The Winning Walk with Dr. Ed Young is the international on-air and online teaching ministry of Dr. Ed Young. The Winning Walk proclaims the proven truth of God’s Word to give men and women the world over a winning way to live life.
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The Winning Walk with Dr. Ed Young | Ed Young - Wasted and Wanting | August 6, 2025
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- Male announcer: spend time with god each day.
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- Get dr. young's 90 day devotional, "putting god first."
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- Ed young: it is my prayer that this devotional will help you to
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- Become all that god has designed you to become.
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- For yourself or someone you love.
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- ♪♪♪
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- Pastor ed young: when you read the bible, it's a good idea to
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- Know how to read the bible.
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- You have to read the bible in its context.
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- What does that mean?
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- That means you have to understand what's going on
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- Before and after and during that inspired word from god.
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- If not, you'll have a totally confused understanding of what
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- God is trying to say to you and what he's trying to say to me.
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- So we read it in context.
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- We've been studying one of the greatest chapters in the bible.
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- Luke chapter 15.
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- It's the great lost and found chapter.
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- Lost, found, lost, found, lost, found.
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- Shepherd lost a sheep, found.
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- Woman lost a coin, found.
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- Father lost a son, found.
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- But to understand this chapter, we have to see what was
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- Going on.
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- You read in luke, jesus was healing people of every kind of
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- Ailment you can imagine.
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- Here and there and over there: blind, lepers, lame,
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- Demonic, healing.
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- And in the context of this, large crowds were coming.
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- And so the pharisees and the scribes, the religious
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- Establishment of the day they said about jesus, he associates
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- With sinners, he runs around with sinners and on top of that,
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- He goes home and eats with them.
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- My, my, my, how can he be a prophet?
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- How can he be a teacher?
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- What's his credentials?
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- What's his education?
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- Where has he been? where is he from?
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- Who's his parents?
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- Because we see he runs around with sinners, sinners and he
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- Sits down and eats with sinners and their charge against jesus
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- Was absolutely true.
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- Isn't that something?
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- And jesus then seeks to explain to those supersonic religious
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- People, their position as far as being lost and found with god is
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- Concerned because i am sure they would have said we're found,
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- We're with god, we're moral, we're ethical, we keep the law,
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- And all of these sinners are lost.
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- Here, we see ladies and gentlemen, a beautiful
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- Understanding of scripture, we understand what jesus was
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- Teaching and saying to you and to me in the 21st century and
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- What he was saying to those stiff neck, super pious
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- Religious pharisees and scribes.
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- I want you to look at it in luke chapter number 15.
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- It begins there in the story of the prodigal son, it says a
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- Certain man had two sons and the younger son said, paraphrase,
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- Dad, i wish you'd die.
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- That's what he said.
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- He said, give me the inheritance i will get when you die.
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- Isn't that something?
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- Now, most fathers in the middle east, and actually all around
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- The world, but particularly the middle eastern father, if a
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- Young whipper, snapper had come up and said, i want the share of
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- My inheritance, i'm gonna get when you die, that medieval
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- Father would slap that younger son and say get out of my
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- Sight, right?
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- That's what they would do in the middle east.
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- But what did this father do?
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- An unbelievable thing, a remarkable thing.
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- He said, okay.
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- Okay, and he went out and started to sell enough goods so
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- He could give that young son his share of what he would get when
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- He would die.
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- Now, this is that little phrase in there, it says not many days
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- After, you know, the son, not many days after, he didn't leave
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- Immediately when the father said he'd give him the heritage
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- Because the father had to sell some property, had to sell some
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- Sheep and some goats, he had to sell some of his crops in order
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- To get enough money for that kid to go off and take everything
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- That he'd get--this was a wealthy landowner, a wealthy,
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- Wealthy man.
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- And when he sold all of this, it affected his family, it affected
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- His other son who stayed at home, it affected the whole
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- Community because they all worked together and so i'm sure
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- They were saying, what got into him, what's going on, what led
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- Him to embarrass his father, to steal from his father, to wish
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- That his father was dead, to hurt the economy in
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- Our community?
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- So he got out of dodge.
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- Now that young man knew there was no way he could ever go back
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- Home to the father and he could never go back to the community
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- Because the community had something called kezazah
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- It was a ceremony in which they would
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- Take burned nuts and they would take burned corn and put it in
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- An earthen vessel.
