When a Generation Comes Late to the Faith

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This is kind of a great thing, and I'll tell you why. Where pop culture, current events, and theology all come together. Speak your mind. And now, here's today's Truth Talk Live host. Have you ever tried to have a conversation with somebody about Christianity, only to later realize, or maybe even realize right then, they don't know the first thing about the Bible?

They probably have no clue who Paul is. They have no clue what salvation means, or why Jesus had to even die on the cross in the first place. You know, for generations, especially here in the South, right? I'm in North Carolina. We have assumed that people have at least some understanding of the Christian faith.

When foundation that that shared understanding starts to disappear, how do you reach a generation that is coming late to the faith? That's what we're talking about today, and I want to hear from you. Have you ever noticed this happening in your life? Give us a call at eight six six three four truth. That's eight six six three four eight seven eight eight four.

We're going to be live for the next hour. My name is John Galantis. I'm filling in for Dr. Abaddon Shah today, and you guys, please do be in prayer for Dr. Shah as he is working on a really awesome.

Filming project that's going to be coming out sometime next year. He was working on that last week. This week he's going to work on it next week.

So it's going to be you and I again. But today we are back and we're in the book of Ephesians. And what we need to do is we need to understand the people in Ephesus, the people that Paul was writing to, right? The culture that they lived in, and how the gospel turned their world completely upside down. You know these Christians in Ephesus were dealing with an issue that I think is becoming increasingly important in our culture, and that is what happens when an entire gener relate to the faith.

Now, what do I mean by that? Late to the faith.

Well. Think back to a time when you were late for something important, right? Maybe it was a work meeting. You know, you had it on your calendar. You knew it was important.

You knew exactly when you were supposed to be there and what you were supposed to have, and maybe you left the house with plenty of time, right? You did everything right, but you just ran into traffic, or there's an accident on the interstate, right? Maybe you just got distracted. Maybe you actually didn't leave on time. Whatever it is, you know the feeling of coming in late.

And walking through the door, and everybody else is already sitting down at the table. The meeting's underway.

Someone's in the middle of making a presentation, and you are clueless. You have no idea what anybody's talking about or why. You just sit down. You open your computer. You try to figure out what's going on.

You don't want to draw too much attention to yourself, and you typically spend the rest of the meeting just trying to play catch up and feel like you're on the same level as everybody else. All right.

Now that's one kind of frustration, but there's actually another kind. Imagine now that you're rushing, you're rearranging your schedule. Right? Maybe it came in at the last minute. You do everything you can to be there on time, and then you pull in the parking lot, and you see that nobody's there.

The entire meeting got canceled, or worse, they moved it to another time, and somebody sent the notification to the wrong email address, or maybe just nobody emailed you at all. Everybody else knew about it. Everybody else got the message. Everybody's on board, but somehow you. Were left out of the loop, and now you are trying to figure out what happened.

Well, that's what I want us to think about today. I want you to keep that frustration, that feeling, in mind, when it comes to Christianity, because there are people all over America who are coming late to the faith. They did not grow up hearing the Bible. They did not grow up going to Sunday school. They did not grow up with parents who taught them how to pray, or grandparents who took them to the church.

Some of them have never heard a clear presentation of the gospel of Jesus Christ, and. And yet, we talk to them as though they know everything we're talking about, right? We talk to them of the Bible like they're familiar with it, and we say things like, you know, you got to be born again, you got to you got to walk in the spirit, you got to be justified and sanctified and redeemed and saved, and those are all important terms, and we should, as Christians, understand them. But imagine you're hearing them for the first time when you're 35, 45, 50 years old. You've never heard these, and this young person or this old person or whoever is talking to you and telling you that Jesus died for your sins, and maybe you don't even understand what sin is.

Maybe you have no clue what the Bible means by sin. Imagine hearing that you need to be saved. But nobody's ever explained to you what you're being saved from. I mean, like, am I being saved from the devil? And then someone comes, no, you're you're being saved from God's wrath.

That is disorienting. And here's what really concerns me. For a long time, again, especially here in the South, we have operated under the assumption that most people have some understanding of Christianity, even if they didn't attend church regularly. They probably know a few stories. They know who Moses is.

They know who David and Goliath are. They know that Jesus, you know, was born in Bethlehem. He died on the cross. As Christians, we celebrate his resurrection on Easter. And maybe that's there's some truth to that.

But the truth now is that that same cultural familiarity that was comfortable once is disappearing, and in a lot of places, is disappearing very rapidly.

