SPEAKER_00: 0:08

Welcome and thanks for joining us on this episode of the Midweek Podcast, brought to you by a Fresh Wind Church. Each week, our team brings you new content to help you take steps towards Jesus and discover more in Christ. Today's episode is hosted by Pastor Ryan.

SPEAKER_01: 0:27

Hey, welcome back to the Midweek Podcast. Pastor Ryan joined as always with Pastor Tim, and we are continuing our Marvel series. Tim had to take last week off. Everybody, I think, just about was snowed in. And man, for one of the, I mean, only couple few times that we've ever had to cancel church was that Sunday too. Um, which was a little weird uh being home on a Sunday morning, not used to that.

SPEAKER_02: 0:54

Yeah. Um I I wanted to um just have a day off like that, but uh my grandkids were like, we're going over to spend the night. So I was chasing kids on my day off.

SPEAKER_01: 1:07

We uh we got in here on Saturday. We didn't want anyone to to miss church, and so we're like, you know what? Let's get in there Saturday before the storm comes in. We'll record service. Probably should have done the podcast then too. Hindsight's 2020. Yeah. Then that snow came in, the cold came in, we're like, man, we ain't getting out of the house. Yeah, and I don't think I left my house for almost a week. Um and so missed last week's podcast. We're catching up this week, and then um, just for those uh regular listeners, um Tim and I were taking our wives uh along with Pat. He's taking his wife um on vacation this week.

SPEAKER_02: 1:43

I hope he's taking his wife.

SPEAKER_01: 1:45

Yeah, we might just get there and it'll just be Pat. Who knows? Um, but uh the six of us were going on uh a little bit of a vacation, so we won't have a podcast next week, and then we'll be back the week after that. So just to keep you up to date on uh the podcast schedule here, but um continuing our Marvel series and uh gonna be looking at uh sermon from two weeks ago, uh, where you were talking about compassion and then uh also wrapping up uh the sermon from this past week talking about humility.

SPEAKER_02: 2:14

Yeah, two things that are um when you're talking about Christianity, that's what people expect from you. Um they expect uh that you'll take care of them and they'll expect that they can push you around. That's compassion and humility, and those things are hard to navigate because we have expectations from the world on what that looks like, and then we have expectations from God, what it looks like, and then we have our own ideas about it too. So it's kind of hard to navigate. It's good to talk about those things that we don't talk about a lot. Um, yeah, every now and then in a sermon we'll say you need to have compassion, but we don't preach the whole sermon about it. Yeah, I think it's important that we take these things and uh break them down and think about them a lot. Like when I was talking uh about the uh widow with two mites, I was thinking, and Jesus pointed her out. I mean, he called the disciples over and says, Hey, look at this. And I was wondering, what's going on here? You know, she's standing in front of this temple and there's gold and marble and it's just beautiful. And and she puts all her money in there, and and I'm thinking, if I if I was if I was having a hard time, would I drop all my money in a place that doesn't look like it needs any money?

SPEAKER_01: 3:40

You know, I it I was a little shocked. Um, you know, we had kind of laid out the the sermon series structure, and when it came to compassion, my mind immediately went good Samaritan. You know, that's not everybody's story. And then you came out with this widow and her two mites, and I was like, what the heck is it? Does he think we're talking about giving this week? Because every time someone talks about her in this story, it's almost always about giving and generosity. And man, you took us a completely different perspective on it and talked about compassion, and dude, it blew me away. I was like, I I I guess I had never thought of it that way, but then as you you laid it out, I'm like, man, that's exactly what's going on here. It was amazing.

SPEAKER_02: 4:23

It had to be, had to be, you know, because obviously uh one of the um temple's jobs is to take care of the orphans and the widows, and she had been taken care of. And even though that's free and she's on the rolls and she's gonna be taken care of, she thought there's other people out there like me, you know, and I I've been provided for, God's provided for me, and I want him to take what I have and provide for others too. So that kind of compassion is huge. Um it's hard to figure out, you know, there's 13 bowls out there, all designated different things. They actually have a general fund, which is which is pretty cool. And um, but she uh Jesus doesn't describe it, you know. She wasn't catching up on her tithe, or she wasn't trying to pay a temple tax because she was poor and she was a widow, so all that was taken care of for her. She was exempt from all that, but she gave, anyways. Yeah, there was no uh duty involved, no law involved. She came and she gave all that she had. So much so that Jesus said, You guys get over here. I want you to see this.

SPEAKER_01: 5:45

How amazed amazing is that that it's man, I keep bringing this up almost every time we we talk, uh either on the podcast or in the sermon, but but this whole Marvel idea that it it's it strikes me every time when God or Jesus, you know, I guess that distinction is always like, well, yes, God is Jesus. But anyways, whichever one, whichever character, whichever person in that moment calls one of these people out. And it's like, what would it take to get the creator? I mean, what does John tell us? All things have been created by him, for him, through him. He holds it all together. Nothing that's been created was created without him. And then he goes, Hey, fellas, get over here and look at this.

