Today I'm Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram. Have you ever messed up big time? I mean the kind of sin that years later you still cringe when you think about it? If that's where you are today, I want you to know you can begin again, you can be restored. The joy that you once knew can be yours.
God wants to give it to you. Stay with me and find out how. As Christians, our strongest testimony to the world is rarely about our success. It's often our recovery from failure. Today, on Living on the Edge, Chipping Room elevates this scandalous truth.
You see, God's dream team includes liars, adulterers, and betrayers, yet they became his most beloved servants. But here's the challenge, how do we pass this liberating truth to the next generation? If our kids have ever felt disqualified by their past or trapped by secret shame, God's grace will set them free. And then later in the program we'll explain how you can take advantage of the December match, empowering you to double the size and impact of your donation to Living on the Edge. But right now let's resume our study about leaving a legacy that lasts forever.
Sometimes stories have a tremendous power. I mean, people give us stories in movies, and if you're a child, sometimes a parent will at nighttime read a story. And rather than me tell you what a story says, I'd like to do something a little different. I'd like to tell an accurate story. historical story.
Yeah. a fellow who is the most powerful man in the world. He had very, very humble beginnings. He was of a tribe that was sort of of the lower class, and he was the youngest, and he went from being a shepherd boy. to being the most powerful king.
in the world. He had everything any man's heart could ever desire. He had wealth, he had fame. He was an artist, he was a warrior. He had beautiful women.
Everything that God could ever give a person. in terms of heart's desire. Probably more than one beautiful woman as part of his downfall that we'll talk about later. But I want to tell you a story of how a very good man who was passionate and loved God and who never planned to make a mistake. in a weak moment.
destroyed major portions of his life. It says in 2 Samuel chapter 11: It happened in the spring of the year at the time. when kings go out to battle. That David sent Joab the servant And all of Israel, and they destroyed the people of Ammon, and they besieged Rabob. But David remained in Jerusalem.
Every other year he went out to battle. Lot of success. Things are going great. I probably don't need to go this year. And then it happened, notice it's not planned.
And then it happened one evening that David arose from his bed. walked out on the roof of the king's house, and from the roof he saw a woman bathing. and the woman was very beautiful to behold. And so David sent and he inquired about the woman. And some one said, Is this not Bathsheba the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?
And then David sent messengers, and he took her. And she came to him, and he lay with her. for she was cleansed from her impurity and she returned to her house. And the woman conceived.
So she sent and told David and said, I am with child. God's man. in a weak moment. Then David sent to Joab, saying, Send me Uriah the Hittite. And Joab sent Uriah to David from the battlefield.
And when Uriah had come to him, David asked him how it was going, and how were the people doing and how's the war prospered? And David said to Uriah, Well, go down to your house and wash your feet. And so Uriah departed from the king's house, and he got a gift of food from the king that followed him. But Uriah slept at the door of the king's house with all the servants of his Lord, and he did not go down to his house.
So when they told David saying, Uriah didn't go down to his house, David said to Uriah, did you not come home from a journey? And why didn't you go down to your house? And he confronts a man with great integrity and loyalty. And Uriah said to David, The ark. And Israel and Judah are dwelling in tents.
And my Lord. Joab and the servants of my Lord are encamped in the open fields. Shall I go down to my house and eat and drink and lie with my wife? As you live. And as your soul lives, I will not do this thing.
The contrast. commitment, loyalty, integrity. What's fair? What's right? As I read this passage, I notice the phrases, Then it happened.
He saw He inquired He sent He lied. She conceived. And then begins the cover-up. And Uriah said to David, Can't do it.
So David tries Plan B. In verse twelve, he gets him drunk. Sends him down. Even in a drunken stupor, his loyalty is intact. And then cover-up Plan B emerges in verse 14.
In the morning it happened that David wrote a letter to Joab, that was the head of his army, and he sent it by the hand of Uriah. What irony. And he wrote in the letter saying, Uriah, put him in the forefront of the hottest battle and retreat from him. that he may be struck down and die. And so it was that Joab besieged the city, and he assigned Uriah to a place where he knew valiant men were.