Now, don't misunderstand me. I don't want to confuse. Cultural Christianity with genuine saving faith. I'm not saying those are the same thing, right? Just because you grew up in church does not mean that you know Jesus.

But there is a difference between growing up with some knowledge of the Bible and growing up with absolutely none. I don't want to talk about that a little bit today. Right now, we got a call from Buck Smith in Ohio. Very early in the show to be having calls. I love that, Buck Smith.

You were on Truth Talk. How are you doing, my friend? Hey, it's really nice to meet you, John. I just had a wonderful conversation with nice to meet you, producer John. And I thought you and he might be the same, so I want to give a shout out to the John taking our calls.

He's your stunt double, right, John? Shout out to shout out to John. I actually met John last week. Last week, setting up for last week's show. You're doing a great job.

He's awesome. Yeah, he's awesome, and I love St. Nick, our regular producer here at. But yeah, what you're talking about, John? You're a man after my own heart.

You nailed it when you said to the listeners, "What they are saved from? We're not saved from the devil. We're not saved to go to heaven. We are saved from a holy God's wrath." The very God that created the man or the woman or the child or the teenager that does not know Jesus yet, that very God who created that person has wrath against due to our sin.

So. What I normally do, John, when I want to reach somebody, is I just first I work the Bible, and and so many of the hosts of Truth Talk Live are in agreement. The problem, John, is is Christians Christians do not know the Bible. They're not biblically literate. Is the two catch words biblical literacy, and like you said in your open monologue.

John is Christians go to church all their lives, and they can't tell you a single verse past John three sixteen. Am I correct or wrong on that? Yeah. Yeah, and you know what's funny? I think you're exactly right.

And you know what's funny is this day and age, we're actually finding more people in that category. And these are not young Gen Z believers, right? These are older people. These are people who are coming to faith. Late in life, and so and so, what's happening is we are eroding away this cultural familiarity with the Bible, and so what do we do when the culture, not just an individual, right, not just a person, but a culture loses its biblical foundation?

And I want to talk about that a little bit later through the example that we find in Ephesus. I really believe that Ephesus embodies the answer that that we're going to be talking about today. That is a great starting point because of how pagan the the the city of Ephesus there in Greece was. You are dead on, brother.

So what I do is I what I call read a person. I see what they look like. I read their T-shirt if they're wearing a T-shirt with with Verma Johanna, football team, and I genuinely start up a conversation out of genuine love for the person that I would like to talk. And I'll just start up a conversation. Hey, I'm Busman.

What's your name? My name's Susan. Nice to meet you, Busman. And from there, you let that person know how much you care about them. And I'm quoting Josh McDowell right now, John.

They know that quick how much I care about them. Then they will know how much that they can. I can. I can deliver to them in Christ because they will not care how much I know, John, until they. Amen.

Does that make sense? And that's why I. Yes, it does, John. And that can be done by even the youngest of of Christians.

Well, I sure appreciate that, and I appreciate that example. And I think that's exactly right, Buxman. I really appreciate you calling, man. And you guys feel free to be calling throughout the show. Eight six six three four truth.

Eight six six three four eight seven eight eight four. We're going to take a quick back when we come back. We're going to listen to a clip from Doctor. We're going to talk about the city of Ephesus, and we're going to have a great discussion. All this and more coming up right now.

Truth Talk Live. You're listening to the Truth Network and TruthNetwork.com. Hey, welcome back to the show. My name is John Galantis. I'm filling in for Dr.

Abbadan Shah as today's Truth Talk host. Give us a call eight six six three four Truth. That's eight six six three four eight seven eight eight four. How do we handle it when people come late to the faith? And we're talking about Ephesians, right?

Paul's letter to the city of Ephesus.

Now, right now in 2026, Ephesus is a bunch of ruins. But in its day, it was extremely wealthy. Ephesus was one of the great cities of Roman Asia. I mean, it was influential. It was sophisticated.

It was filled. With people from all sorts of different cultures, different backgrounds, different religious traditions, and those people were not just bringing products to sell, right? They weren't just merchants. They were bringing ideas. They were bringing philosophies, religious beliefs.

There are estimates that put the population of one city, Ephesus, in the hundreds of the Abra city. That is that is remarkable. And you know, whatever the exact Figure was. This was not a sleepy little village. This was a major, major city.

But there was something else that made Ephesus very famous, and this is really, really critical to the discussion: is the temple of Artemis. Right? It was a Greek goddess, Artemis. If you're a Roman, you'll call her Diana, and you'll see that in Acts chapter 19. But the temple dedicated to her was one of the seven wonders of the ancient world.

