And now, here's today's Truth Talk Live host. What does humility look like in the Christian life? Eight six six three four Truth. Eight six six. Three four eight seven eight eight four.
I want to know what you guys think. What humility looks like in the Christian life, but I've got some great examples. We've got the greatest example of all time in Jesus Christ. Is that right? Which sure is, guys.
And I've got, I've got a book, and it's called the Bible Promise Book, and it talks about humility. I've got some Bible verses on humility right here. Here it is in Matthew 18:4. Jesus said, "Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven." Psalm 10:17 says, "Lord, thou hast heard the desire of the humble; thou wilt prepare their heart; thou wilt cause thine ear to hear." Psalm 10:17, Matthew 23:12 says, "And whosoever shall exalt himself shall be abased, and he that shall humble himself." Shall be exalted, and so when I look at the Bible, I see time after time after time where Jesus tells us, and the whole Bible, Old Testament and New, tells us that we must live a humble life if we're going to be true servants of the Lord Jesus Christ. And and and one of my favorite parables, which is what Jesus spoke, he put it like this in Luke chapter 18, starting in verse 10.
He says that there were two men. Who went up to the synagogue one one day, and he said that one of the men looked at the other guy in the back, and he said, "Lord, I thank you that I am not like this other man." He said, "I give ten percent of all that I have to the poor." He said, "I don't commit adultery." He said, "Overall, he said I'm a pretty good person." And Jesus and Jesus said that there was a second man in that same church. He was in the back of the church. He couldn't even look up. He beat on his chest, and all he could say was this: "He said, 'God have mercy on me, a sinner.'" And Jesus said that the second man who humbled himself went away justified, rather than the first.
And Jesus put it like this. He says, "Everyone who exalts themselves shall be humbled, but those who humble themselves shall be exalted." And who do we have as the greatest example of humility? To look to as Christians, we have Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the living, breathing Son of God. Jesus washed feet. As a matter of fact, when when Jesus was about to wash the disciples' feet, the first thing that Peter said was, "He said, 'No, Lord.
He said, I will never have you wash my feet.'" And Jesus said, "Unless you wash my feet, you have no part of me." And Peter ended up saying, "Okay, Lord, don't don't only wash my own feet." He said, "But wash my whole body." And what kind of an example did Jesus Christ leave us as Christians? He said, "If this is what I did, if the Son of God." The God in the flesh, Jesus said, "I and the Father are one." If He came here and He was a servant, Jesus put it like this: He said, "I have not come here to be served, but to serve." He said, "If I have done this myself, you've got to do it as well." That they could, Jesus could have said, "Hey, you guys are going to make me king. I'm going to rule over the whole place, and you guys are just going to bow down to me while I'm here." But no, he was crucified. He was crucified. He was he was beaten.
People made fun of him. The and and you know who the the people who hated him the most were the religious were the religious ones were the Pharisees. And many times today, it's the religious people, the people who are the Pharisees, and this, that, and the other, and they're the ones. But the Pharisees of our day, who go into a church and they look down on other people. And they think I'm better than you.
I remember there was a pastor, and I heard him on the Truth Network one time. He said, "I would never condone drunkenness in my church." But this is what he also said. He said, even though I would never condone drunkenness, he said I would rather you come to my church drunk than to look at somebody else with a prideful look. Because pride is the beginning of a fall, the Bible says that pride comes before a fall. And so, if you wanna, if you wanna be humiliated, if you wanna fall before the world, then you be prideful.
You tell everybody how great you are, and the Lord will humble you. You know, if you want to pray and ask the Lord to humble you, He'll do it. But Jesus said that he was meek, he was lowly, he was humble. You say, well, you know, I've got to have some stature, I've got to have some clout. You know, people will say, well, I want to be rich or whatever it is.
And well, that's a sign.
Some people will even say the prosperity gospel that, hey, if you're rich, then you're really blessed by the Lord, and that that's a sign that you're that you're a born again Christian. Jesus said it like this. He said. The you want to follow me? He said, "The Son of Man doesn't even have a place to lay his own head.
