Soteriology: The Study of How God Saves People

Church, how are we doing? Let's go, let's go. Hey, earlier this month, a US fighter jet was shot down over Iran into enemy territory. The pilot was quickly rescued. The weapons systems operator endured an injury as they ejected from that plane and went into hiding. Climbed 7,000 feet up a mountain, injured, and hid in a crevice. We didn't know exactly where he was, but the IRGC was quickly approaching him, trying to find him, and as we started a mission, the United States military started a mission to find this guy, they unveiled a new technology, and they said out loud, if your heart is beating, we will find you, and they released something never before seen, never before utilized, called Ghost Murmur, and it is a technology that surpasses all physics and is able to detect a human heartbeat from over 40 miles away. And this was in the news, this was in the headlines, lots of details about how we went about to save this individual. I want you to think about some of those words. Mission, save, these are church words. My daughter just got back from a mission trip. We are out there on mission, we want to save people. Salvation, okay, this is a huge part of what we do as you think about it, we seek to save. Jesus Christ came to seek and save the lost.

It's a part of our, if we want to be like Jesus, we are about seeking and saving the lost. And so today, as we move through this series called Big Questions, where you all have written in questions and voted some of those up, you said, hey, this is the one I want you to take, this is the one I want you to take. We were able to classify some of those questions under the banner of soteriology. Soteriology is a seminary word that means the study of how God saves, the study of how God saves. And so I'm gonna put on the screen, on the back wall, this circle, and in there is Orthodox Christianity inside the circle around soteriology, the study of how God saves. And in there, you see a day of judgment, salvation by grace through faith, an eternal heaven and hell, one of two places, the cross of Christ, Christ atoning, death and resurrection, the deity of Christ. And then outside the circle, you see some other theologies that have crept into our day, things like works-based salvation or moralism, this idea that you can work your way up to God, that you can just be good and get to heaven. Every world religion other than Christianity believes this, several cults believe this. Ideas of relativism, which is the truth is relative depending on where you are and when you're hearing it and what you're hearing, that there can be different truths.

Purgatory, this middle ground place, universalism, everybody gets in. Annihilationism, we cease to exist one day. Inclusivism, that you will be given a post-mortem or post-death opportunity to respond to Christ. Pluralism, there are many gods. And so these are ideas that we would say, hey, we do not believe, we reject that, it's not what the scripture teaches. And yet, by practice, we often do believe some of those without knowing there are things that we embrace that actually at their foundation are rooted in some of those false beliefs. And so I wanna talk about how God saves, answering questions that you might have, questions like, what happens when we die? Questions like, can I lose my salvation? Questions like, what happens to the person who never hears the gospel? Questions like purgatory and questions like, what about if someone commits suicide? Now these are questions that you submitted that we're gonna take on today. I'm going to fly. It's a note-taker sermons. Your pen is gonna be smoking. You write down as fast as you can. I'm gonna put the pertinent information on the board. Here's gonna be the flow of the message. I'm gonna ask the question

as you guys have asked the question. I'm gonna answer the question in long form, and then I'm gonna summarize that answer to a short form answer for you. Then I'm gonna go to the next question. question. We're gonna take on three with a few of those other ones being sprinkled in there also. Try to cover it all. And this is important because you might be here this evening being like, hey I'm saved, like I trusted Christ, I responded to the gospel, but do I believe enough? Or what about my family member who was once here with me, hands raised, responded to the gospel, but now they're into, you know, drugs or alcohol or habits or a cult? What about them? Or what about my friend or my other family member who took their own life? These are real questions that we interact with on the day-to-day. And the goal is not to just answer the questions for you, but to really equip you from the Scriptures to answer these questions for others. Now I want to be incredibly clear where the Bible is clear. And where the Scriptures leave us mystery, I want to take the entirety of the Scriptures and point us in the direction of the character of God so that we have a path to walk. We have an understanding of what the Scripture allows us to understand. To say that in a pithy way, I want to be firm where the Bible's firm and flexible where the Bible is flexible. The three specific ones. What happens when we die? Can I lose my salvation? What happens to someone who never hears the gospel? Let's dive in. You guys ready? Okay, if you're not ready, just say so. What happens when we die? What happens when we die? Hebrews chapter 9 verse 27 says, just as people are destined to die once and after that to face judgment, the Scripture says that three things happen when you die. Number one, you go to one of two places. And I say it like that, I'm not trying to avoid the labels of heaven and hell, but in reality, hell comes later. Okay, people are thrown into hell at the last battle and initially you are in a place of torment is what the Scripture says. Heaven comes later. Initially you are in the presence of God. I don't think it's heresy to say, you know, today you would