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- And if a jewish man or boy went off and lost all their money to
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- Gentiles--who were the gentiles?
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- Anybody that wasn't a jew.
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- If you weren't a jew, you were a gentile.
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- And if a jew went off and lost all the money to gentiles, they
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- Could never come back to the community.
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- In fact, if they came back, they would take and shame them and
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- They would take that earthen vessel and they would break it
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- And they would call their name and say you have been cut off,
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- Zip, never to return.
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- So that young guy knew all this.
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- He'd been brought up in this culture, and so he got all the
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- Loot together and he took off and he went to the far country
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- And the bible tells us he lived extravagantly.
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- In other words, he was some kind of cool cat there, among
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- The gentiles.
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- You could be sure that a lot of the mothers said, you know, this
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- Young man who's come to town, he's got it all.
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- He's handsome, he's got funds, he's an operator.
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- Wouldn't it be nice if one of my daughters would date him and
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- Maybe marry him, man, that would be great.
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- We'd go way up in society.
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- I'm sure he made some deals, i'm sure he dated a lot of women,
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- His older brother said later on he ran around with prostitutes,
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- But you can't live that kind of "let the good times roll" very
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- Long, i don't care how much loot you've gotten from your dad.
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- And before long he ran out of money, he ran out of friends,
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- Said no one gave him anything, a little scripture there.
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- He ran out of everything and a famine came in the land, he
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- Couldn't get a job, he tried there in the far country, and
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- Then finally a pig farmer hired him to herd and feed the pigs.
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- He became a pig herder.
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- And then you have one little verse of scripture that explains
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- What's going on as to why he even thought about going back.
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- Look at verse 17, it says, "i perish with hunger!"
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- That's it.
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- Prior to that you have verse 17, the first part said, "he came to
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- Himself," was that a turning point in his life?
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- He came to himself?
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- A long time i have preached that and taught that.
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- I was wrong.
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- When he came to himself, it merely means that he began to
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- Think about himself and who he was and think about a way that
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- Somehow because he was so hungry and he had bottomed out and a
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- Jew feeding pigs and living with pigs, you can get no lower
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- Than that.
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- He came to himself, he saw who he was.
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- Did you hear about the rabbit who came face to face with
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- A rattlesnake?
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- The rattlesnake looked at the rabbit and said, i know who
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- You are.
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- I recognize those ears, twitching nose, that little
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- Bushy tail, all that fur, you're a rabbit.
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- The rabbit said to the rattlesnake, you're right.
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- And he says, i know who you are.
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- You got a big mouth and you're smooth and you have all those
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- Diamonds on your back.
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- You're a television evangelist.
- 00:10:03.492 --> 00:10:10.666
- So the prodigal came to his senses.
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- He said he came to himself.
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- He didn't come with the idea, i've got to get back in
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- Relationship with my father.
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- He didn't come with the idea, boy, i've done wrong,
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- Taking all that money from my dad.
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- No, he came to himself and then he made a little speech.
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- He said, you know, my father he has hired servants.
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- They eat better than this, they live better than this, and he
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- Made up a little speech and some of the people think when he came
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- To himself, he began to repent.
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- No, that's no repentance there.
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- It's all selfish, all his idea, some people have the idea when
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- They get in trouble in life, they get hungry and things go
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- Bad, they say i'm gonna fix myself.
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- I'm going to a psychologist and get some counseling, i'm gonna
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- Fix myself.
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- I'm gonna leave my wife, my husband, that's my problem, i'm
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- Gonna fix myself.
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- It's the job that i have, it's where i live, i'm gonna
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- Fix myself.
- 00:11:13.496 --> 00:11:15.164
- And a lot of us, just like the prodigal he said, he came to
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- Himself, i'm gonna fix myself.
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- And he made up this little speech.
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- This is the speech, he said, i'll get to my father.
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- Father, i've sinned against heaven and before your sight,
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- I'm no longer worthy to be called your son, make me as a
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- Hired servant.
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- Well, you say that was repentance, no, it wasn't.
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- Because remember his audience?
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- Who is he talking to primarily?
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- The scribes and pharisees.
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- One thing about the scribes and pharisees, they knew the bible.
