Covid Crisis: Is It Really? Part 1

This is the Truth Network. Welcome to Man Talk, brought to you by TAWCMN, talking and walking Christian men's ministry, where they're devoted to breaking down the walls of race and denomination, and challenging men to take their God-assigned role. Here's our hosts, Will Hardy and Roy Jones Jr., a black guy and a white guy.

Welcome, welcome to Man Talk Radio. This is Will Hardy, the black guy. And I'm Roy Jones, the white guy.

Thank you for joining us. And we've just been cutting up here in the studio just before the show. But I'd just like to, right now, we got a guest on the mic, Roy?

Yeah, we do. His name's Pat Tigg. He's one of my teammates from college. We played together at North Carolina State several years back, and been a lover of the Lord since I've known him, even back in childhood before I ever met him. He was bivocational for several years, was a pastor, a professional engineer, and played in the pros for several years. So we're looking forward to having him join us. So, Pat, why don't you introduce yourself, give a little bit of background about yourself.

I kind of gave you the overview, but we can take a few details, and then we'll lead off into our discussion today. Well, he did pretty good, traditionally. My name and some of the things from the background, I also have a ministry called Director of Sports Missions Outreach, and helping you run your race in front of you in such a way that you may win, because we're all in it to win it, not to lose it. The only way is making Jesus your head coach, and following his every play and every move, and always have your helmet on ready to get in the game. So that's what I'm doing, along with still engineering, and playing to fame as a husband and a father, and the privilege to be a minister of the gospel.

So I guess that's about it right there. Well, that's great, Pat. Thank you again for joining us. We're super excited to have you with us, and folks, thank you for joining us. We know these are some very difficult times we're in right now, but the great part is God's got it, no surprises to him.

He was looking for this, knew it was coming, and allowed it to happen, and we're going to talk a little bit about that today on the show. And just in case some of you may be thinking about what that is, of course it's the COVID-19 crisis, among other things. But we're in the middle of a fight. We're in the middle of a war. We have faced the enemy, and the enemy never wins if you know the Lord Jesus Christ. God is blessing us to go through a time and a season with this, and so as God's people, we don't fear what is happening out there. We don't do that because the person who we fear is the Lord, and the Lord is his name.

Proverbs 1 and 7 says that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction. Oh, that's a great lead-in, Will. And folks, before we get started, we just need to apologize. We are having some technical difficulties, so if you're hearing a little bit of static or a little hiss in the background, it's because our guest had to call in on the show today, and we've got some noise in the telephone lines, so please bear with us. It will be with us most likely throughout the show. We did pray about it ahead of time, but just understand that noise is what you're hearing, and it's not your radio.

It's us on the broadcasting side. But God is good anyway, and we're going to get through this. That's exactly right.

So Will, thank you. That's the beginning, the healthy fear of the Lord. And people, don't confuse being scared with fear. Fear is out of love and respect of what the consequences are through disobedience. Right, because when we talk about fear of the Lord, we're talking about reverential fear, fearing God for who he is.

And of course, we know in the Gospels, Jesus said, don't fear the one who is able to kill the body, but fear the one who is able to kill the body and soul in hell. Amen. So we reverential fear of the Lord because we know who he is.

Amen. So Pat, we know that you have put a message out this week to your group of folks that you deal with on a regular basis. Why don't you share a little bit about your take on the situation that we're in the middle of right now globally, how you think God's moving through this, why do you think this was allowed to happen, and we'll all kind of chime in, Will and myself, as you're moving through and we may ask a few questions along the way. Because we want our listeners to feel like we're sitting there with them because we've heard the same questions they probably have, and have had these conversations for weeks now about what God's role is in this whole process. First, God is in control.

He's large and in charge. You had mentioned before, we were discussing how in the last day, difficult times will come and men will be lovers themselves. So how do you deal with a self-centered mindset versus a God-centered mindset? What we do, as portion of our reach, is we have basically seven winning plays for life that you can run every day, and when you don't run in one of them, you're usually falling short in that. And the Scripture has always given us the play to run.

