This is the Truth Network. Coming to you from an entrenched barricade deep in the heart of central North Carolina, Masculine Journey After Hours, a time to go deeper and be more transparent on the topic covered on this week's broadcast.
So sit back and join us on this adventure. The Masculine Journey After Hours starts here, now. Welcome to Mascoon Journey After Hours. We are glad to have you with us. And I'm a little bit clear on the topic for today.
So we don't know who really the originator of the topic was other than God, you know, at some point. But, you know, Darren set it up last show. Danny, take a shot at setting it up and say it in, you know, like southern ease. What's the topic again? No, we were talking about abiding and being still.
Yeah. And as you said up in the first show, being very, very quiet. That's right. And, you know, which is required. But.
'Cause we had kind of ended last week's show talking a lot about abiting. and you know the necessity of that. And you know, it just kind of was a natural Segue, I guess it was to what we were doing now. And plus, we wanted to confuse you when you come back after two weeks. Oh, that's good.
I would have been confused regardless of the topic, I think. My mind was completely not here. It was with God, but not here. And so, getting back in the swing of things, I had to do that a little bit. But anyway, we are glad that you're with us.
We are talking about abiding, and we are going into a clip that you may wonder. Robby, how you could have to do with the biting? Yeah. I'm intrigued. I know, me too.
I I'm definitely intrigued. I was more intrigued the day I put the two together. that I was interviewing. Um North Vietnamese pastor that the Billy Graham Association had sent down for me to interview, and he came in with three interpreters, none of which spoke English, which made it a very difficult Very difficult interview, I'll never forget. And so I start off the interview by just simply saying, um, And this will get to abiding.
You just have to follow me a minute. We're going to follow the train. You know, so the Billy Graham Association, you know, wanted you to bring something to the truth audience, what would that be? And all I heard was a lot of, you know, North Vietnamese and finally it was Prison. just that one word, prison.
And you know, somehow or another it came out of all the interpreters that they all agreed and they all shook their heads, prison. I went, okay, prison, North Vietnam. And immediately my mind went to Rambo. Right. Yeah.
And so I thought that was a PDF. Yeah. And If you think of Rainbow 2, if you've ever seen it, there's a scene in there where they put. Rambo in prison, which happens to be a swamp. And apparently, that's the way they do prisons in North Vietnam.
And so when I looked at the guy, I said, so North Vietnam, like. All I can think of is Rambo 2. Were you in a swamp? And he just starts shaking his head: swamp, swamp. And all the interpreters are, yeah, swamp.
And I said, okay, so you were in a swamp, yeah.
Well how did you sleep? Standing up? How did you eat? What was in the swamp? What did you drink?
what was in the swamp. How many people were in the swamp with you? Oh, over a thousand. You know, it didn't come out that easy, but that was the basic story of all these people in this swamp. And so I was Like, how long were you there?
And he said, over five years. Wow. And I said, Well weren't a lot of people I mean, how did people survive? He goes, Oh, they died by the dozens. Almost every night.
They'd be screaming and howling. And as I listened to him, Explain this. I said well You know, anything any time God ever put me in a very difficult position. He always gave me something to Help me get through it. What did he give you?
And he said, He gave me the 91st Psalm. And so the whole psalm, if you happen to be thinking about standing in a swamp all night. You ought to read the 91st Psalm from that perspective. It's quite a study. But the very first verse says that he that dwelleth in the secret place.
I love it. of the Most High shall abide. under the shadow of the Almighty.
So this man found The secret place. In this Unbelievable The depth. camp or whatever you want to call it. And so I I used this clip from Rambo just to give you a feel of North Vietnam just for a minute.
So Nick, if you don't mind, we'd expert in light weapons and guerrilla warfare. Sylvester Stallone is back. As Rambo. Rambo is the best combat vet I've ever seen. His mission.
To locate American POWs in Vietnam. Think you'll find someone? POWs? Doubtful. If you've seen it, he found P.O.W.s.
Um But he didn't save 'em. Mm. Not the way My little friend did. The the reason why this is so critical to my own understanding Is it Jesus told us in John 15. that the way to bear much fruit is to abide.
That part of what we get to do is if we can find that secret place, if we can abide in that secret place. Jesus will put us in a place to bear much fruit. And fascinatingly, If I was in his studio, this very studio, not two hours ago. With seven people who are abiding every day in a war-torn area of U the Ukraine. And they've gone through unbelievable difficulties.
But fascinatingly, while you're going through that, when you abide, you kind of show up like a sore thumb.
