Reliable Truth

There is one thing that each of us need - if you have this, it will make your life.Tragedies and heartbreak will come, but if you don't have this - you probably won't do well. I'm talking about deep friendship.At its center, Christianity is about relationships - our relationship to God and our relationships with people.What kind of friend are you? I believe there are 4 levels of friendship: an acquaintance, a team member, a social friend, and then what I call a "franchise player friend" - this friend is closer than a brother. A level 4 friend is loyal for life. Whatever it takes they are with you.Yet, many people don't have a single level 4 friendship.So how do I get Level 4 friends? Jesus said that whatever measure I give, that's what I will get. So to get a Level 4 friend, I have to BE a Level 4 friend. Be the kind of friend that you long for others to be to you. Love the people you're supposed to love with everything you've got. Above all other friends, God, the King of glory is offering you His hand of friendship. How do you walk away from that? Your call.Today's podcast is from my good friend Jerry Leachman. I hope you enjoy it!

Have you ever thought about the ideas you have and how they shape your life? Philosopher Dallas Willard says "Our ideas are the assumptions we have about reality. They are the way we think about and interpret life. Ultimately our beliefs and ideas determine how we live, and therefore our ideas about life will lead to certain consequences." Today I am addressing three false ideas about reality, and how to choose wisely what to believe.God is most interested in who we are becoming - and the objective is Christlikeness. Christlikeness involves your character, your wisdom and your ability to love and have deep substantive relationships. These sound very appealing, but we cannot achieve any of these in our own strength. We can change our habits and behavior, but we cannot change our own heart. God has to do a work in your life, and the only way through a relationship with Him. The deeper a person goes into a relationship with God, the greater the transformation that takes place in their life.Is it possible that you believe in Jesus, but you don't know Him? Could it be that Jesus resides in your head, but has never made it down to your heart? 

Today's podcast is from a group Bible study I am teaching about the principle of sowing and reaping. I believe that for every person who is listening to this podcast, God would desire you to have a ministry of some sort. It doesn’t have to be a big ministry, but I believe that there is something that He wants to do through each one of us as we live this life. And I would also say that if you’re at home, and if you have kids at home, that’s probably one of your biggest ministries right there, is raising your children. Ephesians 2:10 - Do you know that verse? “We are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which He prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” That word “workmanship” is a Greek word poiéma, which literally means "work of art." We are God’s work of art! You have been created in a very unique way, with unique talents, gifts, abilities, resources, and He says He wants you to take all that you have been given and use it for certain good works that God prepared beforehand - before you were even born. And that you would walk in them. This is God’s Will. And He desires to see that lived out in our lives.

Today we're finishing the parable of Lazarus and the rich man. This parable reveals something about eternity. Many people don't realize the fact that in Heaven, you will have a physical, resurrected body. We're not going to be these spirits floating around in the clouds like some people think. In this parable, Lazarus and the rich man weren't spirits. They had physical bodies. Think about the Apostle's Creed - it says, “I believe in the resurrection of the body”. That's not talking about Jesus' body. It’s talking about our bodies. II Corinthians 5:1-2 says, "For we know that if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the Heavens. For in this tent, we groan, longing to put on our Heavenly dwelling." The apostle Paul was saying that when our bodies die, they're going to be replaced by a permanent, glorified body that will never pass away. So, what does it mean if Christ really rose from the dead? It means everything. It means he is the Jewish Messiah. It means the Bible is true. It means His words are true, that there will be a judgment and that there is a glorious kingdom of God. And for those who set their ultimate hope on the God who raises the dead, they can rest on Jesus’ own words in John 14, “I go and I prepare a place for you..."My prayer is that through this study you will gain a greater understanding of the magnificence and the beauty of eternal life in God's kingdom. 

Today's podcast is the second part of my Bible Study series on Jesus' parable of the rich man and Lazarus. This parable is found in Luke 16:19-31. Last week, we considered what the Bible tells us about hell. Hell is a real place - a place of agony, a place of torment, and it’s a place that no one really would ever want to end up. If hell is real, what should our lives be about, particularly as we consider people in our lives who may not have a relationship with Christ? Today our focus is on the rich man in the parable. Did the rich man go to hell because he was indifferent to the poor? No. Did he go to hell because he was rich? No. Or did the poor man go to heaven because he was humble and poor? And the answer is no. Mark 8:36-37 tells us, "What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul?”Tim Keller says if you build your identity on anything but God and then something jeopardizes that thing or something goes wrong in that area, you’re not just unhappy, there’s no you left. That means you don’t feel viable and you don’t know what you’re living for. You don’t even know who you are because of what's happening in your life. There is an identity meltdown. Does this describe what you're experiencing right now in your life?

Today's podcast is from a Bible Study series I taught at The Center. We're looking at one of Jesus' parables that I think is very pertinent to us today. This parable is found in Luke 16:19-31 and is about the reality of heaven and hell. It talks about the human condition and man’s resistance of God. It talks about the irreversibility of death, which closes the door to grace. And that’s very seldom taught.Jesus mentions hell 11 times in the Scripture. He also spends a lot of time talking about those who will enter the kingdom of God and those who will not. Those who have eternal life and those who do not. The Bible teaches us that there is a place of torment apart from a relationship with God. Jesus primarily used parables to teach His people and give us greater insight into the mysteries of the kingdom of God. What is Jesus is trying to teach us here?This is Part 1 of a 3 part series. I hope you enjoy it!