And the men of the city came out and they fought. And some of the servants of David fell, And Uriah the Hittite died also. Cover up. complete. Skip down to the very bottom, verse 26.
When the wife of Uriah heard that Uriah her husband was dead, she mourned for her husband. And when her mourning was over, David sent, and brought her to his house, and she became his wife. and bore him a son. commentary. But the thing that David had done.
displeased the Lord. A great portion of this book that I hold in my hands. is called the Psalms of the Psalter. It was the hymnal. of the Jewish people.
And the great majority of these words from God to believers then and now were written by this man. He's a man that's passionate for God, loved God. Humble. God exalted him. He was the deliverer of the people from the Philistines and later in greater and greater and greater battles.
And the trajectory of his entire life changes. Because one night he can't sleep. He's not where he's supposed to be. But it's not planned. It's not malicious.
You just can't sleep. And he's made to do something, but he's not doing what he's called to do in this window. And as he can't sleep, and he walks out and he looks over, and he's a man like any man on a business trip or away from home in a different environment, and something catches his eye, and there's something very normal and natural about the magnetic attraction to a very, very beautiful woman. And then he takes the next step. He probably didn't plan on doing anything, he inquired.
I wonder who that is. I mean, not that I do anything, but I just wonder who it is. And then he gets the feedback, and during that time, the seeds begin to grow. And then he calls for her. And still, maybe, you know, uh And then he lies with her.
And then there's consequences. And then instead of owning his stuff and realizing this is a grievous sin, I mean, by the way, you know, we read this in our 21st century eyes. The penalty for adultery. was to be stoned. This is serious.
And so he You know, kind of like uh The many cover-ups we've seen in the last 20 years.
So I'll cover it up. I'll just get the husband to come home and he'll sleep with his wife. He'll think the baby's his. But he chose the wrong guy. The guy's got too much integrity.
And then in The way sin creeps in is that seed of sin, it was just seeing, then inquiring. Then taking a step, then there's an action, there's a consequence, then there's a cover-up. And all I want to do is get this under the, you know, I just want to put this under the rug, and it's a mistake. God, I'm really, really sorry. I'll never do anything like that again.
And he'll think it's his baby, and it'll be over, and it doesn't work. And so he he's This is how sin works. It's like a cancer that multiplies rapidly, and the cells multiply and multiply and multiply. And he starts thinking things that he would never do, and then pretty soon he comes up with a plan. to kill her husband.
And he actually allows other people to go to the front where it's too dangerous. This man dies and They play the game and she mourns. He marries her. And thanks. Wow.
Yeah. And then that famous, famous passage in the New Testament. Do not be deceived. Your sin will find you out. And I want to make a couple observations.
I don't know how you've heard this talk before, but my first observation is he is a good man. A very good man.
Sometimes we hear about people who make a big mistake and they commit adultery or embezzlement or they do something really horrendous that is so counter to everything we know about them. And we're so quick to say, well, everything they ever taught was wrong and, you know, must have had this super dark heart. You know, the fact of the matter, David was a very, very good man. in a weak moment. And according to scripture, There's not a person in this room.
given the right circumstances. at a window of time when you are vulnerable. that you couldn't do the same or worse. And by the way, until you come to that conviction that that could actually happen, you're even more vulnerable. Second, he's described as a mighty warrior, a righteous king, and a man after God's own heart.
And by the way, that is after this event. That's a New Testament quotation. Book of Acts. The Spirit of God describing King David King Righteous warrior, man after God's own heart. We get that.
after this event. Third, The words murderer and adulterer are added to the biography. of this amazing godly man who is used by God in ways beyond, anything probably we can imagine. And here's the point I'd like to make. We all make big mistakes.
some time in our life.
Some of them get found out.
Some of them don't, but we know them. The question is, how do we recover? We've talked about a number of things, and some of you, when we talked about teaching them to suffer well or working to the Lord.