So while he was in that swamp, my little friend, I you know, later on in the interview, I said, well, How did you get out? And he said Well It was kind of good behavior. It was like I kept leading people to Jesus and they wanted to get me out because I was. You know, turning all these people over to Jesus. And as I began to.
think through that that day of the interview, I'll never forget it, that I thought Wow. You know, I'm not surprised, really, that God could keep a man alive for five years in a swamp like that in that circumstance, isn't it, Pastor? What shocks me Is that all those other guys that probably belonged in the swamp because they raped somebody, killed somebody, murdered who knows what they did. They are dying in a swamp. God sent them a pastor.
To bear much fruit because he was abiding. And so, those nights when everybody else was screaming, this man was singing to God. And you know, he was. Yeah. When you think of that place that whatever it is I'm going through and You know, it wasn't that long ago.
I was getting back x-rays with that broken back, but I can remember abiding in that place and just going, Jesus, here we are again. Here we go. You've always been there for me. And he always is. And You know, people see that and that in of itself You know, the joy that those that the Ukrainian people, if you'd have been in the studio, and Nick knows, because he was in here.
The joy in this place for these people that are in the middle of this war and all that's going on. is so attractive to like That's where the fruit is, right? It's it's in that joy.
So That's why I chose Rambo. Thank you, Robby. We appreciate that. Harold, I wanted to get to you on this topic of abide. Do you have anything you would like to share with your wisdom of the many years of walking with God?
Well, I I'm thinking back to Jesus said Apart from me. You can do nothing. And he illustrated that with the vine and the branches. And so if we're going to do anything. Uh then we have to be connected.
to the source. And Jesus is the source.
So To me abiding is not just being somewhere. It's being in a situation. and that situation being a relationship with Jesus Christ. Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Thank you, Harold. Appreciate that. Andy, you have the next clip, and so I can only imagine it's a good one. Yeah. We'll get to that.
Don't steal my thunder now, Sam. I wanted to make a comment on. On Robby's. I was was when I was binging on movies this weekend, it it happened to be Rambo was a big part of it.
So I was abiding in Rambo this weekend. That's good. Yeah, but uh Oh, yeah. I needed to come out this morning and spend some time.
So you were vertically abiding in the green. Yeah, that's right. Horizontally. Horizontally. I was chilling.
I've been on the road a while. I was chilling. Um, but yeah, m my clip, I mean, I did watch a lot of movies this weekend. It was raining around here and and I just didn't I just didn't want to get out and do much. And uh And so, what I also watched was If I Can Only Imagine Two, which Robby really recommended that.
And it's a story about Bart Millard, sorry, that's how it's pronounced. But he you know, if you've seen the first one, he had father issues and his father and him came to terms. And then this one's more about his son and his teenage son and who's got type 1 diabetes and he's struggling with Taking his medicine and doing what he's supposed to. And Bart just does not know how to father him because he wasn't, he only got a tail end of his dad fathering him. And so they go on the road and They needed an opening act, and they got hired this guy called Tim Timmons.
Who was Had cancer, nobody knew, and he was struggling on the trip. And he was writing a song from his own. Effort to abide. And But Bart was struggling, and he doesn't, there wasn't much of an appearance of him abiding, of really trusting in God. and walking with them and And so Tim gets sick at the end, not able to finish the...
Tour with him, he gives this song to Bart and says, Finish this. It's called Even If You've Probably Heard It, talking about the struggles we go through. And it's like, whatever I'm going through, I'm going to give it to you, God. And Bart goes and finishes it. They're doing a concert at Red Rocks.
He calls his son up, who they've kind of repaired. Their relationship, and it's a really cool scene, but at the very end. You know, this guy had been reading a book about how to write hymns, I think it is, by this, let me see what this guy's name, I'm not going to get into it, but the guy was the one that wrote It Is Well With My Soul, and that was kind of the idea, the hymn version of Even If. And Uh so Um So basically, you'll hear that in the clip about this reference to it as well with my soul. This Tim Timmons, though, again, he had found a way of abiding with God.
Abiding under the shadow of the Almighty during his rough and difficult time. And this taught Bart something. I mean, I think it, even though he was a Christian who was walking his walk, he wasn't really abiding. And just how this song made the difference, where he was able to go in and finish it. And really tap in more to what Tim was receiving from God.
Okay, so you wanna go ahead and play it? Yep. Go ahead. I found a song that... opened my life up to things I could never have possibly imagined.
A hard song. of loss. Heartbreak. Grief. And yet The song that made me believe.
