Seth: 0:05

Hey, good morning everyone. This is the second episode of the Followers of Christ podcast. We are very excited to have you here with us today. We got a great episode coming up, but just wanted to take care of a couple of housekeeping things.

Seth: 0:19

At first, just make sure that you guys can contact us, get a hold of us if you want to. So our website is focpodcom, our email is contact at focpodcom, and at the top of each episode in the description there should be a link there that says send us a message. So as long as that is highlighted, then you should be able to click it on your phone and it'll open up your text message app and then you can shoot us a text that way. So we've got a couple of different ways that you can get in contact with us. Feel free to use any of those, but, as always today, we have our hosts here with us. We have Stephan, mike, jonathan and my name is Seth. We're excited to have you all join us today and we're going to go to our opening prayer and gospel message with Mike.

Mike: 1:04

Thank you. My name is Mike. I love this prayer. Dear Lord, thank you for this day. Thank you for waking us up. Thank you for giving us strength. Thank you for giving us breath. Lord, thank you for everything that you're doing in our lives. Thank you for putting each other into our lives, lord, to help us stay encouraged and to encourage each other. We thank you, lord. Thank you what you're about to do.

Mike: 1:30

I pray, lord, that you help us to focus and set our eyes on you and to be an open ear for your spirit. And I pray for the listener. I pray that you open their eyes, open their ears to their hearts, so they'll hear your spirit. And I pray for the listener. I pray that you open their eyes, open their ears to their hearts, so they'll hear your word. And I just pray, lord, that you guide us into all truth and to help us, lord, in the mighty name of Jesus, amen, amen, amen, all right, here's the gospel message.

Mike: 2:03

So, according to the Bible, this is good news, and what I'm about to say may not seem that way. So, for everybody listening, one day we're all going to die. Romans 3.23 says For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Romans 6.23 says for the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus, our Lord. So what is the glory of God?

Mike: 2:43

I know there's many, you know many explanations of it, but I've come up with one thing. And it's like in this life we're running a marathon and the whole point of the marathon is to finish. It's not a race, it's not about who gets first place, who gets the trophy at the end, who gets first place, who gets the trophy at the end. It's a high achievement. So when you finish, you know you get praise, you get hey, man, you did a great job, that's awesome, you rock. You know you get all the glory, no matter if you're like, if you're the slowest or the fastest. That's an amazing thing. But let's say, during the whole run you take a shortcut, you cheat, you take an Uber down the road to make it shorter. You lose credit, you don't get the well-dones, you don't get the good jobs. You know people are actually ashamed of you, you know. But that's the same.

Mike: 3:47

When we sin, you know it only takes one sin and we lose that glory of God. God's so perfect that you know that's all it takes. But here's the good news Jesus came John 3.16,. For God loved the world so much that he gave his only one son, jesus, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

Mike: 4:18

Romans 8.3,. For what the law was powerless to do, because it was weakened by the flesh, what the law was powerless to do because it was weakened by the flesh, god did by sending his own son, in the likeness of sinful flesh, to be a sin offering, and so he condemned sin in the flesh. The Bible also says that in Christ Jesus there is no condemnation. He condemned sin in the flesh, and that's amazing. So how can we get this eternal life? It says whoever believes in Jesus, whoever believes in God's one and only son, that's all it takes. It's that simple. If you, whether you believe or not, if you're a new believer, just know that in your heart that you are saved if you believe. That's it, plain and simple. So I'm going to finish with this Romans 5.19. For just as through the disobedience of one man, which is Adam, the many were made sinners, of one man, which is Adam, the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man, the many will be made righteous. And that one man is Jesus.

Seth: 5:33

Thank you, man, mike, that is, that's a beautiful, beautiful thing to just remind everybody that it's. It's the belief. It's not works, it's not anything that we can do. It's what Christ came to do for us. So thank you for sharing that very much. And you know, kind of following the last episode listeners, if you heard that one, our next up portion here will be the mission statement and mr jonathan's going to read that for us hey, good morning everyone.

Jonathan: 5:58

this is jonathan. I want to share the mission statement and it says to reflect the love of Jesus by walking with our neighbors, nurturing faith and curiosity and community along the way. So I want to try and break that down a little bit into what I think that means me. It's just to reflect the love of Jesus. Our main mission of this podcast is to present the gospel to people who have never heard the gospel. And then when you listen to the gospel, you accept the gospel and you accept Jesus. And that's where our neighbors come into play.

Jonathan: 6:50

Whether it's at work, at home, when you're in the car, driving wherever, Just know that there's other believers out there and they're going to strengthen you. And then we build a community and we walk along this road to one day be with Jesus. And I believe that's what the mission statement is for me. It's just who can we find to help and strengthen us when we are fighting? And we need just a community of people to rally around us and just help us. So, but first and foremost, you know that Jesus is right there with us, and then we have the community and everybody else. So I think that's what the mission statement to me is.

Seth: 7:44

Awesome. Thank you, Jonathan.

Steffen: 7:46

And then now we're going to move over to Stephan just introducing our episode today, so the title of this episode is Following Christ in Our Lives Right, and you're going to hear today of what that means to us, and you're also going to hear some examples of what the Bible says on how to follow Christ. And ask yourself this question when we are done what does it mean to you? What does the title mean to you? To follow Christ.

