Transcription
It's interesting because in church, a lot of times our natural tendency is fear, which is exactly what we're not supposed to be about. You know, like when I show something like that or talk about where the world's going, or even when we talk about the subject of end times, I hear people getting freaked out about it. Whenever the topic of end times comes up or we're going to talk about Revelation, it's like, "Oh man, that stuff freaks me out."
You guys, it's supposed to have the exact opposite effect on us, really. I was reading this verse, Luke 21. If you have your Bibles, turn to Luke 21. I spoke on this back when we were teaching through Luke, but this passage always stands out to me because I just love what it says.
In Luke 21, when Jesus is talking about the end, in verse 25, he says this: "And there will be signs in the sun and the moon and the stars, and on the earth distress of nations in perplexity because of the roaring of the sea and the waves. People fainting with fear and with foreboding of what is coming on the world, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken. And then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. Now when these things begin to take place, straighten up and raise your heads because your redemption is drawing near."
I love that he says, "You know what? Everything's going to start falling apart. The seas, the waves, there'll be all these hurricanes, everything's going on. People will freak out, and the Son of Man's going to come, and people will be terrified. But you, you stand up straight and lift up your head because your redemption is drawing near."
I love that! So absolutely, as the world gets worse and worse, is there a plane of fear? Yes, but not for us. Not for us! It's during those times, as the world gets worse, there ought to be this side where we can stand up straight, lift up our heads, and go, "Any moment now! Any moment!"
You guys, the end times, the whole idea of talking about this is not to invoke any type of fear; it's a peace. Yes, honestly, on Wednesday, I was a little stressed out. Just a lot of things going on, and then I got sick. I'm thinking, "I don't have time to be sick!" You ever get that? It's like, "Ah, this is the worst time!" You know, there's just too many things I got to get done.
I start getting that, I open up the Word, and I just felt like I was led to read the book of Revelation. You know, I start reading Revelation, and I was like, "See?" It's like I just felt so much peace by reading the book of Revelation. Like, "Oh, this is all going to burn anyway." You know, there was just honestly this comfort that comes over me of just, "You know what? God's in control. I know how it's going to end."
So as we talk about the end times, my prayer is that you just get more and more encouraged and more and more peaceful, not stressed out, because we know our God’s in control. We know the story is ending this way. I don't fear the world getting more evil, and you shouldn't either. I don't fear death. I don't fear the return of Christ. I don't fear the end of the world. All these things, it's fine.
In fact, this needs to be our theme verse as we continue in the book of 2 Timothy. But 2 Timothy 1:7, I'll put it on the screen again: "For God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control." I love that! We need to all memorize this. God didn't give you a spirit of fear, okay? So whenever you're fearing or worrying, that's not coming from God. That's coming from the other source; that's coming from Satan himself trying to get you freaked out about everything.
"Oh no, the world's getting bad! Oh no, this, that! We better, you know, let's move! Let's get to a safer place!" No, you know what? You're not going to find a safe place, not on this planet. You know, we're in supposedly one of the safest cities in the world. You feel safe, you know? It's just not going to be there.
But he says, "You know, God didn't put that fear in you. That didn't come from God. He gave you a spirit of power." I hope this morning, as you walk in this room, you feel that sense of power. You know, I listen to Jen and Cody as high school seniors on their public campus, and I get a sense of power. I get a sense of love for their friends and concern for their friends. I get a sense of self-control of, "Yeah, that's what everyone else is doing, but it doesn't mean I have to do it."
It's this strength, it's this power, it's this confidence, and that's the way God wants us to live. You guys, if we really trusted God's promises and trusted the Word of God like that, our lives would be so much better. I mean, seriously, guys, like that old hymn says, "Tis so sweet to trust in Jesus, just to take Him at His word." It's so sweet! It really is when you just absolutely trust and you go, "You know what? I'm powerful! I got the Holy Spirit of God in me. He put that in me, and so I don't fear the temptation."
I go, "You know what? I have more self-control than whatever temptation Satan's going to throw my way. I don't fear people getting angry at me. I just go, 'You know what, Lord? You'll give me enough love to love these people in return.'" I don't fear things. It's about power.
If you haven't found that power, I pray that you do, because otherwise, you're going to stress yourself out on this Earth. You're going to get depressed. You're just going to live a miserable life, nothing like what Jesus intended for us. I can't really explain this power I'm talking about and this peace that I'm talking about.