And so how do we run this race in front of us in this season? And so to do that through this pandemic, it comes out of 1 Corinthians 16, 13 through 14. The Holy Spirit was bringing it back to mind. I used to run a huge men's ministry, and this was one of our theme verses, and he brought it back to mind.

He said, it's not anything different for the believer. This is more of a foreshadowing of prophetic times as things repeat itself. And I believe in this time, we're in this Passover season that he's bringing, and as other men of God have resonated with, it's just a renewal of what the Passover was all about and the resurrection.

He was the representation of the Passover lamb when Israel was delivered. And part of that is a worldwide movement of prayer. I've joined a group, I invite all of you to join it. It's called Unite714.com. It has a prayer plan, a movement around the world that's happening right now that men and women across churches and pastors are praying at 7.14 a.m. and at 7.14 p.m. So every day you can get on the site and see what the United Prayer is on. Right now it's about Ephesians 6, about just being aware of the spiritual warfare around us. And I believe in this time he's calling his people to pray.

He's calling people to really find again and recognize the power of the blood that covered us and delivered us so he passed over us for judgment and that he would come into a resurrection season or a great awakening in our nation and in our world that Jesus is Lord, that he's coming soon, and that he has got the plan. And so out of 1 Corinthians 16, 13, and 14, he gives some major objectives in this scripture. Number one is be on the alert, being aware of our times and ethics, you know, this time we're living in.

But no matter how we got here, you know, through this thing happening in China and it spread everywhere, okay, now we've just got to deal with how to resolve that physically. But spiritually we have got to be on the alert of what God wanted to do in us and through us in this season to build our character and so have some internal spiritual workouts. You might not be getting your external workouts the way you want, but that fasting and praying has really been making an impact on me. The next one is standing firm in the faith, and that is believing God that he's good all the time and that you're walking in faith, not fear that we talked about earlier. 2 Timothy 1.7, God has not given us the spirit of fear.

That doesn't come from him, but what he's given us is power to his Holy Spirit, love, and a sound mind. So when you look at the facts, you look at it through the eyes of faith, not through the eyes of fear that cause you to panic. And then it says, act like men. Now, that's a huge statement, and that means to be mature about this thing. Don't be led by your feelings or emotions or by what other people tell you is the truth about what's going on.

You've got to seek it out yourself and then be strong. Now, that only comes from a body can divide. Again, that prayer time where his love and his power and his spirit is flowing through you because if a plant, you notice if you pull it and let's say you cut a rose off your rose bush, it's going to look pretty for about a week, but it's not going to last.

It's going to die. And so the only way we can be strong is staying connected, as Psalm 1 also says, to be planted by that river by meditating on the word day and night. And so then the last thing is let everything you do be done in love.

And that's 1 John 4.19, we love because he first loved us. So you might have to social distance. That's just physical, but it should just say physical distancing because social distancing. You still can be social. You can call, text, Facebook, all those kind of things, do WebEx or Zoom, whatever you've got to do, but don't be distant emotionally, but be friendly. If someone's walking by and they're putting their head down because they're afraid to encounter you, you still can be friendly and smile at the other person six feet away.

You can still do that. And so that's how we're going to win if we stay on the alert, we stand firm with the faith and act like men and be strong and let all that you do be done in love because they'll know we're Christians by our love and that's that unconditional love regardless of the circumstances, how to reach out. And you know, Pat, when you were talking about that, it just brought to mind that this is the time for men to step up in reference to leading their family through this and what's happening around the country and the world because the family is looking to you, men. They're looking to you.

And so are you going to possess that spirit of courage and are you going to be that person whom God has called to carry his word through this crisis and to your family so that they can be a light for the individuals who they come in contact with? Because it's the invisible world that drives the physical world. So when you were talking about Ephesians 6, we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, powers, against spiritual wickedness and darkness of this world.

These are the things that drive the physical. So when we are in this battle, we cannot go by the things that we see. We only see the result of what's happening behind the scenes in that spiritual realm.

That's right. And that's what we have to be reminded of. It is a spiritual battle. No matter what the physical evidence is or presence, it all comes down to a spiritual battle. And that's what God's trying to I think reveal to us right now through this journey is that there's life beyond this blip that we call human lifetime. There's eternal life and we've got to be prepared for that.

