Grit, Grace, and a Faith That Endures

You know how my wife and I, I don't want to give you something for me like, but this is something we did to experience mind-bending financial breakthrough. We memorized verses on prosperity. We spoke them, and we spoke them, and we just believed them, and we allowed the word of God to be made flesh to where if you prick me in verse on financial prosperity would leak out. And that word went to work! Welcome to the City Light Church podcast. Thanks for joining us today, as we look into God's word and discover the hope and truth that he has for us. If you want to connect with City Light Church, feel free to visit us at citylightnyc.com, that's citylightnyc.com. Pastor Boyan Jansik and his team believe that the power of the Holy Spirit is already working in our hearts and minds. As you listen to today's teaching, remember that you are deeply loved by God, that you are surrounded by His grace, and that He has a real hope and a future for you. So we have baptisms twice a year in the fall and in the spring, and for some reason, for some wild reason, you couldn't make it this spring, but you know you need to get baptized. We'll be waiting for you around late October, early November. There's this topic of deconstructing, deconstructing your faith. It got really, really popular about two or three years ago, and there's still remnants of it now, and lately I've just been diving into it and listening to the testimonials of people deconstructing. Now, if you're wondering, what is deconstructing your faith mean? And I had to give this disclaimer to the first service. I really appreciate Joel Osteen. I do, I love this ministry, but I'm not him. I'm a lot more offensive inadvertently, like I don't try. Just the way he can say things, and you know, and a lot of preachers are that way. Maybe my Balkan upbringing, it might be the New Yorker in me, I don't know, but I can't sugarcoat it. So what is deconstructing me back in the day, used to just be called backslide it, and for staking the faith and turning your back on God. But now it has just like a little bit of a more nouveau nuance spin, and it goes something like, you know, I once served the Lord, but then I really wanted to do my own thing. But I can't come right out and say that, I got to blame others for my own inner rebellion and acting out on it, so now I'm deconstructing. But the end result is the same, I'm turning my back on God. And of course social media blew it up, but I really wanted to understand this. So I've been listening to the testimonials of people who've deconstructed. And they all have a similar thread, like a common denominator, and the stories, as far as the ones I've been exposed to, all follow a similar pattern. And the pattern goes something like this. I was raised in a Christian family, very few who've been one. They were raised in a Christian family, and they went to children's church, and then they went to the youth program. And then they even went to college and were part of a Christian ministry there. And then some of their testimonials, even after college, I was a part of a new church plant where I volunteered my time, and I quoted everything right, and I gave them my all. But then I noticed hypocrites. Can you believe it? There were people in the church who weren't perfect all the time. And I mean, they just noticed them then. You got to be around Christianity for five minutes to notice there's people who struggled in the faith. I noticed hypocrites, and I wanted to do these things that I knew were out of bounds, out of God's will for me. And I really suffered and sacrificed not doing them for years, but then I look around, and there's people hiding in the pews, and they're doing those things. That's not fair. And they're hypocrites, the whole lot of them, while I'm tired of, you know, sacrificing pleasure while those hypocrites are getting away with it. But I can't say that like that, so I'm going to deconstruct, talk about all the fake and phony things that happen in my life. If I talked about all the crazy people I've met, I'm not talking about, I'm talking about my preachers. I should have forsaken the ministry a long time ago. Do you understand? If I put, do you know how weird people are? They are. You got to love them anyway. Jesus died from them, but us humans were weird. And the weirdest doesn't go away just because we're all gathered in the same building called church. And some are weirder than others. And you got to love. And you don't get to use them as an excuse to forsake the faith. Amen. If the hypocrite is causing you to turn your back on God and get it in between you and God, if the hypocrite isn't between you and God, well, that means the hypocrite is closer to God than you are. Because they're in between you and God. You cannot point to other people and use it as an excuse to forsake the faith. Hallelujah. So that was one thing that I noticed. Pointing another, and by the way, saying that somebody who is not walking out their faith perfectly is a hypocrite is not biblically accurate. You got to let the Bible define the Bible. Let Jesus define the word hypocrite. And look how Jesus used the word hypocrite. He didn't point to the woman caught in adultery and say, you hypocrite. He constantly rebuked hypocrites. It was the