Transcript

Sermon Transcript: It's Time!

6/18/2023 Jeff Schwarzentraub 39 min read

Pastor Jeff:

Our Father in heaven, we give you all the glory, honor, and praise for who you are. And Lord, we thank you. Lord, we thank you for 148 souls that will never face a Christ-less eternity, but have welcomed you into their life through the power of your Holy Spirit, through repentance and faith. Lord, we pray that those children would grow up in the knowledge of the Lord, that they would help advance your kingdom on this side of heaven and that you would continue to grow your church. Father, we thank you for the ministry of your word. We believe that every time your word is faithfully and accurately proclaimed, Lord, that you have a word for us. And so, Lord, our prayer today is that you be helpful to me and you be helpful to all of us as we hear, that we would hear your voice loud and clear.

And so now for all of us who have gathered, who desire to hear the Lord, who will believe what the Lord says specifically to you and who will, by faith, put into practice what He shows you, will you agree with me very loudly this morning by saying the word, amen. Amen.

I'm fond of saying, so go the men. So goes the church, so goes the church, so goes the world. If you want to change the world, you need godly men to change the world. The greatest example of a godly man is the Lord Jesus Christ. When He came to the world, if there's one relationship you want to study, and if there's one person that He cared about more than any other, it was His dad. From the very time that he was a young boy, we see His family traveling back to Galilee from Jerusalem and they realize Jesus isn't with them, so they make their way back down to Jerusalem and they find Him in the temple and they say, "Son, where were you?" And what does He say? "Did you not know I needed to be in my Father's house?" We see Him grow in wisdom, knowledge, and stature, but throughout His entire earthly ministry, He's always wanting to spend time with His dad.

Mark 1:35 says, very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up and went to solitary places where there He prayed. He was seeking His father early in the morning. We see after He fed the 5,000, He's up on a mountainside praying all night long before He walks on the water and calms the storm and takes the disciples to the other side. Even before He selected His 12 apostles out of all of His disciples, he stayed up all night praying to His dad. When it came His time to be betrayed and go to the cross, He's in the garden of Gethsemane. What do we find Him doing? He's talking with His dad. He wants to spend time with His dad. On the cross, who's He talking with? He's talking to His dad. "Father, forgive them for they do not know what they do. Father, into your hands, I commit my spirit."

And right now He's even standing at the ready waiting to hear the words of His dad saying, "Go get my people." And that's when He'll come back. He still listens to His dad. He loves His dad. He loves Him so much that even when He was leaving and He told his disciples, "I'm going to prepare a place for you, but I will come back for you." And they said, "Well, where are you going to go?" And He says, "Well, I'm going to heaven." They goes, "Well, how do we know how to get there?" He said, "I am the way, the truth and life. No one comes to the Father except through me." He's like, "Well, just show us the Father. That'll be enough." And here's what He says. "If you've seen me, you've seen my Father. I and the Father are one."

When we see our God in the Bible, we see God as all-powerful. He's omnipotent. He created everything out of nothing. We see that God is everywhere. He's omnipresent. We see God as all-knowing. He's omniscient. Our God, our Father is perfect. And even in Jesus Christ's ministry, when people were trying to talk about what God was like, He was saying, "First of all, I am God and I know my Father and I can tell you exactly what He's like." And he spends time in Luke chapter 15 telling three stories about a lost coin, a lost sheep, and two lost sons.

And He talks about how His father is compassionate and slow to anger and merciful and not willing that any would perish, but that all would come to the knowledge of Him. And yet we see that the Father is also defined as a consuming fire. The Father is one who doesn't tolerate evil, the Father is one who punishes sin. All these things are true about the Father. And so today what I want to do is not just talk about fatherhood, I want to talk specifically to the men. On Mother's Day This year I went through Proverbs 31 and gave a message specifically to the women. And this year I want to give a message specifically to the men because I believe God created two genders. I think both are equal in God's sight, both are distinct and unique and have both equal value. And I think we need to address the men as well.

And the reason we need to address the men is because of what I said. So go the men, so goes the church, so goes the church, so goes the world. If we don't have godly men, we have no hope in this world. We need to have hope in this world. Statistics will just tell you how bad it is. If you just look across the landscape and you do a study, you'll realize that over 99% of the rapes are caused by a man. 96% of mass shootings are men. 89% of murders, men, 87% of robberies, men. And so what people begin to say is, "Oh, the men are the problem in the society. It's toxic masculinity. We can't have men be men. We need to feminize men." No, we don't need to feminize men. We need godly men. We need godly men and we need men to be men the same way women are called to be women.

I tell women, be as feminine as you want to be. Be the fullness of a woman if that's what God created you. But men, be the fullness of all that God created you to be. And here's the problem. From the time I was a young boy growing up in the church, the church was the one place that I would come where I didn't see strong, godly men. Saw them in the business world, saw them in the athletic world, saw them in the academic world, didn't find them in church. Found very feminized, effeminate men that didn't lead. I was never attracted to Christ because I didn't see men going after Jesus the way I saw them going after something else. We want men going after Jesus. We want men leading for Him. And now is the time, now is the time to do this. Our culture is on the verge of an entire collapse.