Seth: 8:20

Well then, without too much delay here we'll jump right into the episode content. So you guys just heard from him, so we're going to bring him right back. We're going to start off with Mr Jonathan. Hey, everyone.

Jonathan: 8:32

I'm going to be reading out of Romans, chapter eight, and it's just going to be the first couple of verses, one and two, and it says great news because that shows you that Jesus came and died on a cross for not just my sins but your sins and everyone else's sins. And he bled on a tree and a lot of people would be like, well, that's, you know, that's horrible, but the good news is that when he died he came back to life three days later and he rose and that's the gospel that we're trying to present to everyone. So this verse to me has been hitting me hard these past couple of weeks. I will say it's when you're a believer. It's not an easy road. Sometimes it's the less road followed because you're going up against a lot of forces, a lot of people per se. But when you read this scripture and this verse, it just gives you power to know that you're never alone. Jesus is with you and God is always with you, no matter what.

Steffen: 10:23

So with that I just want to hear what you guys have to say Well to me, because that's a very powerful, powerful verse. Of course, to me it's also saying that no matter what our past mistakes, failures or sins are, we are forgiven. We no longer need to carry the weight of guilt given, and we no longer need to carry the weight of guilt Me myself. I battle constantly in my mind to beat myself up every time I say something I shouldn't say or think something I shouldn't have thought, thinking man, why did I do that?

Steffen: 11:01

I shouldn't have said that. Or you know why was I thinking this way? I know that's not right. You know I beat myself up all the time and I know that's that's, unfortunately, human nature. You know, that's what's that? Roman 715, kind of a solidifying that. Let me get me get that up here real quick. One second Paraphrasing why do I do the things I shouldn't do but don't do the things I need to do? That describes me, as, I'm pretty sure, a lot of people worldwide. So I want to end with this. So, 2 Corinthians 12, 9. But he said to me my grace is sufficient for you. My power is made perfect in weakness, is made perfect in weakness. Therefore, I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Man, that's a mouthful y'all. That's all I got.

Mike: 12:18

Amen. If I may add to that in the verse. In verse 4, it says those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires, but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. Since I've been following Christ, I didn't realize the enemy in my mind, Like I was so used to hearing negative thinking towards myself especially, and just to bounce off from the Romans 715,. You know, I do not understand what I do, but what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. That's like a tongue twister. You know I'm surprised. I even said it like that and practicing all night.

Seth: 13:13

Got those skills.

Mike: 13:15

But I'm constantly in a wrestling match, got to put that out there With my mind. You know, with my mind, you know the, my mind's always going on the top turnbuckle and giving me a, you know, elbow drop and yeah. So you know, like to be honest with you, I didn't. At first I didn't want to do this podcast. You know I didn't want to. I didn't think I was good enough or that I wasn't smart enough or wise enough. I've always been very unconfident in my speaking. I don't think I have enough vocabulary, you know what I mean. But I'm glad that I'm doing this because I know it's going to help me grow and and yeah, so, and I want to close with this, galatians 525. This is like one of my favorite verses, since we live by the spirit, let us keep in step with the spirit. And it just reminds me that we're not walking behind Jesus or in front of Jesus, we're walking right beside him and everywhere we go, he goes.

Seth: 14:34

Yeah, that's a great reminder, Mike. Well, I think when I'm looking at this verse, one thing that kind of stands out to me and it's something that, yeah, I've heard a couple different people speak on it and, like Pastor Jason has kind of spoke on it as well at our church that when we look at sin and then we look at what we have in Jesus and that freedom from sin it's not behavior modification, it's not that you're just trying to follow a standard because you think you're going to get caught and get in trouble, kind of like you were when you were like five years old and you were just trying not to get in trouble when you're trying to sneak a cookie or something. No, this is, this is a. It's a complete shift in our hearts and the posture of our hearts and really turning away from that flesh, but not just because it's oh, I'm going to get in trouble if I do this. You know, as you guys have already covered with the gospel message, like when you accept Christ as your Savior, your sins are forgiven. That does not give you an excuse to go out and sin more. You know that's covered by Paul. I can't remember the exact area, but you know, basically talking about you shouldn't sin more because you have grace. That's not what that means, but it is a true change of your heart posture and the way that you feel, and then that conviction that you feel when you do fall back into sin or the flesh desires. You know so.

Seth: 16:04

Another kind of thing in Galatians, following up on what you were talking about, mike, is 5.16. And that says so. I say walk by the Spirit and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. So that one for me is just a really good follow-up to this, in a way that when you have the Holy Spirit in your life, you're not just avoiding sin because you're worried you're going to get in trouble. It is a complete shift in your heart posture to wanting the things that are of God and of Christ. You don't want the things that are of this world, and we'll get pulled back into it for sure. That temptation is always there and there's going to be times when we're going to fall and we're going to fall right back into it. But that spirit's always there to convict us when we get to that point and say hey, you know what you're doing is not right, you need to come back, you need to get back on the right road and get back off of that road. But, jonathan, you got any final thoughts, man?

Jonathan: 17:03

Yeah, real quick. I was actually thinking about what you were saying, seth, just a few minutes ago, and I'll kind of keep this short and simple and sweet. This past week, as I mentioned earlier, I was just struggling everything that in Romans 8, and it goes all the way up to verse 1 through 17. If you have time, just take time and read that.

