BraveMen S3E90: Brandon Cole - Jesus as Never Before

I'm fired up about what's happening on Brave Men today on this podcast. I've got a brilliant young man. His name is Brandon Cole. He's a pastor, author, graphic designer, speaker. He graduated high school in Fort Worth and went to college at, college up into Oklahoma, came back out of that university into youth ministry and then now is the lead pastor of C3 Church Fort Worth, C34worth.com. He's a brilliant young man because he takes after his mom, which would be my wife, and Brandon, he's just turned into a brilliant communicator of the gospel of Jesus Christ. One of the things that he has done recently was take us all through the life of Jesus, leading up to the crucifixion resurrection to Easter time, walking through that whole season. And then I asked him, I said, hey, would you just sit down with me and talk about some of the concepts that have really moved your heart? And that's what today's podcast is. Your mind's going to be blown. There's going to be stuff that expands. There's new things you're going to learn. This is one of those ones that you'll go back and listen to again and then take some notes, write some things down. One of the things that Brandon said, and I've got tons of notes all through my phone for the times I was there, and you can get his messages on C34worth.com. He said, Jesus doesn't point us to a teaching or an idea. He points us to himself. He tells us that he is the resurrection of the life, and Paul tells us that there is no other name by which men will be saved acts for. If we'll give our lives not to a religious code, but to a life-giving relationship with Christ, our life will change forever. It's been a remarkable thing to hear him, and the things he's learned, the depth he has, he's a father of two amazing young boys, and his wife Meredith is a tremendous business woman entrepreneur in her own right, and pastors to church with Brandon, C34worth. I want to also mention that if you go to cmn.com, christianmensnetwork, cmn.men, excuse me, cmn.men, christianmensnetwork, cmn.men, you'll find a chief lab on their partnership. When you partner with us every month, you get access to one of the largest, if not the largest, robust libraries of inspirational videos for men, anywhere in the world, over 400 hours of teaching, different courses that are in there, and Brandon's in there. You can type up a name, you can type in jack hayford, you can type in Bishop T.D. Jakes, you can type in Bishop Dale Bronner, and all these guys, all their messages will come up, different people who have spoken for us over the years, and Brandon is on there, and it is just fire. I'm excited to talk to my son Brandon about Jesus today on brave men. It's brave men with Paul Lewis Cole, wisdom and courage for the journey. Brandon Cole is my son, proud of him, and living in a legacy started with my dad, Dr. Ed Cole. Pastoring the church, C-34 worth, was that the thing you dreamed of when you were in high school? One day, I'm going to be pastoring the church? No, it wasn't a thing. There wasn't a roof ripped off the moment either where God said, you shall. No, I radio TV and film, I watch my dad do it, and I always had a heart for it, and still dabble in it. I'm just going to keep confessing I will someday make a movie, but the pastoring thing has also been something now for two decades, so it's definitely not something I don't enjoy. It's something that I enjoy watching people step into new life, and yeah, so definitely not expected, but yeah, but embraced. You're married wife Meredith How long have you guys been married? 15 years next month. Get out of here, really? Yeah, I'm under the, I got to get something done. And then, so c34worth.com is the website, right? Yes, c34worth.com, everything at c34worth. So yeah, all pretty easy. And you are a, so you are a four-worth fan. Mm-hmm. Yeah, don't tell us. Don't tell us we're from Dallas. We're not from Dallas. Yeah, I'm a problem with Dallas, but we ain't Dallas, so we ain't Dallas. Yeah, and you're you've been teaching you started, I guess the end of last year at Advent, you started teaching from the church calendar. Yeah, the church calendar, yeah, that's right. Yeah, and I think in the process, we discovered a number of other people doing the same thing, like Marcherone and Leonard sweet and completing pastors. And what prompted that? Oh, gosh, I think when you sit down to plan a year and you're trying to be all, you know, creative and plan every sermon and listen, I'm not really much of a notes preacher anyway, so it's not a terrible thing to walk into a Sunday, but I think just with some conversation with some friends and hearing how they had done it, I think my brother-in-law Niles had kind of worked or some of that. And then just looking at it and seeing, our vision as a church is help people see Jesus. So when we sit down and look at what we're preaching, I want to be preaching Jesus, and I know that's maybe cliche, but I think there's a lot of people in our current culture who either have a bad version of them or actually have never truly never really heard about who Jesus is. And so the electionary gives us this opportunity to preach the gospel every single week, because it gives you selected scriptures. The church calendar, you know, they always come up, these festivals and these events that you end up preaching about and you have to explain, and well, they're throughout the year, every year, Advent, Epiphany, Lent, Easter, Pentecost, ordinary time. It started honestly with everything that was going on last year. It just felt like to try to come up with 12 months of great sermons, which I never was good at doing 12 months. I'm not good at that. But, you know, you just felt like, is that what you're saying? No, I give me a couple of months, I'll get out, I'll get it two months out. I'm as Robert Morris used to say, I'm a burdened preacher. I haven't been feeling it before I planned it. And that's where I'm at. And with everything that went on last year, it just felt like, take the quote unquote, sermon planning off the table, put what has been done for a long time by a lot of churches, put that in front of you and allow that to guide you. And it's been awesome to be preaching things that I've never maybe never preached or really dug