Skip to content Unstoppable: Revival Starts With A Remnant Apr 19 · 1 hr 1 min ...more
Unstoppable: Revival Starts With A Remnant
April 19, 2026 · 1 hr 1 min
What if the remnant God's seeking to spark revival is you? Paul boldly proclaimed Jesus as the exclusive path to salvation in Athens, confronting their cultural idolatry head-on despite fierce opposition. Pastor Jeff challenges us that revival doesn't require masses—just faithful few who clearly proclaim Christ, humbly receive Scripture, boldly confront idols, and urgently demand repentance. Through our Taking Ground campaign and expanding campuses, God's positioning us to reach more souls before judgment comes. Don't wait for perfect conditions or unanimous support—step into your calling now and watch God move through the willing remnant! Speaker: Jeff Schwarzentraub
Series BRAVE Church April 19, 2026 · 1 hr 1 min · BRAVE Church
What if the remnant God's seeking to spark revival is you? Paul boldly proclaimed Jesus as the exclusive path to salvation in Athens, confronting their cultural idolatry head-on despite fierce opposition. Pastor Jeff challenges us that revival doesn't require masses—just faithful few who clearly proclaim Christ, humbly receive Scripture, boldly confront idols, and urgently demand repentance. Through our Taking Ground campaign and expanding campuses, God's positioning us to reach more souls before judgment comes. Don't wait for perfect conditions or unanimous support—step into your calling now and watch God move through the willing remnant! Speaker: Jeff Schwarzentraub ...more Show the full description Show less What if the remnant God's seeking to spark revival is you? Paul boldly proclaimed Jesus as the exclusive path to salvation in Athens, confronting their cultural idolatry head-on despite fierce opposition. Pastor Jeff challenges us that revival doesn't require masses—just faithful few who clearly proclaim Christ, humbly receive Scripture, boldly confront idols, and urgently demand repentance. Through our Taking Ground campaign and expanding campuses, God's positioning us to reach more souls before judgment comes. Don't wait for perfect conditions or unanimous support—step into your calling now and watch God move through the willing remnant! Speaker: Jeff Schwarzentraub
Series BRAVE Church Support this leader Liking this video? Support this ministry.
Support this leader
Liking this video? Support this ministry.
Give
Support this leader Liking this video? Support this ministry.
139K followers
Pastor Jeff Schwarzentraub serves as president of Pastor Jeff Ministries, a national and global ministry designed to equip believers and challenge them to take
139K followers
0:01 Thanks, brother. Appreciate you. I I can tell you this from working with a lot of elders over the years. Our stewarding elders are doing a phenomenal job of making sure that we're stewarding the resources that are being0:12 brought to the Lord in a way that's honoring both to God and to man. And so, continue to pray for them, continue to, lift this campaign up in prayer, and we're gonna trust that the Lord's gonna do it to expand campuses0:23 and reach more people for his glory. Amen? Would you pray with me as we get ready to hear God's living and active word this morning? Our father in heaven, we give you glory, we give you honor, we give you praise for who0:33 you are. And Lord, we thank you that we can gather as your body today to worship your name, to seek your face in prayer, to hear your living and active word so that we can specifically know what you're saying to each 10:44 of us and respond accordingly. Because Lord, we as a people believe every time your word is faithfully and accurately proclaimed that it is you who are speaking. So our prayer this morning is speak Lord for we are0:56 ready to hear. And so now for all those who have gathered who desire to hear the Lord Jesus Christ speak directly to you, who will believe what he tells you and who will by faith put into practice what he shows you. Will1:07 you agree with me very loudly this morning by saying the word amen. Amen. Revival always starts with a remnant. When revival happens, it always starts with1:19 a remnant. It never starts with a large group. It always starts with a small group. And when we talk about revival, if you've been a Christian for more than 5 years or you've a Christian like I have for over 35 years,1:28
1:40 read about it in the book of acts, but I'm not really seeing it in my life, and if that's really true, then how come we're not seeing it? As a matter of fact, in our culture, it's more common to see former houses of
1:52 worship and places where the Lord gathered his people turned into restaurants or, you know, stores or worse yet, nightclubs. And we've seen more of that in our culture sometimes than
2:04 we've seen the planting of new churches that are spurring up and helping people grow. So when someone talks about revival or revival starting with a remnant, there's something in this that's like, yeah, right. I've heard
2:13 all this before. I'm prepared to hear this. Let's move on to the next topic because it's probably not gonna happen in my lifetime. I have news for you. Our God is the same God yesterday, today, and forever. Everything
2:23 that God is able to do, He's always been able to do. And if God does not move in your lifetime, it is not a result of God not willing to, it's a result of you not wanting Him to. It
2:35 doesn't take large numbers to change things. I happened to be out in our nation's capital this week. I was in the capital building and I was being taught by a guy named Tim Barton, who is a founding
2:47 fathers historian like his dad, David. And and I've listened to these guys talk before and they talk about the founding fathers like you would talk about your family. Like they know them, like they grew up with them,
2:57 super educated. And I was asking a question and he asked me a question back. He said, pastor Jeff, he said, what percentage of the colonies do you think wanted to fight
3:09 in the American revolution? Like, how what percent of colonists at the time said, yeah, we need to take on Britain? And I said, I don't know, probably like 80 percent or something like that. And he said, of that 80
