What Must I Do To Be Saved? (#532) — http://thegodjourney.com/2016/05/13/what-must-i-do-to-be-saved-532/

Outside the box of religious obligation lies a road less traveled into the heart of the father's affection. Slinging freedom all over the place. This is the God Journey. The God Journey. Well, we've got a special announcement for the God Journey. We do. We do. It started out as a throwaway line joke a couple of weeks ago, but we've had some conversation since and our website's going to take a little time to catch up with us, but you can't be on here as a guest anymore. Yeah. What have you done with it? I'm back. You're well. I never really laughed, but I did wonder. Well, you got busy. Yeah. I'm not as busy. I am more free and I enjoy our conversations. But we're letting you know Brad's coming back as co-host of the God Journey. So he'll be here, again, not every time. There's going to be times when it doesn't work or I'm on the road talking to somebody that's of interest. So we'll just do that. But most of the time again, be back to Brad and I sitting here enjoying the colors. I am more available around. We've had a good time talking about moving back into that space and one of the things that I have really enjoyed is when we were talking about all this is how this started was not to do a podcast for people so that we could talk to people about what they should think or know or to. It was you and I were having conversations that we were enjoying and thought, you know what, maybe others would enjoy listening in. Maybe even as a way to kind of help them cultivate those kinds of conversations with people that they know. Because I find when I'm with you and we're talking about things, whether it's here or if we're not recording it, I discover stuff in the conversations. We end up talking about stuff that I wouldn't have planned to talk about or wouldn't have seen coming. We don't have a problem talking. We don't. And we don't have a problem discovering while we're talking. It's not just I learned from you or you learned from me. It's the synergy of the conversation opens doors into things, ways of thinking that I find incredibly liberating in my own life. Yeah, there's a there's a live, fresh conversation that has been at the foundation of our friendship that has been life changing for me since the first day we met. And I have just thought they're going like, I don't want to not do that. I don't care if it's recorded. Yeah, that's the point. Okay. I mean, I, most of the time I forget that, well, yeah, we're recording. I mean, I can, I can see the microphone, but I don't really, I don't come at this like, oh, if I could only just say this thing to them. You know, it's like, I kind of left that space. Yeah. I'm more interested in going like, well, yeah, how do we sort this out? There's not a lot of places for me that I really get to have conversations like this with someone else who has also been there, done that enough to go, yeah, I'm kind of looking for a new trailhead too. Yeah. And so that's what I think has been the life giving part of doing all this. For me too. Ron wrote this on our blog. He said, several times here it is mentioned this podcast would not go on forever. And it was, and it has gone on longer than was originally expected, but I think it's probably true. And it's my hope that Wayne and Brad continue this podcast as a passion, not an obligation. I will not do this as an obligation. Yeah. I was going to say to Ron, we have never, ever felt that way. I, because I think we have the freedom. I don't need to have one every week. We do because there's fun things to talk about. There's stuff going on that's kind of fun. Yeah. But now it's never been an obligation. And the thing you're hinting at about saying, you know, it's only mentioned the podcast we can go on forever and people need to listen for it forever. I get that knock all the time because I do say, I have said on a number of occasions, you know, we expected people to listen to this for maybe a year or two and then kind of launch on their own journey and find these conversations with face to face people in their real lives back, back where they live and work and all that's good stuff. But I basically say that to set people free because when I travel, people will say, I haven't listened to a podcast in quite a while. I don't care. Me either. Yeah, I've never listened to one. That's not on my checklist for you. And actually it's kind of fun. If I know somebody who hasn't listened for a while, then I've got things to talk about. If not, then they probably know every story I'm going to tell everything I'm going to say. Eve, I already heard it. So we want to free because we don't want it to be an obligation for people either. I don't think we ever wanted to start this. Well, you know what? It's not an it. There's very few things in my life that I've been able to sort of do that don't end up morphing into an it. And when it becomes that and it's something to manage. It's work. But the idea of doing media is always, how do you create dependence with the audience? Because that's how you get. You know, that's jucky. It is. It's jucky. And I'm on a lot of podcasts. I do a lot of things to other people and I can see that whole shtick around it. It's not just, hey, we're putting something out there if it touches you. Great. It's we're trying to build an audience. How to get my sheet and help people in here. And we're trying to do things. I know people who