Dreams do come true. Through the ages, as artists of faith, we search for the sacred. the eternal we sing of the things that last and stand the test of time. Always looking for the strength and the truth to be able to say, It is well with my soul.
Sometimes all we can do is look to heaven. past all the happily ever afters that may never come. All of the unanswered questions and... Just save no matter what. I trust you.
Because in the end, we're all just a small part. of an eternal story. The story of the goodness of God. What do you do? When the only thing in the w You can cling to is a song.
That's right. Yeah, that's right. That's what he says. Thanks, Robby. Yeah, and I think it's like um I think it's John 16, 33.
You will have tribulation in this life, but be of good cheer. I've overcome the world. That was Jesus. And, you know, that's the thing: most of these things that we're talking about, I think we've talked, is that We sometimes think that we can't abide with God if bad stuff's coming 'cause it's evidence that he's not there for us, but it's the contradiction. And that's really what Psalm 91 is talking about, no matter what's going on.
you know he's going to be protecting you it may not look like what you think it should but he's certainly there and present. And uh You know, if you really look at the Bible characters and what they went through, they all went through some really bad stuff. But God's presence was always there, and that's to me what this whole topic's about. The lyric to the song. Um even if It's unbelievably powerful.
And as soon as I say this, you probably recognize it. He says, I know you're able. I know you can save through the fire with your mighty hand. But even if you don't, My hope is you alone. I know the sorrow and I know the hurt.
Well, I'll go away. if you just say the word But even if you don't, My hope. is in you alone. Spectacular movie when you see that come to life. through a shared experience.
in a father and a son. and the group that's going through it. You know, the neat thing is, is I don't know if it's neat or it's I I just I just think it's fascinating to me that it's easier to abide When things are really, really, really hard. Because your focus is like, I am desperate now. I'm in horrible pain here.
I can barely even. subside without you I got to have you right now. Um at that point in time, interestingly. It's somewhat easier to abide. Yeah, the valley is a much easier place to abide.
I'm just glad I'm not the only one. Uh honestly, I mean that's Um That's when it's the hardest. And oddly enough, at one point in my Christian life, um or maybe not so Christian life. During those times were the times that I was probably the most tempted. Yeah.
to give up on God. It definitely was the times when I was the angriest with God. as if I had a right to be. But I was. I mean, I'll admit that.
I was angry with God. And yet. God could handle the anger. 'Cause my anger's kinda like a mosquito. Uh to him or maybe not even that.
But in in spite of my anger towards him, Um he would Push through that. And Allow me to abide. Um always that went to a much, much more rich place. Thank you. beforehand, as Sam said in the previous show.
More intimacy is always on the other side of conflict. If every time you get up to conflict, you just give up and quit and turn around and go back. You will never get to deeper intimacy. And it's the same with our relationship with God. And I mean, it may sound sacrilegious, but I would encourage you: if you're out there and you're listening and you're thinking, well, I'm upset with God right now, let him know it.
I promise you, he's big enough to handle your anger. And he already knows it. And he already knows it. Yeah. And so, you know, you might be in denial as to whether or not you are or not.
But I would suggest you risk it and share with him, not in. disrespect and and you know, vulgarity or any of those things, but In some form of respect, it's okay to say, God, I am not happy with where I'm at right now, and I.
somehow feel like you could have protected me from that, and you don't seem to have done so, so please explain yourself. And oddly enough, he will. Oh, he will. I have. that story when a dear old friend, beloved of mine, attempted suicide.
and went through A nigh two nights of horrors. And got up the next morning with my usual practices to thank God for everything He's done. And I remember the very words were: okay, God, the gloves off. I am not thankful for a thing. I was just like, so mad.
It was like, and. Like all the smoke and fire of war was surrounding my head, and all the things I was so angry about from all I'd gone on through. And up comes this little thought down in my soul. Oh. They lived.
They lived. Oh, I like talk about. Crawl on the floor around your belly, like, oh my gosh, how could I be such a horrible, like, how could I possibly? But if I hadn't gotten angry and said, okay, God, I can remember the gloves are off, man. I am not happy.
But it takes you to a place of authenticity. Right. Right. I mean, the only person you're kidding is yourself, as you started to say there, Darren. And it puts you at least at a place where you're being honest with God.
Yeah. And you're saying, okay, I don't understand. I don't like it. I don't know why. You know, and you may not get your answer supposed not to vocalize it, right?
It's a high, it's a form of hiding, yeah, yeah, it is. It is.