We need men to step forward and do something. People are waiting for men to step forward and do something. Everybody in here has been hurt by a man, just so you know. Every woman in here has been hurt by at least one man, if not multiple men. Every guy has been hurt by a man. Because when men don't live the way they're called to live, the wound that it leaves is significant. So the answer is not getting rid of men, the answer is not making men feminine. The answer is training godly men to be godly so that men can be the fullness of what Jesus Christ wants them to be as their gender. And that's what we want to talk about today because now is the time because the world is waiting for men to stand up.

I heard a story a number of years ago about a pastor that was on vacation when his sons were little. They were about the age of 10, eight, and three. And he told them as they were on the fishing dock, as he was going back to get some more life jackets and utensils and stuff for the boat, just watch your younger brother, keep an eye on him, keep an eye on him. And while he was back there, he heard his two older boys scream, "Dad, come. Hurry." And the dad came running around the corner and noticed a three-year-old boy had fallen in the lake and immediately he went into action. He didn't stop and pray about what should I do. He just went and dove after his son because his three-year-old son didn't know how to swim and he dove down and started looking, but the water was all muddy and he couldn't see anybody and he was floating around trying to see where he was and he was running out of breath.

So he came up, took a deep breath and went back down under saying, "If I never come back up, I'm going to find my son." And sure enough, right before he was about ready to run out of air, he felt a boy. He felt his son and his son had been wrapped around the dock. He was just like holding on. And so he grabbed him and pulled him off and brought him to oxygen. They laid out on the dock for a second and just shock. Son was okay, he was okay. About five minutes later, he looked at his three-year-old son. He said, "What in the world were you doing holding onto the pole?" He said, "Dad, I was just waiting for you. Just waiting for you." There's a world out there just waiting for men to be who God called you to be, that are dying without your leadership. And that's what we want to address today.

If you have your Bible, I want to encourage you to open your Bible to First Corinthians chapter 16. First Corinthians chapter 16. We're going to look in verses 13 and 14. It's the last chapter in the Book of First Corinthians that Paul writes to a church that he's encouraging, that knows the Lord, but they're not living it out, they're not godly and he's exhorting them at the end and telling them, "Here's how I want you to live." And as he's saying these words to them, they're applicable to all the people, men, women, boys and girls. But I'm specifically making application today to the men. Here's what he writes. "Be on the alert. Stand firm in the faith. Act like men. Be strong. Let all that you do be done in love." "Be on the alert. Stand firm in the faith. Act like men. Be strong. Let all that you do be done in love."

It's time men, it's time for us to be everything that God wants us to be. It's time for us to let Jesus Christ empower everything that we need to be. And there's five truths I want to talk about from this text that it's time for us. And the first is this, wake up. Wake up. It's time to engage. Wake up. It's time to engage. Notice what he says. Be on the alert. What's that mean? Stand at the ready. Be vigilant. Notice the signs of the times. See what's going on. Stay awake, be alert. Remember when Jesus went into the garden of Gethsemane and He took three of His disciples along with Him and said, "Hey, stay alert. Be on the ready." Jesus knew He was about ready to be arrested. And what happened to these disciples?

As Jesus goes off to pray knowing that He's about ready to go to the cross and He's sweating drops of blood, that He's praying so hard and so stressed out and He goes back and finds His three main disciples and what are they doing? They're asleep at the wheel. And Jesus said, "Could you not just stay awake with me for at least an hour? All I'm asking is an hour. I'm about ready to die. Pray with me." Beyond the alert. It means, wake up. Men, listen to me. Wake up. Look at what's going on in our woke culture and wake up. Here's what you need to realize. When it comes to the gospel of Jesus Christ, heaven and hell are eternal realities. It is very, very real. When people die, they either go to live with Christ permanently or be separated from Christ in an eternal hell permanently. That's reality.

So when you see things going on in your family, in schools, in our culture, in your neighborhood, it's not enough to just say, well, that's good for them. It's not good for me and I'm going to be ... Wake up. If you don't engage and get involved in what's going on and share the gospel, these very people will spend eternity apart from Christ in hell. And who's He called to lead? You. God wants us to engage our culture with Christ. God wants us to lead in our culture for Christ. God wants us to stand up for Him for Christ. That's what He wants. Wake up, because oftentimes we're just like the disciples. We see things in the news, we hear things that are going on and here's what we begin to think. Yeah, my wife does the devotions with our kids. Yeah, that's the PTA's job. That's the HOA's job. I'm busy with my job. I'm not getting involved in any of that stuff. If I say anything, I'm going to get attacked. I might lose my job. I'm just going to go to sleep.

Wake up. If those of you who know Christ go to sleep, there's no hope for the world. Only men that wake up can change the world. Now, I have great hope because I believe with my whole heart, believe with my whole heart that if men will stand up and be who God called them to be, cities will change, cultures will change, nations can change. That's why Jesus told us to go into all the world, all right. If I didn't believe that, I'd quit today. What's the point? Jesus Christ died for all of our sins and rose from the dead. Through repentance and faith, you can have a relationship with Him. If it stops there, I've already told you all the good news. I'm telling you to get engaged in the battle. Be involved in it. Do what Christ calls you to do.