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- And when the prodigal started saying, i've sinned against
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- Heaven and before you, they recognize that as almost the
- 00:11:53.936 --> 00:11:58.908
- Same words pharaoh spoke to moses after the ninth plague,
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- When pharaoh trying to manipulate moses said, i've
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- Sinned against heaven, i've sinned before the lord, and i've
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- Sinned before you.
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- Was pharaoh repenting?
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- No, he was trying to deal with moses saying, shut down these
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- Plagues, and that why the plague of the locusts in which
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- Everything green in egypt had been eaten up by the locusts.
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- And pharaoh makes the same speech that the prodigal is
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- Making and you could be sure those past jews said we've heard
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- That before.
- 00:12:36.612 --> 00:12:38.180
- Yeah, that's not sincere, that's not repentance.
- 00:12:38.180 --> 00:12:41.784
- He tried to manipulate moses and what is the prodigal doing?
- 00:12:41.784 --> 00:12:45.588
- He's got a speech, he thinks he can manipulate the father.
- 00:12:45.588 --> 00:12:49.491
- And remember the father in this story is a symbol of
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- God himself.
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- So the prodigal gets up and i've said a long time he
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- Was repenting.
- 00:13:00.836 --> 00:13:02.171
- No, he wasn't, he was hungry, he was going home to manipulate
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- His dad.
- 00:13:08.077 --> 00:13:11.013
- And so he retraces his steps.
- 00:13:11.013 --> 00:13:14.383
- And then an amazing thing happens.
- 00:13:14.383 --> 00:13:17.887
- His father knowing that he would not make it looked out and was
- 00:13:17.887 --> 00:13:23.425
- Watching that road day after day, hoping, praying,
- 00:13:23.425 --> 00:13:27.897
- Anticipating his son would come back home.
- 00:13:27.897 --> 00:13:32.868
- Now let me tell you how that whole community would have
- 00:13:32.868 --> 00:13:37.006
- Been structured.
- 00:13:37.006 --> 00:13:38.641
- There would be a village in which in the middle of the
- 00:13:38.641 --> 00:13:42.011
- Village would be the wealthy landowners, the prosperous
- 00:13:42.011 --> 00:13:44.713
- People would have bigger houses and all the other houses would
- 00:13:44.713 --> 00:13:47.950
- Surround them.
- 00:13:47.950 --> 00:13:49.585
- It's not like there was a house here and there's all the land
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- And the cattle.
- 00:13:52.621 --> 00:13:53.956
- Oh no, they would all have lived together and the streets would
- 00:13:53.956 --> 00:13:57.192
- Be probably no more than 12 feet wide through the village enough
- 00:13:57.192 --> 00:14:03.065
- For a loaded camel to pass.
- 00:14:03.065 --> 00:14:05.167
- And the second story would lean together be about 6 feet apart.
- 00:14:05.167 --> 00:14:10.005
- And so that father, in the middle of it, was looking out
- 00:14:10.005 --> 00:14:14.076
- For that son because he knew, listen carefully, if he ever
- 00:14:14.076 --> 00:14:18.080
- Decided to come back and the community would see him, they
- 00:14:18.080 --> 00:14:22.284
- Would never let him get to the father.
- 00:14:22.284 --> 00:14:25.554
- They would have began the ceremony
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- Of being cut off, kezazah,
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- And he would be excluded and cut off and never allowed to
- 00:14:32.161 --> 00:14:36.398
- Go home.
- 00:14:36.398 --> 00:14:37.900
- So the father knew that and he watched and he watched when he
- 00:14:37.900 --> 00:14:42.171
- Saw him a great way off.
- 00:14:42.171 --> 00:14:46.442
- The father did a remarkable thing just unheard of anywhere,
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- Any time in culture in the bible, the father picked up his
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- Long robe and he climbed down and he ran to meet that son.
- 00:14:54.650 --> 00:15:02.758
- A jewish patriarch would never, never do that.
- 00:15:02.758 --> 00:15:06.996
- It was against the law, the mishnah, you know, was
- 00:15:06.996 --> 00:15:11.033
- Interpretation of the talmud and the torah.
- 00:15:11.033 --> 00:15:14.837
- And it said, if a bird would fly under a man's robe, he couldn't
- 00:15:14.837 --> 00:15:20.709
- Get that bird out in public, it would be embarrassing and
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- Disgraceful to show his ankles.
- 00:15:24.680 --> 00:15:27.783
- Listen, that's how pious they were about the law.