go to heaven or hell, but I also don't think it's extremely precise. So what would happen is we would go to one or two places in the presence of God where we are blessed and comforted or separated from the goodness of God, a place of torment and agony the Scripture describes. Here's what it says in 2nd Corinthians 5 8, that you are away from the body and at home with the Lord. Your body goes in the ground awaiting a future judgment. Your soul goes to God or separated from the goodness of God and that fate is determined by what you trusted about Jesus Christ. Some believe in this third place called purgatory that doesn't exist anywhere in your Scripture. I would tell you there's not a verse that points to the idea of purgatory in the 66 books that you have. It comes from the apocryphal writing of 2nd Maccabees chapter 12. Even in there it's not very clear that suffice that to say we do not believe in purgatory. We do not believe in soul sleep which is number two what the Scripture says. You are immediately aware. You are conscious immediately. Like you just you pass from life into the afterlife and you feel things. Luke 16 is the chapter that talks about this and it tells us in detail of a rich man who is separated from the goodness of God and Lazarus a poor beggar who is in the presence of God and the rich man says he is being tormented in agony and he says can you please send Lazarus here to cool my tongue because I'm suffering here and Abraham speaks up and says there's a great chasm between the two of you. You can never go from where you are to where he is and he can never go from where he is to where you are. Your eternal destinations are fixed. So as soon as you die the path that you're on is the path that you remain on. Your opportunities to respond to the gospel to become to be born again as a child of God exist only while you are alive not post-mortem not after death and so both of them died both of them are conscious and both of them experience either comfort or torment. The third thing the scripture says is one day you will be raised and judged okay after judgment you will go to either heaven or hell so immediately that's not the final state. When Christ returns your body will resurrect okay I'll insert here cremation not a problem for God okay not difficult he made you not

difficult for him to put put the pieces back together, your body will resurrect, you will face judgment and go to one of those two places for eternity. John chapter five says this, do not be amazed at this, for a time is coming when all who are in their graves will hear his voice and come out. Those who have done what is good will rise to live and those who have done what is evil will rise to be condemned. It seems to point to this works-based judgment while you are judged and rewarded on your works, salvation comes by Christ, which is the greater context of the book of John, first John, second John and third John. All right, revelation 20 points to this final judgment where some are thrown into the lake of fire with Satan, hell is a place created for Satan, okay? And Satan is trying to drag human souls with him to get them to believe his lies that God is not good or trustworthy. God desires all of his children to be with him, the Lord is not slow in keeping his promises as some understand slowness, but he's patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. The Lord wants his children to come with him where it says he wipes away their tears and they're in a place of comfort,

no weeping, no sadness, no mourning, no death, no grief of any kind, only joy forevermore. The difference between those two places comes down to what you did with Jesus Christ. Did you trust in his death and resurrection for the forgiveness of your sins? The theme today, I'm gonna insert this right here, salvation belongs to the Lord, write that down at the top of your paper, salvation belongs to the Lord, that is clear and abundant throughout the scriptures. When our girls were three and five years old, Weston wasn't born yet, girls were three and five, we were coming up for air from five years of parenting, five years of newborns and toddlers, and we said, okay, it's time now, we're gonna go on a vacation. And so we're gonna take the girls to one of our favorite places, Mexico, right? And so we find this family-friendly, all-inclusive resort, and it was so fun as their dad to tell them about Mexico, it was like this foreign paradise that they couldn't fathom, you know, they're like, is there a swimming pool there? I'm like, it's gonna be the biggest swimming pool you've ever seen in your entire life, like bridges over the swimming pool, you're used to rectangles and kidney-shaped, like this thing, it's enormous, water slides, you know, like, what?