You know, I know some of you, you could come week after week, and you're like, "Man, I want it! I want it!" And I want to explain it to you, and I want so badly for you to just get it. Like, there's literally nothing, nothing, nothing to fear while we're on this Earth. But I can't put that into someone, and yet I know when I see it. I know when I see it in someone. I know when I see that power.
I saw it yesterday when I went over to Walt Fuller's house. Walt Fuller was a guy that you'd see him right up here, front row, or just in the church. He's been coming to the church for a good 10 years at least, back in the multi-purpose room and everything else. Walt was on the train, and he was in the front car, and he passed away. It was an immediate thing.
But I tell you, I'm at the house, and I'm speaking to his wife, speaking to one of his kids, and as tears are coming down their faces, there's this peace. I mean, if you met Walt, you see his face. I mean, he's just this joyful, you know, every time I saw him, just this light coming from him. And then you just think, "Okay, I can't imagine how happy he is now."
I can't imagine, you know, as we're worshiping, and I'm thinking, "It's great down here," I'm thinking, "Oh man, he's got it so much better." You know, and I can't tell you, I mean, I see it all the time, and I know when there's serious peace, and that's just what I felt at the house yesterday.
You know, when his daughter, one of his daughters, came up just crying over her dad, a college student, and she was just so peaceful, though, of just, "I really am okay." As tears are coming down, she goes, "I really am! Like, I know where he is, and I'm so confident and peaceful in that."
It's just either you have it or you don't. Either the Spirit of God has come into you, and you have that peace. I can't talk you into it, and I sometimes try too hard and try to manipulate it or whatever else. Last week at all the services, I had people come up and read scripture. I think it was the 9:00 service where there was a girl, Rachel. Rachel was a girl from Zambia. Was that the service?
Yeah, I think so. She came up and she just read scripture. She's an exchange student, and I don't know, there was something about when she was reading, I just got the chills because there's just a peace and this strength and this confidence in the Lord. Even though she's just reading scripture, she was on the train, and I guess her skull was fractured, and it cut her brain. So she had surgery yesterday, and we won't know for a couple of days. From what we understand, the surgery went well, but you just don't know with the brain surgery type of thing.
But I'll tell you something, I would bet money that Rachel's at peace right now. You can just see it in people. I just see there was no spirit of fear in her. There's just a peace, there's a confidence. And I don't even know what to say this morning. No matter how many things happen, it somehow doesn't get through our heads that life changes overnight. Everything changes overnight, and yet it's not something to fear.
It's not something to be afraid of. There's a peace and a confidence and a power that we can have in the Holy Spirit of God that says, "You know what? I already know the way it's going to end." The world's not going to get better; it's going to get worse. It talks about in this passage how people go from evil to more evil. We're not going to change that, but in the midst of that, there will be individuals who will stand up, lift their heads, and say, "I'm not afraid of that."
Like I said last week, Jesus says, "I'm going to build this church on this Earth, and no matter how bad it gets, the gates of hell will never stand against it." There will always be a remnant of my people that are fearless because they have my Spirit in them, and they will stand no matter how bad it gets.
It's a good thing, and again, this passage is not to create fear in us. It's to warn us but to remind us that we're okay. We're okay! We're children of God in here, and while the rest of the world can freak out about all the things that are going on, it's not that we like them; it's just that we can have the peace in the midst of it.
That's what I've loved, is even looking around in this room. We've gone through some hard times together, and I just love the way, even with tears streaming down your face, there was still a peace about you. That's what it's about. It's not like we're these machines, these robots that don't feel anything anymore. You know, it's not like we're immune to pain or that nothing hurts us because we're Christians. No, we ball our eyes out; we hurt like the rest of the world.
The difference is there's a peace about it, there's a power about it, and I just pray that everyone in this room finds it. I can't force that upon you; I just know when I see it, and I know when I don't.
Second Peter 3, we didn't get real far last week, and I don't know how far we'll get this week because I already spent half of our time. Second Timothy 3, just as a reminder, we'll start in verse 1. We talked about this last week. It goes, "But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having the appearance of godliness but denying its power. Avoid such people."