He was homeless. He didn't have to do that, but he was homeless. He chose to live that way. How else can you humble yourself?
Well, Jesus went into the desert for forty days and forty nights, and he fasted for forty days and forty nights." I tell you what, you want to humble yourself real quick. Stop eating for a day or two. You know now, obviously, if you're a diabetic or whatever, you want to ask your doctor. But the Bible talks about fasting, and many times when somebody told me, they said, "Mike, when you're hungry, you're hungry." I said, "What do you mean?" They said that when you're hungry for the Word of God, when you're hungry, when you're fasting, it makes you hungry for the Word of God. And I remember there was an old.
Lady that I talked to years ago, and this is how she put it. She put it like this. She said, "Mike," she said, "When you fast, you are able to hear clearly from the world, clearly from the Lord, not the world." How about this? How about fasting from your phone? How about fasting from the television?
You see, if the devil can't beat you, if the devil can't prove to you that he's not real and that the Lord is real, he'll try to distract you. He'll try to distract you by looking at your phone all the time, and he'll try to distract you sometimes by doing things that are pretty good. You know, I I heard years ago somebody said the enemy of the best is not something that's always terrible, but many times the enemy of the best is something that's really good. It's not that it's bad. It's not that it's going to drag you to hell.
Something bad that you're doing, but the enemy of the best sometimes can be something that looks good, sounds good, and it may even be a good thing. It may even not be bad. But you know what?
Sometimes you've got to turn away. From what you want, and you've got to turn to Jesus, and you've got to surrender your life to Him. And we talked about this last week. We said that those who humble themselves will be exalted, and those who exalt themselves will be humbled. But to me, when I think about being grateful, which is Stu Epperson wrote a book, "Thanks Living." You know, one of the things that if if you're grateful to God, then you say, "Lord, it's not all about me.
I'm not a prideful person." So, Lord, I know that I can do nothing without you. It takes humility to be able to admit and to serve the Lord and to say, "Lord, I can do nothing without you." I need you, and see, people want to be able to do everything on their own. Have you ever heard the expression "the self-made man"? I did all of this on myself. Look what I did!
Look what I did! Do you know the common denominator in all of that? Is I I I I I? You said, "What's my problem?" You've got an I problem. You're constantly worried about yourself.
But I remember the the somebody told me one time. They said, "Mike." They said, "I've noticed in my life that the natural thing for me to do was to be focused on myself." They said, but when in my life, when I was the happiest I've ever been, it's when I've been focused on others. And my mother's here today, Nancy. My mother, Nancy, is here today. And I remember one of the things that I've always seen about my mother is she was always very unselfish.
She was always putting others ahead of herself. And I remember we used to go out, and the dogs would would be cold. They go out in the snow, and she would warm the dogs' feet up. And she said the dogs' feet might get warm. Most people don't care about that.
Most people aren't thinking about that. But she said, "You know what? It's not just about me. I want to look out for somebody else." I want to look out for somebody else. Jesus put it like this.
He said, "If you want to be, if you want to be a servant, greater love hath no man than this." Then he laid down his life for his friends. Jesus Christ died on the cross for our sins. He laid down his life, and we should give our lives and surrender our lives to him. Eight six six three four truth. Eight six six three four eight seven eight eight four.
This is Michael Zwic. We'll be right back. What has the Lord? How has the Lord humbled you in your life, or what does humility look like to you? We'll be right back after this break.
All right, guys, we are back. What does humility look like to you in the Christian life? And and look who we've got back. We've got a Rick Pearson from Prophecy USA. Welcome to the show, Rick.
Hey Mike, how are you? I I'm good, man. And it's funny, you I had talked to you earlier, and so when I think about humility, Rick, I I think about you because you know you just seemed a a low level guy, just a humble guy, and and one of the things that I saw with you that really impressed me, Rick, was when you were willing to pray for somebody and nobody knew about it. It was somebody who listened to your show. Nobody would ever know that you were praying for this guy, but you.