Jonathan: 17:35

But the Lord was showing me this past week that, hey, you are going to mess up and, like Seth said, you are going to get drawn back into the world. But if we confess our sins, he's faithful and just to cleanse us of all unrighteousness and forgive us. And with that I want to end where verse 17, romans 8, verse 17,. It says Now, if we are children, then we are heirs, heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share his suffering in an order that we may also share in his glory. So what he's saying real quick is we're going to suffer in this world, where we are going to suffer, but one day, when we get to heaven, we'll be in his glory. And that's all I got.

Seth: 18:30

Thank you, man. That's a great way to close that section out. And now we're going to move over to Mr Stephan here.

Steffen: 18:38

So today I'm reading from John 13, 34 through 35. A new command I give you love one another as I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this, everyone will know that you are my disciples if you love one another. Now, to me that stands out because of love. You know, jesus is telling us all how to behave, how to conduct ourselves Well, let me retract, behave, but how to treat everyone right. So love everyone, love one another. To me, that means not just saying the words right, but showing your actions. Actually, you know showing love by helping people, doing things. Let me give you an example.

Steffen: 19:47

So when I go, wherever I go actually church, work, everybody I treat everybody as a family member. Everybody is the same. What's up my brother, what's up family? What's up sister? I treat everybody the same. Whether or not I may agree or disagree with, whatever they may say or do, I still treat them the same.

Steffen: 20:13

Now, is that a challenge? Of course it is, because you'll have those individuals out there who will do something that you might not agree with or say something that you might not think is cool, but then you don't bring it to their attention. You don't share love by talking to them and telling them hey, that wasn't cool what you just did. You just in your mind, you start saying things like man, why'd I do that? You start holding contempt in your head. That's not love to me. That is not love. You ought to be able to open up and talk to everybody and tell them whatever's on your mind and love. Anytime you have any conversations with people, it is with love.

Steffen: 20:58

Now, at our church, let me give an example here. So we have an event that we do once a year and we have a special needs community, a ministry, and they have a prom for them once a year. Now you're talking about something that's incredible. Man, listen, here we are. We're thinking we're going to go in here and bless these people. But these people, our family, blessed us the first time I went. I left so full I couldn't wait to go back and do it again. We had a chance to spend time, hang out and just show love with this whole community. Show love with this whole community.

Steffen: 21:47

You know, to me that is a great example of loving everybody. Just because they may seem different or they don't look like you or act like you, still show them love. That is how God command us to do so. I'm going to also throw out a close with James 3, 9 through 10. So we're showing love to everybody, right? That doesn't mean, you know, we can't sit here and show love, but then we start cursing on the other side of our mouth, right? So with the tongue we praise our Lord and our Father, and with it we curse human beings who have been made in God's likeness. Out of the same mouth comes praise and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this should not be so. I'm going to close with this. Love our neighbors and forgive our enemies. They are often the same.

Seth: 22:59

That's such a strong statement that you closed out with, honestly, for us to even try to grasp the concept of the love that Jesus is talking about here. It's very difficult for us to do that because we all our minds will flip to a judgmental side and at the drop of a hat and we don't even realize it's happening. Sometimes, like it's just easy to form a a us versus them mentality in several different situations. It could be with your neighbor, it could be with a different group of people, someone who's got a different background than you, all these things that we could use to drive some type of wedge or something in the love that we want to show someone else. But in this, in this verse I mean, the standard here is such a strong, pure love, that the part that just jumps out to me is that when it says a new command I give you love one another as I have loved you and that is Jesus speaking as I have loved you, and that is Jesus speaking as I have loved you. So you must love one another. And to think of that, that Jesus is saying that the love that you need to have for one another is a love that I have had for you, a love that brought God to this earth, a love that had him take on the punishment and the pain, the torture that he went through for all of our sins, when he was going through the trial, when he was sent before Pontius Pilate, when he was flogged, when he was beaten, when he was put on the cross. All of that in love, and that is such a deep, sacrificial, pure love that we are called to have for one another. And he knows our hearts, he knows where we are, he knows everything about our nature and I think that he knows that we are going to struggle daily with that love. We're going to struggle. You know somebody cuts you off in traffic. You're not feeling very loving. In that moment you want to yell at them, potentially throw something at their car. I don't know, depending on how bad they cut you off and what sign they may have gave you out the window, who knows? You might be feeling really upset.

Seth: 25:29

But in that moment we're still called to love we're not called to respond in anger or hate or frustration and to look at the example that Christ gave us of his love and then to say love one another as I have loved you. That's just so powerful, and it's a reminder that I think that we have to keep in our minds daily, hourly, almost minute by minute, that I'm called to love. And when you accept Christ and the Holy Spirit is dwelling within you, constantly working on your heart, you're going to find that that love comes more natural over time. Now there's going to be moments where it's still going to flare up in the opposite direction, but that love will come more naturally. But you also have to have to choose sometimes to not lean into your flesh, not lean into your sin, and lean into love instead. And that's just, that's something that we have to make sure that we're always doing. But yeah, that's. I think that's all I got for this one.