keep listening because they say, you know, I love the first 10, 15 minutes of catching up with your lives and what's going on. And and people have been listening since the beginning. And I think that's fine. If you want to listen for that, I'm not trying to discourage people from it. I just have not wanted to build in the idea of you. This is your lifeline for your spiritual life. Well, do you walk around thinking, oh, I got an audience? Do you? I don't go around thinking that. It does come up when people are talking about books published and people in the orbit of this thing. Yeah. But I don't think about my audience. I love my life. I love my life with my family and my friends and doing what God's asked me to do in the world. So, you know, I think what we're doing in these conversations is having real live conversations about walking and talking with Jesus. There's no audience there. It's like if you want to come along the journey, come along the journey. But the thought is you have your own. Yeah. And if there's something going on that's helpful that we're discussing, I think there's tons of stuff. Every conversation we have, I learn stuff. That's why I'm here. I'm not way with adoration stuff. You know, I hate the kind of praise times in services where they're trying to get you to do something. I've always enjoyed most that when that guy or gal or team up there is there loving Jesus and I can come join them if I want. I don't have to. Yeah. And I think that's the same kind of thing we put here. But Esther wrote us this on the other side of things. Glad to say I'm in a much better space and your podcast has helped me so much as well as writing down what I've been feeling. I don't think you realize what a lifeline this podcast has been. You articulate what I'm feeling and believe. Somehow I don't feel so alone when I listen to you and Brad talk. Please, please, please continue. Yours is the same voice in a crazy world. You know why they're not alone? It's a whole surround. Yeah, that's right. And they're not the only one thinking the way they're thinking. Which is amazingly helpful, especially when you're trying to go like, Hey, this religious thing. I don't know that it's working for me. Yeah. And if the only people you know are religious people, then they're going to think you're insane. Yeah. So I get that. But then you got this on the other side. It must be honest and sad, a hard time listening to your podcast because of all the laughter. It says I'm wired differently. I respect your freedom to your way. I'm just being honest. Hey, what did I say? Thanks for the information. That's always helpful to me. Sorry. Well, no, we're not going to change. I think most people listen for the laughter. So that's the way we do it. I just never thought. Laughter comes out of suffering. I just never thought laughter was offensive. I like Proverbs. You're a healing balm for the soul. Laughter is. It is. But I think for people who sometimes are hurting, it can feel as if it's trivializing something. I get that. I don't take that as some stop it. I know in my own life, I was way too serious for way too long. And I took myself way too seriously and got myself wrapped up in a ball. And it's like, I don't want to live that way. It's like I don't find that that gives God access to me. Like I need him to have access to me. Yeah. It's so fun hanging around people who are laughing and enjoying life when you're dealing with the death of a loved one or you're dealing with some tragedy in your life. Yeah, that's hard. That makes it tough. Particularly, you don't feel like I'm included in it. But I don't think this was that. I think in the email from this guy, I didn't write his name down here, I think his point was basically, I'm a much more serious guy about theological things and I don't see much humor in all that. Yeah, which is really weird because I'm a very serious theological guy. Laughter Yeah, that's what I hear all the time about you, dude. And then I got this from William. This was on the blog, actually. But an old one. We'll play back to Holding the Center, a podcast I did with Bob Stamps a few years back. He said, here's the reason that's important to listen to the archives. Hey! He said, I'm now just nine months plus behind trying to get back to being caught up. He's nine months behind this. Wow. Plus his heart. What's that like? Having heard them all before this, so he's listening to them all, he's doing it again some three times. He said, I had to stop and write you this. Why not? The discussion about Christ coming to our table, my table, living my life step by step with me, I'm ready to hear this now. But just two months ago, these would have been just words, a goal for me to shoot for, but nothing real. Oh, wow. Now he's truly my brother. I know my father and walk with the spirit. We are all on the same journey, yes. But to hear you look at the waterfall while I'm able to see the meadow can't be translated to me by my brain. I spoke the language of family while I was sitting in the building. But as I walk free, I now know the truth of family. It is real. Wow. Isn't that cool? That is cool. I think that is so absolutely true because I've heard things before, but if they weren't in sync with what was going on in my life, they didn't have the profound impact that they do when all of a sudden, whoa, that is what I'm dealing with. Yeah. And that, you know, I think it's a fallacy to somehow think, oh, we're all on the journey