So we looked at a lot of this last week. We said, "Okay, during the end times, here's what it's going to be: people are just going to love themselves." Remember we talked about that last week? Did you guys think about that during the week? Lovers of self, that's a comment I kept hearing back from people. "I was so struggling with that this week. I realized how much I love myself. I'm consumed with myself. I adore myself." You know, and just realizing, "Wow, I totally got caught up in that."
I felt totally justified in loving myself that way and taking care of my needs and on and on and on. So good! Hopefully, you've grown in that area this week. You know, that wasn't to bum you out; it was just to go, "Wow, okay, I got caught up. This is a warning to Timothy. Be careful! Here's the way the world's going to go. You got to fight against it."
So here's the warning I want to give to you: realize, "Oh yeah, I was starting to go with the flow. Let me run from that now. Let me be a lover of people. Let me be a lover of God rather than a lover of self." Lovers of money, we talked about that. We talked about the proud, the arrogant, abusive, disobedient to parents, the ungrateful.
You know, basically, all of this stems out of loving ourselves, right? You love yourself; you're not going to love all the people that got you to where you are right now, including God. You almost will have this sense of arrogance, like, "Well, I got here in spite of everyone else, in spite of the cards I was dealt, in spite of what God did to me." No, rather than being grateful that God has placed you in this place that you're at right now.
Then he uses that word "unholy." Now, as Christians, when we hear that word "unholy," we're thinking, "Okay, typically that word, we think these are people who disobey the commands of God." But actually, in this context, this word "unholy" isn't so much about God's commands and every command we see in scripture. This word for "unholy" has to do with an absence of human decency.
He says, "You know, just watch as the world goes on. There are certain things that God even instinctively put into us as humans, and even those parameters, you'll see people could just care less about them."
Then he goes on and he says there'll be, again, "heartless" is another word like that. "Heartless" can be translated, and some of your Bibles may even translate it as "without natural affection." This word for "heartless" is talking about how it's not talking about how the Bible says that we are supposed to supernaturally, by the power of the Holy Spirit, love our enemies.
You know, the Bible commands us to even love our enemies, do good to those who hate you. Okay, that's not what this is talking about when it says these unloving or heartless people. Here, he's talking about natural relationships where there ought to be love, like between a father and a child. You know, like a parent and a child, how there ought to be just this natural love.
You know how when your child's born, and it's just like, "Ah!" You know, it just squirts out the grossest thing, but you know, at the same time, there's this amazing love right then, that very second. It's like, "Wow, this natural bond." He says, "You know what? Towards the end of the world, people won't even have that."
See, it's supernatural when we love our enemies, but there is a sense in which the Bible teaches it ought to be natural for us to love those who love us in return. He says, "Look, anyone can do that. Even the pagans do that." This idea of "heartless" is, in the end times, he says people won't even naturally love people who love them in return.
I mean, it's such a scary thing. He says in the end, there won't even be this natural affection. There will be some of you who will be so self-absorbed that you can't even love those who are crazy about you. You may have a wife that's crazy about you, and yet you'll be so ungodly that you'll still cheat on her. You'll still abuse her. This is going to happen in the end times. This is what's going to take over. This is the mindset of people who will leave those who love them.
We're not talking about the enemies; we're not talking about, you know, Holy Spirit wonderful things. As some of you have done, filled with the Spirit, you love even those who hate you. He's just saying this is just natural love. This stuff, man, it should just happen even among people who don't believe in God.
But he says it's going to get to the point where people won't even love those who are crazy about them because they're so self-absorbed in these natural relationships where parents will just give everything to their kids and pour their lives into them, and the kids will still hate their parents.
There will be kids that are crazy about their parents, and their parents will still ditch them and leave them because they're so into themselves, and they found something that might bring them a little bit more fulfillment. They'll ditch their families, and when this family structure starts falling apart and there's an absence of natural affection, man, you know the world is going to implode.
You know, everything's just coming close to an end, and he says this attitude, it's not just going to happen out in the world. Again, remember, Paul's telling Timothy it's going to be in the church. That's why in the end, when he says, "Avoid such people," he's not talking about—nowhere in scripture does it ever tell us to avoid people in the world. In fact, Jesus says you got to run to those people.
That's what we're saying about the public schools or whatever. Not like we ditch them all. There's so—no, run to those places, help those people, love on those people. He's talking about in the church. The commands to avoid those types of people are the people who call themselves believers yet live this way.