SPEAKER_02: 6:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 6:31

He marveled at this woman, and I'm like, man, I he he speaks and things come to life. Right. You know, he he spoke in well, here's the sun and planets and and here's animals, and he breathes life into Adam's nostrils, and and then this woman shows up and gives her last two mites, and he says, Hey guys, come on. You gotta come see this. Yeah, this is awesome.

SPEAKER_02: 6:57

Yeah, and that's uh probably the heart of the sermon is when the grace God's given you turns to compassion for others. I mean, that is that is what the Christian life is all about. And I know that's difficult for us to um the concept of it is not hard, but uh we have people who are poor and they want something, and but at the same time our government takes care of them or would take care of them if they would cooperate. And uh we kind of like, should I give if I if I try to help them, will they just turn around and do something evil with it? You know, uh where am I? What should I do in these situations? Well, true compassion is compassion that is given um the kind of compassion God gives you. Uh what's he tell you? So I'm gonna save you, I'm gonna forgive you, but now I want you to live this way. You know, and that's that you have a right when it comes to compassion to say, okay, I'm gonna help you. But you're you're gonna have to you're gonna have to own up to your responsibility in this and change. And that's that's hard. So since we see that all the time and it doesn't come to fruition like we think it should, we hesitate. And we shouldn't be uh hesitant. We try not to be in our compassion fund, we try not to be hesitant. Um if people take the money from the church and you know you see them on Facebook buying steak with it or whatever, then we just mark a line through them and make sure they don't get any more money from us. But we don't ever want to say no and someone, you know, really needed it. So we we try to say yes as much as possible. And if we get burned, then we then we make decisions that we're gonna do.

SPEAKER_01: 9:01

Well, I actually had a situation um just this past week. I was uh talking with Joy, and uh one of my kids had walked in. Um and I mean we weren't using names or anything, but this uh compassion uh requested came in. Um and my my son was just bringing up how many people do we help? And so he was just wanting to know how how often do people ask, and and how many times do we say yes? And he had all these questions about the compassion fund. Um and again, we never got into specifics, so he didn't know anything other than we have a compassion fund, he was interested in how it works. Um I said, Man, you know what? We try to help everyone we can, we try to say yes as often as we can say yes. Um now we do, we we've put structure in there. Um, you know, and there's caps on things, and um we try not to hand out cash directly, you know. If someone needs food, we try to um have a food delivery to them. Um something like that. That way we know what the the money's going towards, and so we try to be good stewards of it. You know, we're not just well yeah, here, take this cash and run. Yeah. Um but man, we we try to to say yes as often as we possibly can. And he's like, Well, don't you think like people have scammed the church over that? And I was like, Yeah. All the time. Yeah, I'm sure they have. Um and he goes, Well, what do you do about that? I said, Well, again, we have boundaries and structures in place. So if they did, if they scammed us, here's the most we could be scammed. And it's not that big of a number, right? You know, um, and at the end of the day, they're gonna stand accountable before God for those things.

SPEAKER_02: 10:44

Um I don't worry about that kind of judgment. Um But when you're when you're looking at someone that's uh wants your help, wants your help, and you help them, um But you need to help them in a way that you think God would which means that you help them in a way where they have to be responsible. And uh people who want help mostly don't want that. Every when we help someone and uh they couldn't pay their light bill or their water bill or whatever, and they come to us, can you help us pay it? When they come the next month and say, Hey, I need help with this, and we want to get involved. We say, Well, can we sit down with you, get someone to sit down with you and see where you are with your and help you set a budget? And they're like, Nope, call someone up.

SPEAKER_01: 11:36

So that's I I don't think in 17, 18 years of doing ministry, I don't think we've ever had anybody take us up on that.

SPEAKER_02: 11:44

No, but you know, we've had three or four guys that said, you know what, when you find those people, tell me.

SPEAKER_01: 11:50

I mean, certified CPAs. Right I mean, if you I I will sit down and help you do a budget, I'll help these people. And not one person has said, Yeah, let me let me take that uh opportunity.

SPEAKER_02: 12:03

I'm tired of being short all the time and and I'm tired of living this way. Come on in. Uh there's there's not a lot. And I think that's because there's a lot out there to help people. And uh, but we found uh a Facebook page uh where these guys got a Facebook group and uh where they uh all talk back and forth on which church is giving money and which church isn't, and yeah, there's a lot of scams out there. And there's still a lot of people out there who just need their water bill paid just one time, you know?

SPEAKER_01: 12:37

And again, we try to say yes as often as we possibly can. Um we we do everything we can to say yes in those situations um because we want to be compassionate people. It's why we we even named it, it's not a benevolence fund, it's a compassion fund. Right. That way, that's always the mission. How do we extend compassion in this moment? What does that look like? Um, and it does. We it it comes with boundaries, it comes with expectation responsibility. Like, yeah, if hey, we're gonna help you here. If you need help next time, we're gonna want to sit down, we're gonna want to talk uh through through a budget, what that looks like for you. And not so that we can rub this in your face. We want to help you.