religious leaders. It was the Pharisees. A hypocrite means a finger pointer. So somebody in your life group is struggling with something and they don't always appear Christ like they're not a hypocrite unless they're the ones telling everybody to be Christ like and pointing their finger, but they themselves aren't. Amen. So number one, that common denominator is looking outside and letting other people interfere with your relationship with the Lord. That's never going to work. Your relationship with the Lord is just that your relationship with the Lord. Don't allow other people to get in between that. The second common denominator I noticed in their stories was they did a lot of religious activity when they would share their testimony. They would say I was a part of children's church. I was a part of youth group. I set up the chairs at my church every morning all through my teenage years, but they never talk about an intimate relationship with the Lord. They talk about church activity, religious activity, but they never as part of their testimony talk about, you know, I was touched by the Holy Spirit and I would get up every morning. I couldn't wait to spend time with the Lord. I really love the Lord. It's they had a form of relationship, but deny the intimacy thereof. And that's huge. Just last week I met a preacher. I'd actually wanted to meet for a while. And he comes from like a dynasty of preachers, a lineage of preachers. And he shared really how he got saved in college. I said, how did you, you're like raised, your dad's a preacher, his dad's a preacher, all your brothers are preachers. And you got saved in college. How did you get saved in college? Like I led my children to the Lord when they were very young and continued to leave them. Emily and I continued to leave them in the Lord. How did you get led to the Lord by someone else in college? And he said, well, that's just how it was back then. He said, as long as I came to church, I was okay. His dad, his mom just thought he was okay because he keeps coming to all the activities. But he never had a personal intimate relationship with the Lord. And a man with an experience, you have to have an experience with the Lord. A man with an experience is never at the mercy of a man with a theory. So there are these principles that we raise our kids with that I want to communicate over to you. Like besides the foundations of the gospel and Jesus died for your sins, there's some things that are like non-negotiables for Emily and I that we're bringing our own children up in that I just want to share. I want to share with you because they applied all of our lives. Amen. And number one at the top of that list. That we want to communicate to our kids that I and I'm not trying to infantilize you want to say this because I'm comparing my kids to you but I love you and I am your pastor and I'm to shepherd and protect you and this is my heart for you. This is what I would want for you. Not somebody who views their relationship with the Lord as a scorecard. I did this for you I gave this. He doesn't care but he wants you. He wants your heart. He loves you. And there is an intimacy with Christ that too many church going people to actually don't have. You can come to church, you can give tithes, you can come and set up the chairs and still keep the Holy Spirit at arms length. Still keep like a gate over your heart and never allow him to pierce you to really know you. He saved you to know you. And that word know you know it says Adam knew Eve that meant be physically intimate with it's a deep knowing. When Jesus rebukes those pretend Christians he says depart for me I never knew you. And they could say but I did all the stuff doesn't matter you did all the outward religious stuff. I you never let me in really I never knew you and he loves you. You may not love you. You may have a hard time with you but believe it or not he still loves you. There's a lot of verses that can show how the Lord wants an intimate relationship with us really that's the whole idea of Jesus coming earth. That's the message is God saying I'm no longer all the way here but I'm coming to save your butt. I'm coming and manifesting myself in the person of Jesus I'm becoming man and there's the incarnation so that we can't have intimacy. There's Jesus in John 15 saying no longer do I call you servants but I call you friends. But one of my favorites is found in Revelation 320. Where Jesus is outside of the seven golden lamp stands which represent the church so he's he somehow been pushed out. The churches are still going but Jesus is not in the midst of them and he's saying I'm knocking on the door of your heart. The whole I stand at the door and knock. This is often used as an evangelistic verse. That's fine but in context it's not for those outside the church it's not an evangelistic verse. It's for Christians it's for me for you. And he's saying I'm standing at the door of your heart and I'm knocking. If you hear my voice and open the door I will come into you and eat with you. I will dine with you. I will sup with you and you with me. That's an invitation to radical intimacy. Eating with someone is I like eating with someone today. Still today it's pretty intimate thing but you can pretty much I'll have lunch with anyone doesn't mean that I