It was massive. It was impressive, and when I say impressive, I mean it was enormous—a monumental religious complex that was famous throughout the Mediterranean world. People knew. The Temple of Artemis. They would travel all over the world to come and see it and worship there.

And the thing about it was, and this is seriously, this is critical. It was not just purely religious. It was also connected to the city's economy. Right, religion and commerce were very, very intertwined.

Now, why is that important? Because you have this wealth, the influence, and at the heart of its identity is this worship of a false goddess. And everybody in the city is benefiting from it. The merchants benefit because hey, pilgrims come into town. The craftsmen benefit because you know they're making religious objects, and so people are gonna buy it.

So the local economy is benefiting because visitors are coming and spending their money. Political leaders are benefiting from it because the temple, hey, gives us some status. It gives us some influence. It puts Ephesus on the map, and the ordinary citizens they can take pride because hey, Ephesus is known throughout the world.

So enter this funny-looking guy named Paul. He comes along and says, "Hey, all this is false worship. There's one true God, and salvation is found in Jesus Christ." That is a challenge not just to religion; that challenges the entire culture. And what I want to do is I want to listen to a clip of Doctor Shaw preaching this exact sermon that I'm recapping for you today. I want us to listen to it, and then we're going to talk through it because this—the way Paul enters to this culture—really makes a difference in his.

The gospel.

So let's listen to it, and then we're going to talk about it. Paul was there as a missionary. When Paul came to Ephesus, he came not just to say, "Wow, look at the temple, and look at the theater, and look at the marketplace, and man, the Ephesians—they are rich." And check out this indoor plumbing. No, he said, "Look at the lostness." And he began to talk to them, and this is where he found out that some of them only believed in the in the baptism of John. You know, John came, and he said, "Prepare the way of the Lord, repent, get ready.

Someone is coming, and who is the someone? The Son of God." Who is a someone, the savior of the world? Who is a someone, the one who's going to die for you and die for me? He is coming. I cannot even loosen his bootstraps.

He is coming. Paul was not just a tourist. Let me say something very quickly. Many, many, many Christians are walking through life like a tourist. We're having a great time, and nothing wrong with having a good time.

Nothing wrong with going on vacations, going to the beach, going to the mountains, having your hobbies. Nothing in the world wrong with enjoying life. Amen. But I hope you're not just a tourist. You and I have been called by Jesus Christ to be missionaries.

Paul was a missionary. He went into Ephesus as. Yes, amazing. This, but I'm more concerned about the hearts of these people. How do you see your neighbors?

How do you see your coworkers? How do you see people in the gas station or in the grocery stores? How do you see them? They are human beings with a soul, and if that soul does not receive Jesus Christ, they are lost and going to hell forever. And you, you, and I may be the only missionary who would ever come in their path.

It does not mean that one encounter will take them from here. Oh, they're in heaven. They are in in in church, and they are loving. You may just put a strand, and somebody else will come and put another strand, and another strand, and another strand, and they come to know Jesus Christ, just like the testimonies today. How amazing it is that God saved you and and and use even the pain and suffering of your life to bring you to Christ.

But it takes people.

Now I don't know about you, but that is convicting to me. Just like Buxman was talking about earlier, people need to know that there is an active missionary in their life talking to them right now. Who cares about them? You know, when you walk into a restaurant, does it ever occur to you, if your waitress is going to heaven or not? You know, when you go to work, do you ever stop to consider that maybe the person sitting in the cubicle next to you and the office next to you, maybe they've never ever been told how they can be saved?

You know, if you walk through your neighborhood, do you ever think about the families living in those houses, or do we just say, man, they're they're letting their yard get kind of kind of out of control? And Paul Paul was just built different. Paul was built different. He understood that God had placed him on this earth for a purpose, and that purpose was to proclaim Jesus Christ.

Now, he had actually wanted to minister in the province of Asia early in his missionary journeys. If you go back to Acts chapter sixteen, you know it says the Holy Spirit actually prevented that. It prevented Paul and his companions from preaching in Asia at that particular time. And I think that's interesting. You know, Paul wanted to do something good.

He wanted to go and preach the gospel, and God said no. Why would God do that? I mean, sometimes God closes a door not because the work is wrong, but just the timing is wrong. And I think a lot of times we get focused on what we want to do, even if it's in other people's lives that is good, that we forget to ask when God wants us to do it. And so I think one of the things we learn from Paul's life is a missionary has got to be sensitive to the leadership of the Holy Spirit.

