Brave Men S2E20: Hope Is Alive

Regardless of what we see, or listen to, or watch every single day right now, in the midst of this crisis, hope is alive, because hope has a name, and that name is Jesus. Now, I'm not talking raw, raw, you know, sort of all this sort of superfluous. God's got it. Don't worry about anything. No, I think we have to be wise, not foolish. I watched yesterday some of the reports on television for a few minutes. Don't get too much of it. And then I got on a phone call with the White House. I was one of 250 faith leaders across the United States, and they gave us a report. I was really impressed with the depth of their knowledge. It was Vice President Pence's team, and their grasp of everything and what they knew they didn't have and what they did have. The fact that hard surfaces like Formica are dangerous, but cardboard can't carry the disease. The little things that I had never thought about. Then I was reading about Vietnam, and they're the way that they went after the virus, and the way they've defeated it by and large. And out of all of that, the thing that hit me most was this. The response that seemed to work was a response that was based in community. I'll talk about that today on Brave Men. It's Brave Men with Paul Lewis Cole. Wisdom encouraged for the journey. This is the Brave Men podcast, a special edition. We're recording this during some of the coronavirus times. So depending on when you're listening to this and it's 2027, and you're listening to this, it's like going back in time to see what the content is great. Content's amazing. I'm here. I'm Brian Boyd, and I'm here with Paul Cole. Paul is the chairman of Christian Men's Network, cmn.men. And I always forget to us to the end, but let's do it now. Paul, if someone wants to reach out to you, they can email you. Paul is your cameraman. It comes direct to me and our team Paul at cmn.men. Also at cmn.men, we've got a number of tools and resources available. We're doing a weekly weekly live YouTube feed going through the books, strong men and tough times. If you're listening to this in 2027, it means we got through 2020. But we are going to get through it. And here's what's going to do it. Jesus. Here's here's the key. Here's the key. I saw this. My goodness. I could not believe it. Because we've talked about this, you and I, Brian, we talked about the suicide rates of men between 50, 48, and 65, and how the states that celebrated rugged individualism actually had higher suicide rates among men at that age. Because Jesus never taught rugged individualism. He taught community always over and over and over. It was about brotherhood, love, community, spending time together. I mean, think about it. Jesus, we see in the in the gospels, we see the life of Christ on about a 28 to 45 day window. That's all it's in there. 28 to 45 days of his entire life. 28 to 45 days, including the little thing when he was 12, he's born all at 28 to 45 days of his entire life. That's always see. And in that, think about how many times he was with friends. Think about how many times he was with somebody else in community. He was almost never by himself, even when he prayed, it says that he took some guys to pray with him. And the thing that struck me when I read this article about Vietnam's response to COVID, because when I, you know, I landed in Vietnam on February the 10th. And when I landed in Vietnam, there was a team in hazmat suits that met me at a little handgun thermometer took my temperature. If I had if I had tested with a fever or anything over 98.7. My normal and in fact, a global normal now is 97.9. And if I had if I had had that, they would have put me over the side. They had a test kit that in 80 minutes would have told said negative positive positive. They put me aside and then do a one day intensive on me. And then if I'm still positive 14 days and actually a very nice setting that they had set aside with food and everything else we needed Wi-Fi, the whole nine yards. And there was a number of people, a few hundred people. So now Vietnam has done such a great job. Here's the key. Here's the key. The article was this. The article said the difference between the United States and Vietnam is that Vietnam, their valued community, Vietnam valued community, whereas the United States values individualism. So here's where that works out in community, if my neighbor, okay, so a person in Vietnam, my neighbor gets COVID-19. Then in community, they tell the whole community. In other words, they say, okay, your neighbor, all you guys are quarantined, just little neighborhood I'm in with 28 little houses. And they say, okay, everybody here, because Paul got it, you're all quarantined. And we're all going to test all of you. And then we're going to bring you food and we're going to put military at each end of the street so nobody can come in, nobody leave. But it's community. So, but in individualism, we go, okay, well, this is a