3:20 percent, how many do you think fought? And I'm like, I don't know, probably not as many, maybe 60. He goes, would you be surprised to know that only 15 to 30 percent of the colonies actually wanted to war against Britain
3:28 and only 7 to 10 percent of the men fought? I was shocked, and I started thinking in my heart, it only takes a remnant. We so often wait for every church to come
3:40 on board and every church member to be ready, and once we're all set up and once we're ready to go, hey, God, you move. God doesn't work like that. He's just looking for a few that can do it,
3:53 and you know who you are. I mean, when I was growing up, we used to go to this thing called the movies. It was a movie theater. You didn't get it on your phone or anything like that at your house. You went to movie
4:02 theater. Go we go there and you know, I'm I'm thankful for all the military branches of service, and I'm thankful for all the men and women that serve in our country, but there's 1 branch that's always done the best in
4:12 advertising. The marines. Because I would I knew you're gonna say that. Because every time I would see a marine commercial, there would be a storm coming and the marines would be
4:24 charging towards it. Every time there was trouble approaching, the marines were like, we got this, and it was only just a few guys running and I thought they had the coolest uniforms and all that stuff, and then at the
4:34 end, they would say they didn't say they were looking for everybody. You know who they said they were looking for? The few, the proud, the marines, and even as a kid, I'm like, if I go in the military, I'm doing that
4:45 because I'm 1 of those. Right? That's who God's looking for. He's not looking for the masses. He's looking for those whose hearts are rightly related to him.
4:57 He's looking for the 1 he's no respecter of age. You can be 10 years old. He's not looking for a specific personality. You can be an introvert. He's not looking for specific gift mixes. You can have whatever gift
5:09 mix. He's looking for the 1 whose heart is fully devoted to him. And if he can collect a few of those together, he'll pour his spirit out in a way that the world has
5:20 never seen before. So today I wanted to talk to the few. I wanna talk to those of you who wanted to hear the Lord about how it is that God can bring revival through me. And to do that today, we're gonna be in Acts
5:32 chapter 17. And in acts chapter 17, we're picking up where we left off, where Paul had just been in Philippi and had been thrown into prison, and the gates were opened, and the jailer was gonna
5:44 kill himself, but Paul shouted out, said, no, don't kill yourself. We're all here. Paul led him to the Lord, led his whole family to the Lord, and then he was released and he made the Romans come get him and release him.
5:56 Then he went to that small church in Philippi and then went on his way, and this is where our story picks up in acts chapter 17. It says, now when they had traveled through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to
6:07 Thessalonica where there was a synagogue of Jews. And according to Paul's custom, he went to them and for 3 Sabbaths reasoned with them from the scriptures explaining and giving evidence
6:19 that the Christ had to suffer and rise again from the dead saying, this Jesus who I'm proclaiming to you is the Christ. So here's the first of 4
6:31 ways that I want you to see how God can spark revival with just a few. And revival starts with a remnant when Christ is proclaimed clearly. When
6:43 Christ is proclaimed clearly. Notice notice what he does. When Paul goes there, he goes to the synagogue. That was his normal custom. The reason he didn't do it in Philippi is there probably weren't 10 Jews. There
6:54 probably wasn't a synagogue there. And so he went down by the river. He went to a prayer meeting to get things started. But here he goes. He goes to the synagogue, and for 3 Sabbaths, so for 3 straight weeks on
7:06 Saturday, he's teaching them and explaining to them who Jesus is. And then he says this in the anniversary, this Jesus who I am proclaiming to you is
7:17 the Christ. What's he saying? The Jesus I'm telling you about is the only way to salvation. This Jesus I'm telling you about is the only 1 that can save you from your sins. This Jesus that I'm telling you about is
7:29 the only 1 that can save you from the wrath of God that is to come. And he started explaining all this from the scriptures, but he made Jesus so clear. 1 of the reasons that we don't see people respond to Christ as
7:41 frequently as we'd like is we're not clear enough. We sometimes round off the edges of what truth is so we can make it more quote unquote, palatable. The gospel
7:53 wasn't designed to be palatable. The gospel was designed to be truthful. And when the truth of the gospel gets shared, there's only 1 of 2 things that people can do with it. They can accept it, respond to
8:05 Christ and come to him or reject it. But the reason that so many people hear and don't go either way is because Christ hasn't clearly been
8:17 proclaimed. Now I'm talking to a majority of you that aren't called to be quote unquote preachers. That's fine. But in your daily witness of who Christ is, are you explaining who Jesus
8:28 is clearly? He's not like anyone else. He's not like any other God. When I'm talking about Jesus, I'm talking about the eternal son of God. I'm talking about the second person of the
8:40 trinity who's always existed. There was never a time that the second person of the trinity didn't exist. When you hear let there be in Genesis, that's Jesus speaking and the Holy Spirit responding to
8:52 him. He's always been. 2000 years ago, he put on human flesh. He was born of a virgin because he had to be. He was conceived by the Holy Spirit. If he would've been
9:04 conceived by a man and a woman, he would've been conceived in sin. Couldn't do that. So he was conceived by the Holy Spirit in Mary's belly, in her womb, and he comes out. Now, forevermore, he's the God man.