Did it anyways because you decided that you wanted to humble yourself? But you know, it's funny when we're talking about humility. One of the things that I've, one of the stories that I remember, Rick, is that there was a king who was very wise and very wealthy, and it was in another country. It was about five hundred years ago, and they found out that somebody was stealing from the king king's treasury, and so all of a sudden the king said, "Okay, look, I found it out." He said, "If you Guys, come forward right now," he said. "I will not punish you." And they kept stealing, and it kept going on.
And he said, "Okay, this time it's ten lashes, twenty lashes, thirty lashes, and finally, it was forty lashes." Rick was, which was a death sentence at that time. If you get forty lashes, and so what happened was, was that the they were they finally found out who it was who was stealing from the king's treasury, and it was his own daughter. And when they found out, they said, "Hey, the king made a decree." They said, "The king made a decree. We've got. He's got to do this." They wanted to see how he was going to handle this situation.
And what he did was on the day when the daughter was about to be killed, was about to be lashed and whipped to death. Right before she was about to be whipped, he said, "Stop." And he said, "Hold on!" And he stood in front of his daughter, and he took the forty lashes for her, and he died.
Well, if you think about it, that tells the story of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ died on the cross for our sins. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life. Jesus never did sin; He was a perfect man. But He came here.
He humbled Himself, and He died on the cross, and He rose from the grave. And by putting our trust in Him, we have eternal life. But what do you think, Rick? I I think Jesus was the ultimate. Humility that you could have.
I mean, he he didn't have to put up what he what he had to put up with, but he did it for each and every one of us. And I remember I was leading somebody to the Lord once, and he this guy was dying of cancer, and I said, "Do you remember in Mel Gibson's movie The Passion how Jesus fell down on his knees while they were whipping him?" And I said, and he said, yes. I said, you remember how they couldn't believe how he stood back up to continue the whipping. And he said, yeah, I remember that. I said, when he stood up, he stood up in your place.
He stood up in your place for every sin you ever committed. If you were the only one on the planet, Jesus would have stood up in your place, just like that king. Yeah, that he broke down and started crying. Yeah, he accepted Christ, but Jesus walked in humility. The Bible says that God resists the proud, but gives grace under the humble.
Grace is God's favor, and and one of the things I've learned is you have to deposit mercy deposits when people do things against you. Show mercy and grace towards them, because someday you're going to need mercy and grace. It's like seed faith: give, and it shall be given unto you. If you give grace, forgiveness to others, God will clothe you with grace and humility towards you, and He will give you favor with other people. But if you walk with bitterness and you will not forgive, and you're proud, and you're going to get back, and you're going to, that guy did this, and I'm going to do this to him, that it it brings on a cycle of demonic activity where the devil comes to kill, steal, and destroy, destroy your peace, destroy your your joy, destroy your happiness, and you're walking around with in a like a bundle of nerves.
Mad at everybody, angry at everybody. But if you just forgive them, it takes humility to release people and let them go. And if you walk in humility, God will walk right along beside of you. But if you walk in pride, You're walking by yourself. You're absolutely right.
And here's a few here's a few verses. And you may have mentioned this. James chapter four verse six says this. But he giveth more grace. Wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but he gives grace unto the humble.
Or how about this? Psalm nine verse twelve. When he makes inquisition for blood, he remembers them. He forgets not the cry of the humble. Proverb.
Twenty-two, verse four: By humility and the fear of the Lord are riches and honor and life. And so, I don't know about you, but I I want those things. I want a good life. You know, there's a pastor out of Burlington, North Carolina, and he says, name is Brian Biggers, and he says, you know, we're not here to suck eggs and then die.
So, in other words, we're not here to just live a lowly life and just to feel sorry for ourselves. To do nothing and and this that and the other, and I heard somebody say one time. They said, "You know, they said, 'Hey, you sit, you sit there, and you say to yourself, 'Oh, I just want a little shack on the other side of glory.'" And I heard a pastor say, "He said, 'That's good Nashville theology. That's good country music theology.' But my Bible says, 'Rick, that greater is He who is within us than He who is within the world.' And yes, we can be confident in the Lord and just. Because we're confident in the Lord, we're not confident in ourselves.