accept them. Just means we're having lunch right but back then it meant you accept them. You approve of them. There was no casual eating together. That's why everyone flipped out when Jesus ate with the prostitutes and the tax collectors and he eats with them because when you eat with someone saying I'm letting you in it's almost covenantal breaking bread with someone. Jesus hears saying I'm on the outside but I miss you. I want to sup with you. I want to dine with you and you with me. Now how does that manifest practically? It means you stop hiding from God. Isn't that funny people think they can hide from God? The one who made you. The one who not only knows the end from the beginning but knows everything about you. Not that thing especially that thing. He knows. No, not that thing. Yeah, he knows. And he loves you. And his blood was shed to take away your sin. All of it. Then leave a little behind just so you could have a little bit of guilt. You're the one who. You keep reminding God of your failures. He's already forgotten them and you keep reminding them because you're under Satan's condemnation. Get up from under that thing. There's therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. At any point no matter how ugly it's gotten. You can come. Strip your and and be be real with him. Be free with him. Lord Jesus and just blur the best advice I got when I got saved literally the day I got saved the guy leading me to Lord. He said you got to pray and I said, what do I pray? And he said it's like picking up the telephone and talking to your best friend. That was a great start day number one to my Christianity because you removed the religious legalism and there's a certain formula and picking up the phone and talking to your best friend. And then the Psalms will come alive when the Psalmist says that you can pour out your complaints before him. You can know him. There's praying when you ask for stuff. That's good. Ask for stuff. There's praying for others. But then there's just being intimate with the Lord. And it strengthens your relationship with him. It actually is the very essence of your relationship with him. Hallelujah. Number two for these principles that and these are a lot of basics, but it's time to get back to some of the basics. We have longtime Christians here. We have new believers here. So for our kids, we recognize that if they don't have their own relationship with the Lord, they got nothing. Otherwise, they're just they're just emulating their parents' faith. And the moment, if that's all we give them, week one at college, they're getting slaughtered. A lot of testimonies like that. Well, that's not going to happen with you. Is it? Well, you should see the fire. Amen. Hallelujah. Number two is to know the word like really know the Bible. Be biblically literate. I want to read first Thessalonians 2, 13. There's Christians who are walking collection of sermons about the word. Social media posts about the word, but they don't have the word in any meaningful way living inside of themselves. For all intensive purposes, they're biblically illiterate. And you couldn't really coast by like that, even a generation ago. But today, because the proliferation of media, you can get enough word tidbits that you feel like you got the word in you, but your doctrine isn't strong, you could be easily led astray, you can get deceived, or you just don't have enough word in you to keep you. The word of God is unlike any other word out there, the AKA the word of man. Everything else is the word of man. The word of man isn't alive, but God's word is actually alive. And it has a creative ability. This is one of the most, in my opinion, one of the most powerful verses concerning the word of God. It says, for this reason, we also thank God without ceasing, because when you receive the word of God, which you heard from us, you welcomed it not as the word of man, but as it is in truth, the word of God. Now, here it comes. Which also effectively works. Shout works. That's the Greek word, energy, or we get the word energy from. This is saying that the word of God has a creative ability. It energizes. It's not static like the word of man. It's dynamic. It actually does something. That means if I'm struggling, for example, physically, maybe I'm sick. If I get the word of God about healing, and I keep ingesting the word of God on healing, and I memorize the word of God on healing, that word of God concerning healing will work. It'll work when I'm eating lunch. It'll work when I'm going for a walk. It'll work when I'm going to sleep. It's working, and it will produce that which he sent it forth to do. It's like that for victory. It's like that for prosperity. It's when I don't have peace and anxieties trying to come and capsize my boat. And I allow the word of God concerning peace, concerning strength, concerning victory. The word of God will work and produce good fruit in my life. My job is just to get enough of the word of God in me. You have too many people. They have a dearth of the word of God. Because they don't actually ever crack the word of God open for themselves. It's kind of like people who never worship, but they always have worship on in the background. You can't live like that. Eventually you actually got to stand up, and as the music's