So I think God's calling us back to him through this journey. We'll talk more about that. We're taking a break. We'll be back with you in just a few moments. Thank you for joining ManTalk Radio. We'll be right back. We'll be right back.

We are back with ManTalk Radio and right before the break, Roy, we were talking about that. This is a battle from the unseen world. Yeah, from the spiritual realm. You know, when we encounter things like this, you know, we have to understand, as we were saying, that it's the invisible world that drives those things that we see in the physical world.

Right. So what is it then, I think the question I'd like to just pose to Pat, that how has this crisis, if we could call it that, that we're in right now, how has this affected you spiritually? It has caused me to really press into the discipline of prayer.

And like you said, that deals with the unseen. And really look at that game plan, that verse that I shared earlier is very, very important. And that first Sunday that we were not allowed to go to church, I felt a real burden to fast, fast for my country, fast for my family and our well-being, because there were so many unknowns. And he gave me, and so it just, to pray to scripture. And 2 Corinthians 10, 3 through 5 says we have two very powerful weapons to take our thoughts captive to, and that is what would Jesus do, and then the knowledge of who God is, knowing God is good, He's my Heavenly Father, and that as I pressed into a good Heavenly Father, and that He has adopted us as sons, that I could pray with boldness and confidence, and seeing the promises out of Psalm 91, that it just really put another level of, okay, we've got to step up to the plate more. And he brought to mind Joshua 1, another passage, and where he was talking about be strong and courageous in three ways, that he was talking about the promise, his presence or his power, and then his plan, which was meditate on the Word day and night.

And so it just really got to me to speak it, to read it, to think it, to proclaim it, and just take that to another step. Because ministry-wise, we are centered on being where the players are and the coaches are, and all of a sudden, they're not even around. So there's not much of that going, so I've got to get on my knees more and pray for them, and so it just brought more to mind, and even contacting coaches and sending them a message, and how would you pray for your guys, and giving those practical things, like in the Lord's Prayer, let your kingdom come and will be done.

So where do you want his kingdom to come and will be done? Pray specifically, and do it with just that first part of the prayer that our Father who art in heaven, how great is your name, how he's given us all his name to pray, and to be aware of the moving power of God, and to bring that kingdom of God, the sight of Romans 14.17, of righteousness, peace and joy, into your family and into those that your colleagues are just really getting, like you said, we're finding the unseen, but through the eyes of faith, you can see and discern, because the Spirit gives that to you, of what to take next into that realm. So I think overall, he just really challenged me to just pray more and deal with that. You know, it's interesting, Pat, because I think every person, every follower of Christ is affected, or has been affected differently. You know, some are having different insights. Some are saying, some people are saying, hey, my prayer life has been good. It will continue to be good through this journey, and my peace will be good, because it has been before this journey, and it will be through this journey. So I think there's a lot of different venues, and all of a sudden, your ministry work has basically come to a grinding halt, because of the school systems not being allowed to meet.

You can't meet face to face with the coaches, all those sorts of things that you're so active in. And so, you know, yours has had to change, you know, because your focus has had to change. You're no longer in that personal content. Now you're in the spiritual, back to the spiritual, you're now in a spiritual relationship behind those coaches and those players that you have been supporting through the years. And you know, for me, one of the things that we talked about before we got started, 2 Timothy chapter 3 talks about godlessness in the last days. And we've talked about this, I think the previous show, was that, you know, the day after Christ rose, the end time started.

Right? That was the beginning of the end times. And we're now 2,000 plus years later. And you know, 25 years ago, we would have never thought that we would see so many wrong things in our society being said and called right.

But now we've turned all the things that used to be wrong into rights. And so in 2 Timothy chapter 3, godlessness in the last days, I want to share this with you men and our listeners. 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, which could be translated as loving wrong, 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, for among them are those who creep into households and capture weak women, burdened with sins and led astray by various passions, always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth. That's a great passage of scripture, Roy, because I think when we look throughout history, as we talked about I think on last week and the week before last show, when we look down through history and we see all kinds of crisis that have happened, and of course we didn't live through some of those crisis, but we can read about them. And so we talked about when the people in the 1300s went through the bubonic plague. So they thought, hey, this is the last days coming upon us, those who were born again. And then in 1918 with the plague that hit Europe, they said, this is the last days. The Lord is coming soon.