private thing. So if somebody where I live in a Dallas area, if somebody gets COVID-19, none of their neighbors find out, none of them are told in less that person tells them. They even say, well, somebody got it. We can't tell you who or where they live. Well, how does that help me? So, so the thing is it comes back to community, the book of acts. And this is where I want to say hope is alive. And let me put it this way. Hope comes from the Lord, but it is delivered by people. Hope comes from the Lord, but it is delivered by people. In other words, the communion of the community, the sharing, the exchanging of thoughts, ideas, feelings on a spiritual level, you know, the love of God, the fellowship, we have a Christ, the communion of the saints. All of that, our words, our actions, our love towards each other, all of that is what builds hope in us. So God gives us hope, but it's delivered to my life, Brian, by people. Hope is alive. Hope has a name. That name is Jesus, but the way Jesus gets to people is because of, well, we were called to be we were called to be witnesses. In the original Greek language, the witnesses means a carrier of something like a waiter. And so a witness means I carry Christ to people who need him. Brian, that's why I love what's what's going on right now with all the services that are online. It's like my son Brandon said who pastors C-3-4-worth, he said because we cancel a service doesn't mean we cancel the church. Yeah, sure. Right. He said, in fact, they have a phrase of C-3-4-worth and they put it on shirts at one point and it just was this we be church. Wow. We be church. We are the church. And so wherever we are, loving people, helping people, Brian, it's been amazing to see what people have done in this. So I want to go through hope is alive. Hope is alive and it's found in in each other community was communion. We talk about communion and we act as if it's a not just, you know, it's the bread and the wine. You know, grape juice. It's it's those things crackers and grape juice bread and wine like it's a ceremony like communion. It's just that one thing but communion. That's actually just celebration of the last supper with Christ Paul told us how that went down. Jesus told him. And communion though isn't just that moment. It's everything that's surrounded that moment. They had meals together. They had all these things in common. We may not be able to have a meal together but we can get on Skype or FaceTime or the phone together. You know, we can we can send things to each other. I sent something to someone the other day on an Amazon delivery put in their address typed in the stuff I knew they needed. Bam. It was there two days later. It's one of the paper. Yeah, well, you can't get that. We're going to have to learn some new first world methods on some things. You know, but here's the deal. Here's the deal. Listen to this. How many times did Jesus do miracles in the synagogue? Think about it with me. Just think about it. Where were most of the miracles of Jesus. They were in people's homes. They were on the street. They were at the farmer's market. Right. Yeah, that's right. Which means if I'm on a phone with somebody. Come on. I'm bound by space or time. I can pray over someone and there can be healing in that home because it's not based on proximity. It's based on presence. Oh, man, I got to write that down. That's good. It's not based on proximity. It's based on presence because he's there. He's there. I can't tell you how many people I've met in my life, Brian, who became followers of Jesus Christ watching a television program. I met a man who's one of the top composers in the United States who got saved watching Ben Kinchlow on the 700 club doing a special called, oh, it was a prison thing. It was locked up or locked in or. And it was, you know, and so he does this call to come to Christ and this guy tough young musician in California got on his knees in front of a television accepted Christ. That's a spiritual miracle. That's amazing. Yeah. That's a spiritual miracle. That same miracle can happen on the day of Pentecost. Here's what it is. It's called the Numa and the Ruak. The Numa of God is the breath of God in our bodies when when God breathed into Adam, he breathed Numa, his presence. The Ruak or the breath of God spiritually is his presence. So in in Acts 2 when it says when Pentecost was being fulfilled and they heard the sound of a violent blast of wind, it doesn't say there was a huge wind. Most of us think of this like swirling tornado. Yeah, I've always pictured that. No, it doesn't say that. It says they heard the sound of a wind and it says the roar of the wind was so overpowering. It was all they could stand. In other words, they couldn't stand because the roar the sound of violent blast. In other words, that was the Ruak. It wasn't just Numa breath. It was the Ruak, the breath of God spiritually. And that's what filled their lives. It's the