Some of you, when it's, you know, teaching to make wise decisions, some of you have extremely deep regrets of that picture of kind of. water that's gone over Yeah. The falls And this feeling that There's certain things I didn't do or there's certain things I did do that I so deeply regret when confronted with that truth. And the temptation and the enemy's desire is to cover you with condemnation. It's too late.
You blew it. There is no hope. and the transferable concept you want to teach those you disciple. The transferable concept we must pass on to our kids and to our grandkids. and to people that are in our local bodies of fellowship.
is this. Teach them to live. Grace-filled lives. I want to go over a theology of grace, and it's from the beginning to the end of Scripture.
So, I want to give you the high marks very briefly and quickly, and then explain maybe grace that we really get our arms around what it means to receive grace. What is grace? Grace is the unmerited and unconditional love of God toward us. Underline the word unmerited, unconditional. We don't understand either, and you'll never get it anywhere else from anyone else at all, like this.
Unmerited means you can't earn it. Unconditional means you have it when you're bad, you have it when you're good, you have it when you're up, you have it when you're down. Grace is the disposition in the eternal God of wanting to give you what you do not deserve on the basis of his character alone, not on your performance or your activity. Second, grace is free to us, but it's costly to God. It's absolutely free.
completely removed from our performance. But it's very costly to God. Third, the cross is God's greatest act of grace. We'll develop that. That the greatest act of grace is the cross where he allowed his son Fully God, fully man.
To die in your place and my place, to pay for, to atone, to be the substitute for all the things that you have ever done, or ever thought, or ever said that violated a holy God. You are responsible for every one of those. I'm responsible for every one of mine. And God said, since you could never live up to that, I will allow my son, who is absolutely perfect, to hang between heaven and earth on a wooden cross. And I will take my just wrath and my judgment for sin, and I will pour it on my son, who is an absolutely perfect sacrifice because he is God, and he is able to die because he is man.
And in this moment of time, I will cover or atone for the sins of all men of all times. And whoever would choose to, with the empty hands of faith, ask for. This gift of substitution and grace, I will give it to them on the basis of them believing. God so loved the world, he gave. His only begotten Son, but whosoever would believe.
might receive eternal life. We'll hear more from Chip Ingram's message in just a moment. First, we're inviting you to multiply your year-end donation through an exciting match that's active right now. Because of the match, your donation will be matched dollar for dollar in the month of December. And when you support this match, you're not funding yesterday's methods.
You're investing in a discipleship strategy that actually reaches the smartphone generation right where they are. Will you give to the next generation? Double the impact of your gift at livingonthege.org. from his series called Leaving a Legacy That Lasts Forever. Again, our Bible teacher, Chip Ingram.
For salvation is a free gift from God. It's not of works. Five, grace. must be received by faith. You might jot Ephesians 2, 8 and 9.
For by grace we are saved through Faith. And that's not of yourselves. The idea is not of your religious or Moral attempts of good works. It is the gift of God, not of works. lest any man should boast.
And I I would like if you would just to stop for a second because Something that I think has, at least I grew up this way, and I've rarely talked without people going, oh, and it's so deeply embedded in your psyche. We kind of theologically get to the point where we understand it, we invite Christ to come into our life, His Spirit enters us, we begin this new life. But what's so deeply embedded in our minds is a concept that goes something like this. God has a big chalkboard in the sky. And there's a line down the middle.
and on one side it says good deeds, and there's a line, and on the other side it says bad deeds. And for many of us, all of our lives implied or actually taught to us. If your good deeds All you know, every good deed you get a little mark. And every bad deed you get a little mark. And the way I grew up thinking was, you know, you...
When you get to the end of the game called Life, If your bad deeds are more than your good deeds, You go to the bad place. And if you're good deeds Are better than your bad deeds, you go to the good place. Nothing could be farther from the truth. If you had nine hundred and ninety nine thousand and ninety nine good deeds. And one Bad deed.
you would violate The holy, perfect perfection of God, who can live with absolutely no sin. If you put it in a scorecard, it would be something like this: In order to have a relationship with God the Father, You need your test score in every aspect of life to be a perfect hundred. You either have 100 or you fail.