That's why he says, "Avoid those people." But he says, "You know, there will be people who are heartless, people that are unappeasable." The word "unappeasable," you know those people? It's the word "irreconcilable." It's the person who won't listen to reasoning. Do you know people like that? It doesn't matter how calmly, how carefully, how politely, how sweetly you say something to them; you just can't reason with them. They're always right.
It's amazing! They just are always right. They're amazing people. It's just unappeasable. It doesn't matter what you do, what you say; you can't reason with them because that's the way it's going to be at the end. They're just not listening; they just won't reason. They're unappeasable.
Then there's this word "slanderous." "Slanderous" is the word for gossip, someone who is a gossiper, a malicious gossip. And I know that sometimes this sin is belittled. This sin has been belittled a lot. "Where's the big deal? Me and some friends get together, and we spoke negatively about this other person. It's just a little bit of gossip, right?"
Do you realize the word for gossip or slander here in the Greek? It's the word "diabos." Do you know that the word for the devil, "diabos"? That's the word for slander because that's what Satan is. He's a slanderer; he's an accuser. That's what the enemy is. But we just go, "It's just a little gossip. So what? We got together, and we're talking about how ugly she is."
You know, it's just, "We just did this; we just did that. We're just talking about this person. We're just slandering that person. No big deal." And yet that word is the word "diabos." The truth is, I could say that about everything on this list. All of the things on this list are belittled today.
"So what if I'm a lover of myself? Everyone loves themselves. So what if I love nice things and I love my money? We all love nice things. So what if I'm proud? Man, it's okay; we need self-esteem. We'll teach it at our schools. So what if I'm a little bit arrogant? You know, I say some things. You know what? I get mad; I get abusive toward other people. I just slip at the tongue. I don't obey my parents, but who really does?
Yeah, I feel like I kind of earned my way here, and so I'm not real grateful. Unholy? You know, who? It just goes on and on and on. It's like all these things are belittled. You know, unappeasable? Yeah, I'm just strong-willed. You know, I always was. And oh well, you know, I just got to have my way. What the brat gets, you know, what brat wants, the brat gets. That's just the way I am.
We laugh about all these things. Yeah, me and my girlfriends, yeah, we talk about our husbands, and we probably shouldn't, but we do. And we go on and on and on down this list. Every single thing on this list is belittled. Why? Because Paul tells Timothy this is going to be the prevailing thought. This is going to be popular. Yes, everyone's going to live this way, but you, man of God, you know?
It's like, "Yeah, the whole campus is going this direction, but you know what? Not my children, not my kids." God says they have my Spirit in them, and they're going to walk with me. In the same way, that's the way we got to live. Man, I'm not—I didn't bring up a couple of students to say, "Oh, you know what? Look, you know what? The kids are okay."
I lift them up as examples because, okay, they're in their environment; it's difficult. And you know what? We're in an environment too that's very difficult. Very difficult to stand for the things of Jesus Christ and live this way when the rest of the world belittles these sins. We got to be serious about them. This is the Word of God.
It goes on, it says they're without self-control. You know, you just take whatever you can get. It's just this whole idea of when there's a temptation, you just go for it. "What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas." It's that whole mindset of just go, "Why not? No one's going to know about it. Just go! Whatever your urge is, whatever your desire is, just go for it."
Brutal? You don't care about anyone else. The word "brutal" is a word for savage beast. Not loving good? I talked about that a little bit again. Not loving good, it's always been that way. You know, ever since grade school, ever since adolescence, we always bagged on the goody goodies, right? Why? Because we're not lovers of good.
We'll mock those who live the holy life, and the majority of the world will mock those who are living the way God wants them to. It goes on, the treacherous. "Treacherous" means ready to betray, the disloyal, those who are ready to backstab you. You've been stabbed in the back before, and you thought, "Man, I could totally trust."
But there's no loyalty. There's not going to be loyalty at the end. People just want what they want, and if you're in the way, they'll stab you in the back. It doesn't matter how long you've been partners; it doesn't matter how long you've been together; it doesn't matter how long your friendship is. When there's this opportunity to gain, and it's going to hurt you a little bit, sorry, there's just this disloyalty.
"Reckless" means headstrong or swollen with conceit. Swollen with conceit, I love that word because it's this—it's the word that the root of the word is the word "smoke." It's like you're in a fog; you're in your own world. You just can't see clearly; you're so into yourself.