into. And it's been really cool. Yeah, the whole Easter season that you preach was fantastic. And see three four work.com. You've got your messages on it, right? Yeah, I believe so. At the very least, you go to our YouTube, but it should be on our podcast. And it really was some remarkable things. But, you know, preaching Jesus worked really well for the Apostle Paul. Yeah. You know, well, listen, but even even that, like think about trying to get clever. No, no, Paul didn't preach the miracles of Jesus. He didn't preach the parables of Jesus. He didn't preach, he preached the, he preached the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus. And how that should affect the way we live. And so even we just celebrated Lent and walked through Lent. And now we're in Easter time. And here's my biggest thing about church calendar that has been a revelation so far is that it's still Easter. Yeah, hit that a little bit because that really, that nailed me so good. I mean, think about Advent, Advent, a month on journey towards the birth of Jesus. We did it in our gallery around that Christmas hits. And you got 12 days of Christmas. You, you've got a couple of weeks of Christmas. It's not a day. It's a season. Yeah. And we as people aren't really good at seasons. We're good at days and moments. We're not always good at seasons. Yeah. And so this church calendar makes you, and so Easter, one definitely isn't just a day. There's Holy Week, Passion Week, which is one of three weeks we get of Jesus in the Gospels. You get get the full week of the Holy Week. And then you've got Good Friday, Holy Saturday, and then you've got Easter Sunday. And so and then you enter Easter time. Yeah. So up until Pentecost, Jesus is, is appearing to his disciples and appearing to more and more people and telling them to wait on the Holy Spirit. And he's doing these things, and then he's ascending. So there's all that that wrapped up like we don't leave Easter. So there's a, there's a 40 days. So from Easter, his resurrection is 40 days. And then his, and then his ascension. And then there's a 10 day thing. Yeah. So it's a 50 day. Yeah. Meaning up to Pentecost. So that 40 days, in a sense, it starts to pass over. Could parallel from the time he was baptized right after Passover by his cousin, John, the 40 days in the wilderness. Well, that's even, that's even what Lentus, Lentus, 40 days to mirror the wilderness journey. Yeah. So it's all those. Yeah. It's been, it's been good for me. I think our church is enjoying it. But I'm, I'm really enjoying it. Well, your church is, your church is growing and there's a lot of momentum and it's fantastic. And you're part of a movement. See three movement, Phil Pringle. Yeah. Bill and Chris and Bill and Chris Pringle started that in Sydney, Australia a number of years ago. And about 800 churches around the world that you're part of. So you mentioned something and I want to get into a couple of these things. This is fascinating to me. Some of the stuff you taught was just incredible. And we get into Jesus on a stick. Cause that like that, that's a mind-blower. You hit a lot of things that were like urban myths that we just kind of have built up over time. But you just mentioned something. You said we have the three weeks or three and a half weeks of Christ's life in the Gospels. Yeah. What do you mean by that? Well, if you look at the Gospels and this is something I would have taken from Leonard Sweet, which is a, obviously, you know, our big fans of and I'm reading his book called Jesus right now. But you're doing a theology, a theology, yep. Yeah, I'm, I'm actually listening to that book. Oh, no, I didn't. I didn't know. It's an audio book. So I was listening to it. So when you mention it, I went away. Well, it's, it's a whole book about tying. It's about, it's basically the idea that Jesus is throughout all of the Bible. And so yeah, like we talked about this idea that really when you piece all the moments and all the days and everything from the Gospels accounts into a time frame, it's like when people say, you know, American football, you get, you get, it's a three hour game with 11 minutes of action. Yeah. And so like it is that with the Gospels, you are getting, yeah, it might take you longer to read it than the amount of time it tells you about. And so it's a three and a half weeks of its three year ministry, right? So we really see. Yeah. But then that's why at the end of John, when John says, hey, there's so much more we could tell you about. But we tell, and it's what he says, but we tell you this so that you will believe in Jesus. The goal was not to chronicle everything Jesus did. The goal was that you would believe in Jesus and live with him throughout your life. And so it's not trying to give you an everyday journaling of the, what we did today, you know, eight o'clock at this, 12 o'clock at that. It's, this is Jesus. Live with him and Holy Spirit will show you who he is. Yeah. So it's about the incarnation of Christ into your life. Yeah. That's very good. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So, okay. I just mentioned something. John John 316. Jesus on a stick. Well, John 316. For God's to love the world. Okay. How's it going? How's it going? Yeah. We can go. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. So listen to him. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Don't put me on spot when I'm trusting my notes. I'll I'll measure that. So, so we quote John 316 and you did a message on it's all, it's actually part of a larger piece. Yeah. Because the knowledge put in there until what? A couple hundred years ago. Yeah. Right. Yeah. No, I, this is another one of those that I've never really spent any time in. And I think this is the beauty of what that what we're doing. And I don't know if we'll do it forever but as a church we're doing it this year. And John, look John 316. We all know John 314 says this just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness. So the Son of Man must be lifted up so that everyone who believes in him will have eternal life. And so there's this this John 316. We all know but two verses before Jesus is actually setting up John 316 and he's telling us what he's about to do and he references the story from numbers 21 and numbers 21. The people of Israel get