breath of God a creation when he created everything that exists, his presence, his spirit. The breath of God says the spirit of God, the Ruak, the Holy Spirit was hovering over the chaos, right? What was the earth? The earth was dark, a deadly, bad stuff happening, right? Where was the spirit of God? In the void, in the darkness, in the worst moment of the creation of the earth, where was the spirit of God? I don't do a trick question, Brian, so you could actually answer that one. Go ahead, you're good. What was it say? Where was the spirit of God when the earth was without form and void? There was darkness on the face of the earth and the spirit of God says what's hovering over the darkness? Brian, at your darkest, worst moment, the Holy Spirit is hovering right there with you. And then bam, one word, James 5.8, if we move towards God, he runs towards us. And at the moment God spoke, let there be like bam, the Holy Spirit moved into action. And now watch this. So Ezekiel, Ezekiel says he was carried away by the Spirit of the Lord to a valley filled with bones. So follow me with this Ruak, the breath of God, there's chaos, the Spirit of God's right there. Hope comes from community, comes from us. See all those little elements and then hope is alive, hope is Jesus. Now here's the picture of it, Ezekiel. So it says, he says Ezekiel chapter 37 says I was carried away by the Spirit of the Lord to a valley filled with bones. Okay. He led me all around the bones, valley floor, blah, blah, scattered. Most of us know this. You know, every time I do that, Brian, I feel like that, that Joe Biden clip. Remember, what was it, what was he trying to do, the declaration of independence? And we've always choose to be self-evident and like any of us who are speakers, he blanked on it for a moment. And then all evident, you know what it says. I know, man, we've all done that. But anyway, so the rest of this is God asked him, he showed me his bones, can these bones live? And in Ezekiel looks at God, he never says to God, you know, I don't know, you know. And then God told Ezekiel, we'll speak a prophetic message to the bones and say dry bones, listen to the word of the Lord. So he spoke over them, he said, watch this verse seven, so I spoke this message. Suddenly as I spoke, these bones begin to attach themselves and become, have muscles and flesh and skin, but they didn't have breath. So who spoke? Again, not a trick question. Ezekiel. Ezekiel. So who's Ezekiel? He's a man. A man spoke, bam, watch this. A man spoke and the ruac. The presence of God begin to bring things together. Who spoke? A man spoke. Filled with the Holy Spirit, filled with his presence. That's us. We are carriers of hope. The hope of God dwells in us over and over the Jesus taught us in the community of believers. There is hope because my presence is there. There's hope. Now what's this? He says, I spoke, who spoke? The man spoke. Suddenly as I spoke, they came together. And then God says to him, we'll speak again and speak breath. And the sovereign Lord says, come breath from the four winds, breathe into these dead bodies so they may live again. In verse 10, Ezekiel says, so I spoke, who spoke? Man. Yeah. Ezekiel. A man spoke and breath came and life came. And so basically God's teaching us in that story. Because here's what it says, verse 11, these bones represent the people of Israel. They're saying we've become old dry bones and all hope is gone. When we become dry, when we become brittle, when we tend to look at the stuff around us, we get absorbed and obsessed with the negative news. All hope is gone. And then God says, but you speak. And when you speak verse 14, I will put my spirit in every person and you will live again and return to your land. Then you will know that I am the Lord. I will open the graves of the exiles. I'll bring you back. A man spoke life. So here's the deal. It's like that Goliath guy. You know that story, David and Goliath, you know the big guy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. He's yelling curses at Israel all day. Right. Right. He says 40 days and 40 nights. What does it come out every morning every night? And it says he cursed them. You know, here's the deal, Brian. He didn't have bomb him. He didn't come out there and swear at him. He cursed them. What he was saying is you're defeated. You guys are no good. You'll never make it. This will never happen. Every negative thought you've ever had is going to come to pass. It's you're not going to make it. You're not going to have enough money. You're going to lose all your jobs. The economy is going to go to hell. That's what Goliath was saying. And David said, I trust the word of the Lord. I trust God. And he said this day by the power God, the presence of the Holy Spirit, the Ruak. He said, I speak and what did he speak? He spoke hope. He spoke hope. And Brian, it's up to you, me and every single one of my friends and our friends that are listening