DARK PAST, BRIGHT FUTURE

0:06 Brave Men with Paul Lewis Cole. Hi, I'm Paul Lewis Cole, and this is the Brave Men podcast. Excited about you being here today, fired up about what we're going to share. Dark past, bright future. Dark past, bright future. Man who could not see, who then had... Vision. It's one of the it's one of the seven basic plots, you know, that we have. You've got the the hero, the tragedy, the comedy rebirth. And this is rags to riches. In other words, I was blind.

0:47 Now I can see. And I love this because it is Jesus healed a guy and everyone got upset. except the man who was healed. I think it's a great story. Everybody got upset except the man that was healed. Brave Men is a production of the Christian Men's Network. I want to thank you for being a part of it today. And I wanted to share something. We just had come into production. Just got back from Mexico. And Seven Keys, Building a Powerful Ministry of Men is a book that We'll put into motion now. It's a field guide. We've had it out a little less than a year.

1:28 It's how to build a powerful ministry to men. Seven keys, and it's strong. And then just a few weeks ago, it's now in Spanish. So if you write to us at cmn.men, you'll get that. And at Christian Men's Network, cmn.men, you'll get the tools and the resources you need to disciple men. Have you ever been frustrated about the ministry to men in your church? or the men's ministry in your organization, or how you're discipling your family. Ever been frustrated with any of that? Those are the tools we have, whether it's Maximize Manhood. Where are some of these other books that are favorites of mine? Strong Men in Tough Times, one of my favorites, The Life of Daniel.

2:08 That thing's awesome. A book called Identity. And this is this has to do with what you allow to define. You will determine your destiny. And here in John nine, we have some men who define themselves based on the law and not on life. The Bible teaches us over and over that the law shows us where we're wrong. But it's Christ. and grace and mercy that shows us how we can be set free. This is a word of hope today. This is a word of hope for you and I. And this is, my son Brandon and I have been doing a series on John.

2:49 We've done two parts. We're gonna do six total. And I'm just jumping in and bogarting this one because I love this one. This is John chapter nine. And this is the sixth sign. There are seven signs of Christ in the book of John. And that has to do with his set, the seven miracles. There's so much in the book of John, but it's one man's testimony. In other words, John wrote this not as a history, but. like Matthew, Mark, and Luke. In fact, 90% of the Gospel of John, we don't see somewhere else. You don't see it in Matthew, Mark, and Luke. You don't see it in the writings of Paul. You don't see it in the other places or writings of Timothy.

3:32 You don't see it, or to Timothy. You don't see that You see it here in John because John says, I want to, I want you to experience something I experienced, which is walking with Jesus Christ. So it's this almost a travel log, but it is is a powerful picture of a man. In fact, at the end on John 20, he says, and then 21 again, the epilogue, he said, I want you to. to fall in love with the man that I fell in love with, Jesus. And so it's a powerful one. And John 9 is a man who gets healed. He's blind from birth.

4:12 Okay, that's the setup. blind from birth, and essentially the religious people are saying, yeah, it's because of sin in their lives. So it's just the way it is. In other words, it's fully accepted just the way it is. And Jesus comes and just disrupts all of their little pretty little doctrines all lined up. And that's what Jesus does. I love the fact, I'll give you some context on John 7, 8, and 9, because the context is a festival called the Festival of Booths. I do want to say this, though, that when we pray for someone, things change.

4:55 Something happens in a person's life. I have this note from, where is it? I had it on my desk a minute ago. I threw everything around to try to get rid of all of my workage. You know what's going on? And this man, well, we'll call him Brian. And it's a man who's a friend of a friend. And he came to Lion's Roar a couple of years ago. And he said, can I come over to the studio? So he came over to our studio and he said, hey, can we pray together? And I said, yeah. What do you want to pray about? He said, I want to pray about my spiritual walk.