They're like, and there's like a, what's the ocean like? Is it like Bobo's Tank? I'm like, ah, like Bobo's Tank, but you can't see to the other side, like you'll stand there on the shore and it's just water for as far as the eye, you say, well, what will we eat there? There's gonna be food of all kinds, anything you want, and if you can't decide, you can get both, it's all-inclusive. So what about dessert? All the dessert you can eat. They're just like, what? Like, what about, well, we see fish, and I'd already booked excursions, we're gonna swim with dolphins. Like, they don't even have a category. They're like, you're making it up, Dad. I'm like, no, we're gonna swim with dolphins. Like, this is crazy, we're gonna do it. The day, every night, we're just talking about Mexico, like just building up the anticipation. Every night, the day comes, we go out to DFW, we get to the, you know, to the terminal where we're checking in, I'm just like, here's, you know, Monica's ticket and her passport, and we got the girls, their passports, here's Presley's ticket and her passport, Finley's ticket and her passport, we're just checking them in,

here's my ticket and my passport, and we're there, and the lady's thumbing through, she goes, oh, this won't work. So what do you mean? She goes, oh, your passport, I can't accept it. I'm like, it's not expired. She's like, yeah, it looks like you washed it or something. They won't take that in Mexico. I'm like, oh, no, I'll risk it. Like, just put me on the plane. She's like, I can't, sir. I said, well, can I speak with your boss? She said, you can speak with my boss's boss's boss, but you're not going to Mexico. What? She goes, they can go without you. I'm not gonna send my family to Mexico without me. You know, I'll miss out. So I'm like, what? I mean, there's a dude there with like a Fiesta en la Mexico shirt. He's hung over, and I'm pretty sure high, and he's getting on the plane, and yet I've purchased a ticket. I mean, we have made the plans. I've done everything right. I've got a hotel reservation, and they're telling me that I can't go. There's this one tiny little detail that is preventing us from going,

and likewise, you can work. your tail off. You can give away all your money to the church. You can never miss a Sunday. I mean you can memorize the Bible and you can go to hell. It comes down to one thing. What did you do with Jesus Christ? And likewise you can live a terrible life having done really awful things and get into heaven. And you say well that's not fair. And I would say no it's not. It's grace. It is not fair. No one deserves to go to heaven. That anybody would get to heaven is an act of sovereign grace alone. Okay and so this is the reality. And then I'll just insert this little teaching. That's what hell is. Hell is and it's so much more than this but at minimum it is eternal FOMO. It is the realization of everything you missed out on forever and ever and ever and ever and ever with the realization that you could have had it should had you just accepted the free gift of God eternal life salvation through Jesus Christ. That is available to you right here. You do not win by not accepting that gift. Okay and hell is eternal FOMO with suffering with torment with agony but the realization of everything you could have had had you just been humble and accepted the gift of salvation through Jesus Christ. So the answer when we die we will be with God or separated from God depending on what we trusted about Jesus or depending on what we trusted in Jesus. On if we trusted in Jesus to be precise. Okay so we've trusted in Jesus. You have salvation but then you think okay well can I lose this? Is this something that goes away like my passport? If I lose my passport I can't go. Is salvation similar to a passport like that? Can I lose it? And that's the question you guys ask. Can I lose my salvation? Well if salvation is something God does then it's something God secures. Remember what we said. Salvation belongs to the Lord. That's the thing. That's what you wrote up top. Salvation belongs to the Lord. If salvation is something God does then it's something that God secures. Here's the most troubling verse around this idea that one can lose their salvation. It's found in Hebrews 6. If you want to star this and write this in the in the margin of Hebrews 6 this is the main troublesome verse. Okay there's there's two others that are somewhat problematic. This is