SPEAKER_02: 13:20

Right.

SPEAKER_01: 13:21

You know, if it's a recurring thing, well, hey, maybe there's some opportunities here we can help you you build some structure and some discipline. Um and and that's that's still compassionate to offer those things.

SPEAKER_02: 13:33

Right. So if you want to be involved in that compassion fund, uh when you're when you go on your app and you choose to give, it'll give you an opportunity to give the compassion fund. That is outside the the budget, that's outside the general offering. And uh you can give the compassion fund. A lot of people give um every month, they give to the compassion fund. And so uh that makes it so when we're out of money, we're out of money.

SPEAKER_01: 13:59

Yep. And yeah, we it the only way that we're able to do it is because people in the church have said, above and beyond what I give to the church, I'm gonna give to this fund. Um and then the day that that fund dries up and someone comes asking for help, the answer is no. Yeah, we we don't have it. Um, and so yeah, we you can get involved in that and you can make a difference in someone else's life just through saying, Yep, I'm gonna give, even if it's five or ten bucks a month or something like that.

SPEAKER_02: 14:27

And here's the important thing to know about that the compassion fund is first and foremost for our brothers and sisters here in this church.

unknown: 14:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02: 14:36

Okay, it's not for people out there. I know a lot of people uh in our church would get in a tight situation and and need some help. That's what the compassion fund is for. We are we were given gifts to serve our brothers and sisters, and we want to serve in this way too. So if you go to our church, and I think most people who listen here go to our church, and you get yourself in trouble and you need a little help to get you through, we're here for you.

SPEAKER_01: 15:02

Well, what this is one of the things I love about the New Testament church, right? It says they came together, they shared everything in common. There wasn't uh one person among them that had a need. You know, they they all came together, and you know, this this past week, I'm not trying to jump ahead here yet, but uh, you know, you were talking about humility. Um, well man, I I think what happens is our pride jumps in the way of this, and so we get in those situations where man, I could use some some help here. Um I don't want to ask my church. I go to church with those people and all that, you know, we get all this thing, everybody's gonna know, they're gonna put it on a board somewhere. Nobody knows.

SPEAKER_02: 15:38

Nobody knows. It's all we we keep it all on uh hush-hus and and nobody'll know. But at the same time, that that's what the church is here for. Yeah, and sometimes the Lord demands humility in in those type of situations. You need to uh let someone know you're struggling so the church can support you.

SPEAKER_01: 15:55

Yeah. Well, and you know, another one of the things that we've done, both as a safeguard and also um it it does require humility, is we've had people over the years, hey, uh I I think so-and-so could use some help. And I said, Have them fill out this form. Well, you know, I was wondering if have them fill out this form. Um, but there's that having to put your name on something, it does, it stops people because that pride gets involved there. Right. Um, but guys, listen, this church wants to help you. If you go here, we actually reserve some of the compassion fund only for people in the church. We don't let it get below a certain amount. That way, if someone in our church does need help, we have the funds to help funds to help.

SPEAKER_02: 16:36

So I want um that is part of um uh trying to be can passionate instead of enabling, you know, is to hey, you you're in this situation, um might not be your fault, but you're responsible. So put your name down and be responsible. And let us help you get out of that. And uh we don't we don't reserve, uh we don't have a group that gets together and passes judgment on that kind of stuff. We don't we don't do that here. We're here to help you. Let it let us help. Let us help. Uh being humble. You don't want you're in a bad spot already, you don't want God resisting you right on top of it.

SPEAKER_01: 17:20

That's for sure. You know, one of the other things that you brought up about compassion, and I I do, I think it stops a lot of us, is the problem's just so big. Right. Like I I want to get involved, but where do I as soon as I start, where then where do I stop? You know, like the the finish line isn't this person, it's their whole family, and then the whole system and right, you know, our whole governance structure. Like it the problem is so big. What do I do? And and how does it is it worth it? Am I making a dent? Um how what how do we address that?

SPEAKER_02: 17:58

Always be compassionate, always let your grace be compassionate. But it comes back to uh we're talking mainly about money here. What does your budget look like? And if you've got a budget that'll support you helping in that situation, then I think you should. Um if things are tight and uh you don't give what you can. And uh a lot of times after you give that first time, you'll know whether uh they're gonna stand up to their responsibility. And you definitely don't want to be an enabler in this situation and get yourself in a situation where this person is not growing, they're not um taking responsibility for themselves, they're just leaning back on you. Um you know, with all the guilt trips and stuff like that. But I guarantee you there's gonna be someone that you help that said, Thanks, thanks for getting me out of this. And then one day they can get you out of something too. Um I've had it happen to me. Um I'm giving away a car, and then my car breaks down, and I'm like, Man, I am not prepared to pay this much money for the car, and someone will come along and say, Well, I'll I'll fix your car for you. Uh you just buy the parts. And you know, the Lord's blessed me in that way because someone was compassionate, gave their time to help me out, and um um not because I gave a car away, um, but because um I turned grace into compassion in a situation, and then God has other people to do that too. Yeah. And it it's supposed to work flow through the church like that. So um, you know, I don't know how many times I've had Dave Meyer out on my roof. We gotta find this leak. And he comes out and and he takes care of me. And uh that's um that's part of what we do, you know, when we can we can give, give some time or whatever. You know, if you got a truck, you get called to move people. Now I just give the truck. I'm like, here's the keys. I don't I'm not moving nothing. Uh but when you uh give that compassion, when you're when your grace that God has given you, all the things that He's blessed you with, if you just open your hand and let that flow, um God recognizes that compassion and He says, Hey guys, come over here and look at this.