Because the Bible says that apart from me, you can do what, Rick? You can do all. You can't do anything. You can do nothing. Apart from me, you can do nothing.
You can do absolutely nothing, yeah. And and so, you know, I heard something, I saw something today, and it said Jesus did not demonstrate humility because he lacked power. I mean, he he was all powerful. He said he demonstrated humility because he willingly chose to serve, obey the Father, sacrifice himself for others. And Rick, I know I've been humbled in my life, and I am sure you have too.
Well, you know what? You're better off to humble yourself than to let God humble you. I love it. He hum when he humbles you. He knows how to jerk that chain, and you're better off to humble yourself than have him do it.
And I've learned I've learned the hard way, and I think everyone has when when you get humbled and humiliated. And you know that if you would have done something a little bit different, you wouldn't have had to go through that.
Sometimes we say things we should never say, and it just comes out of our mouth, and then afterwards we regret it or whatever. But when God humbles you, you get humbled.
So if you walk in humility, God will give you His grace. That that's one hundred percent true, and it's good. I'm I'm reminded of a story of uh, and it's the story of Memento Mori. I don't I don't know if you've heard of it, Rick, or not. But one of the things was was that when a Roman general, uh, the highest honor that he could have is after he won a battle, he would parade.
He would be paraded through town, and they would you know basically almost worship him. And that I mean they they would just throw accolades. People would be cheering. For him, this, that, and the other, but while this was going on, they had a servant who would whisper in his ear, "Memento mori, remember you are going to die." And so, yes, the Lord can do some big things with us. The Lord is doing some big things with you right now, Rick.
But at the end of the day, we are all just—we're made out of clay. We're made out of dust, and to dust we shall return. You know that we nobody on this earth. Is going to live forever.
Now, if the Lord returns in our lifetime, then we'll get to see Him and all of that. But, but just putting that aside, every single one of us who are listening today are going to die, and so we have a short amount of time in our life to do everything that we can do for the Lord. And I know many years ago, Rick, the Lord showed you a vision. And when we get back, we're going to allow you to share that vision. Rick is with Prophecy USA.
What's the website, Rick? It's RickPearson dot com, and the vision is about America. The vision is about America. You don't want to miss this eight six six three four truth. We'll be right back after this break.
All right, guys, we are back. We've got Rick Pearson here on the line. We lost him for a second, but Rick, you you mentioned something about America. I mean, that's that's where we're living right now. And you said that the Lord showed you something about America.
Is that right? Yes. In 1986, it'll be 40 years in December. That I had a visitation, an audible voice speak to me, and it was all about America. And I had given a large sum of money to a medical missions, and like just like Cornelius, something was released in the spirit realm, and the Lord downloaded on me things to come in the future, and and.
John, John, I think in sixteen thirteen says, when the Spirit of Truth has come, He will guide you into all truth. For whatsoever He hears, that shall He speak, and He will show you things to come. And I was shown for a period of seven days things coming to America. I was shown the rise of what the Lord said: the same spirits that rose in Babylon are rising again. And He showed me the homosexual movement that was the gay movement.
The darkness that was coming to America, there is going to be great division and darkness, and I had no idea what the Lord was talking about. But here we are in nineteen two thousand and twenty six, forty years later, and everything I was shown is here, and the wheat and the chaff in America are separating. And it's not the time to get walk away from the Lord. It's the time to get real close, because I believe we are getting closer and closer to the rapture, and God is going to give America a final altar call. That in Jeremiah fifty fifty one it says, "The wheat and the chaff, He will release a destroying wind." Inside of Babylon, and he will send fanners, and they shall fan her.
And when when a fanner is a farmer, throws that wheat up in the air, the wind comes and it separates the wheat and the chaff. And that's what's happening right now. And Christians are are being tested. You are going to you are going to come into you are going to either follow the world or follow the word. You're either going to follow the world, or you're going to follow the word.