But then this next phrase is so important. He says, "Lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God." Lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God. And I don't even want to explain this one; I just want you to hear the phrase and evaluate yourself. Lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God. What are you?
You know what it's like to be in love, right? The feelings when you're in love. I don't need to define love for you. I think you know that's always hard to do anyways, right? But you just know when you're in love with someone and love someone, it's not just about the pleasure they bring you. You just love that person, madly in love with them.
Is that true of your relationship with God? I talk about this a lot, how I don't want you just to be in love with this idea that there's a being up there or this concept of this Almighty, all-powerful Savior. But I so badly want you to be in love with Him. It's the greatest command: love Him! Love Him!
That's why I was so good. I just, a couple weeks ago, when we just had that time of silence in this room, and I just gave you an opportunity, and we all turned off our cell phones, and we just blocked out all noise. I said, "You guys, just love on God. Just love on Him."
I remember just after that time of prayer, there were tears all around this room because it was just so good to go, "Oh yeah, I really love Him! I love being alone with Him!" And I got to get rid of all this noise in my life so I can just be in love with Him.
I don't want to be a lover of pleasure. I don't want to just come in the church because I want this, I want that, and maybe God will give it to me because then I'm not really loving God; I'm just loving what He might give me. He may give me more pleasure; He may, you know, fix this, fix that.
It's like, "Oh, it's in love with Him today." I hope so. And then he says this, it's such a—I keep saying that, such a key phrase, but this is it. Verse 5: "Having the appearance of godliness but denying its power. Avoid such people."
See, we're not talking about people that are anti-God. Again, we're not talking about people that are going, "Man, it's, you know, this person's the Antichrist," or "This person's so evil." He goes, "No, these people have the appearance of godliness." Honestly, right now, look around the room. Doesn't everyone in this room pretty much have the appearance of godliness?
We're all cleaned up a little bit. We're sitting in a church building. We just sang some songs. You're listening to a sermon, okay? So, I mean, I look at you guys and go, "Man, look at this room! The appearance of godliness!" We all look good; we just do. We just appear godly.
It's easy to do that in the church. The question is, who believes in the power? It's not who looks like a Christian in this room or who looks like a follower of God or who has this appearance or semblance of godliness. It's who in this room really believes in the power of the Holy Spirit, where you can just stand here and say, "You know what? Every sin you throw at me, every temptation, I really have the strength to put that to death."
I don't come in here defeated and going, "Oh, you know, maybe this will help, and then after this, I'm going to go here for some more help, and then I'm going to read these other self-help books," and on and on and on. All these things together might help me, and a little bit of Jesus too.
No, it's people who stand here and say, "You know what? He's enough for me! I've seen what the Holy Spirit's done in my life. I used to be like this, and then I saw the power of God transform my life, and I know I can tackle anything."
The world's going to get more evil, but I'm really not afraid because of this power of God. There are so many churchgoers—churchgoers are notorious for this—not really believing in the power of God. They just think they're stuck. "I'm stuck here. You know, this is my sin; this is my vice; this is going to be my struggle; this is going to be the thing I'll just keep falling to for the rest of my life. I'll never really have an impact on other people because of this, because of that."
And that's exactly what this verse is talking about. Those who will come to church, call themselves Christians, get dressed up—well, we don't really get dressed up here, but you know, in the South, you know? But it's this whole, "We'll look very godly." I mean, a lot of churches, everyone will come, and they're all dressed up, and they'll look fine. But what's really going on in their hearts?
Do they come in with that type of confidence and that type of power? I love that verse: "They got the appearance of godliness, but they deny the power." You guys, so much of what we believe is out of a powerful, almighty God who sits on this throne. Everything's under His control. He's going to come back, and He's going to take us to be where He is. He's going to destroy this world. There's nothing to fear!
All through scripture, I mean, this morning, I was reading the Bible in 1 Kings 18. I was reading about Elijah again. I just love that story. You know, it's Elijah on Mount Carmel. You remember that one where there are 450 prophets of Baal? I mean, here's one guy, and here's 450 prophets of Baal, and they're all fighting against this one guy, Elijah.
He's just mocking them the whole time. The whole time, he's just laughing at them as they're screaming out for their God to light the altar on fire. Remember Elijah's words? Elijah's words, "Oh, where's your God? Maybe He's relieving Himself." He's just mocking, "Oh, I think your God's in the bathroom. Maybe that's why your altar's not being lit."