together. We're doing the exact same stuff. It's like, no, we're not. We're all having our own journey and they intersect at moments. And that's pretty cool that he can find life out of the old stuff. Yeah. A skilled novelist who died recently, one of the quotes I saw on the Facebook things about him from other people was, reading a book is like holding a mirror. That's the reason why you can read a book multiple times and see different things because you're different. You've moved. Oh, that's good. And I think that's true of the Bible. That's true of listening to a podcast. It's true of books I read. If I read a book multiple times, which I do, that's what I love. I know the Bible gets knocked a lot by people who just think it's a whole religious book. But the reason I love reading the Bible all the time because I do see verses differently. And I can go, wow, I remember seeing it this way and it was touching to my life that way. Now I see a whole different reality here. And it's not that the book has changed. What's changed is me. Yeah. That life. So I think that's cool. And if people want to go back to the archives, awesome. I just, I get depressed when I hear people going back to listen to 10 years of the stuff. I go, man, that's a lot of, but if you enjoy it and if you got a long commute or if you're a truck driver across country, enjoy them all. You know, but something that I have, I just wonder, it's not like what you and I are talking about. Other people don't know. It's just in the realm of media, most of the time people are trying to use a platform to do something. And so they don't talk in ways that I think you and I have really been at pains to avoid that. We're the Seinfeld podcasting. I hear your point. But I think that's why, unfortunately, there's not a lot of other places because most everybody is kind of pursuing some kind of agenda. And I think I have enjoyed trying to walk with another brother free from one. Yep. And that's been unique because I'm going like, most of the rest of my life, I have to navigate around them. Yeah. And there's some other folks that are trying to do that as well. So I don't think we're the only ones, but I think you're right. I think what really touches people is the fact that we're not trying to sell something or drive something or build a community. We're just having a conversation about things that matter to us. And as long as they matter to you, come along when they don't. We won't notice because we don't check the stats. So I don't know when you're doing that, when you're not. Then this from Sarah, this was a couple of podcasts ago, maybe three now. How contrarian are we about the whole evangelical thing? She said, I've had a lot of my beliefs pulled out from under me on my journey. I am a Baptist, parenthesis, Calvinistic background. I'm glad to be free from the things I've wrongly believed, but could someone discuss salvation? I infer from what I'm reading above, and she's talking about the blog, the comments on it, that all people are saved. Where does the sinner's prayer come in? Are Muslims saved? She says, she didn't get it. She kind of lost her idea. What does it mean to be saved? And I'd be wonderful to talk about because I don't know we've talked about that specifically. Yeah. You know, I sort of feel like the people that get saved, I think are the ones that recognize that there's a loss or a separation. With? That sense of a relationship with God. I think when, you know, I don't think the world loves to hear your loss. It's kind of like, well, I don't feel lost. I don't know where I'm going. I was thinking. Well, you're lost. It's like, it's more like, gosh, the dynamic is, do I need to be saved? And I would say, yeah, I'm pretty sure the planet does. I'm pretty sure that includes all of us. And the question is, how and why and unto what? And I think I'm really called into a relationship. I think what salvation, like when I grew up in a, in sort of the church setting, it's like, you know, we're supposed to do stuff. And there were supposed to believe stuff. I went to a confirmation class and it's like, as neat as all that is, if it doesn't produce a walking, talking relationship with a God that can be known, I end up going like, okay, so exactly what is the salvation? Well, and salvation hasn't been defined that way in American or even probably worldwide Christianity for a few, a couple hundred years. Yeah, I know. It's a get out of hell free card. And everybody wants one. If you believe there's a possibility of hell at all, you want to do what you have to do to jump through the hoop to get that ticket, right? Yeah. And I ended up going, so you're saved unto what? It seems like you're being saved from a fear of something. Yeah, absolutely. That's what we save people by. And it's like, yeah, but did you get saved into a relationship with a person that you know? I wasn't offered that. My goodness. I was offered to get out of hell free card, darn it. No one told me I could walk with Jesus. We probably got it. Yeah, probably did. But I went forward and I got baptized and I, you know, there's those formulas that we pulled out of scripture to make it look like, okay, here's what you need to do minimally. And if you do the right things, you get saved and if you don't, you're unsaved. And all that is about heaven and hell. I think that's most of the dialogue. Even down to whether you're baptized in the name of Jesus or in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Or