And I don't mean just missionaries, and I go on overseas missions. A Christian's life. Is a mission. You've got to be sensitive to the spirit. The reason I bring that up is because on his second journey, Paul does visit Ephesus.

Acts 18 tells us that he says he enters the synagogue, he reasons with the Jews there, and when he left, he left Aquila and Priscilla there. And these are two individuals that are extremely important to the story. They were a husband and wife that worked alongside Paul in ministry, and their presence there reminds us that the gospel ministry has never been something that one person does by themselves. In fact, Jesus. Jesus visited Paul in a vision, and tells him that in Acts 18 and verse nine, he says, "Now the Lord spoke to Paul in the night by a vision.

Do not be afraid, but speak and do not keep silence. For I am with you, and no one will attack you to hurt you. For I am many people in this city." So yeah, of course, Paul was an apostle. He was a remarkable missionary, but there were faithful men and women working alongside him. Right, people opening up their homes, teaching.

They were encouraging new believers. They were establishing churches, and that is still how ministry works today. Your pastor is wonderful. My pastor is wonderful, but don't ever forget about everybody else in your life who's making ministry possible. You can lean on those people: your Sunday school teachers, your nursery volunteers, people who come in early just to make sure the building's ready and operate sound equipment and prepare Sunday school lessons and visit the sick.

All those people matter. And when you look at the ministry in Ephesus, you do start to see that God was preparing the way before Paul ever returned. And that brings us to Acts chapter nineteen, where Paul does return on his third missionary journey, and there is a group of disciples living there. And it says in verse one, "It happened while Apollos was at Corinth that Paul, having passed through the upper regions, came to Ephesus and finding some disciples there, he said to them, 'Did you receive the least? You believed.' This is crazy how they answer." We've not so much heard as to whether there is a Holy Spirit.

Think about that. People who have religious understanding—they've they've received the instruction of the church. They've been baptized for goodness sake, but they have not received the full message of what God has accomplished through Christ. And Paul knows right away there is something wrong.

So he asks another question, verse three: Into what then were you baptized? Listen, there's people in your life who have no clue. Even if they call themselves Christians, they have no clue, and so this puts something very important in front of our face, right?

So we're going to take a quick break. We're going to come back. We're going to address this problem head on. Truth Talk Live. You're listening to the Truth Network and TruthNetwork.com.

Hey, welcome back to Truth Talk Live. My name is John Galantis. I'm filling in for Dr. Avadhan Shah as today's Truth Talk host, and we're looking at what happens when people come late to the faith.

So, before we took the break, Paul was talking to a bunch of people, a bunch of Jewish people, like disciples of these are Christians, and he said, "You know, to whom have you been baptized? If you weren't baptized in the name of Jesus," and they said, "To John." And so, here's kind of where we left off. Paul explains it to them, right? He lays. It out.

Verse four says, "John indeed baptized with the baptism of repentance, saying to the people that they should believe on him who would come after him, that is, on Christ Jesus." Verse five says, "When they heard this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus." Now there are some really important theological questions concerning this passage, especially concerning this this transitional period that is happening in the book of Acts, but Don't miss the central point. Here's here's really what the author is telling us. These individuals needed to hear the complete message about Jesus Christ, not fragments, like we hear a lot in our culture today. Our culture is a lot of fragmental Christianity, and Paul was willing to teach them the whole picture. He didn't assume they already knew it.

Right? He didn't dismiss them because well, this is you guys are an established church. You guys should know this by now. No, he opens the truth up to them. And I believe genuinely, this is one of the great responsibilities of the church today that we are missing.

We are living in a time and place in America today where people know fragments of Christianity, and they do not understand the gospel itself. They've probably heard that Jesus died on the cross. They they might have heard that Christians believe in heaven. They may have heard somebody quote, you know, John three sixteen, like Buckman was saying earlier. That does not mean they understand who Jesus is or why he came.

You know, one of my favorite movies. Is Ratatouille. Love Ratatouille. That's one of my favorite Pixar movies. It's one of my favorite movies in general.

And there's a quote there where the main character Linguini, he's this like Ned Dewell sort of like bumbling kid who just knows nothing about life, and he's talking to his boss, and the the chef says, "Oh, sorry to hear about your mom passing," and he says, "Uh, it's okay, it's okay. She believed in heaven, so she's covered, you know, after wife, after life wise," and it's played as a joke. You would not believe how many people in America today believe that. My mom believed in heaven, so it's it's all good. She's she's saved.