9:16 Jesus is not the brother of the devil, and he's the good brother, and the devil's the bad brother. Jesus is not a created being. He's always been here in 2000 years ago put on flesh. He came to this world to do for you
9:28 what you couldn't do. He fulfilled the law, and everything that the father required, everything God required, Jesus Christ did. And prior to leaving this earth, he said he was
9:40 the way, the truth, and the life, and there is no 1 who comes to the father except through him. Here's what his claims were. I'm God. I'm exclusive.
9:52 All other religions are wrong. I'm the only 1 you can follow. I'm the only 1 that can save you from the wrath of God. I'm the only 1 that can do that, and to demonstrate he was telling the truth, he told people he would
10:03 die and 3 days later rise again. And guess what he did? He died, and when he died, he died in your place as a substitutionary atonement for your sin. What you deserved
10:15 and what you earned from the wrath of God, he himself took on a cross for 6 hours and he died. He took all of our sin away, and then validating that he
10:27 was indeed the true son of God and was who he said he was, he rose from the dead. We as Christians do not believe we're going to some spiritual heaven. We believe in the
10:38 resurrection of the dead. In heaven, for both those of us who are born again, we'll have bodies, we'll have eyes, we'll have hands. They'll be awesome. I mean, they'll be incredible. I think I'm gonna look like Thor or
10:50 something in heaven. They're they're they're they're not gonna spoil perish your faith, but we believe in the resurrection of the body. That this body that I'm in now, it's not just going away. It's going to be
11:01 resurrected, put back together without sin, perfect in every single way, maybe with hair. I don't know. God hasn't told me that yet. But if you don't
11:13 recognize me, that's what happened. But Christ needs to be proclaimed clearly, and when we think about how we do ministry, we think about how we're gonna do it, and oftentimes we think about ministry. We as
11:24 Americans like to think strategy first, and there's a place for strategy. That's okay. But strategy doesn't lead the day. Christ does. If you wanna be fruitful in
11:36 your ministry, clearly explain who Jesus is. Use the word of God to explain who Jesus is. Depend upon prayer so that God can communicate through you who Jesus
11:48 is and allow the holy spirit to do his work. If those things are primary in your life, fruit will happen. Right? And so often we don't do that. We we wanna start all these other things and like,
12:00 listen, I'm I'm I'm good with the new screens we're gonna get, you'll be impressed. Some of you guys want new chairs I've heard and that's great. But but that's not what we're about. We're about proclaiming Christ. We
12:10 want you to know Jesus. We want you to know who he is. Right? And so we wanna proclaim Christ clearly. Paul said in first Corinthians 2 2, for I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.
12:22 Now you're not talking about some village idiot or some moron. He was the most well trained guy of the day. He had lots he could talk about. He was an expert in a lot of things and he said, but I didn't tell you
12:32 anything. I just told you about Jesus and him crucified and him resurrected. He says in first Corinthians 15 3 and 4, for I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received that Christ died for our sins
12:44 according to the scriptures, and that he was buried and that he rose according to the scriptures. What is Paul's central message of everything he's talking about? It's the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus.