Wake up. You can't be asleep at the wheel and call your yourself a man of God. Spiritually wake up. Jesus said this. Jesus said, "Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction and many are on it. But narrow is the gate and small is the road that leads to life and few people find it." What does that mean? It means the majority of the people that you know are going to hell. Just think about it. Think about your friends at work, think about your friends at school. If they haven't repented of their faith and are walking in the truths of Jesus, they will go to hell. According to the word of God, they will. According to Jesus, they will. That should bother us. That should bother us.

Christ wants us to share the gospel. Christ wants us to wake up. Christ wants us to engage in our culture. He says be on the alert. We need to be on the alert against Satan's schemes. We need to be on the alert against false teachers. We need to be on the alert against our cultural wokeness. We need to be on the alert against anything that would go contrary to the word of God. It means, men, wake up. Wake up, it's time to engage. You can't just sit by passively and say, "My time's passed. I'm already retired. You know what, I've got all these other things going on." There's nothing more important than the kingdom of God and Christ's righteousness in your life.

Wake up. It's time to engage. Be on the alert. Then he says this, "Stand firm in the faith. Stand firm in the faith." If Christ is calling you to wake up, the second thing He's calling you to do is stand up. Stand up. It's time to protect. Stand up, stand firm in the faith. It's time to protect. Now, stand up means this. Stand up means to offer resistance to somebody or something. It means to refuse to abandon one's opinions or beliefs. If you believe it here, you better believe it out there. Standing firm means, I'm believing it here and I'm not giving up any ground out there. Why? Because the earth is the Lord's and everything in it.

When the world tells you, shut up, that's a church thing. That's a separation between church and state, you proclaim it even louder that Jesus is Lord, whether you want to believe it or not. You don't have the ability to make Jesus Lord, Jesus is Lord. You have the ability to respond to Him as Lord, but you can't make Him Lord. I'm here to tell you He's Lord, He's always been Lord. He'll always be Lord and He's Lord over all. He's Lord over our nation. He's Lord over our schools. He's Lord over your neighborhood. He's Lord over your family. He is the Lord.

In the first century, Caesar was Lord. In our generation, we give lordship to all sorts of other agencies, government and school. No, Jesus Christ is Lord. He has all authority. And men, not only wake up, but would you stand up? Stand up at work, stand up on the golf course, stand up with your friends, stand up with your enemies. Stand up. Because if you really believe it, then live it, because we need to protect what's going on that God wants to protect. You say, well, what do we need to protect? We need to protect kids. We do. We need to protect our churches that they're true, and we need to protect the deity and the lordship of Jesus Christ. That's what He talked about when he was here. Did Jesus care about kids? He said, "Let the little children come to me for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these."

In Matthew 18, here's what he said to those who are hurting kids, to those who are taking kids in the wrong direction, Matthew 18:6 says, "But whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to stumble, it would be better for him to have a heavy millstone hung around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea." Is that clear? You know what a millstone is? It's hundreds of pounds of a weight. Here's what He's saying. If any kid would want to come after me and you're leading them in a different direction, it would be better for you to drown yourself than do that because the hottest places of hell are for people like you. Now, that's not politically correct because no Christian can be politically correct. You preach the gospel.

When you have schools and woke agenda that are more into indoctrination than education, you speak up against it. You stand firm with it. That's what we're called to do. Well, who's called to do that? My wife's on the PTA. No, you as a man, you're called to do that. When school boards have their meeting, men, you should be the one showing up telling them what to change. The reason that people keep pushing back is there's no one there standing up. All you have to do is stand firm and they won't push any longer. Why? Because all authority in heaven and earth has been given to you. And Jesus said, "I will build my church and even the gates of hell will not prevail against it."

You have all the power you need in Christ to stand firm. Stand firm for our kids. You as parents get to decide where you want to send your kids. I could say a lot about that, but that's your decision as parents. But here's the truth, you better speak up about what's being taught to your kids and you better tell people it's wrong to promote an agenda that goes against the word of God, because that's what Jesus would do if He was here. And what about religiosity? People that call themselves by the name of Christ that aren't Christians. I don't care about your denominational background. We have people from every kind of denominational background and no denominational background doesn't even know what a denomination is that come to Brave.

The gospel is this. It's Jesus Christ plus nothing. That's the gospel. God sent His only son, Jesus Christ. He is the Lord of all. He died on a cross. He rose from the dead and through repentance of your sin and turning to Christ, you can have life in Him. That's it. There is no other way you say, "Well, what do you say about the word?" I believe everything in the word of God is true from Genesis 1:1 through Revelation 22:21, all of this book is true. When somebody starts talking from a pulpit or Bible study or anywhere else and say, "Yeah, well I know it says that, but let's not pay attention to those, but let's go on in here." I'm done with them. Done. If you don't want all the book, don't take any of the book. Jesus said, "If you're ashamed of me and my words, I will be ashamed of you when I come." Shame on you for not preaching the word. Shame on you for not believing the word.

