Faith and Hope What does hope look like

Welcome to episode 103.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. Spending time in the Word of God is the best way to spend time with God. Welcome to No Doubt, No Fear, Only Believe podcast, where we will encourage, inspire, and empower you to live your best life in Christ. Here's Greg.

Welcome to episode 103. I'm still on the faith and hope. I, I think I've put to bed the unbelief. I'm, I know I'm not done talking about it, but I'm done teaching on it for a minute, and I need to move on to what faith and what hope and what grace look like. Because again, I want to get us a picture. I thought I'd be talking about it in episode 102, but I didn't get there, obviously, and I'm talking about it now. And what I want it— and we got to kind of— in my mind, I need to get you a picture of what each one of these look like, the way I see it. Now, this is not— this is Gregology, and this is just the way I gotta— I gotta picture stuff. And I don't know if I'm a visual person. I think I'm an auditory— I think I'm— I personally think I'm a little bit messed up because I like listening to things audio. I gotta see things in my mind visually. But kinesthetic, I don't— I have got to hold something. I've got to have a book if I'm reading a book. I have a hard time with, with the Kindle or reading on tablets and stuff. I've got to have a hard book. I've got to print stuff out and I've got to hold it for in my mind for it to be real. So I don't know what is going on with me, but I'm, I'm all three things. I gotta touch it, I gotta hear it and I got to see it. So I am visually— I need to picture. And I think it, you know, you've heard the saying that a picture is worth a thousand words. Well, if I can picture something in my mind— this is where the eyes to see, where I taught, and I don't think I did a great job of that, but I, you know, I just want to open some of this up. And I want the Holy Spirit to teach you. That's my whole goal, is that I, I don't have to be great at it. The Holy Spirit can lead you into his word and say, oh hey, this is what he was trying to teach you, and this is what he what he was trying to say. This is what Greg— Greg don't do a great job of doing this, but he, he really means well. And this is what he meant to tell you. And open up God's word, and God will start leading you, and God will start opening the eyes of your understanding, and he will start opening the ears of your heart, and all of this stuff will start coming together. And it's incredible. I'm telling you that he teaches me so much, that I can't, you know, I can't get it all out. There's no way that I can tell you everything that God has taught me. And I constantly, when I read the Bible, I go, oh yeah, that's right, you, I remember you telling me that or showing me that. And it's so cool that if you just get in the word, that the word will get into you and you'll start pulling some of these things together. And remember Proverbs, I think it's 25:2, that it's the glory of God to conceal a matter, but it's the glory of kings to search out a matter. And that's what— we're kings. We are kings, and we're not— we're kings not of this world. We are kings of God's kingdom, and he is the King of Kings, and he is the Lord of Lords. And so he's our king. And so our king has hidden all of these truths in the Bible. We've got this helper with us that God said, it's better if I leave. If you remember Jesus— I'm still, I'm still in awe of that conversation that he had with his disciples before he went to the cross and said, guys, I'm telling you the truth, it's better if I leave because if I don't go, then I won't send the Helper, or God won't send the Helper. But if I leave, the Helper will come and he'll lead you into all truth. That's paraphrasing, but it was— it's John 16:7 where Jesus first told his disciples, I'm out of here and I'm leaving the Holy Spirit up. The Holy Spirit's coming So the Holy Spirit is here. The Holy Spirit wrote this book. The Holy Spirit is the author. Jesus and God, they're all one. I don't claim to understand it all, but God wrote the Bible, had multiple writers, but he was the author. One author, multiple writers. But God is there to help you, and he will lead you into all truth. And so when you start trying to picture this with the eyes of your heart, and this is where I want to dig in Now, hope— when you— I talked about a rock. Remember I had— I was talking about the rock that you throw the chain around? I think it was a couple episodes ago, but you had the truck when we were talking about moving a mountain. And before we could move a mountain, I wanted you to picture this big old rock sitting in the desert, and you, you're wanting to get it out of the way. Or maybe it was in the row. Let's just say it was just planted in the row. You're trying to get around it, and you got this big old souped-up truck and you get to this rock and you throw this chain around. And you may have a girl there, maybe your wife, and you're trying to impress her. And you're gonna say, man, I've got this powerful truck. You see that rock over there? I've got this big old powerful chain. I've got this powerful truck, and I'm gonna pull that rock up out of the ground. And so you take your truck and you take your chain and you wrap this chain around this big old rock and you start pulling. And it's It's smoking and it's squealing and it's— and then the