils. Those are beans, you know, and David was a man after God's own heart. He fought on the hill of beans to show how he was willing to fight for the most insignificant, worthless items to serve God, not something as precious as, you know, steak and ribeye and bacon. I'm going to stay out of this because I already got kicked out of the church before we went on the air for being ecumenical. So I don't want to make things worse for myself here. It wouldn't be kosher of you. Why would you use that word, huh? I don't know. Where are you from? Where are you from, Ben? Naeem? I do have a Hebrew last name. I feel like this debate's going to get explosive here soon. I do have a Hebrew last name, I will say that. Okay. Last point here. Let's share a Bible verse that'll cheer people up, just like a positive, optimistic Bible verse. Okay. Because if you want to thrive when the world's going to hell in a hand basket, you need to stay optimistic. Pastor Anderson, I love when he preaches on this stuff. When he preaches on being an optimistic person, looking on the bright side, being a glass half full kind of guy, having that attitude, I really appreciate that sort of preaching because I have the tendency to pay too much attention to the news and to look at too many reports, video reports of bad things that are going on in this world, and then it makes me not an optimistic person, but very pessimistic. And obviously I'm not talking about a Joel Osteen type, everything's going to always be okay type thing, but at the same time, we shouldn't just be 100% negative either. And I look at Habakkuk 3 is the verse I'll share, which I know I have an advantage because I put this down before we went on the air, so I'm giving you guys a chance to pull up a verse that you want to read to the listeners. Just about something optimistic or uplifting Bible verse, but Habakkuk 3 says in verse 17, although the fig tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines. The labor of the olive shall fail and the field shall yield no meat. The flock shall be cut off from the fold and there shall be no herd in the stalls. Yet I will rejoice in the Lord. I will join the God of my salvation. The Lord God is my strength and he will make my feet like hind's feet and he will make me to walk upon my high places to the chief singer on my stringed instruments. So we see that even though the land is not being blessed, which by the way, folks, I don't know if you've noticed, but America, not blessed, yet Habakkuk says here, Habakkuk chapter 3 verse 18, yet I will rejoice in the Lord. You know, if God be for us, who could be against us? So just remember that, don't forget that. If you're on the Lord's side, you're going to be fine. The Bible says that God's never seen the righteous forsaken nor his seed begging bread. So we need to stay optimistic. We need to look at the bright side. We need to have a glass half full attitude and not have the same countenance as everyone else in the world who's worried about the election, who's worried about COVID-19, who's running around like chickens with their heads cut off because they're not sure what's coming Next in 2020, let's be peculiar people like the Bible tells us to be and not allow those things to affect us. But rather this is the common theme we've talked about throughout the entire live stream. Instead be focused on the spiritual things and stay optimistic because again, we are on the Lord's side. Folks, we've won the victory. We've won the victory when we believed on the Lord Jesus Christ. We're on the winning team. We're on the winning side because of Jesus. And so we shouldn't allow current events and obsessing over the news to ruin our mood. So that's my little diatribe and gentlemen, do you have an uplifting verse that you want to share just to hammer this point home that if you want to thrive, even when the world's going to hell in a hand basket, just stay optimistic. I'll let Cameron go so I don't steal his verse cause you know, I'm probably, I'm looking at his notes right now and so he can go ahead and share with us his uplifting verse. Ben already stole like Romans 8. Yeah, like he tried to get like a five in there and he's like, y'all got to take all the verses that we would have come up with. But here's that. It's not true. There are many verses, okay? Not just those. Well, we're just cherry picking the ones we like, right? Allegedly. So here's the one that I thought of. I'm going to take a little bit out of context for the context of the passage itself, but I think it's still applicable. First Corinthians chapter number six, the last verse, verse 20 says for your bought with a price, therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's course. The context there we're talking about, you know, before it talks about fleeing fornication, other things to live yourself holy, to make yourself like a holy sacrifice. You know, the Bible talks about a reasonable service, but if you ever feel like you're worthless or you're not doing the right thing or you know, maybe God's super displeased with you. Look, God chastens and