Now maybe the Billy Grahams of the world, although I'm sure he wouldn't say this, or the Mother of the Teresas or some famous missionaries, maybe they get 92 or 94 and maybe axe murderers get like threes and fours and serial killers are a minus five. And most of us see ourselves as like maybe 75 or 80s. But unless you're 100, you can't have a relationship with God.
So being a good guy, being moral, intellectually believing in God is not what it means. to be quote saved or have a relationship or be prepared or allowed to go into heaven. It's by grace you're saved through faith. Grace, number six, produces gratitude toward God. And love toward others.
When you experience grace, it activates something. Philippians chapter 2 says, For it is the grace of God, it's God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure. Grace does something where when you turn in the empty hands of faith and ask Christ to come into your life, the Spirit of God enters your physical body. You are literally taken out of the kingdom of darkness and into the kingdom of light. You're placed into this supernatural community called the body of Christ or the church.
You're deposited a spiritual gift to fulfill your Ephesians 2:10 purpose. Your mind begins to be renewed. You are sealed with the Spirit so that no one can take you out of his hands. You have now power, the penalty of sin has been broken, the power of sin has been broken. The Spirit of God lives in you to manifest the presence and the power of the very life of Christ and the Christian life, far from trying to be a good person.
Is about abiding in Christ so that this new life can be lived out through your personality as you depend and walk by faith in Him. And he transforms you From grace to grace. It is Titus, you might jot this down. Titus chapter 2, 11 and 12. When people think of grace, one of the fallacies is they think the opposite of grace.
is effort. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Ephesians 4.2 says we are to make every effort To become the kind of followers Christ wants us to become. It takes effort, it takes energy. Paul says, I beat my body, I focus, I discipline myself.
It takes great effort to be a follower of Christ to allow the grace of God to manifest itself in every area of your thought, your speech, and your relationships. The opposite of grace is not effort. The opposite of grace is merit. Merit has to do with earning something. Put it this way, a better way.
The opposite of grace is a performance mentality. The opposite of grace is when I read my Bible and pray, God loves me, when I don't read my Bible and pray, He doesn't love me. The opposite of grace is when I give financially off the top and when I'm doing good and I don't have any moral slips, God really loves me. And boy, I blew it. I watched something last night or I had a bad thought or I lusted after that or my money's a mess or now I'm in debt and I made it.
No, God doesn't love me anymore. And when you think that way, then I can't really talk to God right now. I can't be close to God right now, but I'm going to get my finances in order and I'm going to kind of try and work my way back to being a good boy or a good girl, and then God will accept me again. And that's bad, bad theology, but many of you and me think that way. and don't live by faith through grace, even though we're saved that way.
And we live this performance-orientation where we live with condemnation and guilt and are not tapping into the power of God. The theme of the book of Calatians is very simple.
However, you get in relationship with God. or saved. is exactly the same way you grow, Or are sanctified. Does that make sense? You're saved by faith through grace.
The way you grow is by faith. Through grace.
So grace produces this gratitude. Toward God, it produces a love and a lifestyle and a set of good works. Verse 10, right? You're saved not by works, but You are his workmanship. You are created, and there's this new power in life, this grace that gives you a want to and a will.
To have good works of love and kindness and concern for other people. The Old Testament roots are all the way in the early part of the Bible, Genesis 3, verse 21. After the sin of Adam and Eve, we have who takes care, who covers, and he introduces the concept of the shedding of blood for the remission of sins. And it says, also for Adam, And his wife, the Lord God, made tunics of skin and he clothed them. It's a picture of what's going to come.
Something had to die, blood had to be spilled, and two people got covered. That's a good picture of what happens in salvation. The other passage there is Genesis 6:8, and we have this horrendous violence. in the world. Violence to the point, I mean, it was like Back in Noah's day, they had CSI.