SPEAKER_01: 20:28

Yeah I I read a I can't remember if it was a book or maybe a sermon. I wasn't heard a pastor say it, but um he said, Do for one what you wish you could do for everyone. And man, that that stuck with me for years. I mean, I I can't the problem's too big. I can't fix all of it. Um but I can help one person. I can help this one situation. And and I'm gonna do as much as I can for this one because I know I can't fix everything. I can't fix the whole problem. Um, you know, we're never gonna completely eliminate poverty here. Um but I if I can just help this one person and get back on their feet today, or if I can just give them some food, help them get through tomorrow, or take care of that electric bill, because it's cold, man. I don't know. Our house is geothermal, but it's all electric. My electric bill came in this month. I was like, holy smokes, that negative 10 is no joke. Yeah. Um, you you're like, man, there's people out here struggling, and and I I can't help everybody, I can't pay everybody's electric bill. I can pay this guy's, I can help at least. Um, so do for one what what you wish you could do for everybody. And and man, God does. He uses that, he he refuses to be out given. Um, he he sees what's done in secret, you know, and when you you live that open handed way. Um, and I remember years ago I was preaching on like it was generosity, but um, I brought a guy up on stage and I told him to open his hand and I put some money in it, and I said, Now close your hand and grab onto that money, don't let go. And then I kept trying to add more money to it and just kept falling all over the stage. And I was like, now try this. Dump out that money and put your hand back up and I refilled it. I said, Now dump that out. And I refilled it. And the whole idea being when you're holding on to all this stuff, God can't give you any more. You're full. That's right. But if you're a conduit through which God can bless other people, then he can constantly refill you. And he refuses to be outgiven, man.

SPEAKER_02: 22:25

That's true. And don't worry, don't worry. God's going to tell you when to say no. God knows their heart too. And say no. And if they say, you know, you were generous before and now you're leaving me dry, just say God said no. And how does God say no? Why would God say no to me? I'm in need or whatever. But when God says no, it means no. And you never know what God's doing in someone's life. And where was that sermon I was preaching not too long ago? Because sometimes we try to help people that God is under God's judgment. You know? And it don't matter how much you help them, it's not going to work out. So it's a compassion is a prayerful thing.

unknown: 23:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02: 23:06

It's just not, you know, pulling out the wallet or or throwing money around or whatever. It's something that you at you and the Holy Spirit got to be aligned with.

SPEAKER_01: 23:15

Yeah. Definitely requires discernment and and just constant communication with the Holy Spirit. Um as those situations come up. Lord, what do you what should I do here? Um and and listen. And then respond in obedience. Um sometimes he's going to ask you to take that budget that you just put together and he's going to blow it up. He's going to be like, We're going to, we're going to do this big here. Yeah. And other times you're going to have the money and he's going to say, This isn't the right time. Yeah. And it's it's not going to make sense. We don't often always understand, but just man, when if you're in tune with the Holy Spirit, you're using wisdom and discernment, he's going to let you know. Um, yeah, you need to step in here and know this isn't the right time.

SPEAKER_02: 23:57

That's the difficult way. That's the difficult way. But there's some things that are no-brainers that uh uh that are easy to be compassionate and you don't have to worry too much about it. Like when we dig those wells. Um that's an easy one. They need water, they need the gospel. We can give them both. I'm gonna throw 20 bucks in, you know, and I don't have to worry about whether they're gonna come back to me for more or where they're gonna be the next night or anything like that. I uh it's so those things are easy. It's it's the hard ones that are people are afraid of. Yeah. You know, I Kathy uh found this homeless guy in Vermilion and told me and Pat to go get him and talk to him. And so we went and got them and uh got him a meal. I shared Christ with them. I said, Are you interested in you know accepting Jesus as your savior? And he goes, No, I don't believe in any of that stuff, but you Christians always pick me up and you take me and feed me and take care of me, and I really appreciate you. I I I know a lot of people hate Christians, but we I love you, you guys, and uh you always share the same thing with me, you know. And he says, That's okay. I just um I'm not gonna do that right now. And uh we put him up in a motel and and uh for a couple nights, so it was cold outside, and he was carrying these big old blankets trying to stay warm, and um he was on his way to Chicago, and I was like, Michael, go to Florida. What are you going to Chicago for? And uh, but uh he was kind, so we gave what we could give, and uh he had a couple good nights, and and he left town and was heading for Chicago. Um but it was interesting uh for him to smile at us and say, You Christians are the greatest people, you always try to take care of take care of me and try to get me saved and into heaven.