bit by snakes. Right. And this is where this is where as a you know I think my generation and definitely the generation following. There's a level of skepticism. There's a level of question. And I just think that's okay. I think I think it can be unhealthy. You can move into cynicism but I think that the reality is is that questions reveal Jesus. And so being afraid of questions. You know, so I it in other words there are weird things in the Bible and we should all just be okay with that. So yeah, they're difficult. You actually kind of live by a motto which is if there's not a little tension in every conversation. It really wasn't your conversation. Why is that coming up so much later? You know, I guess so. I guess that's true. If if you're going to tell me something so full-hearted all in on on something, I'm going to ask why. I like because you know, you know look especially with whatever everything had gone on last year and especially for those of you that not an American you but you obviously you know but like there's more than just COVID happening in America and there's a lot of things but even this week we're dealing with some things in like and dealing with pain and hurt and justice and all these things and so I just think you know that we should be people who are allowed to ask questions not as statements of faith but as legitimate questions to reveal more truth. And I'm jumping away from John 14 but we talked about this past Sunday. You know, Thomas doubting Thomas doubting Thomas which is really not a great nickname and not and they're really not a fair one. Yeah. When when he when he asked the question in John 14 and says Jesus goes I'm going away and John Thomas goes wait how are we supposed to know which way to go if we don't even really know where you're going, right? It seems like it seems like a fair question. Yeah. And Jesus says I am the way that truth is in the life no one comes as a father except for me. So the question that Thomas asked and even the doubting Thomas moment right when he goes I am not going to believe until well first of all that's a desire to believe that's where doubt should be doubt should be a fight for belief not a fight for unbelief. Yeah. And then and then he says this is I'm not going to believe until I see these things. Well the only reason he says that is because the disciples who were telling him that Jesus was alive had already seen that. They had already touched the scars they had already and they hadn't believed until then either until then he's the same as they all the only reason we see the story is not to condemn doubt it is to show us that in the doubt and frustration Jesus actually pulls back his robe shows up in front of Thomas does he kind of moves he goes piece to you and moves straight to Thomas and says I'm going to show you my stars believe don't be an unbeliever believe it's a heart cry it's a desire and that's the the shepherd right that's the shepherd who would come back for the one a week later he comes back for Thomas because he wants his disciples to be unified to come back into the fold because he was one guy he was what he hadn't seen so a week later he shows up because in those promises there and Thomas's question Thomas what we call the doubting Thomas which was his question actually led to greater revelation come on it's absolutely it and his question actually led to one of the most famous if you will truths from the mouth of Christ I'm the way the truth in life yeah Thomas has questioned it that gave us that well this is the same guy that whenever Jesus says let's go back to Lazarus not Thomas knows that that means certain death and he says he says to his disciple buddies he says hey let's go back with him and die this is not a guy who's a wimp he's not he's not scared he's he's a faith-filled he just he's just going hey if I'm going to take my life on this I need to see something and then we've all been in that place right and Jesus is not when he says the state phrase of you know those who see and believe but bless those who do not see and still believe he's not he's he's not saying that Thomas seeing and believing wasn't blessed he's saying you're also blessed if in even in not being able to see it all the time you trust you believe you step into it and so at Jesus's heart for the disciples is that they would believe he's not even worried about the rest of the world yet he just wants his guys he wants the disciples the people he spent all his time with and not just his guys the ladies the people who were following him to believe to be confident you know yeah the whole crew I want to get back to John the second but I just want to mention again I'm talking with pastor Brandon Cole who is my firstborn son second child Lindsey our daughter is a amazing mother four and her husband Niles my son by marriage is one of the pastors on staff with Robert and Debbie Morris at Gayway Church and then youngest son Bryce who came about exactly a year and two days after you yeah yeah maybe a popular man in our house Bryce is the music pastor at a great church called cross timbers up in Denton our guy all Texas and so all our kids in in forms different levels of ministry you're married to Meredith who you actually met at church pastor by Jim Garlo or great friend called Metropolitan people and you guys first met at a church we met at a church dance it was kind of an outreach thing and I found my wife man it was uh it was awesome I took the seven years to get married but yeah and there's actually a random photo of it of you guys it's pretty cool and so Brandon has two two sons and you pastor see three church four worth yeah and and you remarkable pastor you moved this church from grapevine to south four worth uh how long ago all about three three and a half years ago I guess it's here you met at first 22 miles basically you re yeah we rebirthed uh in existing church very brave move very courageous I think we didn't know how brave it was honestly but you have a heart for a city of four worth and and you guys uh you have uh you're not wearing the the shirt man I thought you'd for sure no well look you know when you guys two kids in the house you're closed don't get washed as fast as there's no problem so but but um you have a motto tell me about streets and hearts yeah see Jesus on every