how you're baptized. And if you don't get it right, then you could not be saved. But when John 17.3 says, and this is eternal life, that you may know him. I just sat there and I parked on that one for a moment. Wait a minute, that's a relational verse that is not an eternity verse. This is eternal life, the life of the eternal one. It's to know him. I think most people are really looking at the future destiny of my soul when they speak of salvation. They do. And I'm going like, there's a problem because you're not dead yet. So what is it? You're waiting for someday for the salvation to kick in. It's like, what are you living now? I just want to make sure all that's punched when I die. I agree. I do do. I do too. There's nothing wrong with that. And you can have that, but you're still here. So why are you still here? And what are you living unto? What is the life? Do you have life? Because that's what I think salvation is. No, I agree with you. But her question comes from this place of salvation is making sure I qualify for that for eternal life and life forever, not life with the sun. And it's hard to talk this way because even when I read stuff or I talk to people on the road, people don't get salvation is you come inside a relationship with the one who created you and loves you more than anyone on this planet ever has ever will. Don't see it that way. It's I might be a friend. Well, it sounds nice. Some people sound scary because I've been praying for that and God doesn't give it to me. So it hasn't worked. And I think we've got to redefine salvation, but nobody's interested in redefining it. Just please, please get my get out of free card. Get guaranteed. They seem to be interested in erasing away the notion of hell. I mean, that's another side of it. Yeah, it's sort of like, hey, is it, you know, as opposed to getting all hot and bothered about hell, let's just do away with it. Let's just say everybody saved in the end. Yeah. And so I don't go like, well, okay, I don't subscribe to that. But guess what? I'm still on this planet have never been off the planet to my knowledge. And I'm not an eternity. So I can't speak with experiential evidence of me personally going, that's hell. Hell is real. Hell isn't real. You end up going, okay, that's a, that's a future dynamic and as nice as that is. What about now? Does, does salvation have anything to do with now? Does God's life entering into me have anything to do with now? Or is it always just some future thing when I'm dead? Yeah, that's, I think that's a big fear for everybody. That's why that's trying to answer that space and why she would say, so that means all people are saved. Muslims are saved. All people say who saved not saved is really the question about who gets to go to hell and who doesn't, who has to go to hell and who doesn't sit that way. Yeah. And I think I want to change the argument. I do want to say salvation is about coming inside a relationship with God because if it's not that, if it's just how do I get my get out of hell free card, then we're going to deal with a certain formula that I hope meets God's demands. Yeah, we've got to define the criteria and then we have to meet it. Yeah. And then everybody's got a different view of that, which is even then more confusing because that group wants that and that group does that. And I don't know what day it was, believers baptism, child baptism, baptism, Howard baptized, sprinkled, you know, and it's just, we've used this thing to separate people into our own institutional need to define our audience. Out of I think a need to validate and to kind of come up with some way to objectify, do I got it? Yeah. You know, who's got it? Who doesn't got it? Yeah. And it's like, I think we've done that with gifts. We've done that with the Holy Spirit. We've done that, you know, in legalism, in terms of morality tests of, well, if you were really saved, you and I just go like, what I find with human beings is I haven't found an unmixed one yet. I mean, everybody I know has mixture in their soul. And depending on when you're looking, you may come up with different conclusions about where they're at and what they believe and you're just going like, okay, I'm pretty sure that salvation is not about perfect living because I don't know anyone. And I don't think salvation is just about where is my destination of eternity. I think it includes that. I mean, I would say we learned that there is three verbal tenses to salvation. There is the, you know, the now. Have been saved, are being saved. And will be saved. And it's like, okay, as neat as that is, that does have to have some bearing into the fact that we're talking about something far bigger than just fire insurance. Yeah. This is not just, okay, I prayed a prayer, so now I'm safe. What I like about seeing salvation as coming inside a relationship with the God who loves you is that now the formulas don't matter. I did hoop one, two, three, but I didn't end up with that relationship. So go those out. I got to find something else. And it really says the product is what we want to get to. The process isn't critical. For the thief on the cross, it's simply, today you'll be with me in paradise. It's simply remember me. That was enough for him. That's the only dude we have actual verbal confirmation of his salvation. Yeah. And it didn't take much. Exactly. Peter says, when Peter's asked, you know, the question, what must we do to be safe? He's actually asked the