Well, we have another clip, Darren, and this one's yours. Yeah, and it kind of addresses this. A little bit. Uh because A lot of us probably are asking the question, if we have attempted To abide in a deeper sort of way, a more intimate way, and we struggled like. Everyone in this room has admitted, except for Harold, but he knew God, you know, before the flood, so it's a little different.
Yeah. Pre-tablet. No, Elijah gave him a lesson. That's right. So that being said, we've all struggled with that, and I know Harold has too.
Um But This is a clip that comes out of a movie called Ragamuffin. It's the story of Rich Mullins' life. A very difficult life. A lot of you probably know the songs that he wrote. And may still sing some of them in church or things like that.
However, Um Rich Mullins struggled. Uh great part with a a massive father wound. And also some alcoholism and and anger issues and abandonment issues, and he was a very, very broken man. Good guy, broken man. Um wonderful songwriter.
Deeply spiritual, broken man. And so those are not. you know uh mutually exclusive.
So In this clip, you're going to hear basically, you're going to hear. A sermon. Being preached by a guy named Brennan Manning. And Rich Mullins hasn't met Brennan Manning at this time. A friend of his, as they're driving down the road, says, Hey, Listen to this.
sermon this that I heard this week from this guy named Brennan Manning. And so that's where we're going to pick it up. And Brennan just begins to talk about what might be in the way. In the 33 years since I was first ambushed by Jesus in a little chapel in the mountains of western Pennsylvania. and the literally thousands of hours of prayer and meditation.
Silence.
solitude in those years. I am now utterly convinced. Then on Judgment Day. The Lord Jesus will ask one question and only one question. Did you believe that I loved you?
That I desired you? Good day. Waited for you day after day.
So that I long to hear the sound of your voice. The real believers will respond and say, I believed in your love. and I tried to shape my life as a response to it. But many of us who are so faithful in our ministry our practice from church going. We're going to answer.
Well, frankly, no, sir. I never really believed it. And there's the difference between the real believers. and the nominal Christians that abound in our churches across the land. No one can measure like a believer.
the depth and intensity of God's love. But then again, no one can measure like a believer the effectiveness of our gloom, our pessimism, our low self-esteem, our self-hatred and despair that block God's way to us. And so there you go. And I I'm not trying to lay a guilt trip on anybody, uh especially not myself, but It is that self-hatred, that that gloom, that despair, that Um propensity to give in. all of those different things.
that block They're not blocking God. You know, I mean, he's coming. He's here. but they're blocking your ability to be still. and and hear him.
And so that, I think, is is the takeaway for me is my own self-condemnation for years and years and years kept me from hearing God in a in a meaningful way. and the more I understand Grace, The more I'm upset about my own sin, and the more I hear God. Yeah, I one of the things that I've been working on for a while, I really battled some anxiety last year, and it started to happen again this spring. And what I really realized it it was a fear-based thing, that I let things uh worry. you know, I start to think about something, I'll worry, and that worry gives ground to fear.
and then that fear gives ground to anxiety. And then I realized, okay, what I'm really saying is I don't trust that God's bigger. Than all these things. And I would say over the last month, I've really done a lot better of putting those things. Aside, And saying, okay, God.
Well, I'll say something that's really silly. Like the other day, I thought I left my mouth guard because I grind my teeth at night. I thought I left it in San Antonio. and I started to stress about it on the plane. And God said, You did or you didn't?
And I just started laughing. I'm like, Yeah, I can't do anything about it anyway.
So I worry about it. And I got home and it was there. But Old me. Would have stressed, oh no, what am I going to do? I just had these crowns put on when I break them when I grind my teeth.
All these what-ifs, these worries, when this other shoe is going to fall. right type thing, living as a pessimist. And God's really saying, okay, where is that coming from? And at the core, at some level, it's a distrust of God. And I got to deal with that, or I'll continue to live and abide there instead of abiding in Him.
And so for me, it's been very freeing. I've felt better than I felt in months. Just by saying, okay, I'm not going to give that ground in my life. And so I just ask you, where do you find yourself abiding? If it's in God, absolutely wonderful.
If it's anywhere else, why? What's keeping you from abiding in God? Right? Wiz, we have a couple more seconds to go out. Anything you guys would throw out as a tip for abiding in God?
Uh for me it's it's just being still long enough and not giving up. Yeah. Robby, anything? Same thing. Stay at it.
Be very, very quiet. Yeah, be still and abide in God. Don't give up. And just ask God what's getting in my way. We'll talk with you next week.
Let God love on you this week.