street and every heart being a youth pastor I always felt like we uh I would always have young people coming in saying they wanted to do ministry in that meant that they needed to request a time to preach on the pulpit yeah and so I just thought it was I thought it was a right yeah and I think all those things are good obviously now I think mission strips shaped my life I think uh you know obviously I'm a doing ministry from the pulpit but I know I just felt like there were far more things far more options and so streets and hearts for us is about owning your street and and seeing Jesus through you on that street and uh and so that's that's kind of the heartbeat of what what is the calling God's put in your life and how we best equipment and power that because the greatest goal of of the church is not to get you to volunteer um it is not to get you to serve that is community serving within the body of Christ is about community and it is about us learning character and doing life together so when Jesus calls the disciples I think intentionally the writer puts follow me he said to them I will make you fissures of men so the you is not personal what is corporate I will make you them follow uh fissures of men so we can't skip over community to pursue our calling and when we do that is when we end up in bitterness hurt uh all bent out of shape maybe stepping into some things we shouldn't is when we can't we don't know how to live our calling with a sense of community and and faithfulness to the body of Christ and so I think that's um Jesus first leads us into relationship first wow um and then into destiny and purpose so if you're looking for your calling you'll find your calling in community yeah I mean I think it will at the very least it'll be refined there so whether you it completely changes or whether you get a better sense of what it is you know it's like you think you're you singing that you sing well in the shower and then you get only American Idol stage and you know and it ain't happening even though mommy told you it did um you know you need some people around uh like we always say in our church or at least I always say if you've seen the commercial it works but you need friends who will hand you a Snickers bar every once in a while and remind that that you're not being a person who's supposed to be so yeah I think the only mom that was absolutely totally right well there were two of them Beethoven's mom and Justin Bieber's mom yeah so uh so uh John 314 John 314 yeah oh you want to look at that do you want to be 21 this was awesome we I think this is the part of the cross we did a good Friday service where we emphasize the cross because everything about Jesus's kingdom is initiated at the cross not at the resurrection wow Jesus Jesus tells us who he is as a savior by beginning on a cross not rising from the grave of course the resurrection matters there's I'm not diminishing I'm telling it just it is that they go together it's why you see Paul talk about um I preach Christ and Christ crucified but then you see the apostles all through acts talk about Jesus resurrected they don't they don't live separately from each other and so Jesus and John 314 says this weird phrase right we kind of reference this a minute ago and then numbers 21 that Israelites are bit by snakes and uh God tells Moses to morays up a bronze serpent up on a stick up on a tree and and put it's the snake up there and then when the people look upon the snake they will be healed now there's a lot of things like even the the medical symbol the is still that it's still a snake on a stick yeah so when you begin to and when you think of the word salvation the word salvation actually means healing so it's or a similar or a can mean healing and so you could you could say that the whole purpose of Jesus on the cross is to bring salvation or to bring healing so John 314 Jesus's first ascension Jesus's first glorification is on the cross and then it's up to heaven the the way we lift up Jesus first is on the cross of Christ and and so yeah the snake on a stick was like wait what and here's Jesus going remember that story like you guys probably thought it was weird too but how the people of Israel were healed whenever they looked upon the stick with the snake on it and then and then Jesus goes that's what I'm doing so he brought redemption so he brought redemption to the snake too yeah right well no I mean the reality is is that most of the time that kind of a statement or that kind of a action would have been looked at very differently that's not a salvation thing in the old testament that's that's you don't go down that road and so yeah God is always in the act of redeeming and always making new and so so it's a really crazy thing for me to be able to tell our church hey listen when you look at the cross you're not looking at judgment you're not looking condemnation you're looking at the love of Christ and when you look at the fullness of love even to the point of death you will be healed of shame and guilt and pain and hurt and sickness and that and and that is and we find healing wildly enough it's so just position so different but we find healing in in defeating death and going through death that we might live the life after life after death which is the empty right phrase that we we live this life after death so I that's why Paul lives so differently I'm man to live as Christ to die as gain because to die really isn't dying I'm I'm being fully healed at that point freedom you know and you read a lot right I do I watch try I don't think I read as much as you are my big sister but I don't know if I'm reading a lot right now I'm reading a number of books yes that's that's my I definitely have a bit of ADD when it comes to books they just keep coming out with more um people keep right so yeah people keep writing one right now so yeah working on it yeah so that's fantastic it's it's like Sam Chan said it's giving blood you know or was that Leonard sweet talking about that's Leonard sweet no that was under suite his book is called yeah giving blood yeah and uh so okay so the the John 314 that's a fantastic and I thought that was incredible tell me about the donkey okay I was out of town I was preaching oh I was uh okay drew David in Seattle Seattle yeah right uh drew an Emma building a