SPEAKER_01: 25:59

So what a testimony, man. Uh, you know, like uh I wish everyone could say that about us. Yeah. Um even if they don't make a decision to follow Jesus. Imagine if that was our church's reputation. Man, I love you people at Fresh Wind because you're always helping me. You're always telling me about Jesus, and I'm not ready to make any of those decisions, but man, uh, you guys are faithful to help. Um that'd be that'd be an incredible reputation for us to have in our community.

SPEAKER_02: 26:25

I appreciate everybody who gives the compassion fund, and and there's a lot of people out there, I could name a bunch of people, but I don't want to embarrass them right now, that have really gone overboard to help people with um addiction problems and and uh homeless problems and don't have a bed for the kid problem and and that have done great things here at A Fresh Wind. And I want you to know I I appreciate you. Absolutely. You give what you can give and let God handle the rest. That's all good. And that's what we need that w that's what we need to do. We need to be I'm making a transition here. Um we need to be humble enough to know that we can't fix the whole problem, but be compassionate enough to try to help. That's good. And that means we gotta work on our humility.

SPEAKER_01: 27:25

Yeah, this is uh this is a tough one for all of us. Um we just man, we love ourselves, don't we? Like, yeah, you're talking about uh, you know, God, I love you. I want you to be in the spotlight. I just want to be up on stage with you a little bit, you know? Right. Look how much I love you. Shouldn't people know? Shouldn't everybody know how much I love you? Um even I mean we're we just got done talking about compassion. Even that one's tricky because all of a sudden our compassion become this badge of honor, you know, like look at me. I'm a compassionate person. Look at me, and and we do. Uh man, I I was able to help this family over here and do all this, and it feels good. And you're like, I gotta go tell somebody that I did that. And it's like, whoa, where did that come from? Right. That's that pride sneaking up in there.

SPEAKER_02: 28:18

Yeah, and we want, and we know God has seen it, and we all know we've heard this all our lives. You know, if if someone sees you do it, then you get your accolades down here, you don't get them in heaven. And uh so, but we're like, man, heaven's a long way off. I'd rather I'd rather have someone uh tell me how great I am.

SPEAKER_01: 28:40

I went to lunch uh a couple weeks ago with a buddy of mine, and there was uh it looked like half the Lorraine police force uh was in the restaurant. I mean, there had to be 10, 12 of those guys sitting over there um having lunch. So we sat down, we're eating our lunch. Uh server comes over and he goes, Hey, that table over there to all the the police. Um, I want to pick up their bill. And I'm looking at him like, have you lost your mind? There's like 12 guys sitting over there. You know how much that's gonna cost you? Um, but he's like, I wanna I want to take take care of that for him. And the guy looks at him like, Are you crazy? Dude, how many guys are um but he didn't. He he wanted to pay for the pay for their bill, which I thought was awesome. Um, well, the server must have told him who paid for his bill. Uh, because one by one, after they were leaving, they started coming over. Hey, did you take care of our lunch? Thank you so much for doing that. Thank you so much for doing that. Well, after the last guy says thank you, uh he looks at me and goes, Well, so much for rewards in heaven. I was like, Yep, that's probably all you're gonna get out of that one now.

SPEAKER_02: 29:42

Yeah. Yeah, I we need to, we gotta get rid of uh get rid of that type of pride. Um and he'll get rewards for heaven. He didn't expect that to happen. He just uh uh but it's good, it's good to be humbled down every now and then, yeah, especially when you give uh you don't want to be embarrassed, um, and you don't want to look like you're trying to be somebody that you're not, you know? And then when someone like my son, he hated wearing his uniform out when he was uh in Iraq, and because everybody was like, Let me buy you lunch, let me, you know, let just drove him insane. I said he's like, Dad, it embarrasses me, you know. And I said, Okay, um, but let me let me borrow your uniform.

SPEAKER_01: 30:29

I was gonna say, what size does it I'll keep it over here?

SPEAKER_02: 30:32

Yeah. Um, but he uh we don't we we struggle with that. Um, you know, Tim's like, I just ran a gun, you know, to protect the base. I didn't do much. It's like okay, if that's the way you see it. Um but we have uh we have a hard time um getting caught out in our pride, you know, and and we know it we shouldn't be that way, but it happens to us every now and then and we we embarrass ourselves. Um but the Lord, you don't have to worry about the Lord in this. This is one thing. Compassion is something that you're deciding to be on your own, and the Holy Spirit might be pushing you to do that, but when it comes to pride and humility, you get a lot of help from God.

SPEAKER_01: 31:22

Yeah, I love you standing up and uh oh man, who did you bring up in service one? Um Cody. Cody. Yeah, yeah. You get up there and bump chest with them, and I'm like, yeah, uh, you ain't gonna do that for real. Cody's biceps are about you know 32 inches round.