5:37 So we just prayed. But something happened. Here's why when we're talking about I was blind, but now I see. Cliff had, Brian, had that moment. He had that moment where it was, I was blind, but now I see. There was just something that happened as we prayed. And that's why we pray with people. Somebody said one time, he said, you know, at Lion's Roar, which is our yearly conference, the first weekend of November here in Dallas, our yearly leadership summit. Go to cmnsummit.com. You'll see it there, cmnsummit.com. But what happened at that is something happened in his life.

6:19 He goes home, and he begins to speak life, if you will, or minister into the lives of his family. Just being, really, just being a man who... on purpose begin to pray for his family, begin to say things, not waving his Bible around, but just begin to speak life and begin to speak Jesus. And his grandson was finishing his senior year of high school and just wrote him a note. And the little part of that note that I love was, was he says to him, hey, he says, and I'll just paraphrase it, he says, Papa, He said, thank you for doing what you did.

7:00 He said, I have learned from you what it is to be a real man. And I believe in my life going forward. My life will be different because of the impact of your life. And this is a man, he wasn't sure if anybody was listening to him. He didn't know if anything was going to happen with his life. You know, he just was in a place where it just was sort of static. Just okay. Good guy. But just not... on fire, not vibrant, and everything changed. We prayed, it changed, changed the way he talked, the way he spoke. And I believe that can happen in your life today. In fact, for most of us listening or watching right now, it has happened. And you have the power of Christ in you.

7:42 And right now, what we see Jesus doing with this man is something we can do for others. John 14, 12, Jesus said, the things that I've done, my disciples also will do. All right, John 9, this is Jesus heals man and everybody gets mad. I love it. And the theme of this message is basically a dark past, bright future. And so the last time I shared this at my son's church, Brandon, I passed out sunglasses to everybody. And so I ended up with everybody sitting here with sunglasses on as I'm speaking. Dark past, bright future. And the little metaphor was, your future is so bright you've got to wear shades.

8:27 And I love that whole... But the fact is, is that that's what happened in this man's life. He had a dark past because everybody said, well, somebody send in your life and there's nothing you can do about it. You're a product of your environment and there's nothing you can do about it. You're a victim of what's happened in your past life and there's nothing you can do about it. You'll never be quite what you want. thought you would be or desire to be, you'll never quite get there because you're this. And they defined him based on his deformity. They defined him based on his past, the things that happened to him. And the beauty of Jesus coming along is when Jesus touched him, it changed his definition, changed his destiny, changed his identity.

9:17 And here it says in verse 13, it says, They brought the man who used to be blind to the Pharisees. The day that Jesus made the mud, opened his eyes, was the Sabbath. So again, the Pharisees asked him how he received his sight. So these are those men who set themselves up. You see that in that verse, verse 13? of John nine, the Pharisees, they were the keepers of the law. Now here's what's happened. This is awesome because these guys keeping the law, what they did is they set themselves up as a rule and a law of what people are supposed to be. Now they are, in other words, they're comparing everyone else to themselves.

9:58 Right? They're the religious guys who say, well, at least I'm not as bad as that guy. And Jesus talked over and over about the sin of comparison. And the danger of comparison is not, oh, I'm better than that guy. Really, the danger for most of us is I'm just not as good as that person. I'm not as good as that guy. I'll never quite arrive at that place. I'm coming from too far back to ever arrive. And we believe we have these... terrible issues that Jesus can't heal. And that's what they said about this blind man. Now, if we go back to the first part, so that's where they brought this man who had been blind.

10:40 We go back to this first part and it says that there was a man, Jesus is walking by, this man blind from birth. And they all said, you know, hey, this guy must have been somebody to send. And Jesus said, he said, Jesus, Nobody send. I came into the world. OK, as long as I am the world, I'm the light of the world. Nobody said I can do something to change this. So Jesus came as hope. And then he put mud. He says he put mud on his eyes. And then when said, wash your eyes out. So that's what he did. So now we pick it up in verse 13 where they bring him to the Pharisees and they say, hey, look at this guy.