great new c3 church up there in um what's uh what's the name of the this is part of hope village yeah hope village yeah I was kind of thinking like the exact little area because it's on the other side of the lake uh Kirkland that's where it is oh yeah yeah Kirkland and so I was up there with them and and then mom your mother my wife called me say hey how are you doing she goes oh first thing she didn't say hey how was your day she goes oh you should have heard Brandon today I'm like no you should have heard me yeah yeah dad she's she's been you all been married for a minute so yeah well anyway he's heard you for it was he was not that it was about the donkey about the about the yeah yeah in the King James I think it's an ass is all right yes yeah yeah there's an acid in the what there's what a donkey and every crowd is what I said an acid every crowd yeah yeah I love that it's your podcast so you yeah well it's and we're live on facebook live that's right my face never coming back yeah and this is coming this is this is going to be on a podcast coming up in a couple weeks on the brave men podcast and uh and then we're rebuilding the studio and the ice stuff and then building it and uh wallanders and his church have been a great blessing in helping do that along with all of our partners at christian men's network they've been an incredible blessing at uh I had a number of guys just jump in and help the ice that all that so once we get that finalized we'll have live cameras actually in that studio also yeah and let me say just add on to that because I know you you would but I would say the studio looks amazing and and I do think that's the next kind of generation of and next iteration of so much of what semen can do and the effectiveness of what semen can be so yeah continues to support it because it's it looks fantastic and it's it's going to be a great resource it's pretty amazing hey okay so Jesus and the donkey yeah yeah I mean look these are it's original thought to me but it's not original thought to a lot of people who preach this over the years and one of the things that you know again in our cultural climate the crowds we get stuck in and the crowds we get surrounded by and and so we we I would guess most of people watching us are listening have heard the story but it's Palm Sunday Jesus is initiating kind of his journey to the cross you heard it said before the same crowd that usher Jesus in with hails of hosanna you are the king was the same crowd that said crucify him and that's possible it's also possible in a festival that brought 2.5 million people into the city that it was a different crowd that to get into the inner courts of yeah I'm a different crowd guy yeah and so here's here's my my thought and I just had this real strong sense when I preach this that this is this mattered and that is that um that he didn't please either crowd there's a crowd that's ushering him in from Bethany because he's done all these miracles they're excited about his ascension right ascension to he's going to be the king the political leader he's and uh exactly and we think ascension goes up Jesus says no ascension goes down I'm going to do the lowest of the low be humiliated be crucified ascension is going low and that god can lift you up right that's the whole thing and so so he shows up these guys they're going to usher in the new king that's what they're doing the palm branches the the whole thing it's I'm ushering in and then you've got this other crowd the Pharisees saying we've got it in this now like this cannot go on if it continues that that he's really going to upset some things that their power grab right it's we we've got a system here that works for us yeah and so they were their stress was that Jesus was messing their with their power and money 100% 100% yeah and then so much what we're doing now that's always the enemy always the enemy power greed lust and so moments lies yes and so unless it's the snake on a stick and just so uh no but I think so so Jesus comes in and here's the thing that we have to understand Jesus doesn't please either crowd he doesn't make either crowd happy he doesn't make the crowd that thought he was going to ascend to the kingship happy because he dies and he doesn't make the Pharisees happy because even in dying he wins wow and so we as people and believers can't be this doesn't mean we need to be rude or belligerent or arrogant or any of those things we need to do what Jesus did riding into two crowds both of which we're going to be to some degree disappointed right we need to be what Paul says that I'm not I'm not a people pleaser I cannot be a crowd pleaser it's not going to work because it doesn't it doesn't fit with the kingdom of God but Jesus doesn't do that arrogantly Jesus does it by getting a donkey now here's what I'd always heard about the donkey that the donkey represented humility lowliness of life right it was the lowest form of the you know and there is an absolute degree of that the the Bible talks about that but what also we find in the Bible is that on multiple occasions in the Old Testament men and women of status princes or money would ride into a place on a donkey hmm why because it was a better ride it was the Cadillac right this was it was smooth it was it may not maybe not as be as fast as the Lamborghini may not look as flashy but man it's going to be smooth and you're going to ride in comfortable and so they would doubt the donkey was not some like thrown out animal it was an animal that was used often and here was the distinguishing factor though if a king or a prince rode in on a donkey he was bent as William Barclay says was bent on peace not war so as my buddy Aaron Snow says across the city was a king who rode in on a horse who also on the coins of Rome said peace for all people but the way that king riding in on a horse was going to achieve peace was through domination was through violence was through I'm going to win by killing others so that they all have to do what I do and Jesus says I'm going to win peace for all people by dying and killing the one that everyone who comes to me in my death and resurrection would find life so he comes in on the donkey of peace right and and he doesn't agree with everyone in the crowd and he it's the first time Jesus kind of makes the statement