I I love it, and and I'm looking and I'm looking you up right now on on YouTube. All you have to do is type in Rick Pearson or Prophecy USA and subscribe to the channel. Check out what Rick is talking about. Got twenty two thousand two hundred subscribers, so looks really good. Um, and you know, Rick, you and I have talked about this a lot, but you know, it's it's funny speaking about.
This has been a very humbling experience for you, Rick, because not everybody has received the word the way that you may have hoped that they have, but. If you look in the Old Testament, if you look at many of the prophets, the people didn't want to listen to them either. And so, you know, I'm sure you've had plenty of instances where you've really cared about people and you've tried to share, you know, the the truth or what the Lord has shown you, and people didn't receive it. But that is where humility comes in. And and and Rick, I'm sure that you've had to learn to be human to be humble.
You know, one of the stories that I'm reminded about humility. Rick is when Jesus was riding in onto town on a donkey, and it was Palm Sunday, and everybody was praising Jesus, and they were you know glorifying him, and all of this. And I heard somebody say one time, Rick, they said, "What if that donkey that Jesus was riding on would have said, 'Oh my gosh, all of these people are cheering for me.'" I'm really something. I'm really special.
Well, Rick, I think one of the things that helps me to stay humble, and I'm sure that you've seen this as well, is that it's not about Rick Pearson. It's not about Michael's Wick. When you've truly humbled yourself and you said, "Lord, I'm here to do Your will," it makes it easier to walk in humility. That's right, and he does resist the proud. And you know, one of the things that I've learned is it's not what you say to people; it's how you say it.
And and you can phrase things wrongly that sounds judgmental, or you can say things that is bringing people to Christ. And you you know, it's kind of like the abortion issue. We know that abortion is wrong and it's murder. And there's been a lot of desperate women who they thought they couldn't make it because there were delinquent husbands and fathers that that that totally deserted them. But two thousand years they shed innocent blood.
Now shedding of innocent blood will bring judgment on a nation. And there's 65 million children in heaven right now. But two thousand years ago. Innocent blood was shed for you. If you confess it, he'll forgive you.
And so it takes humility. And and what we see now is we see the sacrifice of children is actually the worship of Baal and Moloch. It's what destroyed Israel when Babylon came, and and took her out. It was because they were sacrificing to Baal. And so this is this is one of the things that I saw coming, the wheat and the chaff separating.
And but when the judgment comes down on America, maybe a hundred years from now, or might be a hundred days from now, when the judgment comes down, those who walk in humility will go up. Yeah, yeah. Rapture will take place.
So I'm a priest. And Rick, I don't I don't know about you, I don't I don't want to be left behind, Rick.
Well, you know what, science has finally caught up with Bible prophecy. The mark of the beast is ready to go. The digital currency is ready to go. the The European Common Market is is talking about their one world government, and guess what? They hate the United States of America.
It says that that the woman would stand up and sit upon the beast. And the beast would hate her.
Now the beast system, those demons that are rising up, it says they will make war with the lamb, but the lamb will overcome, and they who are with him are the called, chosen, and the faithful. Inside of Babylon the Great is a remnant of believers who see the darkness coming, who walk in humility, and are getting ready for the rapture.
So we don't hate our enemies; we love them. And I like to say you have to love the hell out of people sometimes. You have to love the hell out of people sometimes. That's true. And we've got a Mark Ridge out of Mark is out of North Carolina.
Are you out of Winston Salem or Lexington, Mark? Greensboro, Greensboro. Neither one. You are close to me. I am in Mebane, but if you are not from around there, they call it Mebane.
So let me ask you a question, Mark. Let me ask you the question while we've got Rick on the phone because I know you are part of a group and it's a singing group that I saw singing at the fair. What's the name of the group? Strings of faith. Strings of faith, and you talk about some good gospel music, Rick.