11:26 Should he be doing this? Now, the context that I find fascinating is that Jesus... has been hanging around. There's a festival going on. It's called the Festival of Booths or Sukkoth. And the Festival of Booths or this festival with the menorah and the cauldrons and there's these large cauldrons of oil. This is where Jesus was saying, I'm the light of the world. That's why he said that, I'm the light of the world because he said, you came looking for this light because there were these huge, cauldrons of fire that would light up the entire area there in Jerusalem around the around the Temple Mount and and everybody could see what they were doing is night and day and it was a huge Festival seven days.

12:16 I remember going to Israel the first time in 1977 79 somewhere around there is 77 first time 79 things the second time where I hit the festival of booths Okay, it's it's the festival of the tabernacle the festival of the harvest and And I always thought they were saying the Festival of Booze. I go, this is the Festival of Booze. I'm like, the what? Festival of Booze. What kind of festival is that? And I got there and it's booths and what they did to remember what God had done, taking them through the 40 years of wandering in the wilderness, they would sit themselves outside in a little lean to a booth could be, have a top with grass on it or palm branches or things like that.

13:06 And the goal was to remember what God had done to never forget what, And then at the end of that, they would pray for the harvest. Well, in John 7, that's when Jesus stood up and said, you know, you're looking for the water over the harvest. I'm the actual water. I'm the water of life. If you're thirsty, come to me. So there's all these things that have happened. And so now there's a lot of agitation. There's a lot of stuff in the air. A lot of people following Jesus around. And he's still wandering around. See, I believe that when the Bible says the Spirit of God is hovering over the dark, That's in Genesis 1. It says the earth was without form and void.

13:47 And in that darkness, the Holy Spirit was hovering. I believe that's where the Holy Spirit is in every single person's life. Every man's life. Your life, my life. If we're in the darkest place, the Spirit of God's hovering. If you're a follower of Jesus Christ, the Spirit of God is in you. Always. He doesn't just bail because like you did something wrong. The Holy Spirit is there. not to condemn us, but to convict us and say, hey, let's deal with this stuff. See, if one wrong thing sends you to hell, then King David would have gone to hell with his adultery, much less the murder. Right.

14:27 So so that's the beauty of grace. And so there's this destination. There's this big festival in the middle of all that. There's a woman caught in adultery. Jesus says, I'm the light of the world. I'm the source of life. If you're thirsty, come to me. And no words. He didn't just leave the party. He noticed people in the margins, wherever somebody was that was hurting. He saw them. He goes and heals this man. See, Jesus didn't come to destroy the culture, but to redeem people. He didn't come to destroy the culture, but to redeem it. It was never about destruction, but always about new life. Remember he said, even if you tore this temple down, I would rebuild it after three days. He was talking about the incarnation of his presence.

15:12 the incarnation of his presence. He didn't come to destroy the law, but to fulfill it. You know, and we live under so many laws. I wrote it down. I looked it up. 300,000 laws. In fact, the federal government has a committee on laws, and they're trying to figure out how many laws there are. They know there's over 300,000. And then if you add in your local government, state, city, county, you and I are living under 500,000 rules and laws and regulations. Now, here's the thing. Here's the bottom line. Listen, if rules and laws would change the culture, it would have already been changed. What changes culture is the heart of men.

15:55 And that's where Jesus spent his time. So here's a man. that is in a bad situation and he heals him. So they bring, so good. So they bring the man, they say, hey, he was healed on the Sabbath, you're not supposed to work. This man, Jesus healed him. And they say, where is that guy? He says, I don't know. And they said, well, he did the wrong thing. And he says to them, he says, hey, listen, here's the deal. All I know is I was blind and now I can see. All I know. See, in other words, this man's testimony was, this is what I was like.