question. Yes. So he says, repent, be baptized, be filled with the Holy Spirit. I mean, he gives a pretty, you can draw a little three-step formula out of it. You get your litmus test out of that. And so depending on the group you're with, yeah, there's going to be a way you repent, which is now the sinner's prayer, a going forward and assert whatever. And then being baptized, there's a way to do that. And then, yeah. So we took that and we said, okay, go through these steps. You're good. And you know, people are still saying, I didn't get nothing. I didn't. Yeah. I went through all those steps, but I don't know him like my heart longs to know him. Well, like when Paul walks up to the believers at Ephesus, this is like an Acts 19. And he's going like, hey, wherever he goes, he goes and he looks for the believers. He finds a bunch that he would sort of go like, yeah, I think that's them. And then he has a funny little question. He says, hey, like, when you guys believed, did you get the Holy Spirit? And they're kind of like, the Holy Who? The what? Nobody told us about that. And he's like, oh, we should make sure that we transact that. And you just end up going like, okay, it is possible according to the what you've known and what you've been given and what you were told, you can miss some essential elements that allow for this to really be a relationship. And so I would end up going like, salvation is actually coming into a relationship that you don't need some external thing to validate. Oh, you got it now. It's like, if you don't know that you're relating with him, don't stop. Yeah, it's pretty, it's pretty clear. He's not stealth about that. Yeah. He's not, yeah, I'm here, but I'm not gonna do that. I don't see anywhere in the pages of the Gospels and in the book of Acts where the people that are being the people of God don't know the presence of God as part of the package. And that's who they're relating with. And that's the greatest thing we've destroyed by making salvation about a get out of hell free card. We've destroyed. No, God wants to know you and for you to know him. And learning how to walk with someone who's so far beyond us that we can't even imagine. This is a real deal. It's not, I just pray a prayer. I'm all good. Things are great. It's learning to know him, to be known by him, to engage him, to recognize his fingerprints in my life. Those are all big deals. It's like, this is the fun of this journey. God's invited me into a relationship in which I can come with confidence inside who he is to behold him with unveiled face. The language of scripture, we kind of take that stuff and spiritualize it out of meaning instead of, no, this is what it's meant to be. So I don't have that. Well, if you don't have that, then let's find a way to get there. It involves some confessing. Yeah, some believing. Yeah, some recognition of what's true, not true. It's not a performance thing. It's simply awakening to that reality. And he's going to be the biggest one helping this process happen. But we also are involved in that unfolding. You can't get saved by yourself. And I think, unfortunately, religion is almost like trying to give us a bunch of, you know, things to tick off. What do you mean you can't get saved by yourself? I need to save you to save me. Okay, but you can get saved alone in the shower. Just Jesus needs to be there too. So you're not alone. Okay, yeah, right. So my point is if... I think you just scared a lot of people saying, I confessed to God in the middle of my bedroom and now what the heck? I can't get saved alone. I need the church. Dog, God, I need a bishop, a priest, somebody to... You need one essential being to be with you in this thing called salvation, which is Jesus Christ, the Savior, that there is... And he is with you. Yeah, he's not with you. And you will know that. Well, sometimes he's there and we don't know it yet, right? Yeah, but I don't really want to stop and try to validate that for people because I think that messes things up. No, I'm just saying when you are seeking and asking and opening, it's not like I got to get him to come here from somewhere. He's already with you. Yes. But how do I open to that reality? How does he make himself known? That's where I go like the salvation encounter is that door being opened and the someone showing up and the both of you knowing it. And I'm not just saying, oh, you got to have an experience. It's easier for him to know it. It's more complicated for us to know it. Well, we haven't been given that as an expectation. And then if we have and we haven't experienced that, now we have this as this massive fear of my lack, which freezes us up. And so I do recognize some of this is like, okay, don't make people insecure. But it's like, I sort of feel like there is no way to have, in my mind, salvation like we're meant to have and know and walk in, unless there is a life of communication that comes out of that. However long that tunnel is that you're walking in, don't stop till that becomes a real dynamic. Yeah. And recognize he is drawing you and you come seeking. There's that dance of his deal, my deal. But yeah, it's not don't just stop short and say, well, it doesn't work for me. Obviously he doesn't love me. Obviously he doesn't care. I did my part into his. God is doing his part and learning to live inside that reality and hold this longing in your heart and keep on asking, keep on seeking, keep on knocking. Because I think when we start