Do you realize how obsessed we are with violence? You walk into, and I don't recommend you do it long, walk into one of those video stores and look at the top 15 games. And our kids practice killing things and blowing up people. The way we train our troops. Because it is so viscerally difficult to ever get to the point to take a human life.
And there are times in war where that happens. We train our troops. With video games to desensitize them to human life, so in the crisis of the moment, they will be able to shoot and protect. Those that they're with. I mean, just, I would challenge you to get a little thing, put it next to your TV, and every program that has to do with killing or violence or why did they kill it, or, I mean, it is.
It got so bad. That God said. He was sorry that he made mankind. But in the midst of that, but Noah found grace in the eyes Of the Lord. Our biblical profiles are David, the adulterer and the murderer, and Peter.
The betrayer.
Some of us, you know, really put David in that boy. Man, those are really, really terrible. I don't know that you can do anything worse than what Peter did. Any anybody here been betrayed before? Anybody here have a mate walk out on you and sleep with someone else?
Run off with someone else? Anyone have a business partner that man you were doing life together and You know, $300,000 you found out later that doesn't exist anymore, and he left town. Anybody start a business, do a startup, and get a little slow on getting all the IP and the patent agreements, and have someone steal all your stuff that you thought was your friend? Anyone ever have a close friend that you're in a Bible study with, a lady or a guy in a men's group, only to find out that the most intimate things you've ever shared, they've gone and spread around other people? I I don't know that I've ever been as angry.
or as hurt. as when I've been betrayed.
Now let's put the shoe on the other foot. Anybody here in a moment of weakness ever betrayed anybody? Anybody ever talked about people and you realize, ooh. And then it actually came back around and You got caught. And I know my first reaction has always been, oh, I didn't say that.
So I just added a lie to my other sin. Right? Here's, I'm trying to help you get emotionally to where you understand. If you don't go with me to where you have done these things, and some it's pretty quick, and they're. And some, it's hard.
You'll never grasp grace. because David was probably used by God. as much or more than any one in the Old Testament. even after his sin. And Peter became the core foundation person.
for this thing called the church. after he betrayed Christ. And what the big theme about grace is. Failure is never, ever final. He's the God of the second chance, the seventh chance, the seven times seventieth chance.
He, out of his grace, extends mercy. That means. He withholds the just judgment, penalty that we deserve. And he is willing and open. wherever you're at, whatever you've done.
to forgive and to cleanse, to restore. to renew. The New Testament command is in John chapter 3, and we so often quote or put at the end of the end zone, verse 16. You know, for God so loved the world, he gave his only begotten Son that whoever believes in him shouldn't perish, but have everlasting life. But I love verse 17.
For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him. He who believes in him is not condemned, but he who doesn't believe is condemned already, because he doesn't believe in the name of the only begotten Son of God. People who reject God will be apart from Him forever, not because they have not been forgiven. But because they will refuse the gift of the forgiveness that's been purchased for them. It's stiff arming God.
Jesus' message was not, everyone's all messed up, get with the program. His message was, I didn't come to condemn you. I came to help you own and come to grips with the failure and the sin and the using of people and the abuse and the lying and the deceit to let you know I will forgive you and cover you. And I want you to know you can have a relationship with my Father. He loves you.
And I'm going to pay the highest price that could ever be paid. And I'm going to be separated in this moment of historic time from the Father, the triunity of God. For the first time ever, He would bear the sins of the world, and the Father would turn his head because he can't look upon sin. And Christ would bear your sin and my sin in that moment of time, in that price tag, to cover or atone for your sin. And that is grace.
That's what grace is. And when we tell God, I know you've forgiven me, but I can't forgive myself, that is an insult. That is an insult and it is arrogant.
Well-intended though it may be, it is arrogant. I had an abortion and I can't ever forgive myself. I've been through a divorce, I can't forgive myself. I lied to so-and-so, I can't forgive myself. I did this when I was young, and no one knows about it, I can't forgive myself.