16:36 This is what I'm like now. That's the one story that nobody can argue against. They never argued. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. You can't see what they did argue is that they kept out. They started asking people, Hey, that's not the guy that was blind. Is it? And, and there were people that go, this is great. You got to read John nine and read the whole thing. Cause there's people that come in and they, they say, yeah, I don't think that's the guy. And he goes, no, I'm the guy. So they bring his parents in and they say, is that your son? This is down in verse 20. They bring his parents and they say, is that your son who was born blind? And they're like, they don't know if they're in trouble. They go, yeah, that's our boy, but we don't know how he sees.

17:19 Like, we didn't do it. Like, don't look at us. I mean, what a great dad, right? Bells on the sun. He didn't like say, hey, man, I'm sick and I'm with him. He said, I don't know. Maybe he did something wrong. But but he can see. Yeah, he's the one that was blind. And and then they said they started talking about, hey, you can't give glory to God because the man who did this is a sinner. Verse 25 says the man talks back and says whether or not he's a sinner, I don't know. But one thing I do know is. As I was blind, now I can see. Well, what did he do? It must have been magic. He says, now he put mud on my eyes and I cleaned it off.

18:03 Bottom line is this, is Jesus basically, they came and went after Jesus. And he said to them, he said, you know, I came to this world for judgment in order that those who do not see will see. And those who do not see, who do see will become blind. In other words, he said, if you believe in me, then you will have sight. In other words, you'll have clearness to see what's actually true. Jesus said, go and don't sin anymore. You don't have any more sin in your life. A couple notes here. Light always displaces darkness. The exponential power of the law of displacement is that Jesus always, as the light, always displaces the darkness.

18:50 The problem with those Pharisees and what we see a lot in our culture is what's called a Dunning-Kruger cognitive bias. They they knew that they knew they they thought we are the experts. And so they shut off any other explanation for anything except what they believed. And the Dunning-Kruger cognitive bias is this person who knows the least argues the loudest. Person knows the least, argues the loudest. In other words, they have fewer facts to get in the way, and they're blinded by their bias. You ever had a discussion about particular doctrinal issues or political issues, whatever it may be, and a person that really doesn't know can argue the most because he doesn't have any disruption.

19:37 It's just free flow. I may be wrong, but I'm not in doubt. And so that's what these men have. And here's what it is. People with a high ability, people with a high ability or a high intellectual tend to depend on that. The high intellectual thing, I know what I know and I'm right. And they depend on that. I got skills. I just depend on that. And they don't listen to wisdom. And Christ came as wisdom in and of itself. And so here's, let me finish with this.

20:20 John chapter one, in the beginning was the word and the word was with God. The word was God himself. He was present with God. All things, this is the amplified, all things were made and came into existence through him. Without him was not even one thing made that has come into being. In him was life. The life was the light of men. And the light shines on in the darkness for the darkness has never overpowered it. Put it out, absorbed it, appropriated it and is unreceptive to it. See, that's what happened with these men. They're like, yeah, I don't think that could happen. No, no, I was blind. Yeah, I don't think you're the guy. No, that's me. And when everybody says, yeah, that's him, they go, okay, well, then there's something else that happened.

21:00 They can't believe it. I knew a man that I talked to once about faith in Christ, and he kept doing other things. He kept doing New Age things and you know, crystals and different things. He couldn't believe that grace and the mercy of Jesus Christ was actually accessible, that Christ came to freely give him new life. He was a well-known guy, and there was another well-known man who became a follower of Christ. And I knew this man called him up until this man's death every week to talk to him about freedom in Christ. And he just couldn't.

21:42 He says, I must have to do something. See, Jesus came as the light, and light is the most powerful element in the universe. Nuclear fission. is a product of amplified light. 2 Corinthians 5.17 says, If anyone is in crisis and new creation, it means you're a child of the light. Old things have passed away. New things have come. 1 Thessalonians 5.5 For you are children of the light of the day. We don't belong to darkness and night. Listen, your past is not your identity. Your inability to get things done doesn't contain the ability for God to do things.