And here's what people say. "Well, Pastor Jeff, if you preach the entirety of the word, you're going to offend a lot of people and people that would come to church might not come because they'll be offended." They're already rebelling and going to hell. I don't care. I want them saved. Hey, Pastor Jeff, when I taught on Genesis and Revelation, when I taught on Genesis in Genesis one, that God created the world in six literal days and created two genders, male and female, and they created one race, I had people write me and say, "You can't just say that because there's a lot of Christians out there that believe that God didn't create the world in six literal days, and if you say that, you're going to turn off all the scientists out there." To which I said, "I don't care what other people think about how God created the world. I care what God thinks about how He created the world and God believes He created the world in six literal days and rested on the seventh. So that's what I'm going to preach, and if you don't like it, you can take it up with God when you get there."

God created two genders. He created male and female and both have equal value in the sight of God and both are distinctly different with distinct roles as to how they should function in the church, in the home, and in the community. God created one race. It doesn't matter what your skin color is, we all came from Adam and Eve. You say, "How can you say that?" Because that's what the Bible teaches. I'm not making political statements. I'm making truth statements about what Jesus teaches. And if we don't engage in that fight, we keep giving up ground, we're not going to have anything to stand on. Don't tell me, all we care about is that Jesus died and rose. That's not all I care about. This is who He is. Everything in here reveals who He is.

I love it all, even the stuff I don't understand. It's the word of God. When Jesus was talking to the Pharisees, was He polite? Was He politically correct? Read Matthew 23 sometime. "Woe to you. Woe to you. Woe to you. Woe to you. Woe to you. You travel over the whole earth to win a single convert, and when you do, you make them twice as much of a son of hell as you are. You clean the outside, but inside you are whitewashed tombs. You're dead man's bones. You're wicked. You diligently study the scriptures because you think that in them you have life. Yet I'm standing right here before you and yet you refuse to come to me to have life. You children of hell, you brood of vipers." Who is He telling that to? Nice religious people that were leading people away from the truth. Did Jesus stand firm? Oh yeah, He stood up. That's why He got killed.

How about Mark chapter 14, verse 62, where the high priest is questioning Him. "Are you the Christ? Are you really deity are? You mean you claim you're the son of God, but maybe you're one of the sons of God and we're all sons of God. Are you the Christ? Are you really God?" And Jesus wasn't answering him and the high priest said, "You're not going to answer? Are you the Christ?" And in Mark 14:62, Jesus gives His answer. Here's what He says. Are you the Christ? Here's what Jesus says, "I am." Remember where that comes from in Exodus chapter three, the one that was speaking to Moses in the bush. That's the one that's talking to you right now. I am and you will see the son of man sitting at the right hand of power and coming with the clouds of heaven. He quotes Daniel. What's He saying? Here's the irony here.

You're asking me if I'm God, I am. I've always been. I created you. You're trying to judge me for being who I am. Here's the irony. Next time you see me, I'll be coming to judge you and the entire world. Was He politically correct? High priest tore his robe. That's what caused His crucifixion. We must protect the deity of Christ. We must protect the church against false teachers. We must protect our children. It's not an option. It's not an option. We must wake up and be engaged. We must stand up because it's time to protect. I don't think these are political issues. Abortion is not a political issue. It's not a political issue.

Now, before I talk about this, I want you to know something. I know there are hundreds plus people, women here at Brave that have had abortions. I want you to know something. Our God is so loving and so forgiving that in Christ His shed, blood washes all of that clean. His blood has the ability to make everything new, that you don't have to live under the guilt and shame of all of that. But that doesn't change His standard. Women do not have a right to choose to murder. They don't. Men do not have a right to choose to murder. Abortion is murder. You say, "That's just political." Well, 150 years ago, if I would've stood up and said, slavery's immoral, it needs to stop. People would've said, you're just being political. Now, nobody would argue that. They would all say, slavery's terrible. I can't believe we hung onto it that long. Abortion's terrible. I can't believe we're hanging onto it that long.

Children are a blessing. Marriage, according to the Bible, marriage is between a man and a woman. There are only two genders. The first command in the Bible is to be fruitful and multiply. If you have the same sex, you can't be fruitful and multiply. You can't even obey the first command God puts in the Bible. There's no such thing as civil unions. There's no such thing as homosexual marriage. There's marriage because God designed it between a male and a female till death do they part. That's marriage. That's not political. I don't care what political party you belong to. I care that we stand on the truth of God's word. That's what God says.

How about gender? I don't care what the world says. They think there's like, I don't know how many genders people think there are. There's two. Whatever you were in utero is whatever you will be no matter how many drugs or surgeries you have. You will always be what you were in utero, period. Full stop. Why do I care about it so much? Because I know that people that go through gender transition and all those different things are multiple times more likely to commit suicide, multiple times more likely to be depressed. Why? Because you can't go against what God created and be happy. Doesn't work. I care about you enough to tell you that. I value human life on both sides at birth and at death.

I value freedom of speech. All these things are in God's word. Stand up, men. If you say you believe them, you can't just sit and clap in church and say, yeah, I believe that. If you're not doing anything out there, you're fake and you're a coward. Get involved. Wake up, it's time to engage. Stand up, it's time to protect. Isn't it interesting in Ephesians chapter six where he tells us to put on the full armor of God? What does he say? Ephesians 6:11, "Put on the full armor of God so you'll be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil." First Peter 5:9, he tells us to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. What's the devil want to do? The devil wants to take ground. The devil knows the world and every place in it belongs to the Lord and what's he do? He lies to people to say, no, this is my ground. I get to do whatever I want however I want.