12:55 Everything else comes from there. Paul doesn't give TED talks. Paul Paul's not wanting you to like him. Paul's not wanting you to think that he's smart. Paul wants you to know Jesus and to listen to him and do what Jesus
13:07 says, and any faithful proclaimer of the word and any faithful servant of Christ will want people to clearly hear who Jesus is. And when people hear who Jesus clearly is, 1 of 2 things,
13:19 thank you. I never knew that. Friends, I grew up in a Lutheran grade school going to church my entire life. Now, I'm not saying the gospel wasn't shared, I'm saying I never heard
13:31 it. I just didn't hear it. What I heard was, I'm pretty good, and God's really good, and I'm going to heaven because I'm better than most of my friends. And I go to church more
13:42 than they do, and I go to a Lutheran grade school, and I'm doubly covered. And then when I heard the gospel, at first I was so mad because I was 18 years old. And I'm like, if that's true, then I'm going to
13:54 hell. And, that means everybody hasn't told me the truth. And then it changed really fast. And I was like, but I want this. And when I trusted Christ, I knew everything in me changed.
14:06 When I read the word, the word started reading me. Everything changed. Do you know what I'm saying? And that's what people need. They need a clear picture of Christ. If we don't tell people the whole truth,
14:18 they can't make a decision. They can't respond accordingly. If you just tell people, hey, I believe in Jesus. You should believe in Jesus too. Hey, I go to a church that's kinda cool. You should go to a kinda cool church
14:28 too. Hey, we sing songs. You should sing songs too. Are you good with that? Yeah. That sounds good. Okay, cool. Do you wanna get baptized? Yeah, that sounds good. I'll do that. That's not the gospel. The gospel is this,
14:39 if you don't repent and trust Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, you will face his judgment and wrath in hell forever and ever, amen, and there's no getting out of it. And Jesus Christ loved you enough, he
14:50 came and died, so you'd never have to experience that. And he rose from the dead to validate that he's God's 1 and only son and could overcome death, and he's the only 1 who's ever overcome death. So if you wanna
15:00 overcome death, you better place your faith and trust in him alone. That's the gospel. What are you gonna do with that? Because that's telling you that every other world religion's false. That's telling you that all the
15:11 good people you know that serve other gods are wrong. That tells you that everybody that's not on Christ's road is on the road to hell, and that's not palatable. It's just truthful. Amen? I mean,
15:23 so often we have this idea where we you know, if you wear contact lenses or you wear glasses and you have a smudge on any of them, you can't see very clearly. The problem is not what the doctor
15:35 prescribed. The problem is you have to clean them off, and when you clean them off, then you can see clearly. We need to let the word of God speak clearly so people can hear. People need to know what they're signing up
15:46 for. Jesus said, anybody who wants to come after me must deny himself, take up his cross, follow me. Is that what you're signing up? Well, I didn't wanna sign up for that. I was just signing up for that free fire
15:56 insurance card that you told me about, so I wouldn't go to hell. I don't want anything to do with Jesus because we don't tell them the whole truth. Christ wants to be the Lord
16:08 of your life. That's the truth. And the question is, is he Lord or is he just 1 of many others in your life? Is he Lord or is he nothing in your life? Because you will stand before him and you will give an
16:19 account for your life, and what you do with Jesus on this side of heaven matters. It's kinda like this. So often we're we're just wanting people just to accept Christ and just accept Christ. So we don't tell them what
16:30 they're accepting, but you're not like that. I mean, if your doctor said you're sick and you went to the pharmacy and the pharmacist gave you a bottle and on the bottle, it said, take this, you'll feel better.
16:42 It didn't tell you what drug it was, and it didn't tell you how much to take. You'd be like, what in the world is this? Like, what am I taking? How much do I take? When do I take it? I mean, what is this thing? You'd
16:51 want clarity on it. You wouldn't just swallow it. In the same way, people need clarity on Christ so they know what they're aligning their life with. And friends, we need to be clear on this.