Mike: 26:35

And those may all explain it very well. And I've learned so much already about loving people, loving God and loving neighbors. That's like my. My prayer every day is God, help me to love you and help me to love my neighbor. I thought you were going to say it, steph, so I'm going to add it.

Mike: 26:58

I heard this from my brother, pastor D. What's up, pastor D? He always tells me that he's been telling me this since I met him People don't care what you know until they know how much you care. And I've seen it in him, I've seen it in Stephan, you know, like what Stephan is saying is true. He treats everyone the same, and I'm trying my best to mimic him and mimic my brother, and it's hard, you know. But you know we got to love everyone the same, no matter. No matter what their status is.

Mike: 27:46

No 1 Corinthians, 13, 13,. It says and now these three remain faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love. And I'm saying that because last night I got, I believe, the Lord. I was trying to come up with some notes for this podcast and I believe the Lord told me to say that we can have faith to move a mountain, but love is climbing someone else's mountain, and it just reminds me that we can to love somebody. We can meet them where they're at and walk with them and share their burdens, and that's all I got to say.

Jonathan: 28:29

Yeah that's man. The staff had a powerful verse I, I look at myself sometimes and I'm like man, wherever'm at, whether it's at the grocery store, work, whatever, have you driving that love is the love that he's saying when somebody has wronged you, you still, out of love, you, you respect them and you love them and you, you do your best to hold back all the negative stuff you want to say at the time. Like you know, whatever have you, whatever's running through your mind, you're like, oh, but love is holding that back and saying, okay, lord, I'm going to let you take over. I may not like what people have said or done, whatever, but in the end I give that to you and that's one way of love. You know, like my brothers have mentioned, there's other ways of love and I'll just close with that.

Steffen: 29:44

Well, fellas, I'll tell you, it is such a challenge when you're out here in the world and then the world does you wrong. So it is so easy to lean into the flesh, so easy, you know whether you're at the grocery store, you know going through the mall or whatever, and you just feel that flare up when the world does you wrong, and then we have to stay focused, like it's in Romans 5.8, right, but God demonstrates his own love for us in this. While we were still sinners, christ died for us, right? So we look at parents, family members, parents when your kids do something, and you're thinking, oh my, goodness, what's going on?

Steffen: 30:43

Yeah, you get frustrated, but you do. Anything in the world you'll bend over backwards for your kids. You'll move pardon the expression, but a mountain for your kids. If they need anything you would do everything you can. You know, when you've got family members, I've had family members do me wrong. We don't have enough time to go over that, but you know it's so easy to lean into. Do I do it all the time? Of course not. I screw up. I make mistakes, we all do. That's why we have to constantly, constantly go to the word. Go to the word, lean into God and we pray that God shows all of us that agape love because he loves us unconditionally, no matter what. That's all I got.

Seth: 31:38

And for those of you who don't know him, stephan's a pretty big dude, so you definitely want him more on the love side. If he's on the opposite side, you gotta, you gotta go hide somewhere. Hey, you know, you got the muscles. They definitely they definitely want you on the love side.

Jonathan: 31:58

They want they want the muscles being used for a hug and not for a body slam you know, brother oh man, they want the muscles being used for a hug and not for a body slam.

Steffen: 32:04

You know the pythons Brother. Oh man, oh man.

Seth: 32:10

All right.

Mike: 32:14

But we're going to roll it over to Mike for his verse. All right, great verses so far. My verse is from Matthew 7-7. This is from the NLT. Keep on asking and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking and you will find. Keep on knocking and the door will be open to you.

Mike: 32:36

Did a little research. It's part of the Sermon on the Mount. It focuses on the importance of persistent prayer. It emphasizes that God is a loving Father who desires to give good gifts to those who ask, seek and knock with faith and persistence. The verse encourages believers to approach God with confidence and trust in His willingness to provide.

Mike: 33:01

Also in Philippians 4.6,. Be anxious for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving. Let your requests be made known to God. My brother. He always says if you care about it, god cares about it. And that's so encouraging because, like I was saying earlier about my mind, the constant battle in my mind, I got all these negative thinking, negative thoughts, and the Bible encourages to take those thoughts to God, give it to God. My brother Stephan always says to give it to God, talk to God. And we got to have a constant communication with God. The Bible calls him the wonderful counselor, and I believe in therapy, but I also believe in prayer, and even more so. My dad shout out to my dad. One thing that stayed with me for a long time is he says that the greatest thing you can do for someone is to pray for them, to say their name to God. So I encourage you guys to you know, to pray for others and take intercession for your brothers and sisters, and, you know, because prayer works. That's all I got to say.

Steffen: 34:37

Man. That's definitely a powerful verse, brother, and you know, to me, just like you said, that verse is encouraging and active and persistent relationship with God. You know it's like so when you pray a prayer. Prayer is not like a ritual, oh, I have to pray, I got to pray at this time. You know you don't pray just repeatedly, just basic stuff. No, you open up, you talk to God, you share everything he already knows, he already knows. But you establish and you pursue, you seek that relationship with God. You seek that relationship with God. You know not just a. You know God. I need this. No, no, talk to him, open up to him. You know this verse is a verse of action, right, so you know?

Steffen: 35:45

Asking, because it describes three things asking, seeking and knocking. Asking, talking to God, having that conversation with God. Seeking you're actually seeking God himself. You're not seeking materialistic things or other things, you're seeking God. You're seeking God.