that I have arrived it's the first time Jesus is like saying so him riding in on a donkey was symbolic not just of loneliness but also symbolic of he was showing up as a king but not the kind of king you thought wow I'm showing up as a king I'm a I'm a prince I'm showing up on this donkey I have status there's something happens the first time he's done this every other time he's like don't tell me yet it's not time yet it's not time yet he shows up on a donkey there's something happening there and he rides in palm branches a whole thing and he's he's the donkey of peace you know which is not always the person in the crowd that gets the most respect I mean right now we just draw lines to fight each other with we you know politicians pick a topic they don't want to solve it they just want to campaign on it they don't want to solve it they just want to use it they just want to use it to why they write bills at government or pages long power position and money power position money lust they like the power and the system that has them where they are for sure yeah that was a whole thing before you were born there was watergate which you know about because you're a reader and study your history but you know the thing that that came back to those who were pursuing the truth in that story uh particularly the reporter from Washington Post they they were told by a a deep cover person they the guy said follow the money mm-hmm I don't think that's changed today and I think it was the same back then so what other things really hit you in this lead up to Easter now you're in Easter time yeah because as you shared these things and you studied and you really dug into it what other things really sort of stood out to you yeah well I think uh yeah just a couple of things right at the top um one is that Jesus is everywhere um he's just throughout scripture and there's just uh as um as Dallas Willard says there's the big problem we have is that there's just so much more to God than we want to allow and there's so much more to him and there's so much more mystery and that's not a bad thing that's a good word um the mystery of loving relationship that what tomorrow holds right there's there's beauty and mystery and embrace it so there's it's been really cool and and expanding for me to kind of step into some of those things um I think that one of the that maybe what really started this whole thing for me in a new way was when Jesus gets baptized and when Jesus gets baptized uh he is he is getting baptized in the Jordan River which was made this is the stuff I don't didn't know the Jordan River was considered dirty the the the Pharisee said don't you can't go in that river it's too dirty you can get baptized in any other river except for the Jordan and he's getting baptized by a guy John the Baptist to eat locust right who eats locust wears wild animals yeah uh yeah and and there's one statement if like if I if I can I'm I'm gonna go put it's it's out of um the story of Jesus being baptized and it's this thing for me was like this tells you everything you need to know about Jesus and it says in Mark chapter one verse and I says in those days Jesus came from Nazareth not not really a city of people wanted to come from go in Galilee not the buckle of the Bible belt and was baptized in the Jordan a river you're not allowed to use because it's too dirty you can't do anything clean and that by John the locust eater that's one verse if you want to know who Jesus is read that verse wow he is not so highly minded that he would not show up as a man to redeem his creation he is not so lofty he is not so far away he is so close so ready to identify with his people he starts with baptism he ends on the cross he identifies with every part of who we are and in that moment God looks at him and says I'm well pleased it's this is the initiation of the greatest ministry of all time is to be baptized in a dirty river by a weird looking dude in a city no one wanted to be in I mean that's that's the greatest statement about who Jesus is that he cares so deeply Jesus Jesus was willing to get into murky waters yeah he was willing to get into our stuff yeah those are those are amazing things and these are all on c34 worth dot com c34 worth dot com is where your messages are great church you are in basically what's called near southside yeah you area of Fort Worth kind of region and is a great church you guys meet on Sunday mornings yeah fantastic venue you're also online on Sundays on Facebook and YouTube yeah Facebook live and YouTube live yeah yeah so and then you're if you go the website c34 worth dot com you can find some of these messages that you preach and they were they were they were incredible I mean they were just absolutely fantastic and it's a great church and really proud of you and Meredith what you guys have carved out and so give me a give me like a summating statement here as we kind of close our FaceTime Live and then also closing the the podcast brave men which is which is now on Amazon we're now on Amazon I don't know I guess I don't have to be a supporter of Jeff Bezos if my podcast is on Amazon come on hey we all like two-day shipping so anyway so brave men podcast and thank you for doing all the artwork and stuff on it you are a digital artist and a lot of people don't know that that's how you made your living when you were first married for yeah for a minute yeah for sure yeah still doing it our friends Marcus and Joni Lamb at Daystar um created a bunch of things for them and and you were a youth pastor you've traveled and spoken they love you in Calgary Canada I love Calgary yeah you're like a hit in Calgary you know Calgary's like a can a Canadian version of Fort Worth just with snow it added it's this yeah I mean mountains obviously too they have now I got the mountains yeah that's pretty cool yeah awesome in the tablets and yeah really yeah and so you were okay yeah I think so summations summary yeah give me like like something awesome that we would put on the front of a book or something right now it's like like like cool up the air like something that just goes so viral that we just go yeah bang oh yeah guy must have had an awesome dad that I used all I used all my stuff I would know I look I do have an awesome dad if we can make that a part of my mom and dad