going and make a nice background ambiance, you got to have a little worship session with the Lord yourself. Amen. We hosted a young man went to a very famous Bible school. Very quickly I realized, you don't know the word, man. You know how I knew? Because he kept quoting preachers and kept, he could memorize a tweet. And he would quote tweets. And I spoke to him. He would stayed with us for a while. I said, you. And you came out of Bible school. You can't go with like, you know, John Piper 516. You can't quote other men of God. That's not going to get you through. You need the word of God that you dug in yourself. When I told him that it was like it was like a foreign thing to him. And I won't get into that, but his story with us wasn't so great. And he he's from what I hear doing okay now, but he he fell. You know, the word word of God works so much. The Psalmist said, your word have I hidden my heart that I would not sin against you. The word of God will actually keep you from falling. What I encourage people to do, we have people here from all over the place, different places in the Lord. Lots of new people. I'm encouraged whenever you what that communicates is the Lord is saying that we're yielding to him enough to where he can trust us with something as precious as a babe in Christ, a new soul in Christ. Always remember that people who were new, they are gift, new to the faith, you know, walking on fire with the Lord 30 years and came. Those are welcome too. Awesome, but a gift is the babe in Christ. I would tell everyone, those of you who don't know how to read the word, I'll tell you what not to do. Don't open up the Bible randomly every single day. And most Christians do that. They open up a boom Isaiah. Well, right now you're reading a prophet that lived over a thousand years ago at some point in Israel's history, you don't even know the historical historical background, the context, and you're reading and you're like, okay. And you get frustrated, then you go to something even we're like, haggie, I have her back a cook. They're like, I can't do that. All right, I'll read some of the words of Christ and read and you're getting like, this is how people study for years. And I'll just like read a snippet from different books of the Bible. You're going to end up like a bowl of mixed nuts, like stick with stick with a book, messages, the gospels first, the gospel of Mark. It's the first gospel that's translated when missionaries go to another country, because it's known as the action gospel, the power gospel. Not too many parables, just boom, boom, boom. Those of you who want the highlights, Mark is the highlight reel of the gospels. Sixteen chapters only. You read two chapters of there. It's five to seven minutes. In eight days, you would have ingested an entire gospel that puts you ahead, then read another gospel. Then pick a book in the New Testament Ephesians. There's a great one. Galatians. We did a series. I mean, every year I used to do a series and I gave you guys a break this year, although I'm mentioning to do all the Galatians again. And just read it and read it again. Memorize verses. Meditate on it. What does meditate to mutter? And then the word is getting strong in you. It will cause you to last and it will produce fruit in you. You know how my wife and I, I don't want to give you something for me like, but this is something we did to experience mind bending financial breakthrough. We memorized verses on prosperity. We spoke them and we spoke them and we just believed them and we allowed the word of God to be made flesh to where if you prick me a verse on financial prosperity would leak out. And that word went to work. It worked when I made mistakes. It worked when I was in the shower. It worked when I was sick, sleeping, the word of God. And that yield, it produced it created and it'll do the same in you. You just got to get it in you. Hallelujah. He brews for 12. A great name for a Christian coffee shop, by the way. For the word of God, see it's different than the word of man. The word of God is alive. It's living and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword piercing even to the division of soul and spirit and of joints and marrow. And as a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. I don't give a lot of homework assignments, but if you want your Christianity to go to the next level, memorize 10 verses. What verses? Find, find verses that speak of who you are in Christ and what you have, what you possess as a result of his crucifixion and resurrection. A verse, you know, all of the word is good, but sometimes you hit one verse and it's like you, it quickens you as the old timer say. It brings life to you. Memorize that one. Memorize 10 verses. It'll change you. Hallelujah. So number one is to have an actual intimate relationship with the Lord. I should title this sermon. How to avoid deconstructing 10 years from now. How to avoid you trying to start your own podcast encouraging other people to backslide and forsake the faith. Make friends with Jesus. Don't just come to church, become best friends with the Lord. Know your Bible. And number three, actually surrender, surrender to his plans for your life. This is what we would teach our kids. You don't get to just do what you want to do. You have been