Steffen: 36:07

Knocking you got to take action. Don't knock once and expect everything to happen. You got to keep knocking, keep knocking. Now, here's the thing. The answer may not be what you want or when you want it. It will be answered according to the will of God. Look, on God's time, how we get impatient and think, man, god, I really wanted this and God's not doing it. Then you jump in and you try to do it yourself. No, no, no, it will be answered, but on God's time, his time is perfect. We have no concept for that. That is beyond our grasp of reality. So, guys, I want to close with this one Luke 11, 9, 10, 9 through 10. And I will tell you, and I tell you, ask and it will be given to you. Seek and you will find Knock and it will be open to you. Hey, the words is clear, scripture is clear. Talk to God. You'd be amazed what God can do in your life. That's all I got.

Seth: 37:22

Yeah, and a big part of maintaining a prayerful life. You know God is relational. This is not a one-sided deal where we just send prayers to some far-off being that doesn't have an intimate relationship with us. But it's not like where you send you're sending something to a request, a worry, a concern, to just some empty place. God cares. God is with us always. He is listening to everything that we have to say. He sees every desire in our heart. He knows every worry. He knows everything that's on our mind. So God cares about everything in our life. He sees every single worry that we have. He knows every thought, everything that's on our mind, everything that's on our mind, and he wants to be invited into everything with us. That relationship, that intimacy that's there with our Father, is just so strong. But if you don't engage in a prayerful life, if you're not taking quiet time with God to bring all these things to him, it's going to feel like a distant relationship.

Seth: 38:47

You know, one of the things that a book recently that Pastor Jason brought up and then a few weeks before I've been talking with Pastor Aaron about is called the Familiar Stranger by Tyler Statton. I just finished that book earlier this week and a big component of this book is prayer. This book is all about just re-engaging with the Holy Spirit and just really getting in tune and listening to where God's trying to lead you and listening to His voice and it's described as a whisper and that's exactly what it can feel like and trying to just become more in tune with God and more open. But you do that through prayer, you do that through obedience, you do that through that quiet time with him and it's good to pour out your heart. I mean everything, everything that's on your mind.

Seth: 39:42

God knows when you have a doubt. He knows when you have something that's weighing heavy on your heart that you might be afraid to maybe mention to somebody else because that's not good theology, or you're worried that, oh you know, air quotes a Christian would never think or say that. God knows that we're all human. He knows that we have worries. He knows that we have thoughts, that we have things that come into our mind that we might be afraid to bring to someone else. So we can always bring it to him and he's always been faithful when I've had those moments to walk me through, those times, to bring me through to an answer if I have a question on the other end and it may not be immediate, but it's bringing it to him first and trusting him and just following where he's taking me from there.

Seth: 40:31

But the last thing that I'll say about this and this came from Pastor Aaron, and I'm sorry if I kind of butcher, pastor Aaron, if you listen to this kind of butcher or word, it wrong how you put it but when you're praying and you're in that quiet time, take a moment at the end. Of course you're laying out everything that's on your heart, but take a moment at the end to just say something like you know, god, if there's something that you want to open my eyes to or something that you are leading me to, something along those lines Like I said, I might be getting the wording wrong, you know please, please, reveal that to me. Please open my heart or my eyes to it, please show that to me and just sit quietly after that. Don't end your prayer and walk off. Don't immediately dive into Bible reading.

Seth: 41:30

Of course, reading your Bible after prayer is always a great thing, but just take a couple minutes and just sit and see. Is God bringing something to your attention? Is he putting something on your heart that maybe your eyes haven't even been open to previously. Maybe it's an area of your life where some sin is deeply rooted and he's trying to work on that. Maybe he's trying to draw your attention to your family and say, hey, your family is a gift. You need to cherish that. That is something that you need to lean into and show that love. So it's just a good way to really experience and grow that relationship in the way it's meant to be.

Jonathan: 42:20

But that's it for me the way it's meant to be, but that's it for me. Yeah, that's man, you guys, everything that you guys have said is powerful, man. I looked up a verse and it's Matthew 6, verse 6. And it says but when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your father, who is unseen. Then your father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.

Jonathan: 42:53

So, going off these verses, man sometimes we just need to get away and just pray to God.

Jonathan: 43:03

Sometimes we just need to get away and just pray to God and, like it was mentioned earlier, just about anything. It's that conversation, lord, I'm just having a bad day, or Lord, my mind is racing right now of a million things, whether it's work, whether it's school, whether it's papers, whatever have you. And the Lord hears that and that's what he wants. He wants us to come to Him with everything that we have and just lay it at the, to hear everyone when they pray, because a lot of people will come up to you and be like man, you know, thank you for praying for me, because I needed that, even in my darkest moments. I needed people to just pray for me and it's just a blessing to hear the receiving end, but also being the one to pray for others. Prayer has power and I've noticed when I pray for others, it's not what I can get out of it, but, lord, this glory goes all to you and, like I said, just to hear the stories of people just telling you thank you for your prayer, that's all I got.

Seth: 44:38

Mike, you got any final thoughts?