He's just, you're one person, you're on a mountain by yourself, and here are 450 enemies, and you're mocking them. Then he gets on his knees and says, "Okay, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, light that thing on fire." I love that! It's that confidence.
Yeah, I'm just one guy, but I've got my God with me. He didn't just have the appearance of godliness; he had the power. He believed in this God. Again, I don't know what I can do to tell you and convince you, man, this God's for real, and there's this power about Him.
But the Bible says for those who don't believe it and yet have that appearance of godliness, He goes, "Get away from those people. Avoid such men. Get away from those people who don't really believe in the power of God." They don't believe that God can actually do something in their lives. They say, "Oh, we believe this, and the Holy Spirit's in us," but you won't really feel Him, and He won't really do a whole lot.
But just believe! He says, "Avoid those types of people." This is about power! Our God is about power!
Let me just read through those last few verses. Verse 6: "Among them are those who creep into households and capture weak women, burdened with sins and led astray by various passions." I love this verse. Verse 7: "Always learning and never able to arrive at the knowledge of the truth."
Just as Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so these men also oppose the truth. Men corrupted in mind and disqualified regarding the faith. They will never get very far, for their folly will be plain to all, as was that of those two men.
He just says, "You know what? There will always be people like this taking advantage of you, trying to take advantage of other people." But that phrase, "Always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth," this is what grieves me.
There will be some of you that will attend this church week after week after week, and yet there's just some block there. It's like you know it; you're learning and you're learning, and each week you're, "Oh, I get it more! I get it more! I get it more!" But you just, you know, there's some sort of block that keeps you from just going, "I want it! I want Him! I want to dive in completely! I trust Him now! I believe that He died on that cross for me, that Jesus literally died on that cross, that God the Father had His Son pay for all of my crimes so I can trust Him."
So I'm ready! I'll jump in this water! I'm ready! I'm done with my old life! I can let go of the money! I don't even care about that anymore! I can even let go of myself! I don't even love myself anymore! All these things that used to be so tempting, I'm done!
And just to jump in and go, "It's it! I want Jesus in my life 100%! I want this power! I want this Spirit of power, love, self-control! Give Him to me! I want Him! I want Him! I want Him!"
And there are those of us who have done that, and there's others that you'll come week after week after week, and you'll always be gaining more knowledge, and yet you'll never come to that actual knowledge of truth where you get it.
It's great that you're here. You know, I'm glad you keep learning and learning and learning, but at some point, you jump in. And I don't know what that block is for you. If it's just this doubt that the Holy Spirit can really come into you and be more fulfilling to you than whatever vice you're holding on to.
And you'll learn more about Him. It's like dating someone forever and never making the commitment. I just—that's what I see in that passage. It's just you're going to date God for the rest of your life and never commit and just say, "Okay, for better, for worse, this is it."
And maybe that's been you, and maybe you're seeing this, and you're looking at the end times and saying, "Wow, okay, so there's this wide road that's headed to destruction, and there's this narrow road that's not as attractive to the world."
But the truth is, if I'm in the room with all of those people and I'm popular amongst them, I'm in a lot of trouble. I want to be with the few individuals that will stand on their campus, in their city, at their workplace. I want to be one of those. I want that Spirit in me, and I'm ready to ditch the whole world and follow Him.
I want that Holy Spirit! I want that power! And if that's you today, then during this worship time, come forward. Give your life to Jesus. Even though you weren't planning on it, get in the waters of baptism. Go home soaking wet because you just don't even care anymore. You just don't care anymore!
You don't love yourself that much; you're a lover of God now. God loved you so much that despite everything you did, He sent His Son to die on that cross for you. And then His Son died, was buried, and three days later, He rose from the grave.
And God says, "You know that resurrection power that raised Jesus from the dead? That can be yours to get rid of any issue you've got." See, I believe in that power! I don't believe there's any temptation on this Earth that I can't overcome. I don't believe there's any adversity on this Earth that I can't overcome.
That doesn't mean there won't be pain; it doesn't mean life won't be hard. It's just that I'm not scared! The world can get as evil as they want to get, but we want to be like those people in scripture. You can be thrown into a den of lions; you can be on a mountaintop with 450 enemies; you can be thrown into a fiery furnace; the floodwaters could be rising.
You just stand because you know who your God is, and you know the Spirit that's in you.