or yeah you got an awesome model line um but I would say look I think the other I don't know I think I would say this to everyone especially those of you who are in ministry please um pray seek into that you would see Jesus like never before that's another statement we use in our church and I say that to say um you know Jesus was a shock to the system for Pharisees and Gentiles and oh that's you know what dad that's the one I would want to hit before we go too far and I think this is maybe probably the best way to end okay and that is when Jesus uh when Jesus flip the tables totally um now do a real fast temples 35 hours cool because that happened that's part of passion week yeah yes this is second yet uh yeah the time I think he did it so many times that yeah maybe one week maybe that's why he had to have uh an accountant travel with him yeah to pay back everything too yes I think we're we're too desirous to to to flip tables these days I don't think Jesus did it too much I think we only see it happen one time so this idea that we should flip tables more tables is it's not really the pattern or Jesus Jesus sat at tables and he did sit with Pharisees let's not get too high and mighty on this Jesus sat with anyone and everyone who'd be willing to welcome to a table because he knew he knew I think he'd just get a glimpse who he was he said he said it tables more than he spent time in the temple yeah and so oh yeah that was his ministry model right eat and drink with those around him so uh so here's it and he became the temple right he became that for us he became the bread broken um became the wine poured out like those are that he is now with us and so so uh the flipping tables 35 acre temple that the king was trying to make a political statement didn't want the Jews to ever start an uprising he wanted to have the biggest temple so he built a massive temple Jesus didn't flip every table in the temple that's that I know he's God but like you know he's also human there's no way he flipped all the tables there's different courts there's different levels sit simple the Holy of Holies and it moved outward from there and the last layer the last kind of courtyard for the temple was the Gentile court and by all accounts Jesus was in the Gentile court what does that mean he's flipping Jewish tables in the Gentile court he's not mad that they're selling uh sacrifices because these people had journeyed for days and if they didn't approve the sacrifice they couldn't go home so the the idea of selling a sacrifice was not a problem it was the fact that you walked into Dallas Cowboy Stadium had to pay eight dollars for a Pepsi instead of two dollars for a Pepsi they were extorting them right they were doing it an exorbitant rate but then what he so he is frustrated with that he is frustrated with the the way it's an injustice in his eyes but the thing that really happens is he makes a prophetic declaration of what he's here to do he doesn't go into the women's court or the Jewish court he doesn't go further in to flip tables he goes to the Gentile court the place that most Jews didn't think these people even like you don't get to come in here and Jesus begins to flip tables to make room for a new group of people to step into a place of what prayer this is a place of prayer and not just for you but for these Gentiles who are also coming and how many times as a church with all of its bells and whistles and all of its programs and systems charge more money than they should and no I don't mean tiding I just mean we we expect more than we should from people walking in right and they just came to pray they just came to find something that they needed in Christ and God and Jesus flipping tables to make room for those people and I think that is for us believers right now we have to be willing to flip some tables not to prove a point but to make room for people to come in that have never been able to come in before and and that will require us to see Jesus differently that will require us to see Jesus in a way that we've never seen him and so it's important that we never get so arrogant or so hardy to think that we've arrived at the end of history like Mark sayer says that somehow we figured it all out we must be we've got to be humble in our pursuit of Jesus so Jesus always makes room for people in the margins absolutely and prioritizes them he didn't flip tables anywhere else that is just such a great revelation I love that brand I I'm telling you man when I when I preach that the next time I'm I'm preaching somewhere they're going to think I'm a genius they're going to go like where'd you get that go I don't know just dropped in my spirit those songs yeah like John yeah it was like revelation first chapter I was there on the Lord's day no spirit absolutely a voice behind me been with the flipping tables was about yeah oh man that's awesome anyway I love you lots I love you very much awesome pastor proud of you and Meredith proud of all my children and grandchildren who are amazing and you know two of them and so it's pretty cool anyway great stuff Brandon c34worth.com thank you for being thank you for being on my Facebook live and thank you for making all this stuff thank you great great who's someone yeah great great have done a very good job I expect a hard to do okay yeah great come here man say hi though he's the shy one so he is the shy one there's not beautiful hey man I love you um yeah gray is not going to come to work gray gray is not only only on his only on his terms on his terms and how many touchdowns did he have uh Saturday four four he ran through four touchdowns playing flag football and uh well four touchdowns on four runs I mean that's even a better way to say it uh he's just three weeks in he's got like eight nine touchdowns and he's the youngest kid out there smallest kid out there he is and he juke some it's crazy and then your uh older son kason who seven is batting like nine fifty or something yeah he doesn't miss the thing he's the only one reason he's not bad in the thousand is because one of his hits was a fielder's choice yeah yeah he's uh he's got it man it's unreal his wife was or his mom sorry his mom was obviously athletic because uh they they got uh you were anyway hey i love you i love you uh love being a member of uh c three four