This these guys are really really good, and I and I saw them face to face. But but Mark, what does humility look like? What does Christian humility look like in your life? Service. You know it's it's service.
It's it is. Doing things for the Lord and not for myself. You know, in our in our singing group, we we play for a love offering because we don't want any church of any size not to be able to afford good gospel music. And if we can't, and if and if somebody won't, somebody can't pay us, but they want us, we come. We just ask if you take up a love offering, and if we get five dollars, that's good.
If we get five hundred dollars, that's good. God takes care of us. It all works out in the end. We're not starving. And and of course, we don't do it professionally.
We almost all of us got day jobs, and a couple of us are trying to retire. But but we just do it to serve the Lord. And humility would be serving others for us. Yeah, humility is is serving others, and and Rick, we were just talking about this as well.
Sometimes it's tough to be humble. You know, I remember when I was in right after I got out of college. Excuse me. One of the things that Somebody told me was this: is they, you know, I was talking to a friend of mine who was an atheist, and I was really trying to encourage him to give his life to Jesus. And so, as far as I know, Rick, that never happened.
But I remember one night, all of these guys were around, and it was me, and I was the only one who was a Christian. And they said they said something about Christianity, and it was stupid or it was silly or this or that and the other. And I remember at that moment, Rick, I had to stand up for. The Lord, because the Lord says, He said, anybody who is ashamed of me in front of other men, He said, I will be ashamed of them in front of my Father in heaven. But whoever denies me before men, I will deny them before my Father in heaven.
And I stood up and I said, Well, I'm a Christian, and they about died laughing. And I remember after it happened, Rick. I said, "That's it." I thought it was going to be so much worse, but I tell you what, there there is something. My dad always told me. He said, "Michael," he said, "You've got to, you've got to be proud of who you are.
You've got to stand up for what is right." And when you stand up for what is right, Rick, even though there's opposition, that the Lord, it's like he gives you a blessing, and it feels good that you've done the right thing. Have you experienced that, Rick? Absolutely, and we use something called mercy deposits. You show mercy to others, and they'll show mercy to you. And even in Matthew five twelve, it says, "Rejoice when men persecute you and mock you, for so did they for Christ towards Christ." So rejoice and be happy, for great is your reward in heaven.
When people laugh and mock at you, they're not laughing at you. The spirit inside of them is mocking the spirit that's inside of you.
So this is a spiritual thing. There's not you shouldn't take it personal when somebody persecutes you for for being a Christian. In fact, you should be honored by it because that means you really do have the spirit of God inside of you. When people start mocking your faith. You're absolutely right, and there was a time where the disciples, I believe, were they were actually flogged for their faith.
And so you think about it.
Well, you say, "Hey, well, if I'm flogged for my faith, you know, I'd probably be upset, or you know, I'd call my attorney, or I'd I'd post something on Facebook." But this is what this is what it said that they did, and it says, "And they departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer." For his name, you know what?
Sometimes, and I'm talking to myself too. Maybe sometimes, myself included.
Sometimes we get a little too upset when when people come against us. We get a little too sensitive when people speak against us as Christians. But maybe sometimes we should rejoice like the apostles or like the disciples did, because Jesus put it like this. He said, "If you are," He said, "If they did this to me, if they." Persecuted me. What do you think that they're they're gonna do to you?
And I'm here to tell you today that if you are being persecuted for the name of Christ, rejoice, rejoice in the Lord always. And Mark, I want to thank you again for calling in. What's the name of the group? Strings of Faith. Strings of Faith.
You can check them out on Facebook, and you guys really do a good job worshiping the Lord.
So thank you, and we'll be right back with Rick Pearson after this break. And move out of Buckman, who's called in as well.
So, what does humility look like to you in the Christian life? And we've got a Buxman out of Ohio, and Buxman and Rick is back on as well. But let me ask you this, Buxman: What does humility? What does Christian humility look like for you in the Christian life? I don't, I can't hear anything you say.
Are you there? Yep, I sure am. Go ahead.