17:03 Some of you, when you study, some of you, when you're in your car, some of you, when you're walking around your house, you like background music. You like all different kinds of background music, and background music's
17:13 good. Sometimes you have them in your earbuds. You just have background music so you can do other things while you're listening to music. It serves a purpose, but that's different than a fire alarm, isn't it? A fire
17:24 alarm is not something that's fun to have in the background. A fire alarm is on the front. Within the last month, I had a fire alarm in my house go off in the middle of the night. It was piercing. It was loud. It was
17:35 awful. And as I got out of bed, was trying to figure out what floor it was on, and the closer I got it was in the basement. The closer I got, the more piercing, the more loud it became. When I climbed the step ladder to
17:44 undo it, the more piercing and loud it became. It was so annoying, and it kept coming back on that I took it out to the garage, put it in my truck, shut my truck door, shut the garage door, went back to bed because I'm
17:55 like, don't wanna hear this thing again. Like, it's annoying. Now all these people in first service were telling me your batteries were probably out. Hey, thanks for all the advice. I appreciate it. My point
18:07 is the gospel's not background music. To most people, they think it is. The gospel is a fire alarm. The gospel apprehends your soul and says, are you living for Christ
18:19 or are you not? I mean, Peter at Pentecost didn't say, hey, let's just explore spirituality together, y'all. He said, this Jesus whom you crucified, God
18:30 raised up. You're responsible for his death. Right? I mean, that's the gospel. And here's what I would say. Revival doesn't begin with better programs. It begins with a clearer Christ. It
18:42 begins with a clearer Christ. I mean, when we first started our church, people would ask me questions like this, like, what's your target audience? Who are you trying to reach? And my response was simple, and we don't
18:51 have any people, so anybody with a heartbeat would be great. We'd love to get them here. Like, I don't care who they are. I don't care what age. Just bring them in. Now, as we've grown as a church and somebody said,
19:00 well, who are you targeting? I I can be really clear on who we're targeting. I'm targeting people that wanna go all in with Jesus. That's who I'm speaking to. If you're brand new to church, you've never been here before,
19:09 you don't even know what I'm talking about, you are so welcome here. We're so glad you're here. We would love to introduce you to Jesus and let you walk with Jesus to the full. If you've been seasoned for 50 years, I
19:18 want you to walk more closely to Jesus than you've ever walked. That's that's who I'm preaching to. If you don't wanna walk with Jesus, my hope is that my messages upset you greatly.
19:31 I'm not here to tickle your ears. I'm here to get you to walk with the resurrected living Christ that you're gonna meet. Amen? And if I
19:43 can just say this, I mean, I am irritated beyond belief at our culture in the number or percentage of pastors that don't believe this word is true. And even some that
19:55 say they do, if they really did, they would actually teach all of it without apology. But you know it's true if you own it, not if you say it. I just wish more and more people
20:07 said, Mel, that's just the word. The word actually changes. The word is Jesus incarnate, so I'm gonna preach the word and let the Holy Spirit do the the work. Don't need more programs. We need a clearer Christ. People
20:18 need to hear the word. My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Hosea four:six. Revival starts when Christ is proclaimed clearly. Let me give you a second 1.
20:30 Revival starts when scripture is received humbly. Notice what happened here in verse 5 after they, preached the gospel. Verse 4 says, and some were persuaded and they joined Paul and Silas along with a large number
20:42 of the God fearing Greeks and a number of the leading women. So there were some, some Greeks, some Jews, some of the leading women, yeah, we that we're in, but notice verse 5. Here's how you know Jesus
20:54 was proclaimed clearly. But the Jews becoming jealous and taking along some wicked men from the marketplace formed a mob and set the city in an uproar, and attacking the house of Jason, they were seeking to bring them
21:04 out to the people. When they did not find them, they began dragging Jason and some of the brethren before the cities city authorities, shouting, these men who have upset
21:16 the world have come here also. So what happens? When when the Jews see, the religious people see, hey, Jesus is getting in the way of our religion, and Jesus always gets in the way of other
21:28 people's religion. If you proclaim that it's the resurrected Jesus Christ and nothing else matters, there's gonna be some people that get upset. And so they did what a lot of people do when they get upset. They went and
21:38 hired somebody out to go get them. So they went and found these wicked men in the marketplace. What are wicked men in the marketplace? Men that have nothing better to do than bother people in the marketplace. People that
21:47 don't have jobs. People that are doing their own thing. People that are living to go after other people. That's what they were doing. And so they go to this guy's house, Jason, where Paul was apparently staying, and they
21:57 go to drag Paul out, but Paul wasn't there. So they take Jason and some of the brothers down to the authorities, and here's what they're saying. These men that have thrown the whole world into confusion have now come
22:07 here. Here's what they're saying. They're ruining our city. Their values don't match our values. They're serving another king. We don't want them here. So they drag
22:19 them all out. So notice this. Paul's the preacher. Jason only housed him, but Jason's gonna pay a massive price because of his relationship with Paul. I mean, Jason's not like,
22:31 don't know, man. I'm just watching it online. I don't I mean, he's with him. And so he has to go to the magistrates and notice what claims they make. It's the same thing they said in Philippi, that these people are
22:42 upsetting the whole world and throwing our city in into confusion. So they came and they said, these men have come here also, and Jason welcomed them. And they all act contrary to the decrees of Caesar saying, there is
22:53 another king, Jesus. Here's the claim they didn't like. Religion, no problem, but you're claiming there's an authority higher than any earthly authority that you're giving your allegiance to, and we don't like
23:05 that. Nobody has a problem if you say you love God. Even some people don't even have a problem if you say love Jesus, as long as he's not the authority in your life and you expect to live under that authority and have
23:17 others live under that authority too. If Jesus is your authority, you're living under his authority and you expect other people to live under his authority, expect problems. Expect problems. So they're dragging Jason
23:28 down to the authorities and they're saying they're they're saying there's another king that's even bigger than Caesar. Can you believe that? Yeah. I believe it's Jesus. He created Caesar. Right? And so what happens? They
23:38 stirred up the crowd in the city authorities who heard these things, and when they had received a pledge from Jason and the others, they released him. So what did Jason have to do? He had to put money down. He had to
23:48 sign, hey, we won't take this thing any further just so that they can get Paul out of town. Right? I mean, he's living for the Lord by housing somebody who's speaking on Christ's behalf.