the main one and I'll just show you what it's saying what it's not saying. It is impossible for those who have once been enlightened, you can underline enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, who have tasted the goodness of the Word of God and the powers of the coming age, who have fallen away, underline fallen away, to be brought back to repentance. To their loss they are crucifying the Son of God all over again and subjecting him to public disgrace. Okay we read that verse like this. It is impossible for those who have once been saved, and then you you get down to verse six, and who have lost their salvation to be brought back. That's not what it says. The Greek word therefore enlightened is exposed to truth. The Greek word for fallen away is a decisive abandoning of truth. The author of Hebrews is writing to the Jews okay who have embraced the Christian Church, the movement of Christ, they've experienced the miracles of Christ, they've examined the death and the resurrection of Christ, and they came to a place where they said nope not for us. We reject that. We think that's some other spirit. I believe the parallel verse to this one is the unforgivable sin, and the unforgivable sin is taking the works and miracles of Jesus and saying that they were done by the power of Satan. It can't happen today because the Incarnate Christ is not walking on the earth, and so I believe the unforgivable sin is saying that the works that Jesus did, when we witnessed them and we saw him do miracles, said that was actually Satan doing those miracles. And I think there's a parallel verse to this is like for those Jews who witnessed the miracles of the church in this time and said hey I reject that and I'm leaving, they were never saved okay that word was not saved, they were never saved, so the fallen away was not losing their salvation, it was rejecting the truth that they examined. So we interpret Scripture with Scripture, and I would go Ephesians 2, 8, 9 as one, for it is by grace you've been saved through faith, and this is not from your sin. It is the gift of God, not by works so that no one can boast. You didn't earn it so you don't maintain it. The scripture says that you've been adopted to the Father through the Son. Listen, if you could lose your salvation, if your

salvation was contingent upon your obedience and your performance, you would lose it in five minutes. If you could lose your salvation, you most certainly would. The scripture says that you've been adopted to the Father. This is the metaphor, the illustration that it puts in front of us over and over and over and over again. You've been adopted to the Father through the Son, the first born over all of creation. Okay, you were born into Him. A family adopting someone is their choice. The parents say, I want to make that person a part of my family. They go through the legal process to make them a part of their family. They change their last name and now them being a part of that family is not performative. Especially in the first century, a legal adoption could not be legally undone. It was impossible. So that is why you see that idea so prominent throughout the scriptures because adoption in the first century was absolutely permanent so that we've been adopted to God. There's nothing that we could do, no performance that we could fail that we can be unadopted by God. I'll give you some other scriptures. John chapter 10 says, I give them eternal life and they shall never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father who has given them to me is greater than all. No one can snatch them out of my Father's hand. Philippians 1.6 says that God's going to finish the work that he started, that he doesn't give up. Whatever God starts in a person, he finishes. The Bible promises. One of my favorite from Romans 8. Romans 8 is one of the most beautiful, spectacular chapters in all of the scriptures. I'm going to give you the first verse and the last two verses of Romans 8. The first verse, therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. No punishment, no eternal consequence for those who are in Christ Jesus. And then the whole chapter ends with this, for I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor death, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. So you do not keep your salvation by behaving. But when you are saved, you behave. You behave saved. The works are