So, what does what does humility look like for you, Boxman? Humility, Michael. As you've gotten, I number one, I love that segment you was just in. I felt like I was in literal biblical church. Brothers who have gone out, done battle with the enemy, and then come back in saying, "Hey, I need help.
I just I was in a battle. I've been sharing Jesus with people, and they have just been punching me and carrying on and threatening me." That's true church. When the brothers and the sisters come in from battle and say, "Look what I did," just like the disciples did when God sent them out and and said, "Hey, go out there and do these miracles in my name," and they come back and they say. Lord, they did this, and the demon left, and we healed people, and it's just incredible. I can just see Jesus smiling among them.
Humility is coming in from battle, Michael, knowing that you've got the the wounds of Christ on you, and saying, "I hear you, non-believer, but I will still love you anyway." Until you have the hope that is in my chest, in your chest, without getting upset, without getting irate, and I think you're right, Michael. We have to start rejoicing in the fact that we were treated just like our master. That's right. That should be times of rejoicing deeply within ourselves first, and then among the brethren and the sisters. That says yes, Busman, yes, Michael, yes, Rick.
I've got a similar story, and then that sweetness of the shared is just—it just—I would say that it would outsurpass any, like you said, feeling over any church service with the best worship song, the best coffee, the best sermon combined. Is just coming into a sweet connection with like bruised and bloodied Christians from battle. That's good. I think that's humility. That that that's that's really good.
You know what? You know what else I read, and I read this today in the Bible. It's it talks about there is a false humility. There is something called a false humility. What what is a false humility?
Look at Colossians chapter two, verses twenty three.
Now it doesn't go into great detail about what it what it is, but you know, one of the things that I've heard. People say before Rick is they'll say you know that humility is not thinking less of your thinking less of yourself. It's thinking of yourself less, and so it's funny. And now I love it. I love it when I love it.
Go ahead, Rick. That's a good word. It's thinking less of yourself. Yeah, you're absolutely good word. That I mean that that's exactly what it is.
And so, you know, I I heard something else, and it said, "When I'm nothing, God is everything. But when I'm everything, that God is nothing." And so, Buckman, when you go out, and when I go, when we go out and share our faith, when we share the gospel, not everybody's excited about it.
Okay, if you're not humble, you're not going to be able to do it. If you're if you're infuriated when people don't want to listen to you or the They're giving you negative feedback or whatever it is. I think eventually it's kind of cool, and you've probably seen this from years of evangelism, Buxman. But that the more that you do it, the less that it bothers you. Have you seen that?
That is spot one hundred percent. That little hundred percent emoji. If he was on a phone, Michael, I would I would hit it a thousand. Yeah.
So, so can you give us an example of when you've when you've had to be humbled yourself, Boxman? Yes. When I went in with the wrong attitude, and I'm thinking, okay, Buck, you got to go in. You got you got to do this, and I realized, brothers. That I hit a Paul wanting to go to Asia Minor experience.
You guys remember that in the Book of Acts? Oh yeah. Paul wanted to go. He wanted to minister to Asia Minor, and the Holy Spirit, the the Holy records, prevented him. That is when I am like, okay, I was not.
And isn't that wild, gentlemen? That even sometimes the Holy Father says, "I don't want them evangelized yet, boys." So no, Busman, you're not going. But I don't realize that, brothers, until after I get home, and I realize. It was it was your attitude. It wasn't time.
And then God speaks to my heart silently and says, "No, it wasn't." And I did not want you to have those people saved yet.
So I'm in control, not you, my son. But you get, you know, a credit for having that desire to go and save people in my son's name instead of stay home, watch TV, or watch this. Attended church service. You actually wanted to go to Asia Minor, but I prevented you. Yeah, and that rests my soul, brothers.
And then I, I, then I try to remember that activity that was going on the previous time I failed, and I learned from it. That's right. the The lady who's out front, her name is Rebecca. She said, you know, she said that if you think about it, humility. People who are humble are teachable.