The fragments that people hear are misleading. The fragments of Christianity that people have are very misleading because a lot of people will tell you today that Christianity is about loving and accepting people. It's about That God accepts us because we do more good things than we do bad things. I've tried to live a good life, so you know God is going to take care of me. God's going to bless me, and He's going to let me into heaven.

Maybe people say, you know, if if you have enough faith, God is going to protect you from suffering. That's all you got to do is believe in Him hard enough, and He's going to protect you. Thing happens in their life: some tragedy, some loss, marriage falls apart. They start asking questions about life, death, eternity. The older they get.

And all of a sudden, they're interested in Christianity. But where do they go to find the answers?

Well, they're not going to the church. I can tell you that. They're going to the internet. They're going to YouTube. They're going to social media.

They're going to. I'm serious. They'll go to Chat GPT. They'll ask AI how to have eternal life. There's something wrong with that.

We have got to return to the Word of God. We have got to teach people how to read the Bible. We got to teach people how to understand passages like this in context, and distinguish between what Scripture actually says, and what we wish it said. Right? We have to be willing to patiently walk alongside people as they learn.

Because the truth is, people are coming late to the faith, and they're trying to catch up.

Now, maybe you're listening today. Maybe this is for you, and you're thinking, "Man, that sounds like me." I've heard bits and pieces about Christianity before. I've been to church a couple times in my life. I think I might have been baptized as a child, but starting to realize that I don't really understand the gospel.

Well, I just want to take this moment and encourage you right now. Just the fact that number one, just the fact that you're listening to this right now, you're listening to me talk on Christian radio. That's a huge win. Don't ever, ever be ashamed to ask questions. Don't be afraid to admit there's something you don't know.

There's a ton I don't know. That's why I'm I'm so grateful I'm in the church that I'm in. The mature Christian is not the person who thinks he knows everything. The mature Christian is the person who is teachable. You know, I think about Paul himself.

I mean, Paul was extremely educated. He had an extraordinary religious education before he was saved. He studied under a man named Gamaliel. Big big. Jewish leader, he knew the scriptures.

He was deeply, deeply committed to the Old Testament traditions that he had inherited from his teaching, and yet before his conversion, he was terribly, terribly wrong about Jesus. And then what happens? He encounters Jesus on the road to Damascus, and his whole life changed. His whole understanding changed. Paul was teachable.

His whole direction changed, and I think that's what genuine faith will do in your life. It's going to change everything about you. People think they're just going to try just a little bit of Christianity, right? My life is going bad, so I'm gonna I'm gonna still be me, but I'm just going to sprinkle a little religion on top of the life I'm already living. Not a chance.

Not this. Not it's not going to happen. It's not going to work. It's going to transform your understanding of who God is and what He's done for you. You're going to be a different person.

In fact, the Bible says that you're a new creation when you're in Christ.

So I want to bring this kind of home to the church, right? Because what is the church's responsibility in this conversation? At Clearview, our logo is a lighthouse. It's a big, big part of our branding, our image, and I love that because it's reflective of our identity. This is who we are.

You know, think about what does a lighthouse do? A lighthouse is not for the people who are already standing on shore. The light is for the people who are out there, being tossed around in open water. The people who are in trouble. It's there to warn them.

It's there to help them recognize where they are. Like you're in danger right now, you need to know where to go. That's what a lighthouse does, and that is a beautiful picture of what the church ought to be. Your church, even if it's not your logo, it's not part of your branding. Your church is a lighthouse.

You are a lighthouse. We we ought to be shining the light of the gospel into a dark world, not hiding it, not apologizing for it, not not changing it to make it more fashionable to the world, so people will want to come to the lighthouse. We should be faithfully proclaiming Jesus Christ, and of course, we do that in different ways, right? We do that through preaching and teaching, and discipleship, and worship, and ministries for children and students and adults, and and for us, you know, we get involved in the community. We're involved in media.

This very radio show we're listening to right now, Doctor Shaw's sermon podcast, his YouTube channel. He's got scholarly works, his books. I'm not bragging to you. I'm just saying that I'm grateful. In fact, I'm grateful for this.

What I get to do right now, speaking to you guys, because the truth is, I don't know you. I don't know your story. Maybe you're driving home from work. Maybe you're sitting at your kitchen table. Maybe you're at the gym.

Maybe at your job. Maybe you're just flipping through the radio program, and you weren't planning to listen to a conversation about the Bible at all. But I genuinely believe God is using this moment right now to get your attention. And if that's you, I just want to tell you before we cut to another break. Jesus Christ came to save you.