Jesus says, no. Everything belongs to me. I have all authority over all things, and if you truly believe in me, speak it. Live it. Stand up to it. Don't back down. Don't retreat. Don't run around. Don't be a coward. You stand firm. Men, I'm telling you, it's time to stand up. You can't watch what's going on in our culture and be a Christian man and be passive. It's time to stand up. Now, if you're called to wake up and stand up, what's the third thing He calls us to do? I love this part. I like it all, by the way, can you tell? Be on the alert, stand firm in the faith. What's the next three words? Act like men. If you're going to wake up and stand up, I'm going to tell you this, man up. Man up. It's time to lead.

Got any Texans in here? Cowboy up. All right. Speak your language. It's time to man up and be a man. You're being called up. Now, these words, act like men, are one word in our Bible. You know what act like men really means? Be courageous. I think we'll say it like this here. Be brave. Acting like a man means to be brave. What does it mean to be brave? We use words like bold, resolute, authentic, virtuous, and engaged. Be bold in your faith. If you're really trusting Jesus, then here's my question. What are you trusting Him for? Where are you being bold in your faith? What are you trusting Him to do that if He doesn't come through, you're in trouble? How are you trusting Him with your money? How are you trusting Him with your family? How are you trusting Him with your kids? How are you trusting Him with your job?

When's the last time you took a step of faith and said, "I know I'm being prompted. I don't even know how to do this. I don't know why God's having me do it, but I'm going to do what God told me to do because I'm bold in my faith." That's what it means to act like a man. Being resolute in your identity. What does that mean? That means what God says about me in His word is completely true about me and I'm going to take ownership of it. I'm completely forgiven. I'm completely loved. The devil has no power over me. In Christ, I have all authority. I'm chosen. I'm special. All those things because Christ is in me are true of me. Being a man means I'm going to take hold of the word of God and believe that what God says about me is true even when the enemy lies and says it's not.

What about being authentic? Authentic in relationships. Authentic means this. I am who I am at all times and all places the same. I'm the same here as I am in my family. I'm the same in my family as I am at work. I'm the same at work as I am in my neighborhood. I'm the same in my neighborhood as I am on the golf course. I'm consistently authentic. If there's something I don't like here, I'll tell you I don't like it there. I'm not a Christian chameleon where I act a certain way at church and I act a different way at home and I act a different way with my friends and I act ... I'm authentic. What you see is what you get. That's what it means to be a man.

What about virtuous? Virtuous in character. It means I'm growing in Christ's likeness by obeying His commands more and more, not perfectly, but increasingly. I want what Christ wants. I want to grow like Christ wants me to grow. I want to be who Christ wants me to be. I want to be virtuous in character. And E, I want to be engaged in the mission. If Jesus Christ put me here and decided this was the time and space for me to live and these were the gifts that He gave me, I want to exercise them all for His glory through the church and through the world as long as God gives me life. I want to be on mission for Him. That's what it means to act like a man. It's not machismo. It's not how much you can lift. It's not how many cars you can fix. It's not even if you have a toolbox. I can say that on authority. It's who you are in Christ and how you're living for Him.

Because men tend to go two ways when they don't have Christ, they tend to get abusive and be bullying or what happens most times in the church, they get really, really passive. They're milk toast. They're cowards. They don't stand up for anything. Their wives lead everything. Their children do everything. They might provide a paycheck if they're lucky, but they just kind of sit around and do nothing and both are abuses of what it means to be a man. Being a godly man means I'm going to man up and be who God wants me to be and reflect His glory into every sphere of influence that I have. In my church, I'm a man. I'm called to lead in my church. In my home, I'm the head of my home. I'm called to lead like Christ wants me to lead. I'm going to elevate my wife and my kids. In my job, I'm called to lead for Christ wherever He's given me employment. In my neighborhood, I'm called to lead for Christ because this is the ground He's given me to lead.

That's what it means to be a man all the time. Not that we do it perfectly, but that we desire it and that we want to grow in it. Man up. It's time to lead. I want to tell you something. Oftentimes we think when we watch, I had the privilege of being a starting quarterback and I had the unfortunate situation of being a backup, so I've been on the field and I've been on the sideline. Much prefer to be on the field, but on the sideline you can hide. You can't hide when you're in the game. On kingdom soil, there is no sideline. When you got connected to the Lord Jesus Christ, you got put in the game. You're in the game, so act like a man. Now, the Septuagint, which is the Greek transliteration of the Hebrew Old Testament that was written, was first produced, you'll see that word act like men show up all over the place.

I'll give you an example in Joshua chapter one, when he's taken into the promised land where it says in your Bible be strong and courageous, which is a correct translation, here's what it would read literally. He's telling Joshua, be strong and act like a man. Only be strong and very much act like a man. Have I not commanded you, be strong and act like a man? That's how He was talking to Joshua. Act like a man. Acting like a man means to have the courage of the Lord on the inside to lead God's people in the way that you want them to go. And when men lead, the world changes. And I'm not talking about outside prowess. When the Lord called Gideon and the angel came and said, "Mighty warrior." Gideon's a wimp according to the world standards, but not with God. God saw him as a mighty warrior. God even saw him as so powerful that he could trim his army down to 300 and God was going to show him victory to show him just how mighty in the Lord he was.