SPEAKER_02: 31:41

Yeah, um yeah, it's it's uh what God gets in your face when you and when your pride starts filling you up, and you you don't know what that you don't want that you don't want that to happen to you. Number two is if you let that happen to you, it it'll grow. Yeah, it'll grow. And I've seen a lot of preachers who were very good preachers and were told how good they were, and people drove miles to hear them speak, and they crash and burn. And you gotta be careful of that. And uh, I had one uh guy that I really liked. He said, Don't don't tell me that, Tim. Don't tell me that. And um I was like, Oh, you're going through it, man. Okay. Um but I would travel a long way to hear him speak. And he um he says, I don't I don't want to get myself in that situation where you know uh these people need me. No, they don't need you, they need Jesus. And um we need to be we need to be those type of people. God might use you to stand in the gap for people and it might be an amazing thing, but he didn't need you to stand in the gap, he lets you stand in the gap.

SPEAKER_01: 32:57

That's what's so tricky. Um in and it man, it starts at you know, volunteering for the church. Um and then, you know, if you're on staff, you know, uh it all the stakes just get higher because you're doing all sorts of these things for God. You know, I'm God, I'm doing this for you. Um and there's there's plenty of Sundays when you know you come down off the stage and people are talking about your sermon and um how great it was and how it spoke to them, and you know, man, were you following me around this week? You know, all those things. And it's it's easy to listen to those things and be like, oh God, see that? Yeah, see how you know all that study of time I was putting in this week, you see what that all that did? Um and that pride, man, it it creeps in. And I man, I'm there's so many pastors, and it it almost makes you nervous to, you know, for the church to grow and get big or to to write a book and you know, sell a bunch of copies, or because so many of them when they get that success, just start falling. Yeah. Um and I think a lot of it, man, pride gets in the way. And you start thinking, man, I've done something here, and these people, they like to listen to me, and I'm important. Um and it's like, man, as soon as you get there, yeah, it like you said, God gets involved here. This is one of those you're gonna get a lot of help because he he opposes you, right? He's not gonna sit here and put up with that, he's not gonna ignore you. No, no, no, he actively works against you when you're operating in pride. Um, this is man, it's so important that the humble spirit it's tricky.

SPEAKER_02: 34:43

I know I said it a thousand times on Sunday preaching it, and you said it a thousand times right here. But man, that guy who was praying, the first guy, the Pharisee praying, he was giving thanks to God. He was saying, Yeah, look at me. This is because of God. This is because of God. And it was still pride. And we need to realize we have to have a complete dependence on God, even to serve God. You know, he didn't call me because I was a great speaker or because um I knew the Bible or anything like that. He let me get involved with what he was doing, and and that's that's all he did. That's it. Yeah, and and I thank God for it. Thank God we've seen another ten baptized last week uh or yesterday. That is wonderful. Um and I I love that, but I gotta watch the pride. You know, when I see my pastor friends and stuff, that's the first thing I want to say. You know how many we have baptized? And I'm praising and thanking God for that, but at the same time, there's that little pride thing there.

SPEAKER_01: 35:48

I remember a couple years ago, you and I we drove out, oh, is that Illinois, Indiana, one of those states. Uh, went to this pastor conference thing. And it's what all the churches, you know, pastors get together and oh, how many people are you guys running? And and a lot of it is pastors just celebrating and seeing what God's doing. Um, but man, there there's this it it that pride starts to swell. And oh, we're running about 70, oh, we're running about 100, and you're like, oh, we're okay. We're yeah, we're we're doing better than those guys. Um even in the we had a new hair gathering this past Sunday, and um there was just a couple in the church um talking about how they went to you know smaller, more traditional church, um and you know, came here and fell in love with our church. I absolutely love it. Um and I celebrate that. Uh uh man, every time someone comes in, um I'm so so grateful and excited when they talk about just how welcoming our church, our church is. Um, makes me proud of you guys. Uh a fresh win. Uh that you you welcome people and you love our people so it's hard not to be.

SPEAKER_02: 36:54

It's hard not to be proud of you guys. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 36:57

You guys, you're awesome. And I just want you to know in those new here gatherings, people rave on you. Um, Emily and her team, you know, the greeters, the the welcome desk people, um, the check-in, check-out teams, kids' ministry teams. Preachers, the preachers, don't forget the preachers. I mean the how you treat people is is awesome. And so these people come here and they're just they're loving our church. Um, but I man, in that new here gathering, I I pause. I'm like, hey, I love that you guys love being here. Um, but I want you to know we we celebrate in honor of those small churches too. There's a lot of pastors showing up faithfully week after week after week, spending hours preparing sermons for 30 or 40 people. Um and and a lot of times we can look at it and say, man, there's something wrong with that church, or that pastor's not doing something right. And um and I there's there's probably a whole lot of reasons that go into that kind of stuff, but the truth is there's a lot of really faithful pastors out there um leading a lot of really small churches. I I I think the average, like I don't know if it's 80 or 90 something percent of churches in America today are around 100 people in attendance, um, or less than 110, something like that. That means most churches are are small churches, you know. Um but man, faithful pastors. Um and just showing up and I want you to know if you're one of those faithful pastors, we honor you. Absolutely. And thank you for the work you're doing.