worth and part of this movement is fantastic and yeah this is going to be an awesome podcast and then when the book comes out what's the book on that you're writing right now uh charisma take courage get wisdom you got it you can't go pick up a girl with just courage and you can't just figure out with wisdom one one's gonna get you to her the other one's gonna know what to say when you get there so okay well i couldn't use that so it's all no you i think you did all right yeah no like well it's just uh yeah Jesus shows up tells the disciples to take courage i'm here yeah but then the process of getting wisdom is a little bit longer journey but it's worth every second so yeah fantastic stuff thanks brand i love you i love you everybody for being on Facebook with us today yeah uh you know awesome stuff love you bye love you bye when i get together with Brandon for coffee we talk about the things that we've just talked about we talk this is the way we talk we talk about life we talk about his kids talk about family we talk about different concepts and things that are going for but we talk about Jesus we talk about the things each of us have learned in the word so it's fascinating for me to hear these things that God's giving him and what i do is i write him down and then when i preach them i look like a genius so let me say hey where'd you get that well you know i just Lord dropped this in my heart and then Brandon put it on my phone in the notes so maybe that's the best way to put it we didn't even get to the part he's got an amazing message on Easter we didn't even get that far yet we'll have to have him back and do some more on that and he talks about the gardener and how Jesus uh was the gardener the original garden of Eden and that's who uh Mary mistook him for was the gardener oh it's a tremendous message hey thank you Brandon Cole for being with us c34 at worth.com and for the tools to disciple men i began taking my sons when they were nine years old and ten years old nine and ten it was Bryce and Brandon and i took them through the first book with strong men and tough times and you would say well that's a book written for older guys it's a book written for men and when boys who are nine and ten began to see what it looks like to be a man it moves them that direction they get an image in their mind of what a real man looks like so we looked at the life of Daniel and every Saturday morning at 9 a.m. which apparently was a little too early for a 19 year old coordinate to them we would set up my kitchen table and i would take them for an hour through strong men and tough times and we did that for three months and then we did it with other materials and tools over the years and i would on purpose help disciple them and their mother was involved in and frankly a number of friends and i can think of many right now who have impacted the lives of my children one of the things the Bible says in Psalms is i will i will take the heroes of the land and bring them in front of my children in other words help your sons to see an image of what a hero looks like point them out say this is a champion this is a hero that guy let me tell you his story tell them your story tell them the tough times tell them the things you've gone through what decisions you had to make and how you made them and that'll help grow them from the inside out and build them a resilience for life that will make them more successful in the years ahead so thank you Brandon you're an awesome man i'm so blessed by your life and and i'm excited about cmn. men what we're doing with the dangerous nations campaign go on there and click we're going into the 50 most dangerous nations in the world with maximized manhood doing it out of the studios right here in beautiful downtown colgol texas which is in the greater metroplex area Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex and taking maximized manhood training pastors and leaders the goal is over the next five years to train 50,000 pastors to disciple five million men think about children who have a new dad comes home think about churches that now have volunteers men who will show up men who will participate and the results have have been great and so click on there cmn.men and you can click on the dangerous nations campaign remember we also have Monday night men go on youtube type in Monday night men and apple come teachings on three books in the 10th of May which you may already be in it by time you hear this we start bartender just a bartender that on identity purpose and belonging and that is going to be a tremendous time just six weeks you can go back and pick it up if you if you missed it if you're listening to this now and you caught it a later time may 10th 2021 through June whatever it is 13th or something that goes through the week before Father's Day and then on august the 23rd we start real man august 23rd 2021 on youtube uh Monday night men and that's 28 minutes every Monday night you can pick it up during the week I've got a lot of friends who will do a Tuesday morning Thursday morning breakfast I've got we've got some churches that'll have 100 men others 20 30 men who will gather watch the video and then do small groups got others who will have guys watch the video and then talk to each other by zoom or by uh go to meeting or something like that one of those social platforms so we've got all those things and all of that is about building the local church we believe that christian men's network if you build strong men you build strong families and strong families make strong churches and as strong churches the hope of the world hey thanks for being with us today remember hope is alive hope as a name hope's name is Jesus we'll see you next time and remember this I gotta I gotta do this for a friend that that hit me because our first dozen first season I guess I always close it with and I love my wife and I hadn't done there for a while it just kind of we changed the season the way we were doing it but I gotta add it Judy asked me about it she said what the guy said I said I always close with I love my wife she goes you haven't been doing that I go you haven't been listening so and I love my wife God bless we'll see you next time on brave man you just experienced brave man 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