Today I'm honored to share a talk with you that my good friend and former NFL chaplain Jerry Leachman gave at a large men's breakfast hosted by The Center. Here is an excerpt: "There is an incident that happened a few years ago in Cleveland. I had a guy from Cleveland in one of the groups and he said, that happened. They tell the story about the Cleveland symphony orchestra. Some seasons ago, the orchestra was forming a well-known piece by Mozart called “The Magic Flute”. Midway through, a powerful storm raging outside the symphony hall caused the lights to go out. Undaunted by the darkness, the musicians hardly skipped a beat. The members of the orchestra knew the music so well, they carried on the performance even though it was pitch black dark in the symphony hall. At the end of the Mozart symphony, the audience burst into thunderous applause, clapping and loud at this extraordinary feat. A stagehand illuminated the conductor with a flashlight, shined it along the front row. The musicians took their bows, the applause crescendoed again and again and again. It was a night never to be forgotten.This illustrates a great lesson. Do we know the Savior by heart? Have we rehearsed in the good times? Have we practiced the presence of God to the point if the times went dark and the lights went out, if we couldn’t see the conductor, would we still make the music? Dark times will come. Storms will for sure make everything seem pitch black, but, like you, I want to get to the point in my life where I barely miss a beat. I want to do that not for my own soul’s sake, but for the applause that will resound to the Lord, Jesus Christ. This leads me to ask you 3 questions:"What do I really want in life? How much am I willing to pay for it or suffer for it? And who or what gets my time?You need to decide what you really want, what your mission God has called you on. You might reply, "I don’t know if I believe. I don’t care." Yet you’re still called of God. He put you here for a reason. I encourage you to align up with the God who came into the cosmos and created you and everything else. You have a destiny. One of your missions is to find out what your destiny in Christ is. Put His jersey on and then find out what He has put you here to do."

Faith. Culture. Hope. Life. Longtime journalist and commentator Billy Hallowell has covered thousands of the biggest faith and culture stories. Today I am honored to share a recent interview I had with Billy discussing my book Reflections on the Existence of God. Either God exists or He does not - There is no third option. The question of God’s existence, in my opinion, is the most significant issue in all of life. As renowned French philosopher and mathematician Blaise Pascal said, you are betting your eternal destiny that you are right. My prayer for you is that through this podcast you will encounter truths and reasoning to challenge and bolster your faith.Billy Hallowell is the director of communications and content for PureFlix.com, the former senior editor at Faithwire.com and the former faith and culture editor at TheBlaze; he has contributed to FoxNews.com, The Washington Post, Human Events, The Daily Caller, Mediaite, and The Huffington Post, among other outlets.Subscribe to Billy Hallowell's "Edifi" podcast today! https://edifi.app/podcasts/edifi-with-billy-hallowell-26031/

Today's podcast is a message that I’ve been sharing for over 25 years, and about 10 years ago, it made its way into a book. What I really hope to do this morning is to help you understand yourself as a man. John Calvin said that “all true wisdom consists of two things, knowledge of God and knowledge of self.” And yet, one of the things that I find is that we as men don’t really understand ourselves that well.So, let me start by just kind of laying a couple of thoughts out for you. Think about this. Growing up, I wonder how many young boys hear, during their adolescent years, these words: “be a man, be a man.” I wonder what they think when they hear those words, usually coming from maybe their fathers, a coach, an older brother, “be a man.” You have to wonder what they’re thinking when they hear that. What does that mean? Does it mean to be tough, to be strong, never cry, never show emotion? I think that most modern men have a real problem understanding what true masculinity is.I would like to pray for each of you listening to this podcast and for the men in your life:Dear Lord, Thank You for each one listening to this podcast. I pray that we as men would truly grasp the significance of building our life and our identity around You, to set us free to really live the life that You’ve called us to live. To not live in fear always wondering what people think. Being delivered from the fear of failing, not always comparing ourselves, enabling us to have true rich relationships with others, particularly with other men. And so, as we go forth, Lord, I pray that You would do a mighty work in each of our lives, that You would draw us to yourself in a very real way, and that we would truly be on the path that leads us to be the men that You have called us to be. And we pray all of this in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Today I am discussing the struggles that men deal with. Life is difficult. I don’t care how talented you are, how wealthy you are, how knowledgeable you are, life is difficult and it’s full of pain. Most men tend to withdraw - we tend to isolate ourselves in reaction to the pain and struggles in our lives. We just withdraw.Did you know that eighty percent of the suicides in this country are committed by men? Eighty percent. What’s also interesting is of all those men who commit suicide, ninety percent of them are white males. There was an interesting article in the New York Times saying that researchers are really baffled over why so many middle-aged men are taking their lives.I had a chat with a man who had struggled with depression and yet he seemed to really be a put-together individual. He made this comment that powerfully struck me. He said, “You know, I have never contemplated suicide, but there’s been many times I wish that I was not alive.”There is a question that every single one of us men is always asking ourselves. And you know what? Often, we’re not even aware of it. The question is this: What are other people thinking of me? Join me today as we consider this question, as well as look deeper into how to deal with the deepest issues that men face.