SPEAKER_02: 38:26

I had a lady come into the church today and and um said she was going through something and and she got over the hump and she was praising little church in Lorraine, pastor that's faithful. Um she went in there and um and he started preaching, and she said he just he preached right at me and um pulled me out of my funk. And um I I was like, praise the Lord for him. I said, when you go to church on Sunday, tell him I appreciate him. I love him for what he does. And uh we we need to be um a whole church, not just one church. And some people are gonna grow in one church, and then they're gonna hit a spot where they need to go to another church and grow or help people grow in that church and might get moved to another church. We celebrate that if God's moving you around. If you're running around getting mad at everybody, we don't celebrate that. No, but um, but if you if you feel like the Lord's uh moved you here to to uh be part of us, then we celebrate that. If he moves you from here to somewhere else so you uh can be a part of that, then we celebrate that.

SPEAKER_01: 39:35

We celebrate that too, yeah. Man, I years ago, uh I think church was just getting ready to start one of the um, I don't know, the bathroom needed clean or mopped or something. Um, and I ran and I grabbed a mop bucket and I was getting ready to mop it. And I don't know if I was preaching that day or you were preaching that day, but someone comes up to me and they're like, hey, you you shouldn't be doing this. Um, and the truth is pastor probably shouldn't be mopping the bathrooms on Sunday morning.

SPEAKER_02: 40:03

But I I looked at it and I said, Man, Pastor should have known the bathroom needed mopped on Saturday.

SPEAKER_01: 40:10

I was like, you know what? The day I become too big to mop this floor, you fire me. Right. Um and I I want to keep that spirit and and I want you to know that we need to have that. Man, I whatever it takes, um, there's nothing beneath me. Um, if we're if we're sharing the gospel, if we're helping people discover more in Christ, there's nothing beneath me. I'll do whatever it takes to help someone take a step towards Jesus. And if that doesn't look glamorous, that's all right. Um, if it means I'm you know changing diapers in the nursery, that's all right.

SPEAKER_02: 40:41

You would never change diapers in the nursery.

SPEAKER_01: 40:43

I'd get my you have to do it.

SPEAKER_02: 40:46

You have you have weasled out of everything every time I try to get you in there, you're like, I don't do kids.

SPEAKER_01: 40:53

Okay. Parking cars out in the cold. I would do it. Um, whatever it takes. Um, and and I just want to encourage you, man, keep that humble posture before the Lord. Um, because as soon as that pride comes in, and like I said, it's sometimes it's so insidious because you're doing great things. Um this church is doing great things. We're seeing God move and change lives, and we are seeing um people show up and fall in love with this church and and just the baptism videos that we were hearing on Sunday, and all the people coming and just loving what God's doing here, yeah, and then choosing to follow Him and Baptist. Oh, that's exciting. Um, but man, we we need to we need to stay humble um in all of this and just say, Lord, we are completely and utterly dependent on you.

SPEAKER_02: 41:38

Yeah, we need to we need to thank God and uh not thank a fresh win. Fresh win is here because of Jesus Himself. Uh He called us uh He started this ministry and we're just aligning ourselves with what He's doing. And we don't want to be, you know, a Fresh Win is my church, and that just that doesn't even make sense here. A freshwind is not your church, it's Jesus' church, and you've jumped in on what he's doing, and that's what we want to, that's who we want to be. And um pride is a tricky thing, and uh you'll know when you stepped across or you stepped up on stage with Jesus, um he won't let it slide. His glory is his own and he won't share it with you. Now he'll exalt you one day, and that'll be great. Um then you can bask in whatever that looks like in heaven, but uh you're just gonna take whatever he gives you and throw it at his feet because it's all about him.

SPEAKER_01: 42:39

Right. That's that's the key to this whole thing, man. Um we feel like someone needs to notice.

SPEAKER_02: 42:48

Um the right to be recognized.

SPEAKER_01: 42:51

And it it feels good. It does. I I think that's I mean that's part of the human experience. It feels good to be noticed, to be recognized, to be seen. Um, and we feel like, man, someone's gotta know. Someone's gotta, someone needs to see this. Yeah. One time you got done doing something at the church and you called me and said, Hey, I just got done doing this at the church. Tell me, tell me I'm awesome. I'm like, you're awesome, Tim.

SPEAKER_02: 43:15

My love language is is um oh, what do you call it? Words of affirmation. Words of effort. I need some affirmation, every now. And I can always trust you to say, you're awesome, Tim. Yeah, you're awesome. Can you hang up now?