22:31 That constriction that holds you in your mind in a place where you think nothing good will happen does not predicate the ability for God to speak into that. And all you and I have to do is say right now, Father, right now, dear God, you don't even have to have the right prayer. Remember that there's Mark 5. There's this man. It's a parallel a couple of places. A man healed of being demon possessed. And it says he cried out. He just cried out. I don't think he had the right prayer. I don't think he prayed the right stuff. I don't think he prayed the right steps. I don't think he prayed the right one, two, three. I think he just in his heart cried out, God, help me.

23:16 I know I have met a number of men who late at night, one man in particular I'm thinking of, in his bedroom, late at night, they said, God, there has to be something more. And he had a vision of Christ, went and got a Bible, began to read it, and realized he's the truth. And his life was radically changed. Everything changed in his life, radically changed. And today he's actually a pastor, a minister. Your past is not your identity. Ephesians 5, 8 and 9, listen. Ephesians 5, 8 and 9. For you once were full of darkness, but now you have light from the Lord. So live as people of light. For this light within you produces only what is good and right and true.

24:00 Dark past, bright future. Dark past, bright future. Check this out. John 16, 31 through 33. So as Jesus said, do you believe in, do you finally believe? In fact, you're about to make a run for it, saving your own skins and abandoning me. But I'm not abandoned. He was in an issue with some guys. The Father is with me. I've told you all this so that trusting me, you will be unshakable. Say it with me, unshakable and assured, deeply at peace. This is in the message. This is John 16, 31 through 33 in the message. In this godless world, you will continue to experience difficulties, but take heart.

24:42 I've conquered the world. And in Jeremiah 29, 11, I love this. Dark past, bright future. I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord. This is the Lord's declaration. Plans for your welfare, not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope. Hope is to live in the expression of your life today today. of what you expect to come to pass in the future. In other words, live today. The expression of your life today is based on what you expect to happen in the future. Because following Christ is never about walking back. It's always looking forward.

25:24 Dark past, bright future. What changed everything? This man in John 9, the touch of Jesus. The touch of Jesus changes everything. And, I mean, you know, just pick up the Gospel of John. Just start going through it. And I want to pray over you. If you're working out, you know, wherever you are, don't close your eyes in the car. If you're watching on your phone, pray with me. I want to pray for you right now. I sense that. Something I've said, it's like that little time of prayer I had with the guy Brian.

26:06 It's that little time of prayer. And something shifted and changed. And I believe as you and I pray together, that can happen right now. Father, in the name of Jesus, I pray for my friend right now. By the power and anointing of the Holy Spirit, I speak life over him. And I pray, Father, the things that you brought to us through the writings of your servant John, in the life of Jesus would come so alive for us right now that we would be like that man. I was blind, but now I see. I had no future, and now my future is bright. I had a dark past, but I have a bright future. because of you, Christ.

26:46 And I thank you, Father, for that. And I thank you for doing that for my friend right now, in Jesus' name, amen. Hey, thank you for being a part of the Brave Men podcast. And every week, the goal of the Brave Men podcast is to fire us up, to motivate us, to move us closer to the man we desire to be. It's the only reason we do it. You ever listen to something and you go, man, I don't like my voice. You ever do that? Yeah, well, I'm the same way. I don't want to hear me. Now, you listen to my voice. You go, yeah, it sounds like Paul. But if I hear my voice in my head, then I watch something. I go, ah, come on, really?

27:27 And so I'm not doing a podcast so I can listen to it. Bottom line, we're doing a podcast with Christian Men's Network so that it helps you become the man you desire to be. that you walk through life and say, you know what? Bam, I can do this. That's why we do it. Thanks for being a part of the Brave Men podcast. For tools and resources to disciple men or your own family, or to help your church start a ministry to men, go to cmn.men. It's Christian Men's Network, cmn.men. We're in a war, we're in a fight, and it's the men of God that will make the difference. Thanks for being with me.

28:08 God bless. Just never forget this. Hope is alive. Hope has a name. Hope's name is Jesus. This has been Brave Men with Paul Lewis Cole, sponsored by the Christian Men's Network. CMN resources for discipling men are at cmn.men.