bought with a price. So what do I do? I don't know. Figure out with the Lord what he's called you to do. I mean, if you, if you don't hear from him, you will. He will lead you. He will guide you. But you always, you always have the written word work with your hands that which is good. Live at peace with all men. Share the gospel, share the word, relieve suffering wherever you go. But in other words, you're not. Doing whatever is in your eyes right to do the way the Bible describes backsliding for saking faith in the Old Testament. There's a certain phrase. It's scary. Real scary. Like when the heinus would say Mufasa to each other. And this is the phrase. It's very terrifying. It says they did concerning the rebellious Hebrews. They did whatever is right in their own eyes. That verse, that kind of phrase is echoed through five or six different periods in Israel's history. It means that they became their own gods. They were no longer submitted. And there was always destruction that followed when they did whatever was right in their own eyes. It's actually Luciferia, the chief tenant of Satanism. They're actually our tenants and the chief one number one. So lemma is do what thou wilt. Now do what he wills. You do whatever you want to do. And the opposite of that is you're submitting to the Lordship of Christ. You're saying, I don't want to do whatever I want to do. Because I don't trust myself. I trust you more. And I believe that you know better than I know what will actually make me happy and fulfilled in this life. So when we go to Psalm 127 and 1 through 2. See if you try to build your own house, your house is your life. You will end up both very, very tired and very, very disappointed. I'll repeat that. If you try to build your own house, your own life stubbornly. Maybe like Frank Sinatra and say, I did it my way. Sorry, I know that was way off. I might even try. I did it my way. Did you imagine reaching into your life and saying, I did it my way. I don't want to that terrifies me. I tried to do it my way. See, it's glamorized. I did it my way. Well, if you did a year away and you're without Christ, I don't want to go on old Frankie. I like his music, but I remember they buried him with a bottle of gin or something because he said, I don't want to go to the other side without a drop to drink. I want to do it his way. I tried building my own life. I tried building my own house. I'm a terrible contractor, awful engineer, horrendous architect. I couldn't build an outhouse, let alone a good house. Unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain who build it. How does this work out practically? Practically means your heart cries, Lord. I don't want to get in your way. I don't want to be headstrong. If you're anxious and you're nervous all the time and you're in your heart, you feel like if it's up to you. It's only up to you. If it's to be, it's up to me. You got to make it happen. You're trying to build your own house. You're getting exhausted. You're getting tired. City light, it's struggled for the first, because look, there is a part where you got to get up off your seat, right? And do something. But that's the dance. You got to do something, but you can't do too much. You got to do just what he tells you to do. But I was terrified I was going to do less than he wanted me to do so I did too much and City light wasn't growing. It wasn't a full service. I was preaching empty seats. This is actually my story. Then guess what happened? I collapsed. For five years I was hitting it and my reward was preaching empty seats. And then I collapsed. I actually gave up. I was at the end of my road. And I thought to myself I'm going to make it a few more Sundays and I'm just going to announce the closure of the church. But I wasn't even studying. I wasn't praying. Normally like 40 hours in those early days, 40 hours a week every week to make one sermon. I stopped all that. Then I started preaching and people were like, that's the best sermon you ever preached. I'm like, I used to prepare for 40 hours. Now I didn't even prepare. And now that's the best sermon ever preach. And then the church in a matter of weeks just started multiplying and growing. I'm not saying that's the secret to church growth is to like backslide, have backslide in the pulpit. But it was the Lord teaching me something that my nice sweat, my effort actually isn't that important. That won't take me across the finish line. What matters is me surrendering to him and let him build the house. Let's read the next verse. It is vain for you to rise up early to sit up late. This is like the anti-ambitious New York City scripture to eat the bread of sorrows for so he gives his beloved sleep. So we're teaching our children. And because I love you, I'm teaching you that great satisfaction is to a life that is wholly surrendered to him. And that doesn't happen right away. When I was getting saved like that day as they were leading me the Lord, they told me I have to surrender all. And I was like, okay, but I lied in the back of my mind. I was like, that's surrendering. Oh, that's a bit. Why? Like I never thought of that clearly, but that's what was in the back of my head. My actual thought was, I'm going to surrender about 85% and I think 85 is a good number. That's like a B. So it's not a 