SPEAKER_01: 43:31

But man, if if we could get this, if we will humble ourselves before the Lord, he will exalt us at the right time. That's that's the key. And we feel like, no, no, I gotta get in here and I gotta make people see what I've done, and I gotta make people exalt me. And when you do that, you rob the creator of the universe the opportunity to exalt you. And man, there's nothing anybody could ever say or do that's gonna mean more than Jesus looking at his disciples and saying, hey. Hey you guys, come watch what they just did.

SPEAKER_02: 44:02

Yeah. I love that um when Jesus told that parable about the the wedding and um and he was sitting at the head of the table and someone went and sat down next to him and he had to tell 'em, This this spot's not for you. You don't want to be that guy. You don't want to be that guy. So sit down there at the end of the table, and when the Lord wants you sitting next to him, he'll call you up there. And and then you can celebrate because you've been recognized by him, not by yourself. That's right. Um pride is a tough thing. Here's the thing about talking about being humble and living in pride. We all know. We all know when it's us, you know? And um so just respond to the Holy Spirit and say, Lord, I'm gonna turn this around, this thing I think I I've done well, and we'll give that back to you. The only reason I could do that for you is because you let me. And I just want to thank you for the opportunity. Say the words. Uh, even though you you think, well, I don't feel it in my heart, you know, someone needs to affirm me. Let the Lord affirm you. What did what did uh David say? Encourage myself in the Lord. Right. Right. Sometimes we got to do that. And uh, but we here at our church, we want to encourage you. We want to thank all you guys who work so hard to make our Sundays possible. We affirm you, we recognize you. Um we couldn't we couldn't have this ministry without you. That's right. And um we want to thank you for saying yes to the Lord and and aligning your life to what he's doing here at A Fresh Wind. And that's a great thing um to praise. Um, but we're try not to take pride in it.

unknown: 45:54

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 45:55

Um, you know, practically, um, a couple things you can do. Number one, what Pastor Tim just said, just daily, man, acknowledge your dependence on the Lord. Um next, when He when God does something for you, thank Him for it. Um, recognize it was Him. He is the giver of every good and perfect gift. Um so whether that's a raise, whether that's uh you know a new job opportunity came your way, um whatever it is, um, Lord thank you for that and and just let him know you recognize that was Him. You're you're dependent on Him. And then personally, you know, when you're when you're in a a conversation with someone, avoid that temptation to one up. You know, we we love those. We hate the one uppers, but we love to be them. Right. Um you and I were sitting here talking about vacation, sharing sunburn stories, and we're like, oh yeah, well, hold on, mine was worse than yours. Um avoid that temptation and man, be interested in other people instead of and and I struggle with this because when I'm in a conversation with someone, I I'm more interested in my rebuttal to what they're saying than I am in what they're actually saying. Um and I love to tell about my life and my story and my kids and my job and my church. And I very rarely want to ask about your job and your kids and your family. Um, and so just be be the kind of person who asks more questions than than you give answers and and be interested in people and those I think you do those things and you'll you'll start to develop a humble spirit.

SPEAKER_02: 47:26

Humility um is something we need to pray for and to say, Lord, keep me small, keep me small enough to need you every day. And uh when we do that, um the Lord will exalt you, so you don't have to worry. But even in that exaltation, you need to keep saying, Lord, I need to need you. Yeah, I need to need you. Um and that's that's where we we stay protected. Yeah, but don't get all worried about this, because um this is something the Lord gets involved in.

SPEAKER_01: 48:01

Yeah, he's he's gonna work this out one. He's gonna work this one out for you.

SPEAKER_02: 48:05

That's it. Will you pray for us? Father, I want to thank you for um The Widow with Two Mites. And um Lord, she gave back because you had given to her, and she gave it all. Lord, teach us to have that kind of compassion, to understand that we've had grace and that we can hand it off to others. And we want to thank you for this tax collector who so um showed us what it means to be humble before God. He beat his chest and said, God, forgive me for my sins. And that's where we want to be. At your feet on our knees uh because it's all about you. Thank you for letting us align ourselves with your mission here at A Fresh Wind and letting us um serve people and reach people with you. And uh because we couldn't do it without you. Lord, I know um these things when we focus in on them, we we see all the failures in our life. But Lord, tonight as we go to sleep, um tonight as as we uh uh say our prayers and get in bed, I pray that you'll you'll exalt us in our dreams. Remind us of all the things that we did do, not the things that we didn't do. And um we want to be people who remember what you've done and remember what you've done through us because we made ourselves available. And we thank you for those opportunities. Not that you need us, but that you used us in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen.

SPEAKER_00: 49:52

Thanks again for joining us for this episode of the Midweek Podcast. We'd love to hear from you. Let us know how God is using this resource in your life or send any podcast questions or topic ideas to podcast at a freshwind.org. If you would like to support this ministry financially and help us continue offering new resources that equip you to discover more in Christ, simply text any amount to the number 84321. We're so grateful for your support. Make sure to tune in next week for a brand new episode of the Midweek Podcast. Be blessed and have a great week.