God has forgiven you and He has atoned for it for you to not receive it. It is to tell God that what He has done for you doesn't measure up to your standard. Whoa. I didn't realize your standard was higher and better than his. Wasn't it pride that kept Peter from saying, Lord, not my feet?
And it wasn't the call to humility where Jesus would say, Peter. If I don't wash your feet you don't have any part in me.
Well, then, Lord, wash all of me. What was he saying? It takes huge humility to admit I have need and allow another to wash our feet, to cleanse us, to meet our need, to say that there's dirt here. And it takes great humility to allow God to do that. The number one reason people miss heaven is at the core of it, they are unwilling to humble themselves, admit their need, and realize.
I can't do this on my own. I uh Love the passage in 1 Peter where he takes it not only from what's done in the past, but he begins to help us focus toward the future and an orientation. And in verse 13, he says: Therefore, prepare your minds for action. Be self-control. Then I love this.
Set your hope. Set your hope fully on the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed. You set your hope. On grace. Not if I do this and if I do that and if I try really hard and if I do this and if I do that, I set my hope.
On God's grace. I love a quote by Tozer in, I think, his most classic book. The knowledge of the holy. And just listen to this theological perspective. He says, No one has ever been saved.
other than by grace, from Abel to the present moment. Since mankind was banished from the eastward garden, none has ever returned to the divine favor except through the sheer goodness of God. And wherever grace is found, In any man, it's always been by Jesus Christ. Grace indeed came by Jesus Christ, but it did not wait until his birth in the manger or his death on the cross before it became operative. Christ is the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.
The first man in human history to be reinstated in fellowship with God came through faith in Christ. In olden times, men looked forward to Christ's redeeming work. In latter times, they gaze back upon it. But always they come. And they come by grace.
through faith. Let me ask you how Do we Pass. this radical, radical concept on In a performance-oriented world, to those we care about most. I think the first step is for you to write in your name. In my notes, it says, I, Chip Ingram, choose to believe that with God, my failure is never final.
I choose to believe. That's not an emotion. I choose to believe that with God, my failure as a parent is never final. Failure as a pastor is never final. My failure as a friend is never final.
My failure morally is never final. My failure with regard to neglect in the past is never final. It's powerful. It's grace.
Now let's talk about how do you experience that? Let me give you three specific ways. First, encourage them, whether it's a fellow you're discipling, a young woman. One of your grandkids, encourage them to meditate. on the lives of David and Peter.
Murderer? Adulterer? and betrayer. who are among God's most beloved. and mildly used servants.
Did you ever did you ever wonder? I mean I mean, some people wonder: is this really God's word? Can you really trust it? Did God really write this? And, you know, the many authors over 1,600 years, and all the alignment, and all the archaeology, and all those are great reasons.
But I got news for you. No man would ever write. such a self-revealing book and allow the heroes of the story to be so messed up. You don't have that in any mythology. I I mean think of this.
The deliverer of Egypt, the one who brings us the Ten Commands. Oh, yeah, murderer. Mmm, I kind of messed up that day. David, the greatest king, the writer of the Psalms. Oh, adultery.
Murderer. Oh, boy. The Apostle Paul Greatest mind of a century, wrote 13 books in the New Testament, murderer. Why? Rahab, prostitute.
James, John. Anger management issues. The other Judas, he was a terrorist. I mean, we read it in the Bible like, you know, he was a terrorist. He was trying to overthrow the government, get a band of people to take it over physically and kill people and take over Rome.
He was a terrorist. Matthew, crook. He's an embezzler. He was a dirty little croc. Wiping people for their money.
This is God's dream team. And we have the audacity to say, well, God could never forgive me. I don't think He could ever use me. Are you kidding? I remember I had not read the Bible growing up.
at all. And I remember, you know, probably after a year or so and dealing with all the stuff that, you know, I had to deal with. Just sort of a naive thought. I thought, you know, I've not killed anybody. I think God could use me.
Because so far, the people that are used the most, they've all at least killed someone. I'm thinking, and how. How much worse could it be than that? And you know, with your Uh kids They're going to fail.