24:00 And the Holy Spirit says that's so important. I'm gonna put that in the scripture so that you can know that if you're not a preacher, support those who faithfully preach the word. That's what he was doing. Amen? So
24:10 notice verse 10. The brethren immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea. That's 50 miles away. And when they arrived, what do they do? What do you think they're gonna do? Are they gonna lament the way they
24:21 were mistreated in Thessalonica? Are they gonna call a small group and sob together? Are they gonna just pray? No. Notice what they do. And when they arrived, they went into the synagogue of the Jews. So
24:33 let's go do the work here. We're arriving. We need to go proclaim Christ clearly here. We're in Berea now. New city, same mission. So they go in and it talks about the Bereans. It says, now these were more noble
24:44 minded than those in Thessalonica, and here's why, for they received the word with great eagerness, examining the scriptures daily to see whether these things were so. Noble minded means they were open to receiving the
24:56 scriptures and they were hungry to receive the scriptures. And can I give you a promise from Jesus when you're hungry to receive the scriptures? In the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew chapter 5 verse 6, blessed are those
25:05 who hunger and thirst for righteousness for they shall be satisfied. Who's God looking for? He's looking for people that hear the word, read the word, hear the word proclaim like, I want this. I want it to take
25:17 ownership in me. I wanna hear what God has to say. I wanna do what God wants me to do. I wanna do it God's way no matter what the cost is. I want the word. Let me devour it. Let me consume it. And the reality is
25:29 every time the word is read or every time the word is proclaimed, there's really 4 different types of soil the Bible makes clear. Some have hard hearts, they don't wanna hear anything, they're just dragged here, they're
25:38 angry, they're not listening to anything. Satan comes and says, I'll take that word. Some have a rocky patch where they got some decent soil, and when it hits there, it springs up for a while, but when trials and
25:49 tribulations come, they're like, didn't sign up for this, I'm out. Some, the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of wealth are the weedy soil that choke it and make it unfruitful. However, when the word of God falls
26:00 on a receptive heart, it always produces a yield of 30, 60 or even a hundredfold. It means anytime there's somebody hungry for the word and say, God, I want what
26:12 the word says, work it in my life, put it into practice, always 30, 60 or a hundredfold. The problem is not the word of God. The problem is the rest of rest of what am I trying to say? Problem is is the receiving
26:23 of the person. Receptivity. That's what I'm trying to say. The receptivity of the heart. That's the problem. Right? And so when you hear the word, your attitude on how you receive it changes everything. That's why some
26:35 can hear a message, and people can hear all the same message, and some can say, I got nothing out of that. And some can say, that was really good, and then fall away later. And some can be like, it's good, but man, I'm
26:45 more concerned about all my other idols in my life. But then there's some that hear it, I'm like, that changed me, and that changed me, and I'm different now because the word of God penetrated my heart and God's doing a
26:56 work in my life. Right? Here's the remnant God's looking for. He's looking for those who will talk about Christ clearly and hunger for him, and hunger for his word and receive it humbly. When you
27:08 receive the word humbly, it means this, when I go into this book, whether I'm studying it on my own or whether I'm preparing for a message or whether I'm proclaiming it, whether you're hearing it, however you're doing,
27:16 Lord, you have something in this book you want me to hear today. I wanna hear what you have for me to hear today and whatever it is, I wanna by faith, believe it and put it into practice so I can grow. When you start
27:27 approaching the word like that, and Lord, even the things that bother me, because there'll be plenty that do, because it will go against the grain of your life. Even the things that bother me, Lord, I want what you want.