right now to this podcast to speak hope. I'm not talking raw raw. Hey, it's all going to be good. You know, this happened for a purpose. Everything happens for a reason. Dude, I'm telling you, man, that whole everything happens for a reason thing. Well, that's not right. Sometimes a nail that's in your tire is just a nail in your tire. Yeah. It didn't happen. You know, God's not teaching me a lesson because I got a nail in my tire. I got a flat tire. Well, here's the lesson, son. You should have been five minutes earlier on the freeway or whatever. Give me a break, man. Everything doesn't happen for a reason, but purpose can happen out of everything that happens. That's the chaos and the darkness of the earth. Bam, God spoke and it happened. So the enemy speaks fear to you and me all day long. We need to speak hope. In fact, we need to fill our hearts with hope, Brian. And I know you do this. And I do the same thing. I'm listening to podcasts. I'm reading books. I'm speaking to friends. And God is our hope. And the spirit of hope is delivered by people. Hope is alive. Hope is a name. That name is Jesus. And so we have to pray over people who are in the cave. Jesus had a friend named Lazarus. You remember this guy? Jesus had a friend. In fact, he was such a close friend that he didn't make him a disciple. In other words, he had to have somebody he could decompress with. That was Lazarus. So this guy dies. Martha and Mary's two sisters send word, hey, the man you love is dead. He's in a cave. And the side of the hill, he's buried. He's in a dark cave. Jesus shows up. And when Jesus showed up, everything changed. And then Jesus spoke and he spoke life. Spoke hope. Lazarus came out of the cave. Brian, there are some of our friends that are in dark caves. There are some of our friends who are anxious and stressed. We need to speak, speak the breath of life, fresh air, fresh air. Romans 1513, I'll finish with this. See, navigating life with hope happens with friends, community. Romans 1513, now may God, the inspiration and fountain of hope fill you to overflowing with uncontainable joy and perfect peace as you trust in him and may the power of the Holy Spirit continually surround your life with his super abundance until you radiate with hope. That was written from a prison cell in the darkness and depth of a Roman prison. Paul said, may you radiate with hope. I think it's easy as we go through tough times like this, Paul, to forget. I'm guilty of this. Forget the word that the Lord wrote, what the Lord said. And this are ingrained. We have hope. We have hope. We know who to trust. So if you wake up one day and you watch the news and something is not positive, go back to Romans 1513 and read that one more time. Hope is alive. Hope has a name. And hope's name is Jesus. Here's the thing. We're not, we're not in denial. We're not going to be foolish. We're going to be wise. We're going to wash our hands when I was on the phone call yesterday with the White House. One of the vice president, Pence's team said, I probably wash my hands with soap. And what do we sing to birthday song or something like that? Yeah. What's the singing song? Yeah, I noticed a lot of things online where people have got some great other songs to sing. You know, I just, I sing a sharp dressed man by ZZ top. And so that's it. That's I never would have heard that. Never would have thought of that. Well, I'm just trying to help you out. But he said, she said this, this woman on Pence's team said she washes her hands 30 times a day. And you know, it's a smart man. It's just smart. But she's, she was not negative. She was not down. She was not hopeless. She was very hopeful. She's a follower of Christ. Most of his staff is. Yeah. And, and there she said the prayer meetings are incredible. Most of them are virtual or they're social distancing. All I can say. I don't think when you sing sharp dressed man, do you spin the soap bottle around in your hands like ZZ top does with the guitar? You spin it around. This has been the Brave Men podcast with Paul Cole. And on that note, we invite you to visit cmn.man for more resources. cmn.man or, you know, please give Paul a note. Write a minute. Email is the best way. Paul at cmn.man Paul P.A. U.L. at cmn.man. As always, we really do appreciate our subscribers and listeners. This podcast is available on Apple, Google Spotify, Pandora, iHeartRadio, Stitcher, and other places that great podcasts can be listened to. So please tell a friend and we encourage you to share this. If this touched you, just copy the link, send it as an SMS and let someone else know. Paul, thank you again for this message of hope today. Hope is a lot. That's great. Thank you so much. And thank you for tuning into Brave Men podcast. We'll see you next time. You've just experienced Brave Men with Paul Lewis Cole. Paul is president of the Christian Men's Network. Connect with Paul at cmn.man or write to him at Paul at cmn.man.