Manning up is not out of my own strength. Manning up is under the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ so that I can live out the full values of everything the Bible teaches me that I need to be. That's what it means to be a man. And now's the time. I remember talking to my wife when we were first married. She was in a Bible study with about 200 ladies that were doing different small groups. And I remember asking her, we lived in central Illinois. I said, "What do you think would happen if another a hundred women joined your Bible study?" She said, "I don't even know what you mean." I'm like, "Well, if you had a hundred more women, what would go on?" She's like, "Well, we'd have 300."

And I said, "Yeah, I know the math, but what would happen?" She's like, "I don't know what you mean. We'd just have more godly women, I guess." I said, "That's great." I said, "You know what would happen if we had 300 men that were living for God completely? Our whole city would change." Because men are called to get involved and unfortunately the gospel has been relegated to just an intellectual ascent to I believe in Jesus and do nothing when the gospel is a call to be on the kingdom soil to advance Christ's kingdom on this side of heaven. You look at the great movements in church history. One of them was the Methodist movement, which is no longer a great movement because I was part of it and got out, but at one point it was, when John Wesley was the founder.

Here's what he said, "Give me 100 preachers who fear nothing but sin and desire nothing but God and I care not a straw, whether they be clergymen or laymen, such alone will shake the gates of hell and set up the kingdom of heaven on earth." Do you know why I love preaching to the men at Brave? Because I love you. We have some of the most special godly men that come here. This is not a rebuke, I'm preaching to myself while I'm preaching to you because I want to be the fullness of everything God wants me to be and I want you to be the fullness of everything God wants you to be when you exit this building. So when people see men from Brave, they're like, "Oh, that's that group that truly lives for the Lord. That's godly, that's responsible, that speaks the truth and does it in love. Man, that's an incredible group of men." That's what I want. That's what you want. That's why you're here. Amen.

But now's the time. God's called you to lead. He's called you to lead in your family, by the way. Men, I'm telling you, if you're the husband of a wife, bless her with your words. If you have children, bless them with your words. It doesn't take much of a reading through the Old Testament to see how there was always a fight to see who was going to get the blessing. There's something special about a dad speaking words of life over his children. It's not enough just to show it, you got to speak it. It's called a blessing. A blessing is spoken. Speak the blessing. I'll tell you how important it's because I know there's people here 80, 90 years old that didn't get the blessing spoken over them, and there's still an emptiness in your heart saying, I wish I would've had a dad that told me how special I was.

Well, why that emptiness? Because the way God designed it and the way God set it up for families is for godly men to be the one speaking blessing into his kids' lives. If you have sons, speak blessing into their life, show them their future. If you have daughters, speak blessing into their life and show them their future. If you have a wife, speak blessing into her life and show her how special she is and how you're better because she's in your life. Now, I'm not preaching this because I do it perfectly. It would only take a short conversation with my wife, daughters, and son to be like, "He ain't perfect, trust me." But part of being a godly man then is going back when you're not and saying, I need to ask your forgiveness because the way I spoke to you or the way I acted, that was wrong, that was not in alignment of who I am as a Christian man, and I need to tell you, I'm sorry and this, will you forgive me? That's being godly too.

God doesn't call you to be perfect, only He's perfect. God calls you to grow into perfection. God calls you to be that kind of man. Bless your kids. Everybody else is telling them stuff. Dads, you have more influence in their life than any other person on the planet. Even when you think they're not listening, they're listening. Even when you think they're not watching, they're watching. Bless your family, bless your wife. Bless your kids. Men, wake up. Stand up and man up. It is time.

Now, if you're going to wake up, stand up and man up, let me tell you the fourth one that you need to do. Let's look at the text. It says, "Be on the alert, stand firm in the faith, act like men." Then it says this, "Be strong." Be strong means this. Rise up. Rise up. It's time to fight. Rise up. It's time to fight. I know it doesn't sound like a churchy thing to say and the reason it doesn't sound like a churchy thing to say is our church in North America has become so feminized that men can't really be men anymore in the church. It's hard. But when I read stories in the Bible, I get pretty fired up about the stories in the Bible because I see men being men. Remember when David killed Goliath? Anybody ever heard of that story before? I love that story as a guy. At our warrior night, I preached that story for an hour. I love that story.

In a cursory reading, what you find is, it wasn't David's power, it was God's power through David. He said, "You come at me with javelin in spirit. I come at you in the name of the Lord Almighty. Today, I'm handing you over." Gets five stones, only needed one. Hit him in the head and we think, well, that's the end of the story. He killed him with a slingshot. He didn't read on. You know how he killed him? He stood over him, pulled out the sword from this 10-foot giant and cut off his head. Yeah! That's being a man. It's cool that you have Precious Moment figurines. Find me that Precious Moment figurine, I'll put it in my office.