You're a sinner. You are a sinner, just like me. The Bible says that all have sinned and all have fallen short of the glory of God. Every one of us, we have broken God's law, and there's no amount of religious activity, church attendance. Buying CD, buying church CDs, none of that.

That can erase the guilt that we have before God. But Jesus Christ, who is the sinless Son of God, He came to this world and He gave His life on the cross for our sins. The news is this: He did not stay dead. He rose up from the dead. He's alive right now as I'm talking to you.

He's alive. He offers forgiveness and eternal life to everybody who repents. And puts their faith in him. That's what the gospel is. When I say the gospel message that transformed Ephesus, that transformed America, that's it.

That's the message that Paul brought to the Ephesians. And here's something else that encourages me. When we talk about Paul and the Ephesians, he didn't just preach one sermon, right? And then see a few people respond and then said, "All right, I'm all done." Paul stayed there. Paul stayed in Ephesus.

He taught. He discipled. He invested in the people, and that ministry. Produced extraordinary spiritual awakening. It didn't happen overnight.

In fact, it says Paul was there for two years, but the gospel started spreading all over the region. People really responded. They abandoned their idol worship, all that Artemis worship that was going on, that Diana worship. People abandoned it, and the name of Jesus was magnified. But before we do get there, I want to leave you with one question, and that's this: Just like Dr.

Shel talking about earlier, are you living like a tourist? Or you live in like a missionary. People think you have to travel overseas to be a missionary. You really don't. You can start right where you are in your neighborhood, in your workplace, among your family and friends.

You know the people around you have eternal souls, and maybe God has put you in their lives for the purpose of telling them about Jesus Christ. Right, and so I think there's something really, really powerful there. I want to talk about the gospel coming to Ephesus. I want to talk about how it changed this entire community because that's exactly what it did. Right before long, the entire city had heard about what Paul was doing, and you would think that when that happens, people would celebrate.

But the gospel is very disruptive, right? What happens when the gospel comes into a community, and people are opposed to it? They don't celebrate. What happens really is that people start to come against it, and that's what happened in Ephesus. Like I said, the gospel was spread.

People were coming to Christ, and the city got into an uproar. And there's some important lessons here for the church in America today. I want to hear what you guys think. Give us a call: eight six six three four truth, eight six six three four truth, eight six six three four eight seven eight eight four. And if you're still with us, turn to Acts chapter 19, because we're talking about this spiritual awakening and what happens when biblical truth confronts the culture.

Because that's really what it is. The gospel is a confrontation. You know, it didn't just make a few people feel better about themselves; it changed their lives, and it started affecting the population around them. That's important because I think a lot of times we have a small understanding. Of what Christianity is supposed to accomplish.

Someone gets saved, right, and now all of a sudden they're attending church.

So mission accomplished. The gospel won. We think about somebody they they they didn't pray before their meals.

Now they pray. We think about somebody becoming a little bit more religious. Mission accomplished. The gospel did it. That's your modification.

That's not the gospel. Like we said, the gospel changes who you are in your core. You are fundamentally different now because you have a personal relationship. With Jesus Christ, and what ended up happening is it started because people are different now. They started burning all of their books.

They started burning all of their black magic rituals and all that stuff. They started getting rid of all of their Diana temple worship. What do you think happened to the economy after that? What do you think happened to the people who were making them? This guy named Demetrius, he was started losing money.

He he wasn't gonna have that, so. What happens is he gathers all of the people in Ephesus, or all of the the craftsmen, and he turns them against Paul, and there's this huge riot that comes out. This, I mean, it's it's massive, and some of Paul's companion gets snatched up, and Paul himself has to go into hiding. He wants to go and confront the crowd, and his companions are like, "No, it's it's it's bad, dude. Seriously, don't go out there." And so, what ends up happening?

Well. What ends up happening is Paul has to confront this reality that the gospel has not made him very popular. He has to confront this reality that the gospel is costing him something, and he knows that. and And I think that's something that we often forget. There's this.

We're going to talk about this a little bit more as we come back. But there's this truth that a lot of us have forgotten: is that even in twenty twenty six, the gospel is costly. The gospel will cost us something. Believe it or not, what I'm doing right now is easy. I can talk about Jesus until I'm blue in the face.

It is another thing entirely to allow that lordship to start impacting my decisions. And when I do that, when you do that, it's going to cost you something. We're going to talk about that a little bit more as we go to the break. But stick around. I want you to call us eight six six three four truth eight six six three four eight seven eight eight four.