So then now here we are in this time period, and we're looking around and we're seeing how ill-prepared the world actually, yes, not just the United States, but the world was in reference to dealing with this crisis that we're in. So the word of God where you read is it definitely speaks to the things that I think God want us to get away from so that we can come back to him. And if nothing else, I agree there with Pat, is that it should strengthen the prayer life of those who haven't prayed because they say, oh, I'm late for work.

I got to get the kids to school or take them to soccer practice, all these things. They didn't have the discipline to do it. And so now God is saying, okay, no soccer practice, no NBA, no NFL, no NHL.

So now you can concentrate and you can pray. You can get together as a family, come back together as a family, and this is why we stress men taking that leadership role. That's right, and that's a great point, Will, because somebody was talking, and forgive me if one of my listeners, the last day or two, this whole thing was about the family. Their perspective was that God was pulling the family back together. You can't go to the restaurants, you can't go to the movie theaters, you can't go to the ball games, you can't go to school, you can't go to work.

You have to work from home for those who are able to continue working. So what is the byproduct of all that? The family is being forced back together, and if the men will take the leadership role during this time period, stand tall, stand peaceful, stand comforted knowing that God's got you and lead your family to the foot of the cross every day and talk to Jesus and talk to God with your family and show them that this is what it's all about. Amen. Listen to what he said in Isaiah 26, beginning with verse number 2. Open the gates that the righteous nation which keeps the truth may enter in. You will keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you because he trusts in you, trusts in the Lord forever.

For in you the Lord is everlasting strength. For he brings down those who dwell on high, the holy city, he lays it low, he lays it low to the ground. So he just don't lay it low. He bring it all the way down.

He brings it down to dust. The foot shall tread it down the feet of the poor and the steps of the needy. It says a lot. It says a lot about the nation who comes back to God. God will begin to open himself up and start to reveal himself even more and more and more the closer we get to him. And this is the point that we're at. We need to be drawn back to God. Well, I think that's the whole point of this exercise or crisis that we're in, Will.

He's used many, many evangelists through the years, many pastors, many lay people to spread the gospel. But through social media, I think it has run off the road so quickly and so, I guess, it's been heavenly and ungodly because of all the mess that's out there. And back to our earlier conversation, right is no longer right. Wrong is now right. So he said, hey, enough. And he has taken it globally. Look how fast it has passed.

And from October, November, here we are the first or second week of April. And it's a global pandemic. And only God can allow that to happen. And only God can bring us through.

That's right. So we are coming down to the end of the show, but we're going to pick up next week's show. We're going to talk, bring Pat back. And we're going to talk some more about what's happening in our world today.

We thank you for listening. And of course, Roy, how do we become born again? Folks, if you're listening, haven't made a decision to follow Christ, admit being a sinner, recognize that Christ died for you.

You are covered by the blood. He rose on the third day and sits beside the Father. All you've got to do is say, Father, I have sinned. I want to ask Jesus into my heart and start following Christ from this day forward. Get in the body of fellowship once we're all able to start meeting face to face again. Meanwhile, get on your social media network and find a group of worshipers that will start feeding into you. And you know, you don't really have to wait until you come together, because there's live streaming on Facebook and all these watch parties that's going on in reference to how we can come together virtually. So don't wait. Come together and men, get out there and lead your family.

That's right. They are waiting for you to lead them in fellowship and in truth. Join us again next week. I'm Roy.

And I'm Will. As we wrap up today's show, be assured that TAWCMM, Talking and Walking Christian Men's Ministry, is building a community of men that are Christ followers with the desire to be servant leaders in their homes, communities, churches and work environments. Check out our website for upcoming events and regularly scheduled meetings. Drop us a note for topics that you would like to have us visit in the future. Thank you for joining us on Man Talk today. Visit us at www.tawcmm.com. Men walking the talk.