the evidence that salvation exists. You cannot work your way up to God. There's nothing that you can do to get you to God. But you also, if you belong to God, you are God's child, then the salvation inside of you, the Holy Spirit inside of you produces fruit. And that's what the scripture says. They will know they are mine by the fruit they produce. You'll be able to tell what kind of tree it is by the fruit that the tree produces. Okay, so what if someone commits suicide? If that's a part of your story, it's certainly a part of my story through both a friend and a family member. And one of the more difficult things to minister to, but the hope that I would put in front of you is the answer doesn't change. If someone trusted in Christ, there's nothing they can do to undo that. So suicide is absolutely not the unforgivable sin. And you would say, well how could someone who has the Holy Spirit do that? And what I would present to you is people who have the Holy Spirit do all kinds of terrible things often. I mean, mental illness, circumstances, our biology or chemistry gets messed up. We're capable of all kinds of things. And you say, well, what about then, you know, my kid or my friend or the person who led me to faith who now belongs to this cult or they're always getting high or they're always getting drunk and they're acting crazy. Like, do they still believe? And I would say, here's the reality. They were either faking it when they were in church, or they're faking it now. Meaning, they never had the Holy Spirit, and so they left and went into a life of rebellion, or they had the Holy Spirit, and they're absolutely miserable in the rebellion, and the Spirit of God, if given enough time, will win and bring them back. But it's that, I know I don't wanna say it's that simple, and yet, there's a simple explanation. For what could be happening,

according to what the Scripture teaches. Jesus can save anyone. He can take the greatest terrorist in the history of the world, and make them the greatest missionary, and have them write about 60% of the New Testament. He's that good. There's no one past his reach. The problem is, we're not heartbroken for the lost. We don't care. People get under our skin, they annoy us, they frustrate us, and we hate them. And as Christians, we say we don't hate anyone, but you do. That's the reality that we exist in. We're not heartbroken for people who are lost. And so, the Bible talks about three interactions with salvation. Number one, true believers who accept it, they're born again, they're kept by God. Number two, false professors who look saved, but they are not. This is the depart from me, I never knew you in Matthew 7. They did things in his name, they never miss church, they memorize Scripture, they're not saved. They're pretending. And then there's those who reject truth. They hear it, and they walk away unchanged. I'm Jonathan Bakluta. I was born to John G. Bakluta.

He is my father, and there's no act of sin that I can commit that would make him not my father. That is a reality, a permanent reality that I sit in, and I can't undo it. And likewise, you have been born of Christ, and there's nothing that you can do to undo that reality. Jesus says to Nicodemus, you must be born again. And once you are born again, you cannot undo that birthing. Salvation comes from being born of Christ and cannot be lost. Salvation comes from being born of Christ and cannot be lost. And so if you get this from Jesus, if this is our responding to the gospel, what about someone who never hears the gospel? What about someone who was born into an Islamic home, they lived in an Islamic home their entire life, they never had an opportunity to respond to the gospel? The way you guys ask the question, what happens to someone who never hears the gospel? It was number two in all of the questions. And this is what I would tell you, is God is perfectly just, and the gospel is absolutely necessary. No one is condemned by not hearing the gospel. We are all condemned universally because of our sin against the holy God, all right? Every sin is going to be paid for. It was paid for on the cross by God himself on Christ, okay? It was defeated at the empty tomb,

or it will be paid for in eternity forever in hell. Everybody can choose where they want their sin paid for. We can look to the cross and say, I need saving. I am desperate. The problem with us is we don't think we're that bad. And we start measuring our sin against the sins of others. And so we don't come to God with need. We don't come to God with a desperation to be saved. But when you get to the place where you realize how big of a sinner you are, you look to that cross like a lifesaving device when you're drowning in the ocean and you're saying, please help me. And God says, for that person, for that person, I can make them children of God, right? But you have to respond to the gospel. If you could be saved by any other way, then sending missionaries would be one of the cruelest things we ever would do. I would never ask you to share your faith because all you would do is bring condemnation on somebody. If they could get to heaven without hearing the gospel, without understanding what Christ did for them, we should never share the gospel. Like if there's another way we should do, it would be the cruelest thing that we could possibly do. But the scripture's clear in that that is how one is saved. If they confess with their mouth that Jesus Christ is Lord and believe in the heart that God raised him from the dead, then you will be saved.