scourges all whom he receiveth, right? If you're without chastisement, then you're bastards and not sons. So now I'm going to give four or five verses. Just kidding. But the reason that I bring that verse up is that it says you're bought with a price. You're worth something. If you're saved tonight, you're bought with a price. And you know what? Even those that are unsaved that have not yet come to the truth that have not yet accepted Christ. Hey, he still bought them. He still now they might not receive that gift that's bought and paid for. But God, Romans five, eight, commend of his love toward us and that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. And I think about the fact that literally God, who is magnitudes greater than we ever will be, thought it right, thought it just thought it merciful rather, because just would be sending us to hell, thought it merciful and gracious enough and not above to die for us and to buy us with that price. So it doesn't matter what's going on in your life, how you feel, whether you're at the high of highs or the low of lows, you're bought with that same price. So you know, don't be like the guy that doesn't use his talents, you know, use your talents up so that you can return it all at the end of your life to God. Those are some uplifting verses, I was going to steal the one that I've recently preached on. And it was in Second Corinthians chapter two, verse 14, which says, Now thanks be unto God, which always causes us to triumph in Christ, and make it manifest the saver of his knowledge by us in every place. So it's kind of amazing how the Bible actually paints this picture to say that you're going to win no matter what. And really, that should just motivate us to have hope no matter what situation we're going through. I mean, it's crazy how God has illustrated the gospel is the fact that once you're saved, you're always saved. And so it's like, no matter how bad you screw up, you're still going to heaven. No matter how bad you are, you're still going to heaven. No matter how bad your circumstances are, you're still going to heaven. And you know, these things are not worthy. Because suffering and the affliction is not worthy to be compared. I'm looking at that verse, it says, for I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory, which shall be revealed in us. And so, you know, no matter what difficulty we're going through or struggle or affliction, it won't even be something that's worthy to be compared. And that's kind of a crazy verse to kind of wrap your mind around. I was thinking about that this morning, about how, you know, I'll miss things in this world. Like I'll miss, you know, because I love Texas, and I love eating chili without beans. And I love preaching against false doctrine. And I just love so many things about this world. You know, this world's great, honestly, in a lot of ways. I love my children. And I love the life that we have. And I love playing sports. I mean, there's so many cool things that God has created for us on this earth. And it's something that I think a lot of people get a really tight grip on because of how great God's creation truly is. But he says, you know what, it's nothing in this life is even worthy of being compared to the next life. I mean, there's certainly never going to be beans and your chili in the next life. I mean, it's just, it's not even going to be there. That's a false doctrine. There's no remembrance of former things. And so, you know, we don't have to worry about disappointment and sadness and loss and all the things because at some point God will wipe away all the tears from our eyes. And so, you know, obviously, I don't want to discount suffering and say that it's not real and we won't have temporary pain and affliction because we certainly will. But since we're always going to triumph, and because, you know, the little bit of suffering we have is not even worthy to be compared, we should always be able to encourage ourselves as a Christian, having hope, you know, the Bible describes those that are saved as having hope, and those that are not saved as having no hope. And so, it would be sad to be a critic, it would be sad to be an atheist. Like, not only does your, you have no hope at the end of your life, your life right now just sucks with all the COVID and the mask and whatever, like the only thing that's really positive for me right now is my family, my quiet time with the Lord and church. And if I was an atheist, I probably wouldn't have any of that. And so, I would basically just have nothing to live for and be trapped in my house and I couldn't go anywhere where it's normal and be surrounded by like normal people. I love going to church and having that fellowship and I love Steadfast Baptist Church and I love visiting the church plants and just being around like minded believers. And you know, in heaven, we get to be around all like minded believers and have great fellowship and we don't have to worry about Judas being there, we don't have to worry about some creep infiltrator freak or whatever. We just get to be with just all