90 plus, but I'm going to surrender about 85%. But there's like a little 15% of my own stuff that I just... I didn't know the Lord yet. I couldn't trust him enough to surrender 100%. But you know what? As soon as I met him within weeks, he won the other 15% over because I realized why? You know how to push my buttons better than me. You know what would make me happy and fulfilled better than me. If I give you my whole life and surrender, you do a way better job than me. Hallelujah. Proverbs 35 through 6, a companion verse, surrender, surrender. God, where he wants to financially bless you, yes he does. But also there's a warning that those who pursue riches have pierced their own soul through with many sorrows. Yes, he wants to fill your home with love. And if you're single, bring a godly mate to you and you have a godly family. But if you do it in your own strength, if you try to build your own house, it'll result in unnecessary frustration and suffering for you. If anything at least let this be the prayer of your heart right now. In fact, can I lead you in this prayer? Just say this. Lord Jesus, don't let me do what's right in my eyes. Help me to want what you want for me. Amen. And this is the invitation to trust in the Lord with all your heart. Lean not on your own understanding. Next verse, please. In all your ways acknowledge him and he shall direct your paths. That's the invitation to surrender, but it requires trust. And especially if you're new, he wants to prove himself to you. Trustworthy. But to some that are not new, like you've been in the faith for a while and you're never fully surrendered, you got to ask yourself why not and ask yourself how it's going with you not surrendering for. The most miserable Christian in my opinion is the Christian who's been in the faith for a while but never fully surrendered. They got one foot in the world and one foot in Christ and they're like a walking civil war. They don't know whether they're going left or right. They're going to have like a schizophrenic split at any moment. Make a decision. All right. We got one intimacy. Make friends with Jesus too. You got to know the word and have it be alive in you. Three surrender your life surrender to his plans for your life. And then number four is a real important one. They did a Harvard study that lasted over 50 years following people through five decades to find out what character trait more than any other resulted in success. Is it their IQ? A bunch of other things that their characters and what is it and you know what came up number one. Tenacity and there was a New York Times bestselling book based on this study called grit. Grit. Tenacity. Not quitting. Stick ability. The word we just made up here. Pit bull bulldog tenacity. You know when a pit bull bites that mailman's leg. Forgive me. Let me use another. But sometimes I just got to wake you up when a pit bull bites that stick and it gets locked. It won't let go. That's how we got to be. I've been tempted if you actually knew I might not be your pastor any longer if you knew how often I'm tempted to quit. And by the way, this is the best time of my life. We're living a bit. City lights doing great. Personally, I'm doing great. And still out here, you should just quit. No, it's surprising. Look, you can't keep the birds from flying over your head. Those are thoughts. You can just you can keep them from building a nest in your hair though. So we all get crazy. But this is something Satan has tried with me all the time. Why? Because quitting is a permanent solution to a temporary problem. He wants to get you to quit. And you got to have tenacity. In the Old Testament, he says, I will heal you of your backsliding. He doesn't mean backsliding as far as falling away from the faith. In that context, backsliding meant your desire to quit. Second Corinthians 1.8. And here's the reality. Every single one of us is going to have multiple crises of faith. Nobody gets a free pass. And my wife and I were just talking about that. As I now cross 50. And I have life experience. And I'm meeting other people. And we're talking, we're saying, you know, everybody, nobody got a free pass. There's like nobody 50 plus that's like, man, this has been like life has been, this is like a playground. Every one of them, when you get to know them, they have at least one nightmarish horror story to tell. I'm sorry if you're under like 40. And this is just meant to be, you'll be encouraged by the end. I know it sounds depressing right now. But I'm not saying anything Jesus didn't say. He said, in this world, you will have trouble. But for your not, I have overcome the world. You will have trouble. I believe in victory. I preach victory. I preach the goodness of God. All that is true. But still, you will have times when you want to jump out of your own skin. Life will not be fun. It won't be cool. It'll be agonizing. You're going to go through the dark night of the soul. You're going to go through a dark season. That's par for the course. Anybody who's anybody, if you've been a Christian longer than a few minutes, you know, a crisis of faith will come. What will you do? You can't have a quit in you. You've got to have lockjaw. You've got to be like that pit bump that bites down. I'm biting on Jesus. I won't let go. I will not let