27:37 And why? Because second Timothy 3 16 says, all scripture is God breathed and is profitable for teaching, for reproof, for training in righteousness, so the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.
27:49 Even at the end of James 1 21, he says, in humility, receive the word implanted, which is able to save your souls. For some people that say that
28:01 they love the Bible, they they view the Bible as a window to other people. So they read the Bible and they read it like this. Yeah, Lord, you need to really help my spouse see what they need to be. And, my kids, I
28:13 can tell you that they're not being as obedient as they should teach them how to be obedient. And, by the way, at work, my boss, he's just yeah. He's definitely not that. He needs to be more forgiving and loving. He
28:22 needs to be more generous with his time and money. I see that. And oh, yeah, my neighbors. Yeah. They need to get their life together. They're pretty immoral. I mean, we read it like a window for other people. But if you
28:32 read it, the Bible the way it's intended, you'll read it like a mirror. And when you read it, you'll say, Lord, how can I become a better spouse? And how can I become a better dad? And Lord, what are the immoralities in
28:43 my life? And what are you trying to wash away? And what am I not hearing that you're trying to tell me? And Lord, speak to me about me because I know there's so much to change. You read the word like a mirror, you won't
28:53 have time to worry about other people. Because there's enough in our own lives that God's dealing with. And then when you do deal with other people, you'll you'll have the grace to to take the speck out of their eye
29:05 because God's been taking the plank out of yours. Amen? And when scripture is received humbly, that's when things begin to happen. You know, 1 of the good kings and there weren't
29:16 very many for Judah, there were only about 6 in the Old Testament was King Josiah. He came to the throne at the age of 8, I believe. And when he came to the throne at the age of 8, he never really heard the law. He was a
29:27 good king, but he really didn't know it because his father and his grandfather were horrible and evil. But at the age of 26, he heard the law of God for the first time because they found the book of the
29:39 law that they hadn't had before, and they brought it in, and he heard the word of the Lord being read at the age of 26. And here's what he said. In second Kings
29:50 22 11, when the king heard the words of the book of the law, he tore his clothes. Then he called his commanders and in verse 13, he said this, go inquire of the Lord for me and the people of
30:02 all Judah concerning the words of this book that has been found. For great is the wrath of the Lord that burns against us because our fathers have not listened to the words of this book to do according to all that is
30:14 written concerning us. So he hears the law and he's so contrite and sorrowful, he rips his garments. He tells all of his authoritative leaders, go find out what we need to do. Because as I'm listening to this,
30:26 we haven't done this. Our fathers haven't done this. God's wrath is great. He hates what we're doing. What do we need to do? And he gets word from the word, what he needs to do, and he starts tearing down all the idols
30:37 in the culture. He starts ripping down the Asherah poles. He starts making sure they only worship the true God. He is the king is telling everybody, we will serve the Lord and serve him only. He's the only 1 we're gonna
30:48 serve, and he continued to do that for the rest of his kingship. That's what happens when the word of God gets ahold of your heart. When the word of God gets ahold of your heart and you're hungry for it, the Lord has a
30:59 way of showing you the grievousness of your sin, and at the same time, showing you his incredible mercy that he has for you in a way that no human being can. God will
31:11 show you. Search me and try me, oh Lord. See if there's any offensive way in me. Lead me in the way everlasting. And if you read the Bible as a mirror, this book will read you. If you have the Holy Spirit, this book will
31:22 read you. When I got saved, I mean, I went like I said, I went to a Lutheran grade school and church my whole life. I read the Bible. I memorized scripture. I knew things. But when I got saved and the Holy Spirit was in
31:31 my life, I remember reading the first book I ever read in the New Testament after got saved was the book of James. I read it all read it about 20 minutes. And it was like, I understand all of this. I've never seen any of
31:42 this stuff in my life. I had passages of it memorized. I didn't know what it meant. I didn't know what it meant after I got saved. It all started to make sense. If you're born again, you have the spirit of God on the
31:52 inside to teach you the truths. If you're born again, you have the spirit of God on the inside when the word of God is being taught to know how to respond. The people of Berea, 50 miles away, the different than the
32:03 Thessalonians. Thessalonians heard it, some received it, some didn't. The Bereans were saying, man, we gotta check this thing out. Is this really true? Now when Paul's reasoning from the scriptures, understand he hasn't
32:13 written first Thessalonians yet because he just left Thessalonica last night. I mean, there's no new testament he's reading from. He's going through the old testament scriptures proving that Jesus is the Christ, and
32:22 they're all saying, we hear you. We hear you. We wanna see it for ourselves. Is this where it is? And therefore, many of them believed along with a great number of prominent Greek women and men. But notice this, he's
32:34 teaching so clearly that he's causing problems because notice verse 13. But when the Jews of Thessalonica found out that the word of God had been proclaimed by Paul and Berea also. So those
32:45 Jews that were stirring up trouble 50 miles away back in Thessalonica, they heard that the same Paul was preaching the same word in Berea. And
32:57 they're troubled that he's 50 miles away doing what he was doing. So what do they do? So they came there as well, agitating and stirring up the crowds. I mean, 50 miles is not like
33:09 50 miles today. Some of you drove 50 miles to get here. I get that. You can do it in less than an hour. Right? 50 miles by foot, you're talking 2 to 3 days. So these guys are hearing, hey, Paul's preaching in Berea.