people that love the Lord and we're all in unity and we all are worshiping the Lord Jesus Christ with sight, our faith becomes sight. And you know, I think if you just let the Bible fall open, you're going to be encouraged, you know, unless you open to Jeremiah. But I mean, basically everywhere in the Bible, I mean, it's just going to be up, up and up. Yeah, if you're an atheist, life sucks and then you die. There you go. That's what you get for being an atheist. Then you go to hell, which is a lot worse than whatever you experienced. That sucks a little bit worse than life, I think. Yeah, a lot. We were on the same page. Gentlemen, we made it to the end. This is the finish line. How does it feel to have completed another live stream? Okay, everybody's very... Do I get a sticker for the back of my car like the little marathon people have all the time? Like two. I want the like, I voted sticker, but like I made it through Ben's live stream. There we go. I'll get those printed immediately. Thank you very much for doing this. If you didn't come on, it would have been just me rambling in front of my webcam and interacting with the live chat room. We wanted that and you saved me from having to do that tonight. So thanks for coming on. I appreciate it. Both of you all kidding aside, it always means a lot that you take the time out to do this for me. It is a favor. So Pastor, anything that you want to say to just close it out here before I disconnect? No, I really appreciate you having me on and I always look forward to coming on the broadcast and I appreciate your zeal and your desire to keep serving the Lord. And so I'm glad that I could be on here despite other people that like beans in their chili. I won't name any names, but I really enjoyed the broadcast otherwise. And so thanks so much. Vague booking here on the podcast. Nobody's perfect. So it's just one of those times as a Christian where we have to have grace and be, you know, how we tell people all the time, don't go to another, you know, church where they're, you know, uh, you know, pre-trib or something and cause a bunch of issues. Don't go to a church where the pastor's mistaken about beans and chili and, you know, gently guide him into the truth, you know, so, all right, well, you know, because I love his precepts, I hate every false way. And so, you know, I just, it was a burning inside my bones that just had to be let out. And once you discover the truth, you just want to manifest that to everyone else. You want to shine the light, but those that hate the, hate the truth, they never come to the light. You know, they just want to stay in darkness and I feel sad for them, but, uh, we're going to continue to share that light and we're going to take over Ben's broadcast. He said that we were going to, and he's going to try and control us. So we're going to have a video now at OKC about who, you know, I'm on what's I'm on the bean side. Obviously, this is where the debate needs to come into play and we need to have our appoints and contend earnestly for the chili that was once delivered to Texas. And so they get to make the rules. I don't know where Oklahoma gets their opinions, but they have no leg to stand on, frankly, so All right, folks, that's it for the podcast. Let me end with this announcement that I teased earlier for the next two episodes. Next week, episode 55. If you liked brother Cameron Hall here on the program, you're going to get to hear him again because we'll be talking about the church of Christ. We're going to excoriate them. We're going to dismantle their false doctrines and he's going to give us his personal testimony of getting saved and repenting of all of their garbage beliefs. Episode 56. Tune in for that one. That's October. Episode 55 is October the 19th and then episode 56 is October the 26th. Pastor Roger Jimenez will come on and Pastor Aaron Thompson to talk about Pastor Jimenez's recent sermon series, Mixing Politics and Religion. There are certain traditions that are woven into the fabric of Americana, if you will, that are really not biblical. So we'll talk about that and some other things on that episode, an epic roundtable discussion. The podcast always airs Monday nights at 8 p.m. Central, 9 p.m. Eastern Time. Go to BendtheBaptistKJV.com if you want to listen to every show that's ever been recorded. But until next time, for Pastor Jonathan Shelley and Brother Cameron Hall, both from Steadfast Baptist Church, this is Ben Naim signing off. I'm also a member of Steadfast Baptist Church, a steadfast stream tonight. We'll be back again next week. God bless you all. Thanks for listening. Subscribe to the channel for more. Don't forget to subscribe to the Steadfast Baptist Church YouTube channel as well to hear more of Pastor Shelley's sermons. They are excellent and you're missing out if you're not tuning in to them. Have a good one and I'll talk to you guys again after a while. God bless you, God bless you, God bless you, God bless you, God bless you, God bless you. God bless you, God bless you, God bless you, God bless you, God bless you. God bless you.