Now, does it mean that there's not consequences for sin? Absolutely not. Does it mean you don't discipline? Absolutely not. But I will tell you what, we can pass on, oh.
Jesus died for you. He loves you. He rose from the dead. You need to put your faith in him because I want to feel really good about us being in heaven and all that stuff. And then raise them and your disciples in a way that basically your love is conditional.
You know, they get good marks on the one side of the board and bad marks on the other side. And when they do good, you're affectionate and caring. And when they don't, you back away. And part of that is, we got to tell stories. We've got to tell the stories of Peter more than walking on the water.
And saying you are the Christ. and talk about What goes in a human heart to betray the person who loves you the most? What happens in people who really, really are good people and love God, that they start getting deceived and then they lie and then they commit sexual acts and then they cover it up and then they commit murder and then they go into denial and then they lie about it and the web that occurs. And how did God treat people who blew it that badly? He caused some loving consequences.
and he restored and loved and use them. This is Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram. Chip is presenting a practical teaching series called Leaving a Legacy That Lasts Forever. and it's a five-part study that concludes on Monday's program. Don't rush away because Chip has prepared closing comments for you coming up in just a moment.
But first, if today's message inspired you to learn more about guiding your children and grandchildren, I'll suggest that you order a copy of Chip's practical study guide for families. It's called Effective Parenting in a Defective World, and you'll find all the details at livingonthege.org. You can also call 888-333-6003. Chip parenting is not for the faint of heart. And these days, grandparents often find themselves in roles they never expected as a guiding light for their grandkids.
Thanks so much, Dave. You know, I hear from grandparents all the time that are actually heartbroken. Their grandkids grew up in the church or maybe even Christian school. They're now in college or they've graduated, starting their careers, and their faith seems literally fading from the picture. Or I hear grandparents all the time who say, I don't get it.
They grew up in church, but now they're living with their boyfriend or girlfriend, or they've changed their sexual identity. And I feel hopeless. I'm praying, but I don't know what to do. I don't know how to have a spiritual conversation. And then they meet us at Living on the Edge.
And at Living on the Edge, we've become the bridge. Grandparents are listening. And we've been teaching them how to engage around today's questions with biblical answers and finding ways to really connect, to build a bridge to their grandkids, to talk their language, and to really listen. When you support this match, you're equipping the older generation to pass the baton of faith to the younger. And honestly, that's how the church survives.
Your gift today, are you ready? It secures tomorrow's impact. Because of this match, whatever you give is instantly doubled. But only during this campaign window. Will you make the most strategic gift ever?
Our best days aren't behind us. They're ahead, and you're a part of that story. Living on the Edge is uniquely postured to help parents, grandparents, and their families not only in North America, but around the world as well. All that's standing in the way to succeed in this mission are the resources to do so. Perhaps you've been hearing that we're celebrating 30 years of God's faithfulness to Living on the Edge.
Remember the first time you heard Chip's Bible teaching?
Well, that moment was sponsored by someone you'll likely never meet. It was made possible by someone just like yourself who has given generously to support the ministry of Living on the Edge. Maybe today's the day you'll decide to do for some unsuspecting listener what a generous stranger did for you. All that to say, as you feel God nudging you to respond, please follow his leading. Whatever amount he places on your heart will be multiplied by two because of the match.
To give right now, go to livingontheedge.org or call us at 888-333-6003. To send a check in the mail, write to LivingOnTheEdge, PO Box 3007, Atlanta, Georgia, 30024. Because of the match, your gift of $100 will become $200. A generous gift of $250 becomes $500, double the amount, twice the impact, until we reach the goal. And the deadline for receiving your match gift is midnight, December 31st.
Again, write PO Box 3007, Atlanta, Georgia, 30024. You can also call 888-333-6003 or visit livingonthege.org.
Well, I'm Dave Drewy, inviting you to hear the final message in Chip Ingram's study about leaving a legacy that lasts forever, Monday, on Living on the Edge. Yeah.