go of him. No matter what happens. You've got to have that heart and you come hell or high water. As for me in my house, we're going to serve the Lord. Hallelujah. Here's Paul. He says, for we do not want you to be ignorant brethren of our trouble, which came to us in Asia, that we were burdened beyond measure above strength so that we dispared even of life. And what did he do? He just hung on. He kept on. And when you're going through it, a great relief, at least to know is that all you have to do when it's really hard to stand. And Ephesians, the admonition is having done all to stand stand therefore. You know, a lot of times in this success culture, ambition culture, people say you've got to be going forward. If you're not going forward, you're going backward. What a pressure to put on people. Sometimes it's a win just to stand. Hallelujah. Let me give you one more verse. Hebrews 1039. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. God's taking the quit out of you. And I try to share these stories. Hey, you know, Pastor Brian, guess what happened the other day. It was like a few weeks ago. I get an Amazon delivery box in front of my house. It's just so funny. And I open it. And it's a Walmart employee jacket, a vest, a Walmart vest. And I first open, I'm like, who sent me a Walmart vest? And it was a note from Pastor. I forget what the notes are. I was like, this guy. These men. If you don't know what that is, I confessed them a few years back. I got tempted to quit. Like it was a thing. I got tempted to quit the church and move to the poke nose where we have a cabin in the woods, whatever. And I was like, you know what? The pressure is too great. I'm just going to work at the Walmart. I'll be the greeter. It was completely ridiculous. And I share these outlandish stories at the risk of you leaving here and going. That's not who I want as my pastor. I don't really want a pastor who was tempted to go work for Walmart. I realize that's the risk I run. But when you get those crazy thoughts, which I know you do, maybe you'll remember me. And how I too was tempted to put on that baby blue Walmart vest. By the way, it's in my walking closet right there. I look at it every time I'm in there. I use it more than the Atari 2600 you gave me for my birthday. That vest was like bullseye. Because we are not of those who quit. This is the book of Hebrews was written to a group of very highly persecuted Hebrew Christians. They were not popular because they were Hebrews and they believed in the Messiah Christ. So they were ostracized. They were ostracized financially. They couldn't barter and trade economically. They were shunned. Socially they were shunned. The pressure was on. And because the pressure was on, they were really, really tempted to quit. You'll really understand the whole book of Hebrews. When you understand it's in a message of encouragement written to a group of people who was on the verge of backsliding and forsaking Christ, committing the sin of apostasy, forsaking the faith. And the warning to them was there's no coming back. You can backslide you can get it. But when you forsake your faith in Christ, there's no coming back from that once having known him. And then he encourages them. He says, but we are not of those who draw back. There will be no moon walking in the body of Christ. There will be no moon walking. None of that drawing back at city light church. We're not of those who draw back to preserving or quitting in Jesus name. But of those, we are of those who believe to the saving of the soul. Come on, shout amen. Hallelujah. Worship team, come on up. I got one more point. And it's not that good really. So I need a musical accompaniment. No, it's not bad. This is how we're endeavoring to raise our kids and definitely with tenacity. It's a lot easier. I think for me to do that for the mom because the mom's primary desire is to protect and nurture. It's not primary desires to make sure my kids don't get killed and taken out by Satan. Every dad understands what I mean. Other people are looking at me like, so you know, if Victor starts to belly, he could complain about something. I'm like, hmm, the sweet soft part of me wants me to just give him a break. The part of me that wants him to develop some spiritual muscles and physical muscles so he doesn't become a whiny, deconstructing soy boy one day. And he's going to just lovingly just kick his butt a little bit so that he's a man. Amen. Not a quitter. Another thing we try to communicate to them is be authentic. Make peace with who you are in the Lord and embrace that because you're the only you that anyone could ever be is you. You don't have to try to be somebody else and that you you will enjoy such freedom. In fact, I've said that the greatest freedom anyone can enjoy is the fear of the opinions of others being lifted off. Not caring about the opinions of others. Caring only about the opinion of God. Not to do things out of fear of what will someone say, what will someone think because the fear of man brings a snare but whoever trusts in the Lord shall be safe. And you will have that test, the fear of man, usually starting with your faith. Do you hide your closet Christian? Jesus said if you're shamed of me, I'll be ashamed of you. There is no such thing as closet Christianity. That's