Mike: 44:41

Yeah, just got to say throw your hands in the air, lift up your heart with the prayer. No, hey, dude, I was looking up a verse from Romans eight, 26 through 27. It says in the same way the spirit helps us in our weakness. Looking up a verse from Romans 8, 26 through 27,. It says In the same way the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans and he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God's people in accordance with the will of God. So I'm not going to lie and say like I'm an expert on prayer and I pray, and say that I pray every day because I don't.

Mike: 45:33

I don't know if you guys ever experienced this. Was anyone asked you to pray for them? And like, yeah, sure, asks you to pray for them? And you're like, yeah, sure, and the next time you see him, you know, hey, thanks for praying. You know everything's good and you know I forget to pray. I've forgotten to pray for him and oh, anytime, and my brother stephan, he's encouraged me lately to just take the step of faith and just pray for them on the spot. You know, because that happens.

Mike: 46:08

You know, life goes on and we get so entangled in our own lives. And also I want to say that you know, for me personally, sometimes I don't know what to pray. For Me personally, sometimes I don't know what to pray for and you know, the verse I just said encourages me that God knows my heart, he knows exactly what I need to pray for, even if I don't pray for it. So it's not about, like, the words that you say, it's about your heart. You know, I've heard it from you guys probably all of you guys about heart posture. You know that you gotta. You know, yes, it's all about the heart, the heart posture. So if you don't know the words to say, um, just ask god to you know, search your heart and he'll reveal to you what you need to pray for.

Mike: 47:02

And yeah so that's all I got to say.

Steffen: 47:05

Well said, brother, well said.

Jonathan: 47:08

Amen.

Seth: 47:09

Yeah, yeah, thanks, mike. Great way to close that out, and we're going to have to get you on here singing at some point in time. Any listeners out there? If y'all want to hear that, just let us know. We'll arrange a special freestyle session for Mike Because he has skills. Now I don't know about that, we'll see, we'll get it going. We'll get it going If you catch the special phrase and I'm not going to say it yet because I'd give it away but if you catch the special phrase five times in a row, we'll get you a freestyle session with Mike.

Seth: 47:42

I've been trying to get that myself so I'm sure mike's probably like nah, we ain't doing that. So maybe we'll get you a group picture of us with the involving that special phrase which you'll hear later as long as long as you know you bring the chicken, you know I'm all I'm all for it.

Seth: 47:59

There you go, all right. Well then, I will close this out here with my passage and it is a passage, so I'm going to save you guys from two minutes of me slowly reading this. But if you want to read it, if you want to check out the whole thing and I highly encourage you to do it if you've never done it before it's a really strong example of servant leadership and that's going to be in John 13, verses 1 through 20. And what this is is it's a passage covering when Jesus washed his disciples' feet. And if you're not familiar with the Bible, if you're not familiar with the times, you might hear that and think why in the world in the Bible does it cover Jesus washing some nasty feet from these dudes who've been out walking around? And there's a couple different things to know about it here. First off, back in the time when Jesus was out in his ministry, out in the world, just traveling from town to town, his disciples traveling from town to town, you know those roads were nasty and when they would come in and eat there weren't chairs. It wasn't like when we go sit down at like Golden Corral and we all sit around a big table and everybody's got a big old plate of rolls. Like it's not like that. They would all recline at a table and so someone's feet were basically right next to you at all times. Like it's just not a not a fun experience, I'm sure. So typically what would happen is when guests would come into a building and into a home to have a meal, there would be a servant who would wash their feet and that would just be the role of whoever that person was, and typically it was the lowest servant kind of out of the hierarchy there who would have that job, because that was such a considered, such a dirty job essentially to have to sit there and do that and having to get all that dirt, having to get all the anything they might have stepped in. You know, you can probably fill in the blank there and get that off before they go sit down and eat.

Seth: 50:05

So Jesus is preparing for, basically, this is right before he is going to the cross. He is with his disciples, he is about to be betrayed by Judas and he knows that that betrayal is coming. And he knows that that betrayal is coming. If you read this full passage, it is in the passage that he knows that he's about to be betrayed by Judas. But Jesus, if you think about this, the Son of God, takes on the job of the lowest servant to his disciples. He picks up a cloth, he goes around to each of them and washes their feet, including Judas, who he knows is about to betray him.

Seth: 50:53

Who is still in that group? Someone who by all other means someone of his stature, I mean. I say someone, I mean he's God. It's not just someone, but the king of kings, the lords of lords. He should be exalted. He should never be doing something like this.

Seth: 51:17

You know, if we look at this from a from like a human perspective, that that would be like the president coming in your house and like cleaning your bathroom for you, like that's just not going to happen. But in this case, jesus assumes the posture of a servant and he goes and serves his disciples in this way. And it's so shocking that even Peter said to him you shall never wash my feet when Jesus tried to wash it. And then there was an exchange there. Once again, please go read this passage, because it's a powerful passage, and when you put it in the context of understanding that Jesus lowered himself to the point of a servant to serve those around him. That ties into love, that ties into just acts of service, that there are so many things that can be said about this. But when I look at my daily walk, when following Christ, this is something that really stands out to me.