He is the way, the truth, and the life, and no one comes to the Father except through him. And you can't look at that verse and out of convenience and say, well, people must be given an opportunity. after death, no, it's not what it teaches. It's not what it teaches, but it is what we believe. Let me say it again. It's not what it teaches, but it is what many of you believe. So why would you say that? Well, look back past the seven days behind you. If you're in the grocery store and you're surrounded by people who are going to hell and your mind is on the milk, eggs, and cheese, then there has to be something at a foundational level that you think there's some other way they can get to God. It's not compassion, it's not grace, it's not mercy, it's not loving. Like this is core to what it means, foundational to what it means to be a Christian is that we share the gospel of Jesus Christ. The way that this is always framed up is, what about the Bushmen in Africa? That's how it used to be framed up. What about the Bushmen in Africa? I was in Africa. I'm in the jungle of Africa, I'm in the lobby. This lady walks in, native to the area, African woman, and she has this big smile and she says, are you saved? And I said, that's the weirdest first question ever.

I'm like, what do you mean by saved? Because I thought surely she doesn't mean what I think she means. And she says, have you trusted in the death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ? I said, I am saved. So what about you? Are you saved? Big smile. She says, yes, I am saved. I said, how did you become a Christian? She said, God has always talked to me in my dreams. And she said, one day he told me about his son and that his son had died for me in my dreams and that he raised from the dead. And I said, without even thinking, I said, oh, a missionary came here, shared the gospel with you, you had a dream about it. She looked at me, she goes, no missionary came here until after I believed in him through my dreams. And I said, how did you know his name was Jesus? She said, that was his name in my dreams. And like you hear that, and I've got lots of, I've got other stories like that. 12-year-old in Iran, I was on a show in Iran. This 12-year-old girl calls in, says, oh, Isa, Isa, I dreamt about him last night that he died for my sins. The story this man is telling. A man that moved here from Mexico

had never interacted with Christians and he met a Christian and then had a dream that night and God said, I've loved you with an eternal love in his dream and he woke up and he gave his life to Jesus. People are coming to faith in dreams all the time and it's an indictment on us. It's not God's plan A. And in fact, any time you see someone come to faith in dreams, then God sends a person. Cornelius has a dream, God sends Peter to bring clarity to that which he is seeking. Listen, everyone has some revelation of God. Romans one, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them, for since the creation of the world, God's invisible qualities, his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made so that people are without excuse. In the verse 21, for although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him. No one seeks God and doesn't find him. No one in the history of the world, in all of creation, has ever sought God and not found him. Acts 17 says, God did this, that's created all mankind, so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us. God desires to reveal himself to you. God desires to reveal himself to the lost

much more than anybody desires to find him. And then this, Romans 10, and this is the indicting part. How then can they call on the one they have not believed in and how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? This is God's plan A. This is God's plan A. And the problem is many of us are universalists. We're functioning universalists. We think, man, there's some other way they're going to be saved. We're inclusivist. We think maybe they'll be given an opportunity post-mortem. But not everyone. So what happens to the unreached person? One of two things. They will seek God and find him. Or they will reject God and never search for him. They will embrace dead religion just like we do, just like many do in the States. And they will become functioning whatever their religion is, Hindus, functioning Muslims, functioning Buddhists, but never find the one true God. They'll settle for religion. But there's folks here at Harris Creek, and I want you to know this, that we are a sending church. We are an evangelizing church. There are 10 people here currently who are training to live among the unreached.

Why we send people, and in fact, in a couple weeks, we're sending someone to Central Asia, which is 99.6% Muslim. And they will live there long-term, like indefinitely. There's 30 students here that are meeting before school at 6.30 a.m. every single week to go out and share the gospel. Like what? You know, it's crazy, man. I'm just telling you, because like for me, like I would do see you at the pole once a year and be so nervous about praying out loud. And there's 30 of our students that are like, no, we're gonna get there at 6.30 in the morning. And then we're gonna go throughout the city and share the gospel before school. It's like, who does that? It's amazing. There's this disciple-making team that have met for 10 weeks now. They've shared their faith 1,000 times. They have prayed with nearly 900 people, 11 have trusted Christ, three have been baptized. Like that's what's happening here all around us. You're either on the sidelines watching the game or you're in the game. And I just want to invite you by the power of the Holy Spirit to get in the game, to get in the game. And if you're like, well, I'm scared and I'm nervous