33:20 Alright. I'm taking a vacation. I'm taking PTO. We're going over to Berea because we're gonna stop this. I mean, they're at people get agitated when all you do is preach the true unadulterated
33:32 word of God. All you do is tell people about who Jesus is. So they came there and stirred up the crowds. Then immediately, this is the second time it was immediately. Verse 10, immediately sent them to Berea away from
33:41 Thessalonica. Now then immediately the brethren sent Paul out as far as the sea, and Silas and Timothy remained there. So Silas and Timothy stay in Berea. Paul's getting sent out to sea. That's another 50 miles away, and
33:52 notice where he ends up. Now those who escorted Paul brought him as far as Athens, and receiving a command for Silas and Timothy to come to him as soon as possible, they left. It was easier to get to Athens by sea.
34:04 Going around by foot would have been 180 to 200 miles. Going by sea was a little bit quicker, but it's a pretty big journey. And all why? Because people were receiving the word of God in
34:16 humility. Friends, I'm here to tell you, I don't care if you're young or if you're old, but the secret of growing with Christ is to humbly receive the word of God. When you say,
34:28 God, I want what you want and I wanna hear what you're saying. And even if I don't understand it, that's what I wanna put it into practice. If you I wanna make a difference for you. I wanna know what you have for my
34:35 life. I wanna know what your plan just receive the word of God in humility. He will lead you, guide you and show you. You'll be on the right path where you need to go. Revival starts when Christ is proclaimed clearly
34:45 when the scripture is received humbly. Let me give you a third 1. Revival starts when idolatry idolatry is confronted boldly. When idolatry is confronted boldly. Now,
34:57 Paul was waiting for them at Athens. So he's waiting for Timothy and and, Silas to join him. And then while he was waiting for them in Athens, he his spirit was being provoked within him
35:09 as he was observing the city full of idols. So he's seen the city, seen all these idols set up, and it's not like, okay, I guess this town worships some different things and different gods. He's agitated on the
35:21 inside and here's why he's agitated because he knows that because these people don't believe in the resurrected Jesus, that all the people he's looking at in the city are gonna spend a Christless eternity in hell and
35:32 he's bothered by that. Can I just say, if you can look around our city and you're not bothered by the non Christians you see, then you do not understand the fullness of the gospel? I mean, if you can see the
35:44 people who don't serve the living Christ and you're like, yeah, they're fine. You don't understand the gospel. If God gave a picture on our screens of what it looks like when somebody dies apart from Christ, it would
35:56 scare you to death. It would it would terrify you. Because if the Bible is true, which it is, it means when people have not responded to the goodness of Christ, guess what happens? Immediately, they'll hear these
36:07 words, depart from me, you worker of iniquity. I never knew you. They'll be thrown into hell. Will they wait the final judgment in Revelation 20, where the all the books will be opened, their name will not be read, and
36:16 then they'll be cast into the lake of fire. Now they'll have a resurrected body too that won't be able to perish or spoil or fade, but that will be in the lake of fire for all eternity. Bad day. And if you really believe
36:26 that and you know that that's true and you can see people or hang out with people that aren't going the direction you are and that doesn't grieve your soul, you don't understand the fullness of what's going on. Paul was
36:37 agitated. He's bothered. He's he's grieved. He's looking at all these people in Athens that live in this great town, and he's like, they don't get it. So he was reasoning in the synagogue, verse 17, with the Jews and the
36:47 God fearing Gentiles, and in the marketplace every day with those who happened to be present. And also, some of the Epicurean and stoic philosophers were conversing with him. Now, just real quick without getting into
36:57 tons of details on time. The Epicureans I mean, if you if you're on Epicureans, their whole thing was like comfort and pleasure. If you've ever been around people whose main goals in life are just comfort and pleasure.Show more
Comments No comments yet. Start the conversation.
Comments
Keep it kind. Comments are public.