not biblical Christianity. Not being afraid of man, not comparing yourself to others. Paul spoke about that in 2 Corinthians 10, 12. Comparison will lead to major frustration. That was always the case. And I've compared it only led to frustration especially when it comes to church planting because you never know really how you're doing. There's no scorecard so you compare yourself with others except the problem is the past of Paul says if I compare myself to others I'm not wise. So man has always had a problem with comparing and then feeling bad when they compare throughout human history but in the last 20 years thanks to social media that's received like a giant steroidal turkey based your size shot. Because social media is an envy amplification device where you can compare and compare and that's why I believe a good reason why depression and anxieties through the roof. You cannot. You're unique. God has a different timetable with everyone. Some people experience in an explosive growth, explosive breakthrough in their 20s but then really like nothing much is happening in their 40s and 50s and they have to find joy just in Christ. Me my 20s were like a horror show. Now I feel like it's awesome and you know what I have to always make sure it's awesome is it is like heaven on earth now I have to make sure that it's not anything outside of Jesus that's bringing me joy. I have to because that stuff can go anything can happen that's left can be shaken and then what would I lost the stuff I lost it. But if my faith is in Christ no one can take Christ out of my bosom. For we dare not class ourselves or compare ourselves with those who commend themselves but they measuring themselves by themselves and compare all right I'm going to paraphrase this. It says if you measure yourself against someone else you compare yourself to somebody else you're not wise why because there are another story you are God's story the Bible says you're his poem up his masterpiece his poem and he's going to do it uniquely with you everyone has a different story don't compare yours to someone else's. Hallelujah hallelujah let me pray for you heavenly father you know what I feel not to pray for you I feel like we need to make a declaration of faith which requires you speaking okay I want you to just say this Lord Jesus I trust you. I believe you know me you made me you saved me and you will continue working your plans and your purposes in my life. You will show yourself strong on my behalf I have victory in Jesus name shot a big amen amen hallelujah hallelujah. Well we have a plane to catch Luke in a few hours I feel like so biblical I'm taking Luke with me it sounds so new testament like come Luke bring my tonic and my scrolls and come before winter for I have need of the. But we're going to Serbia to see pastor Yavitsa that's a ministry we've supported for many many years we supported his church well he was in Montenegro he's raised that church up it's going fine he started another one in Serbia our church bought the chairs the sound some of the instruments there we support him every single month and I'll be going and preaching there then I'll also be going to Bosnia meeting other ministers. So just pray for us and next Sunday I will be here but Nathaniel will be here Nathaniel Saint-Eloy the Haitian celebration himself the walking holy ghost party from heaven will be here. And when you think of us just pray for us we really want to see an impact there it's the same statistics as the ten forty with no. Countries like Jordan Yemen. Oh man oh man. There's not much actual biblical Christianity there so pray for us and pray that we see your awakening. Are you all ready to worship and honor the Lord with your tithes and offerings. Hallelujah. Give God your best give with a glad heart the giving information is on those screens you can give by pointing your phone at that QR code. There's also physical offering boxes throughout the sanctuary. And I pray that the Lord will multiply it back to you the doors would be opened. There be no lack in your life but overflow only that your vats burst forth with new wine and that your storehouses are filled with plenty. Thank you Jesus. Ministry team won't you please go to that blue lit area and if you want prayer for anything. A ministry team will be there that blue lit area to my left you're right just go over there and ask for prayer. They would love to lay hands on you and minister to you and pray with you. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. We believe we'll have a good report to bring back to you from Serbia and Bosnia. Let's all stand. Go with blessing. Go in the peace of God and go and enjoy the salvation that he purchased for you with his own blood. Be blessed city like. This is the city light church podcast. If you've missed any part of today's message or if you would like to find out more about Pastor Boyan Jansik in city light church visit us at citylightnyc.com. Feel free to visit us online or in person anytime we would love to connect with you. We pray that you have been encouraged today that you have been reminded how much God loves you and that you are surrounded by grace. Thank you for listening. Make sure that you subscribe to city light church podcast wherever you find your favorite podcasts worldwide.