- 00:15:27.783 --> 00:15:31.353
- But this father, he didn't care.
- 00:15:31.353 --> 00:15:32.955
- He tied up his robe, he ran to meet that son.
- 00:15:32.955 --> 00:15:36.392
- Why?
- 00:15:36.392 --> 00:15:38.227
- Oh, he's glad to see him come back home.
- 00:15:38.227 --> 00:15:40.262
- No, he knew if he did not meet him outside that village and a
- 00:15:40.262 --> 00:15:44.400
- Villager would see him first, knowing that this young man,
- 00:15:44.400 --> 00:15:47.970
- This pig herder coming home had disgraced the father and
- 00:15:47.970 --> 00:15:51.573
- Disgraced the village, they would have cut him off and
- 00:15:51.573 --> 00:15:54.376
- Shamed him and never allowed him to come home.
- 00:15:54.376 --> 00:15:57.246
- So the father had to run out.
- 00:15:57.246 --> 00:15:59.681
- Now notice this, the boy began to make his little speech.
- 00:15:59.681 --> 00:16:03.886
- He said, father, i've sinned against heaven before you.
- 00:16:03.886 --> 00:16:06.855
- And i'm no longer worthy to be called your son.
- 00:16:06.855 --> 00:16:09.491
- About this time the father got there and he embraced him and he
- 00:16:09.491 --> 00:16:13.495
- Kissed him and covered him, i'm sure by his robe, and the son
- 00:16:13.495 --> 00:16:18.600
- Never got to say, make me as a hired servant.
- 00:16:18.600 --> 00:16:25.541
- Now watch this, the son thought he could go back and bring
- 00:16:25.541 --> 00:16:31.513
- Something into the grace and in the forgiveness that he hoped to
- 00:16:31.513 --> 00:16:34.983
- Receive his father--father make me as a hired servant and i will
- 00:16:34.983 --> 00:16:38.787
- Work long enough and hard enough to repay you for all the
- 00:16:38.787 --> 00:16:43.325
- Inheritance i have thrown away and exploited with
- 00:16:43.325 --> 00:16:47.229
- Sensual living.
- 00:16:47.229 --> 00:16:50.432
- But the son never finished that speech.
- 00:16:50.432 --> 00:16:53.802
- Why?
- 00:16:53.802 --> 00:16:55.337
- Because repentance for him was exactly what repentance was for
- 00:16:55.337 --> 00:17:01.110
- The sheep and the coin, it was the acceptance of being found.
- 00:17:01.110 --> 00:17:07.282
- Ladies and gentlemen, that's grace.
- 00:17:07.282 --> 00:17:10.853
- The boy thought i'm gonna go, i'm gonna earn my way back, no,
- 00:17:10.853 --> 00:17:14.289
- It never works like that.
- 00:17:14.289 --> 00:17:16.625
- It's all by the love and the grace of god.
- 00:17:16.625 --> 00:17:19.761
- The boy thought the problem was he'd thrown away all the money,
- 00:17:19.761 --> 00:17:24.433
- Though the problem was that he had broken a relationship with
- 00:17:24.433 --> 00:17:28.036
- His father, and that relationship was reestablished
- 00:17:28.036 --> 00:17:31.807
- With his father and therefore the village would never have
- 00:17:31.807 --> 00:17:34.877
- That ceremony of cutting him off because the father had embraced
- 00:17:34.877 --> 00:17:38.247
- Him and more than that, the father had said, look, bring the
- 00:17:38.247 --> 00:17:41.984
- Best robe and put it on him.
- 00:17:41.984 --> 00:17:43.919
- That was the sign of a family robe, a uniform if you would,
- 00:17:43.919 --> 00:17:47.623
- And they put a ring on his hand, that would be a signet ring.
- 00:17:47.623 --> 00:17:50.893
- He has all the authority of the family that he ever had and
- 00:17:50.893 --> 00:17:54.329
- He's barefooted.
- 00:17:54.329 --> 00:17:56.231
- He's not a slave, he put shoes on his feet.
- 00:17:56.231 --> 00:17:58.567
- Man, he's totally rehabilitated.
- 00:17:58.567 --> 00:18:01.303
- He's totally forgiven, he's back in the family with no merit of
- 00:18:01.303 --> 00:18:05.574
- His own.