See, we've trained men to say, when you fight evil, it's wrong to think that it's wrong. Evil is wrong. It's always wrong. It will always be wrong, and you have to fight against it. If you're going to stand up, you're going to have to fight. And this is what He says. Think about it. God is the one that always does the work, but God always calls men to do something. When Noah, who was living in the most wicked generation ever in the history of the world, because when he preached for 120 years, only eight people got saved and God asked him to do what? Build an ark. Noah didn't just pray about it and say, "Well, Lord, I guess if you want an ark, you'll provide one and we'll walk into it." "No, you build the ark, you do the work, you get ready. I want to see your faith." So Noah and his sons constructed the ark. They had to build it in such a way that the world would say, "Why are you building this huge ship? What's going to happen?"

Well, it's going to rain and flood. No way. Until it did. But God had Noah build the ark. God had David slay Goliath. Could God not have put Goliath down? Sure he could have. What about Joshua? We read about Joshua in the Book of Exodus. He was Moses's right hand man. He was with him all the time. He was in the presence of God. After they got 40 years in the wilderness, and God calls Joshua to go into the promised land. What does he do? He tells him to consecrate yourselves today, for tomorrow the Lord's going to do great things among you. He didn't say, "God, if you want to part the Jordan, we'll kind of walk through. God, if you want ..." He said, "No. You take the priest, you put him out front. You go to dip your foot in the water, it'll be gone. Just go." And within days, Joshua took 2 million people across When it had taken him 40 years. Could God have gotten them across by himself? Yeah, he could have teleported the Israelites across. God chooses a man to do it.

Or how about Elijah? Don't you love the story of Elijah against the prophets of Baal? We don't think about that story because that was Old Testament where God was really mean and brutal and killed people. Have you read the Book of Revelation? Have you seen what's coming for the wicked? That's a warmup. That's an appetizer for God's fury and wrath that's coming on the planet. And Elijah was testing the prophets of Baal. 450 of these men. Said let's have a little showcase, showdown, shall we? "You build an altar, I'll build an altar. You call on your god, I'll call on my God. Whoever sends fire, we'll know that that's the God." So they built theirs first. And all morning, what do they do? They begin to call on their god. They begin to get serious, screaming. They got so serious, they ended up cutting themselves to show their god that they were bleeding blood. All the while, you know what Elijah's doing? He's taunting them. He's like, "Well, maybe your god's not hearing. Maybe he's deaf. Or maybe he's busy", which is a Hebrew euphemism for maybe he's in the toilet. "Maybe you need to call louder." He's taunting them and nothing happens.

Then it's Elijah's turn. Elijah wants to make sure that they know that it's God when it happens. So not only does he put the sacrifice on there, but he drenches it in water so there's no kindling, there's no indication that anything would even light. There's water all in the trench, and then he calls on the Lord and in about three sentences, prays a prayer and God sends fire from heaven that not only consumes the sacrifice, but it licks up the water in the trench so it's perfectly dry. And everybody knows He's God, our god's false. But it doesn't stop there. They go and slay 450 prophets of Baal. Why, because preaching a false gospel is damnedable and it's wrong, and we need to put a stop to it.

Now, if you're hearing me, understand this, we're going to talk about this in the next point. God doesn't call us to kill anybody. Do you know that? He doesn't call us to kill anybody. He calls us to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us, but we should stand up and say they're wrong. What they're saying is wrong. I have no tolerance for what they're saying. They're leading people to hell and they need to shut their mouth. What's wrong with that if it's true? If you don't say it, it means I don't care about the people that are leading to hell because I don't care about Christ and I don't care about His church, and I don't care about what He wants. Paul cared about it. That's why he called people out by name. Jesus cared about it. I care about it. Guys, it's time to fight. When God calls you, it's time to get in the game.

God called Moses to go to Pharaoh. He didn't want to go, but went. God called Joshua to take the people in, God called David to kill Goliath, God called John the Baptist to announce Christ's coming. God called John the Baptist to tell Herod that he was wrong in what he was doing, which cost him his very life. God called Peter to preach the word to the Jews and Paul to take it to the Gentiles, and many of your New Testament apostles that were all martyred, died as enemies of the state because they said Jesus was Lord and Caesar's not. These are our founding fathers of the faith. Amen. They were brave. They rose up. They knew when it was time to fight. It's time to get in the game. Wake up, stand up, man up, rise up.

And then verse 14, "Be on the alert, stand firm in the faith, act like men. Be strong. Let all you do be done in love." Let all that you do be done in love. You cannot do this apart from Christ, otherwise, you'll end up doing it in the flesh and it will have no prevailing value. We have to do it in love. Why, because that's what Jesus taught us. He said the greatest commandment was this, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength and love your neighbor as yourself." He said, "Love God. Pursue God. Give God all your best and then love all of His creation and everybody in it." Well, what about when people are mean to me and they persecute me and they say all kinds of evil? Rejoice and be glad because your reward is great in heaven and love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, but still stand firm and still man up and still wake up and still get ready to fight. But love him. Love him.