See if you've got all the answers, and if you think you know everything, and everybody else is wrong, Rick. You know, and Rick, we've Rick, we've both met, we've both met people like that, right, Rick? Yes, and you know the true the true test of leadership. Is if you listen to everybody, you'll lose your mind, and if you listen to just yourself and nobody else, you'll probably lose the vision. There is a perfect middle road where you're listening for the voice of God to speak to you, and He might speak through somebody.
Balaam had a donkey speak to him, and it was God. And you might have somebody correct you or speak to you, and you think they're a donkey, but God's testing you. Are you listening for my voice? And when that person says something, I'm thinking of constructive criticism. And a good friend of mine said, my my best helpers in my ministry has been my critics.
And I said, "How? What do you mean by that?" He says, "Well, my critics pointed out stuff in me that I never saw in myself." And I said, "Lord, they're right." Now that makes me angry, but you know what? They're right. I'm going to correct that. And so you have to.
You when you walk in humility, you're always looking. It says a wise man will surround himself with counselors, but sometimes the critics are pointing out stuff, and God's screaming at you. Correct this, and watch what happens when you correct that. And I've had people say stuff to me, and I thought, boy, you know that that's that's kind of an insult. And then I got home and I thought about it.
I said, you know, they are right. Maybe I am a little proud. Yeah.
Maybe I do need to humble. Maybe maybe I need to be a little less critical. Of of other people in ministry, and say, listen, they're doing the best they can. Stop criticizing them. That that's right.
You know what, Rick? There was there was a preacher I heard a while back, and this is what he said. He said, when people want to criticize me, I don't say no. I'm that bad. He said I'm actually much worse.
He said I am partially responsible for the death and the crucifixion of the Savior and the Lord of the world.
So whatever you're saying about me. It's actually much worse to me. I was like, "That's that's a pretty good way to humble yourself." Yes, and and you know what? Rule of thumb is this: I've I've studied the Bible for years. You know why?
All through Scripture, God used imperfect people. Why is that? Every one of them was it because He has no other choice. And the imperfections. Listen, listen.
The imperfections in you. If somebody criticizes you, and you get a prick in your spirit and go, "That's right," God's yelling, "Fix this," because I'm going to take you to the next level. And you release that person in humility, and you say, "You know, I don't agree with everything you're saying, but some of the things you're saying." I think you're right, and I want to thank you for that word word of criticism, because I'm going to become a better person from that. But if you get all riled up and you're going to start yelling and screaming at them, you you get into a mess. Go ahead, brother.
Yeah, and sometimes go ahead, go ahead, go ahead.
Well, and and and you know what's funny when you were saying that, Rick.
Sometimes when you get riled up and you start arguing with them, I don't know if you guys know this or not. That's exactly what they want. You know, my son Michael, he he's filming me or whatever, and there's somebody on the YouTube live or whatever, and they're saying all this crazy stuff, and I told him, I said, Michael, ignore it. Ignore it. I said, you know, here is the funny thing: what they don't know, or they may know this, or they may not.
But even by them putting negative comments, it does something with the algorithms, and it actually pushes it out to more people. Yes, it does. And my Bible says this in Romans eight twenty eight. It says, and we know that all things, not some things, not a few things, but we know that all things work together for good to those who love God and for Them who are called according to His purpose. Exactly, Amen.
This is what I would leave everybody with to answer Rick's question. He is dead on with that. Also, what I'll add to what Rick said: the reason God uses us, feeble people, ladies and gentlemen, is so that He gets the glory, and not Bustman, Michael, Rick, Susie, Jane. He, and He alone, He will not share His glory with another. Amen.
I mean, I I don't think I could have said it any better than that myself. And as we're running out of time, Buxman, I want to thank you for the call and and Rick Pearson. Ah, yeah, man, and Rick Pearson. Buxman, if you guys want to check him out, go to just subscribe to his YouTube channel, Prophecy USA, or Rick Pearson. Dot what is it?
Rick Pearson. Dot what? Rick Pearson. Rick Pearson. Dot com.
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