- 00:18:05.574 --> 00:18:07.075
- The repentance of the prodigal was he didn't say make me as a
- 00:18:07.075 --> 00:18:10.579
- Hired, psh--no, it was this acceptance of the grace, the
- 00:18:10.579 --> 00:18:14.950
- Love, the forgiveness of being found.
- 00:18:14.950 --> 00:18:19.354
- Here's the question: how do you and i--we're lost, how do we
- 00:18:19.354 --> 00:18:24.826
- Get found?
- 00:18:24.826 --> 00:18:26.562
- Is it your initiative and my initiative as we go to god?
- 00:18:26.562 --> 00:18:30.599
- Or is it god's initiative as he comes to us?
- 00:18:30.599 --> 00:18:33.702
- Can i go to god any time i want to or can i go to god only when
- 00:18:33.702 --> 00:18:38.106
- He is leading and he is calling me to come to him?
- 00:18:38.106 --> 00:18:41.510
- I won't spend a lot of time with the armenians and the
- 00:18:41.510 --> 00:18:43.779
- Calvinists if you're a theologian.
- 00:18:43.779 --> 00:18:46.348
- But here we see the situation.
- 00:18:46.348 --> 00:18:48.884
- How do we get right? how do we get safe?
- 00:18:48.884 --> 00:18:52.521
- How do we know we are salvaged?
- 00:18:52.521 --> 00:18:54.389
- How do you know we're in god's family?
- 00:18:54.389 --> 00:18:57.292
- How do you know, and i know, that we're going to heaven?
- 00:18:57.292 --> 00:19:01.363
- Both of us have the idea, the world does at least, that god
- 00:19:01.363 --> 00:19:06.802
- Grades on some kind of cosmic curve.
- 00:19:06.802 --> 00:19:10.806
- You know, you've had class in which the teacher would grade on
- 00:19:10.806 --> 00:19:14.376
- The curve and they'd take the highest grade in the class, say
- 00:19:14.376 --> 00:19:18.780
- The highest grade was 75 and perfection was 100, but 75 would
- 00:19:18.780 --> 00:19:23.719
- Be the highest grade and they would take all the other grades
- 00:19:23.719 --> 00:19:26.688
- And marshal them on down, so, if you and i made a 40 the highest
- 00:19:26.688 --> 00:19:30.826
- Grade was 75 and the professor grade on a curve, that 40 might
- 00:19:30.826 --> 00:19:35.464
- Be a c and not an f, and so a lot of people think that god
- 00:19:35.464 --> 00:19:40.502
- Grades on the curve.
- 00:19:40.502 --> 00:19:42.037
- That god is such a god of love, that universal is
- 00:19:42.037 --> 00:19:44.873
- That--everybody is going to be saved.
- 00:19:44.873 --> 00:19:47.509
- Johns hopkins university, i think this last semester, if i
- 00:19:47.509 --> 00:19:50.279
- Read it correctly, they had a professor there that said he
- 00:19:50.279 --> 00:19:53.715
- Always grade on the curve.
- 00:19:53.715 --> 00:19:55.951
- And so they went in for a final exam and the class decided,
- 00:19:55.951 --> 00:20:00.289
- Well, he's going to grade on the curve, the highest grade will
- 00:20:00.289 --> 00:20:04.226
- Get an a, what if all of us do not take the final, the only
- 00:20:04.226 --> 00:20:09.931
- Grade for the whole semester?
- 00:20:09.931 --> 00:20:12.267
- And we all made a zero and he would grade on the curve, huh?
- 00:20:12.267 --> 00:20:17.806
- We'd all make an a and believe it or not, that's what they did
- 00:20:17.806 --> 00:20:23.111
- And believe it or not, he graded on the curve and all of them
- 00:20:23.111 --> 00:20:26.448
- Made a zero, but it was the highest grade in the room, so
- 00:20:26.448 --> 00:20:29.351
- All of them made an a.
- 00:20:29.351 --> 00:20:31.820
- That's universalism if we think we get
- 00:20:31.820 --> 00:20:34.623
- Right with god by doing good.
- 00:20:34.623 --> 00:20:38.126
- I got news for you.
- 00:20:38.126 --> 00:20:40.162
- God does not grade on a curve.
- 00:20:40.162 --> 00:20:43.765
- Sorry, he doesn't do it.