We'll be right back. Truth Talk Live. You're listening to the Truth Network and TruthNetwork.com. Hey, welcome back to the show. My name is John Galantis, and filling in for Dr.

Abaddon Shah is today's Truth Talk host. But now we've been talking about Ephesians. We've been in Ephesus. I want to take you to the final chapter of our story, and in some ways, I genuinely think this is the most important part of everything we've discussed. The story of Ephesus is not wrapped up in Ephesians.

It's actually wrapped up in Revelation, because the church in Ephesus had an extraordinary beginning, right? And yet. In spite of all that history, something went terribly wrong, right? Because Ephesus is not a church today, and Jesus Christ Himself actually addressed that. Isn't that great?

Before we talk about that, I want to play another clip from one of Dr. Shaw's sermons. It's going to sort of set the stage for what we're talking about in this last segment here.

So let's listen to it real quick, and then we're going to talk about it. And go back to the first-century church. In Ephesus, and talk to those people, and say, "Hey." How are y'all doing? Oh, we're doing great. You know, Paul.

Paul is in a Roman prison, but hey, he left us Timothy, Pastor Timothy. He's an amazing expositor of the Word. He preaches the gospel to us, and he teaches us to love our culture and to make an impact for Jesus Christ. That's beautiful. I see your children with you.

That's wonderful. Oh yes, yes. Our goal is to let our to to lead our kids to follow Jesus Christ. We want to be good examples for them. That's wonderful.

That's wonderful. Great, great.

So, so, what are you hoping for the future? Oh, we're hoping to pass down this faith to our grandchildren and our great grandchildren, so they can keep following Jesus Christ.

Now, right now, we're meeting in a home church, but we're hoping one day to have a church, so we can do more for the kingdom of God. That's great. Um. The future. Do you know that one day, if people will come from that part of the world called Mongolia now, and they will move into Asia Minor, and and and many of them will follow the the faith.

They will follow Jesus Christ. They will come to know Christ and all of that. And you know, life will move on. But down in the 11th century, more people will come. They will make a stop in Persia and pick up Islam, and then they will make their way into Anatolia.

They will be a minority, but they will be so powerful that they will take over the majority. And with oppressive policies, they will convert your grandchildren to Islam. Islam? Was that? Because there is no Islam right now.

They would have laughed at us. They would have laughed at me and say, "You're crazy, man. What's wrong with you? Go away." If you were to go to Ephesus, there is no church there. It's gone.

Now I want you to keep that in your mind, okay? And turn to Revelation chapter two. If you got your Bible, if not, you can just listen to what Jesus says in verse two. He says this. He's talking to the church in Ephesus.

I know your works, your labor, your patience, and that you cannot bear those who are evil.

Okay, that doesn't sound like a bad church. Jesus is commending them. He says, "I know you." I know that you can't tolerate evil things, and he's commending them for testing people who claim to be apostles but weren't. And then we come to verse four, and everything changes. The whole mood changes.

Jesus says, "Nevertheless, I have this against you, that you have left your first love." Think about that. Nevertheless, I have this against you. Right there, that that should sober you up a little bit, because remember who's talking. This is not some disgruntled church member coming to complain. Right.

This is not just somebody who's upset because the pastor made a ministry decision they didn't like. This is Jesus Christ Himself evaluating your church, and He says you have left your first love. That should make your insides turn to ice. I mean, something essential has been lost. Yeah, you still got activities, you still got programs, and you still got doctrine and perseverance and all this, but your love is no longer what it once was.

And I wonder how many churches can be described that way today. All right, a church can have excellent music ministry, beautiful building, beautiful architecture, children's ministry is so organized, calendar is full all the time, committees and programs and events, big online presence, professional video video quality, thousands and thousands of people. But if that church has lost its love for Jesus, something is wrong. Because the purpose of the church is not to remain busy, right? The purpose of the church is to glorify God.

How? By making disciples of Jesus Christ. And I'm telling you right now, you lose sight of that purpose. Even good things will become distractions. Even good things can become a curse.

So I want to make this personal because it's again, it's easy to talk about churches in general, right? We just point to another congregation, especially one that's declined, and it's easy to to criticize denominations or ministries, or you know, we think maybe they've compromised. But what about me? What about you? What about the church you attend?

What about the church you serve? Are you serving? What about your own heart? Are you still in love with Jesus Christ? Or have you become so familiar with Christianity, the motions and the rituals, and the comfort and the familiarity, that you lost your sense of wonder, that drive that led you to worship in the first place?