Seth: 52:11

And verse 14 specifically says if I, then your Lord and teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. He's saying that none of us are above each other in this way, that we should always seek to serve those around us. If you're in a leadership position, you're in a position of service. You are not there to be served. You are there to serve. And that doesn't mean that you have to be the CEO of some major corporation, and that doesn't mean that you have to be the CEO of some major corporation. You can be a servant leader in your home. You can be a servant leader in your church. You can be a servant leader to your family, to your friends. There are so many ways that you can do this and show that love.

Seth: 52:55

But this whole passage is just such a strong reminder of not only just how different Jesus is and how he was he's always been the same but this example from 2,000 years ago to now. There's not been a shift in the social structure to think that at any point from then to now, that it would be normal for someone of his power to humble themselves to a servant and do this. But he did it, and he gave us this for a reason. He gave us this example for a reason he's showing us that we can all serve one another, regardless of where we are, and that there's no point where there's a task that's beneath us, a task that we are meant to shove off on someone else. We should always approach it with humility, love and just a heart that's ready to serve one another. But I think that's it from my side, guys. What do y'all think?

Steffen: 54:00

Well, to me that's a very powerful, really powerful example of love, what we were talking about earlier. But I just want to touch base on and give another example here. This is from our ministry that we are blessed to be a part of, called Santa for the Homeless. This ministry was started about six years ago with Brother Randy. Love you, bro.

Steffen: 54:33

God put it on his heart to give out gloves and scarves during the wintertime for people over here not too far from where we're at in Athens, right, athens, georgia. So he would go to homeless people. He did it by himself the first year. He'd go to homeless people and he was handing out stuff. He would collect whatever he could collect and give back to the homeless community, and he told me about it once he did it. I'm like, brother, I would have went with you. Just let me know Next time you go. I want to go. So I went with him and that was such an experience just to be able to be blessed to give back, and we were helping those that we could help, right. So that was love. You know, we were serving as God had directed us to serve. So over the years, because he would go every year, so he was just doing it during the wintertime. But then God put it on his heart to go to another part of the state which is not too far from us. He found this homeless camp. He's got at least 100 tents in this one camp, just this one camp alone. He started serving out there at this one camp Right.

Steffen: 56:03

So I was blessed to have Seth come join us. You know I had a little physical challenge to where I wasn't able to join that year, but as soon as that got off, so we went from doing it for one year to doing it once a month. He went from having two, three tables Now he's got about six or seven tables. It went from three, four people Now he had last month 40 volunteers, four, zero. The amount of homeless people could say was at least 200 people out there that we were serving. You know we had an ice cream truck come up give them free ice cream and you know they got their hair cut over there. And you know we had food, clothing, you know toiletries. You know it was such a blessing but God put that on our brother's heart to serve and our hearts were opened up and we had that desire. That passion was on us as well, and Brother Jay has joined us too.

Jonathan: 57:20

We all, you know.

Steffen: 57:22

We went out there and it was something incredible for us to be able to share what God put on our hearts. We've had some of the members at the camp say, hey, can you pray for us? We even set up a prayer tent as well. We've walked around prayed for us. We even set up a prayer tent as well. We've walked around prayed for individuals. We've had individuals come up to the prayer tent prayed for them there. It has been such a powerful experience and it's been such a blessing to be able to share God's love, to do God's work. So we went from that one camp to three camps. So we started in Athens finding whoever we could find that was homeless, which was nowhere near the amount of people that we have now or that God has shown us to, not that we have, but that God has pointed us at. So I say all that to say Serving others. You know, and Jesus made, he was the, the perfect example of what he did. You know we are not above anybody. Any one of us could be out there or any given time. You never know where our plan is or what direction we're going in.

Steffen: 58:47

Then I want to close with this from John 12, verse 3. This is about Mary, mary and Martha Lazarus' sisters. Martha's out there getting the house ready, taking care of business and whatnot, but Mary, she took about a pint of pure nard an expensive perfume and she poured it on Jesus' feet and wiped his feet with her hair and the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. She enjoyed and was so thankful for being in Jesus' presence. She loved him so much, she served him the best way she could, and now I'd encourage you to read the rest of that passage and everything that was said during that time frame. But that was just a fantastic example of serving. She just showed love. She loved him so much, she enjoyed and was so happy, so thankful to be in his presence. She said this is what I know, what to do, and that's what she did. Praise God, that's all I got, amen.

Mike: 1:00:08

Yeah, those are some great examples. In my life I have two young'uns at the home and I'm in a season of serving them as a father, serving my wife as a husband, and I think serving is you can serve anywhere, not just out in the world, but in your homes too. I think that's very important and I'm not saying I'm a perfect husband or a perfect father Not even close but it's a struggle, especially balancing life and work, and I work at night, so you can imagine it's a struggle. But yeah, as far as like feet washing, I grew up I actually grew up in a church that does that. They do it during the communion service. And I remember back in seventh grade, my thing, the social studies teacher, he actually one day he like poked fun of it and I was like I wanted to say something. But you know, you know the Bible says be slow to speak, slow to anger. So I held back. Mr Murray, if you're out there, man, I forgive you, man, I love you.