making our approach to God, God is unraveling things to help make that clear for us. Yeah. And sometimes that unraveling takes a significant period of time before this knowing that you're talking about. And in the meantime, are you saved? Yes, you're saved inside his grace and love, but salvation is a gift that has to be received. That's, I think, where you and I go, it's tough just saying everybody gets in. But this is where it's like, I also don't want to rob someone of, of nobody needs to come. Yeah, you got it. No, I don't need that from outside. Yeah, I don't think that's a problem. It's like, if salvation is real, I'm not needing that external human validator. It's like, you know what? I think most people are looking for that because you come out that number of times. I think they are. I think they're looking for that kind of assurance. I think that's why we have all these denominations that have their triptych and want to be able to, when can I count you as you're one of us? Well, wouldn't that be true that if you don't know him and the way you're talking about, you are looking for validation? Once you have that with him, you will not need it anymore. Exactly. So it is part of that insecurity of, I don't know that he knows me, so somebody please tell me I'm okay. Exactly. Right. And I don't think that helps us. No, it doesn't. But once they get inside the reality of who he is, what to say, they won't be asking that question anymore. They don't want somebody else's validation or feel like they need it. You know, it's sort of amazing to me when Jesus, when he talked about what he was about to do on the cross, he likened it to Moses lifting up a standard in the wilderness. And I'm pretty sure most people really haven't read that story. It's a standard gas station sign. That's the standard. It's a pole. It's a chevron. It's a pole that seemed to have a vertical and horizontal around which they wrapped a serpent. Why did they do that? Well, in the Old Testament time when they're cruising through in numbers, they were all grumbling and also and got allowed out of the ground, the grumbling materialized as red, viperous serpents and was biting people and they were dying. And out of that, it's like, hey, Moses, we think we've done something wrong. Good. Moses went to God, what do I do? He said, you know, fashion a bronze serpent and lift it up. And all who would look at it will live. That's what Jesus is saying, his work on the cross. That's what he directly likens it to. And I end up going like, okay, that whole look and live thing seems to be what the thief on the cross did. It is that simple. The only people that are going to look are going to be folks that are recognizing, I got something bad going on here that I need help with. I think that's the repentance part and the looking at him. It's like, whatever that transaction is, I think they'll know in that look when I clearly see him as the means of my salvation. I think a transaction happens inside us that nobody has to externally tell me, oh, you're good now. I think we'll know. And I think there's a simplicity in that really religion has made a whole lot more complex and difficult, and it has made us insecure. Yeah, and it has given us a sense of incompetency at the individual. You know, until you've had the Greek and had the Bible knowledge and training, then you really can't be transacting these things on your own because you can just lead yourself astray. And I think we do have a religious climate in which people have been bred in the sense of their own incompetence, wrongly so. Yeah. And I think what you're speaking back to is, you know, this is about looking to him. This is about recognizing who he is, what he's done. It helps have another brother, sister along to kind of walk, not to validate you, but to walk you through just the early church did it. You know, it was proclamation. There was prayers for people. There was laying on of hands and the Holy Spirit ripped up in someone's life. All those things can be an important part of it. But like you're saying, they're not necessary. They're not essential. You don't have to have these certain steps to go through. But there is a knowing that you're now connected with God in your life. And you can walk in the light, which isn't perfection again. Walk in the light just means I don't have to hide stuff from God anymore. I don't. God's with me. God knows. And I want to open my life to him and I'm going to keep doing that every day. And to me, that's what salvation is. It's that growing communion and relationship with him. Yeah. And I think if there's a takeaway, it's that it really is meant to be a relationally understood dynamic. If you've never met someone that is called the Savior, I mean, it's like, have you ever met the president? Well, I mean, I've heard about him. I've seen him. But no, but have you ever met him? Well, no. I don't think it's that common. I don't think it's that complex. I don't think it's harder than that. It's like, when you actually have met someone, I think most all of us go, oh yeah, I met them. I think we've got to allow salvation to be brought back into that simplistic dynamic of have you met Jesus? Have you in a satisfying way where you know you've met him? Have you encountered him that way? Well, well, if you're not sure, then let's do that. Yeah, let's find out how that makes sense for you. And I think, you know, when you go like, well, what about the Muslim people? It's like, well, I