and I don't know what to say, good. That's who the Holy Spirit uses. He loves those people. I see it all the time. It's like the most nervous, most introverted, like social anxiety becomes the greatest evangelist because people are like, wait, you're talking about this? You must really care. You don't talk about anything. And people get saved and it's awesome. And it is a life well-lived. Like imagine your funeral, your memorial service, and there's 27 people or 127 people or 1,127 people that just want to stand up and talk about how you led them to Christ. That's a life well-lived, man. My concern, and I am concerned for the unreached. I am burdened for the lost, but I have a greater burden for us who exist in a place where there's a Bible in every hotel room and a church on every corner, and we just get lost in the things of this world. If you want to get in the game, email us. It's tothenationsatharriscreek.org, tothenationsatharriscreek.org. I just want you to know we are the solution to the unreached. If God needs to use dreams, it's only because of our disobedience. To answer the question, someone must respond to the gospel to be saved.

They must respond to the gospel to be saved. So in summary, when we die, we will be with God or separated from God depending on if they trusted in Jesus. Salvation comes from being born of Christ and cannot be lost, and someone must respond to the gospel to be saved. Earlier this month, there was a man who had been shot down over Iran, climbed 7,000 feet and hid in a crack in the mountain waiting to be saved. We sent 150 aircraft. 150 planes took off one night to go save the man. Imagine just for a second, the fuel cost alone, 150 aircraft, 400 soldiers. 400 soldiers, a small army to go rescue this one individual to the sum of, you ready? Here's what it cost. 200 million dollars. That's what we spent to get this one guy back. 200 million dollars. If your heart is beating, we will find you. Ghost murmur. I'm gonna send you out those doors. You got the holy ghost murmur, okay? If they've got a beating heart, you find them, all right? You don't have to spend 200 million dollars. We don't need to send up 150 aircraft, 400 soldiers. You have God, the creator of the heaven, the earth, who has your back, the holy spirit

who will give you the word. God wants to save them so much more than you want to save them. So much more than you want to see them saved. Family members, neighbors, people across the sea, the ocean, none of it is a problem for God. He's inviting you into the game. And he's saying, wanna play? You wanna have fun? And I think sometimes our biggest problem is we just don't love people. We just don't love them enough. I mean, I have seen people hate people badly under the banner of loving people. It's the craziest thing. Can I say this to you? It is a really miserable evangelism strategy to hate the one you're trying to convert. So we're gonna repent right now. And may this be a turning point, this day be a turning point for our church. We'll repent right now. Let me pray for us. Amen. First Lord, we just repent for not doing what you've asked us to do. Not seeking to have the conversations that we need to have, to hiding behind our fear, our fear of man, our need for approval. We repent.

Amen. I think sometimes talking to you now, sometimes we feel disdain for people. We want, we say we want them to come to know faith. And so if there's been any hatred in your heart that has drawn a line between you and someone, I need you to identify who it is. It may be a person or a people group. Don't be distracted by who you hope is listening right now. You focus on your heart. Is it the immigrant that you hate? Or is it the ICE agent? Is it the Democrat or the Republican? Is it the Muslims, the Iranians, or the president administration? Who is it that you hate? And I want you right now to ask the Lord, the creator of the heavens and the earth, to give you a great love for them. They are the ones that you love. Give you a great love for them. That your heart would be broken for them. That your eyebrows wouldn't go down when you think about them. That you wouldn't bow up and get all vicious with vitriol. That you'd weep. That we would weep. And we would strategize. And we would ask, how can we get them saved? And we would go.

Overseas or across the street. Across the aisle. Walk across the carpool line. Across the coffee shop. Ask Him for courage. God, give me courage. In Jesus' name, amen.