Mike: 1:01:36

But what else? Oh, verse 10 stands out to me. It says Jesus said to him which was, what was it? Who's he talking to? On peter? But yeah, he who is bathed bathed, I can't say that word, man, I'm sorry. He who is bathed needs only to wash his feet but is completely clean, and you are clean, but not all of you, referring to jud. But this verse reminds me that, you know, even if I like mess up, you know, every day it reminds me that I'm still clean, but you know, my feet aren't representing my daily sins. And it also when you, when it talks about washing each other's feet, it reminds me that or it kind of symbolizes. For me it symbolizes holding each other accountable and and serving each other and we can confess our sins to one another and we will be healed. So that's all I got to say about that.

Jonathan: 1:02:41

Yeah, this is again. Everything that you guys have said is wonderful being a servant or having somebody serve you. The one thing that I can remember is back in 2019, I joined a program. I go to Calvary Baptist Church Shout out to Pastor Matt Deibler and Calvary. But back in 2019, a little after right around 2022, 21-ish I joined their program and it's called the Reformers Unanimous. Shout out to all of you guys, all of you. You guys have been wonderful to me. They have helped me, they have come beside me and when I joined I was like man.

Jonathan: 1:03:37

For those of you who don't know what Reformers Unanimous is, it's a safe place where you can go if you're struggling with whatever it is alcohol, addictions, whatever and I was just struggling with the mind and I needed a safe place to go.

Jonathan: 1:03:56

And when I went to Reformers Unanimous man, they treated me like family and they were nice to me and that goes to show you the example of being a servant to somebody in need, and I just want to thank them from the bottom of my heart, you know, because, like I said, they came beside me when I needed somebody and I just needed people to help me come through. So if you guys are interested in a Reformers United mess. They meet on Friday nights at seven over in Statham Georgia but they have them all over over in Statham Georgia but they have them all over. So I'll get the information and I'll send that out to you guys or stuff. Then I can work something up, post it on the page. But that's all I got. Like I said, I just want to thank those people Matt Deibler and the RU people, ru guys and gals, just for being there for me, yeah, and if any of you guys listening are interested in something like that, just let us know.

Seth: 1:05:08

Our contact information was at the beginning of the episode, but you'll also hear it again here in just a few minutes. But we're always for anything like that that can really empower and strengthen and just give someone a safe place to to pour out their heart and then receive a loving environment or be a part of a loving environment that receives them and just really treats them that way. So thank you for sharing that, jonathan. That's awesome. But, yeah, I mean, you guys have all shared some really good stuff around this. You know, I just I can't encourage everyone enough to to go out and just read this passage John 13, 1 through 20. And it's it's just deep and it's good. Good to read it, good to just reflect on it, read it, good to just reflect on it. Reflect on how can I show this kind of servant leadership or this kind of service and I don't want to always phrase it in servant leadership, because some people might hear that and then try to disqualify themselves by saying, oh, I'm not a leader.

Seth: 1:06:18

I'm not a leader at work. I'm not a manager, I'm not this, I'm not that. No, you're a leader. Every person in their life, whether they know it or not, is a leader In one way or another. You have influence. Your voice matters and your voice has impact on others, and you might not realize it. You might think that no one listens to you. You might feel like that you're separated or alone. You might not feel that influence on others, but you have it.

Seth: 1:06:51

And another thing, not necessarily related to this, but when I say that your voice matters, tying back to what Stefan was talking about earlier, use that voice for love. You never know what someone else is going through. You never know where their heart is. You don't know where their mind is. You don't know the hard situation they just came from. You don't know the hard situation they might be going to. So just use your voice for love and just try to serve one another in every opportunity that you get. But that's about it, I think, for the episode content. So we are going to bring it back to the man who is the master of freestyle, mr Mike, for our closing prayer and just to kind of close out and wrap up the episode here.

Mike: 1:07:37

So, mr Mike, yeah, thank you for all you guys, man, you guys are amazing. I am very encouraged. And this episode we learned about how to walk or follow Christ. You know, we had Brother Jay with Walking by Faith. We had Brother Stephan the Blessing no Question, talking about loving by Faith. We had Brother Stephan the Blessing, no Question, talking about loving by faith, and I had myself talking about praying by faith. And we had the number one contender, chicken Dinner, seth, with Serving by Faith. So if you guys have any questions, you know, or tips and suggestions, hit us up at contact at F-O-C-P-O-D dot com. Again, that is, contact at F-O-C-P-O-D dot com, and also check us out at focpodcom.

Mike: 1:08:43

All right, I'm going to end this with a prayer and I'll let you all go on your way. Dear Lord, thank you again. Thank you, father, for waking us up. Thank you for giving us the strength to take on the day. Thank you for the breath in our lungs, lord.

Mike: 1:09:03

I just want to bless all of the listeners out there. I pray, lord, that they're encouraged and that they, you know, will have this open heart to follow you, lord, no matter what they're going through, to know that they can be confident and just be confident in you, no matter how they feel, no matter how they think in their heads, but I just pray that they know that you love them so much and that you want a relationship with them. I thank you, lord. I pray, lord, for all my brothers here. Pray that they'll just go on about their days and just focus on you and put you first and seek your kingdom first. Seek your kingdom first and just to be encouraged and, you know, just to help us to focus on you. Help us to follow you in everything that we do and glorify you and to show others that you are everything that you are. The meaning of this life, the meaning for our existence is you. Thank you, lord. I pray that you bless this day In the mighty name of Jesus. I pray Amen.

Seth: 1:10:32

Amen Amen.