What does the Apostle John tell us? This is love. Not that we love God, but that He loved us and sent His son as an atoning sacrifice for our sin. First John 4:10, Jesus, when we were enemies of His, Jesus, when we were rebelling against him, Jesus, when we were steeped in our sin, what did He do? He came and proclaimed, He came and lived. He came and did everything I'm talking about and then did this. He gave up His very life so that we who were dead could be transformed into His glorious image. He takes dead things and makes them alive. That's what Jesus does. We love because why, He first loved us.

You say, "What about all these other groups out there that are doing these things?" You can be against what they're doing. You can be against their satanic ideology. You can speak out against it. You can tell them that they're wrong, but it always has to come from a heart of love. It always has to come from the heart that you actually care about them because if you don't, you'll be callous and all you're going to be is white noise. Friends, I'm telling you, it doesn't matter who gets elected, God's still on the throne. He's still on the throne. Amen.

Political leaders matter. We should vote for those that most align with who we are. There should be opinions on that, dialogue on that. We should be able to discuss that. That's fine. We don't even all have to agree on that, but here's what we need to agree on. We need to agree that Jesus Christ is Lord and we need to love Him and love other people. And being loving to other people doesn't mean agreeing with their sin. It means I love you enough, I'll embrace you. I'll serve you, but I love you enough to tell you that you're wrong and there's a consequence for how you're living because I love you enough to tell you that because nobody else is, they're just celebrating your sin. It's time for us to love. We have to look up. That's why being part of a local church that serves the Lord, that preaches His word, that engages people in prayer, that sends people out on mission to do His bidding, to be on mission for Him is so important for every single man.

Look up, look up. It's time to love. I don't know if you can tell this morning, but I'm pretty fired up about this topic. We had a warrior night back in the spring. We had about a thousand guys. We're doing a conference this fall. I think we'll double that because I think God's doing something special here with our men. Just a word to the single men here who are here today, okay? If you're of the 0.0001%, that's called the celibacy. Praise God for you. But if you're not, would you be a man and get married and would you love a wife? Would you have children and raise them in the knowledge of the Lord? That's the way the tide's going to get turned. That's what Jesus is calling you to do. That's called responsibility. That's called being a man.

Every single girl here wants a man like what I'm just describing, that will love them and their family like that, that will lead for them and their family in the world. Women, am I telling the truth or not? And in the same way that we as men don't demand women to be perfect because only Jesus is perfect, they're not demanding you to be perfect because you're not perfect, but they want to see you growing in that. They want to see that you're not afraid to speak the truth, not only inside a safe church building, but out in the culture that says, you're crazy. No, I'm not crazy. I'm Christian. I'm not celebrating the woke madness in our world because regardless of what political party you're of, it's wrong and Jesus hates it, and Jesus has died for every single person on the planet so they could have life, and Jesus wants you to have life. Jesus wants you to be the man that God called you to be.

Boys, I'm looking at a lot of young boys out here. God wants you to grow into this kind of man. This is who He's calling you to. That's why a tuning fort goes off in your heart when you hear a message like this saying, that's who I am. That's who I want to be, I just needed to have somebody tell me I could be that. And I'm telling you, there's men and women and boys and girls out in this world that are waiting for you, that are saying, "I'm just waiting for you, dad. I was just waiting for you to step forward and show me in my neighborhood and in my job, and in my school and in my community, and in my church, what it looked like to be a godly man so that I could step up too." That's what he's waiting for.

So men in the same way that we celebrated women on Mother's Day, I want to end by celebrating you today. If you're a boy or a man that's here today, would you just please stand so we can give you honor? Amen. Stay standing if you would. Amen. We love you guys. You see, some of you that are standing may feel today like you're not good enough to be standing in church. I got good news for you. Jesus Christ died because He knew all those sins. No matter how far you've gone, no matter how far you've blown it, through repentance and faith in Jesus, He can restore all the years that the locusts have eaten. He can bring back relationships. He can do neat things in your life you didn't think. And everything that God's put on your heart, He who calls you as faithful, He will surely do it. So what I want to do today is just pray for you men. Pray for you boys that are growing into men, that you would be the kind of man that the scripture is talking about.

If you're here with your husband, you want to hold his hand, or you have daughters or sons, they want to hold your dad's hand and put your hand on them or something like that where they're at, feel free to do that. I'm just going to pray for these men and just ask God, as we pray a blessing over all these guys. Father in heaven, would you do a work today? Do a work in our hearts because, Lord, what we want to be and who we are sometimes are two different kinds of people. But Lord, when we hear your word, we say, that's the kind of man I'm called to be. That's who I want to be. Lord, these men are standing because they want to be a reflection of the Lord Jesus Christ. Lord, every single man or boy standing knows that we've come up short. Every single man or boy standing knows that they can be more. But Lord, I'm not calling them to be more than you want us to be. Lord, we just want to take that next step of faith, whatever that looks like.

We want you to bless these men, encourage these men, remind these men that they are holy in your sight, that you chose them before the foundation of the world, and that you desire to use them for your glory until they meet you face to face. Lord, for everything you're calling them to do, we realize the battle belongs to you. We're just conduits of your grace. Work through them. Do work in them. Let them feel your love today. Let them be a blessing to everyone they come into contact with. And it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen and amen. Can we praise the Lord and all stand and sing together?