Do you still open your Bible expecting to hear from God? Right. I read the Bible every single morning on my way to to take my son to school. But I'll tell you right now, there are mornings where I do it because I know I'm supposed to, not because I hunger to hear from God. Do you still pray because you genuinely want to talk to God, or do you pray because you need something?

You're in trouble, you know. You still worship because Christ is worthy of your praise, or is it just I worship because the band is up there? What else am I going to do? I got to sing before the before the sermon. I genuinely think one of the greatest dangers facing longtime Christians is familiarity.

We have become so accustomed. To the things of God, that we stop being amazed by them, we know about the cross, and we nod our head and we say, "Praise God, praise God." You hear about the resurrection, God Himself raising Himself to life, and you say, "Of course, yeah, yeah, He did that." You hear about forgiveness and eternal life, and you nod your head, and then you move on to the next thing, and you. But think about the gravity, the weight of what we're talking about, especially to someone who's coming late to the faith, who has never heard this. It's going to change everything about them, and it's just part of our culture. The eternal Son of God entering into human history, living a sinless life, dying a sacrifice for our sins, buried, third day rising again, and then through faith in Him, you as a sinner can be forgiven, reconciled to God.

And given eternal life, yeah, yeah, I believe that. That so many times that's our reaction. How do you become bored with something like that? How do you become indifferent to that? How do you lose our excitement over the greatest news the world has ever heard?

And yet it happens. It happened in Ephesus, and it can happen to you.

Now listen to what Jesus says next. Remember, therefore, from where you have fallen, repent. And do the first works, or else I will come to you quickly and remove the lampstand from its place. Unless you repent, repent. That's that's.

And do the first works. You remember, remember what it was like when you first came to Christ. Remember where you were. Remember when the gospel became real to you. Remember when you recognized the seriousness of your sin and the wonder of God's grace back when it meant something to you.

Remember when you couldn't wait to tell other people what Jesus had done for you, and when prayer wasn't just some religious obligation. When opening your Bible wasn't something you just did because I feel guilty if I don't. I know I'm supposed to. Remember when you genuinely wanted to grow in your Christian life. And yeah, as you mature.

It's going to take time. Spiritual maturity doesn't mean I'm supposed to feel exactly the same emotions every single day, but your relationship with Christ should be becoming deeper. Your understanding should grow. You should be becoming wiser. Your maturity should not be an excuse for spiritual coldness.

And Jesus says, He says also repent. That's an important word. Repentance is a change of mind. It's going to require you to to think differently, to acknowledge that something's wrong with my faith right now. It requires humility.

You can't repent and still keep your pride. You're going to have to stop making excuses. And a lot of times, for churches, that is difficult. We don't like admitting that we've lost our way as a church. We don't like acknowledging that we've become distracted, that maybe we've taken our eyes off the prize, and recognizing that something that we might have been doing for decades is not helping us accomplish the mission that God has given us.

That's why Jesus doesn't say defend yourself. He says repent, do the first works, return to the kind of faithful obedience that flowed from your love for Him. And the warning becomes very serious because, as we know right now, Ephesus is not a church. Christ warned them that their continued existence as a church could not be taken for granted, and He was good on His promise. He removed that lampstand.

Think about that, Ephesus. The church associated with Paul, Timothy, was the pastor. For goodness' sake, gone. Is that your church? Is that going to be your church because of unrepentance?

That's an extraordinary warning, and that warning is just as true for you as it was for America. I believe every church, or for Ephesus, I believe every church in America needs that warning today, because sometimes we act like history. Guarantees our future, right?

Well, our church has been here for a hundred years, right? Our denomination has a great heritage. We've always in this town. We've always had a strong Christian community, and I know you're grateful for those things. I'm grateful for Christians who came before us and people who sacrificed to establish those churches.

But the faithfulness of previous generations does not excuse the unfaithfulness of the present generation. We got a lot of work to do. We can't just we can't just ride on the coattails of what happened in the past. And the church that received that warning is not there today, and it's a bridge form.

So I want to add that. What makes you think the same thing can't happen here? And I don't want to end on a downer. I want to end on a good note because God is working in America. He's moving.

He is doing something really great. We've seen that at our church, and we have seen that he is he is really moving in people's lives. People who call into the show, people who come to church. It's really a great thing. But it is requiring.

It will require people to come back to their first love, to remember what it was that made them fall in love with Jesus Christ. What kind of future do you want? Amen. We're so glad you joined us today. We're going to continue this discussion through Ephesians next week.

Make sure you're calling us eight six six three four truth eight six six three four eight seven eight eight four. Thank you for listening. We'll talk to you next week.