don't know. Let's ask them, have they met Jesus? Do they understand who he is? Is that who they are looking for salvation to? I end up going like, I don't know that that religion is the same God of the God of the Bible. I see some real disparaging difficulties of reconciling them. I'm going like, I don't know. Well, I think Jesus makes himself known in a variety of ways. And I know it scares people like universalism. I'm going, no, I think people can be calling Jesus the wrong thing. They've really met Jesus in their heart, but their upbringing hasn't given them the words to use for that. Yeah. But it's Jesus. In fact, they're following. Yeah. And it isn't the English version of the Latin name. I mean, it's like, it is a person. And there are different languages. So it's like, well, you know, have they met him? Yeah. Paul seemed to get back to the same idea of simplicity in Romans 10. This is the Romans road, the Romans 10, 9 and 10 thing. But he just says, the word is near you. It's in your mouth and in your heart. This is the word of faith we are proclaiming that if you confess with your mouth, Jesus Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. It really makes it that simple. He doesn't have as complex a formula as Peter did about get repent, get baptized and all that stuff. But it's the simple awareness that the knowing of God lies already within you. It's the word of faith that you proclaim. And it's not, again, what does confess and what does believe look like? And it's the right set of doctrine. It's to know and believe that this Jesus is in your life. You've met him. You know him. And now you can go on a journey together for all that God wants to do in your life and help you get on in the world and to save you from the destruction of the way the world is and the way darkness is. That salvation is to save us out of darkness into his incredible light. And that light gives us a way to live in the world differently. And that's an ongoing process. Yeah. And it takes a lot of time. But I know there are people, because I'll get the emails. I know there are people listening to this going, okay, man, I've gone forward. I've done the sinner's prayer. I've asked Jesus to show himself to me. I've been prayed. I speak in tongues. I had the Holy Spirit, whatever all these things are. But I don't know him. And I get that letter all the time. But I think we have talked a lot about that diamond. I think that's where part of you says, okay, then stop running around, sit down, and invite him to make himself known. Where the onus is far more on him to reveal than it is on me who doesn't feel very gifted at seeing, hearing, or doing. Because I can't save me. I can be saved. The active portion of this is something that God does that I'm available to. I can't control the livers. And I like to say, stop reading. Don't read another book. Don't listen to another podcast until you do that. Because I think people expect it to come from something else. They'll go to a meeting. They'll go to a revival. They'll go to, I'm still looking for this connection. And you getting alone with him. You seeking and knocking, opening the door. I think that's critical. But if I'm looking for it to come some other way, or... I think we're grabbing for an external validation that really is an internal reality. And once it is, you won't need the external reality. I don't want someone else's validation at the expense of my having an internal reality. But this is pretty big stuff. If you guys are wrong, you guys are wrong. And it really takes... We're not wrong. I know, but that's the fear. But we're not wrong. Because there's so many... The language is all over there somewhere else. These are the three things you've got to do in this group. These are the four things you do in that group. And how do you qualify for this? But it never produces the guys who are talking about, Hey, these things, our hands have handled. Our eyes are seeing. I end up going like, there is no way to remove the experiential internal reality of knowing that I know him. And once that happens, there's gone this insecurity of, gee, what do I need to get externally validated? It's like, really, that's where you start to become really free. And this starts to become really fun. Because I really am having a relationship. The sad dynamic is church and religion would kind of like, I'm not so sure about you. You must be imbalanced. And I'm going like, that's a real deal. And those of us that want to be helpers in the world, the help is not, okay, I'll get these three steps and I'll walk you through them. And now you're good. Let's pray. Let's see God make himself known. Let's be a helper to that reality, to open someone's life to recognize the God who makes himself known to them. Instead of giving them any kind of cheap substitute that just said, well, I control this. So repeat after me these words. Let's go throw your head in the underwater somewhere. And now we'll pray and you do. My father has a better Honda and you have a better Honda. And then we're all good. And then that person still goes on drifting in the emptiness of, but I don't know him. And my soul longs to know him. And if your soul longs to know him, don't stop anywhere short of that. Yeah, because he'll make it known. He will. And he already is. It may be taking time and it may be that your expectations are misplaced, but that doesn't mean he's not coming at you and that in him you are safe from the very beginning.