transmission goes and the engine blows and this rock is still sitting right where it's sitting. I wanted you to picture that. I need you to picture that rock. And if you— if you didn't picture it, if you were just listening to my words, I want you to picture that rock in the ground and then the chain. I want you to picture how big each link in that chain is. You know, how big around is each link? How big a thick chain this is? And you wrap it. I want you to picture the truck. Is the truck black? Is the truck red? Is the truck white? Is it got big old wheels? Does it have a roll bar? Does it have a nice stereo? I mean, I want you to start picturing this stuff because when you see truck, I want you to see this big old bad truck. That, my friend, is your imagination. When you start picturing what the truck and how it's smoking and how it's squealing and it's trying to pull this rock up out of the ground and how you're straining with this truck to try and hold it onto the steering wheel. That is hope. That is a definition of hope in my mind. That's how it's— it's you using your imagination, it's that, that mind, the eyes of your heart. That is using the eyes of your heart, and that is what I'm talking about for hope. When you start— because faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. We don't even know where this rock is. But you can picture a rock in the ground, and you can picture Rapid getting out of the truck. And it's you, not me, it's you getting out of the truck, and you're looping this chain, and you're hooking it to the truck. And I don't know if you got it on the back bumper, or are you going backwards on the front bumper? I've got it— I'm— I was, I was trying to back up and get the, get the rock out. Some of you that probably know a little more about trucks were probably going 4, where you had the, you had the chain hooked on your back bumper and you were trying to pull it out. I was trying to pull it out with that, with backing it up. But anyway, you've got it pictured how you're gonna pick. But that is hope, that when I start talking about, when you read the word hope, that is when you start picturing in your mind, start using your mind's eye to see it. And you can't go anywhere in your physical body that you have not already been in your mind. And I want you to kind of get— let that sink in, because most people don't really believe that. But you cannot do something in this physical realm that you have not first already done mentally. That is such an incredible truth that you just got to let that just simmer And you just gotta let that percolate a little bit. And I wanna take it to the negative level, and I've just gotta take it to the sin level. Let's just say that the sin is adultery. I just do not believe that a person that is happily married to a woman, and they have a couple of fights or whatever, and they start, you know, maybe they're arguing over something, but I don't think that argument goes from there to adultery. I think the argument goes and they start getting discontent or whatever, and then you start, you see somebody at work, or you see, and then in your mind you go, oh, she looks nice. And then you start thinking, and I don't even know if this is a good example, but you start in your mind thinking, you know, and that's, I think this is how Satan works, is he starts planting negative thoughts and he starts attacking you in your mind, and you start thinking thoughts you should not think, and you start going places in your mind you have no business going. And I think that's why Jesus just kind of opens this up in Matthew 5:27. You have heard that it was said to those of old, you shall not commit adultery. But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. And I want to stop there. That is the perfect example. Of course it's perfect because Jesus said it, but that is how you can't go somewhere in your body that you haven't already gone in your mind. And Jesus said, look, it said the old, the old way was like you just commit adultery, but I'm telling you And when you start digging into this truth, if you've lusted for her in your mind, you've already committed adultery. Yeah, I mean, you're already hooked. So that's why you have got to— that's why you got to just clear your mind. It's that Romans 12:2 says, do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God. There is a good, there's an acceptable, and there is a perfect will of God. There's three, and all of it— there's three different things that you can do. But I think the perfect will of God is the one you're fighting for and the one you're gonna— the one you're gonna want to do. But this isn't about the perfect will of God. This is about not being conformed to this world, but renew your mind. We have got to read the Bible. We've got to clear this mind up and we've got to get after it. In Jesus' name, let's pray real quick. God, I thank you so much for everything you've done for me in my life. Lord, I thank you for what you're doing in this person that's listening to this podcast. God, I pray that you would continue to lead and guide and direct them. And Lord, we thank you for everything you're doing and everything that you're going to do. And Lord, we ask it all in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, thank you for being a part of this, and I look forward to visiting with you on the next episode.

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