- 00:20:43.765 --> 00:20:47.502
- God grades on the basis of, you're either saved,
- 00:20:47.502 --> 00:20:54.409
- You're lost.
- 00:20:54.409 --> 00:20:56.545
- You're either found or you're lost.
- 00:20:56.545 --> 00:21:00.115
- To say it in this way, you pass or fail.
- 00:21:00.115 --> 00:21:04.186
- In god's course, everybody here passes or fails.
- 00:21:04.186 --> 00:21:09.458
- Good, better, best has nothing to do with it.
- 00:21:09.458 --> 00:21:13.995
- Whoa, how does that work?
- 00:21:13.995 --> 00:21:18.200
- You pass or you fail, what about all those good people?
- 00:21:18.200 --> 00:21:21.570
- A lot of people are--well, how can god send anybody to hell?
- 00:21:21.570 --> 00:21:25.307
- Ladies and gentlemen, god never sends a person to hell.
- 00:21:25.307 --> 00:21:29.444
- We're free, moral agents, we make our own choice about
- 00:21:29.444 --> 00:21:33.548
- This thing.
- 00:21:33.548 --> 00:21:35.050
- You say hell is there, why?
- 00:21:35.050 --> 00:21:36.752
- Why does god even have to have a hell, hell is there because we
- 00:21:36.752 --> 00:21:40.288
- Live in a moral universe.
- 00:21:40.288 --> 00:21:43.091
- Without hell, there's no morality.
- 00:21:43.091 --> 00:21:44.793
- There's no right and there's no wrong, there's no punishment for
- 00:21:44.793 --> 00:21:48.363
- Wrong and there's no reward for being right.
- 00:21:48.363 --> 00:21:51.967
- In other words, if there's no hell, what are you gonna do with
- 00:21:51.967 --> 00:21:54.536
- The pedophiles?
- 00:21:54.536 --> 00:21:56.338
- What are you gonna do with adolf hitler?
- 00:21:56.338 --> 00:21:58.673
- What are you gonna do with all of those in our city right here
- 00:21:58.673 --> 00:22:03.412
- Where we live, who are selling thousands of children every day
- 00:22:03.412 --> 00:22:08.817
- In sex trafficking?
- 00:22:08.817 --> 00:22:10.819
- What are you gonna do with those folks?
- 00:22:10.819 --> 00:22:14.122
- I thank god, there's a hell and it is a moral choice that
- 00:22:14.122 --> 00:22:19.694
- Everybody makes.
- 00:22:19.694 --> 00:22:21.530
- If you're in a little boat and it goes down at sea and they
- 00:22:21.530 --> 00:22:24.299
- Send a boat to rescue you and you say no, i don't want to be
- 00:22:24.299 --> 00:22:28.470
- Rescued, i'm gonna take care of myself.
- 00:22:28.470 --> 00:22:30.906
- Did that boat cause you to drown at sea?
- 00:22:30.906 --> 00:22:34.409
- No, you drowned at sea because the choice you made not to get
- 00:22:34.409 --> 00:22:38.280
- On that boat.
- 00:22:38.280 --> 00:22:40.215
- God grades on the basis of pass or fail.
- 00:22:40.215 --> 00:22:43.251
- You say, well, goodness, what do i have to do to pass?
- 00:22:43.251 --> 00:22:45.921
- How good do you have to be?
- 00:22:45.921 --> 00:22:47.889
- How good do i have to be?
- 00:22:47.889 --> 00:22:50.225
- Now, this will blow your mind, but what the bible says, you
- 00:22:50.225 --> 00:22:52.694
- Know how good we have to be to be safe, to be salvaged?
- 00:22:52.694 --> 00:22:57.165
- We have to be as good as god.
- 00:22:57.165 --> 00:23:00.402
- Boy.
- 00:23:00.402 --> 00:23:03.004
- I'm disqualified.
- 00:23:03.004 --> 00:23:06.041
- You're all disqualified.
- 00:23:06.041 --> 00:23:09.244
- On a pass or fail basis, you're not as good as god, i'm not as
- 00:23:09.244 --> 00:23:13.415
- Good as god, i guess we're all permanently lost.
- 00:23:13.415 --> 00:23:17.352
- No, this is where grace comes in.
- 00:23:17.352 --> 00:23:21.690
- God sent his son jesus christ, who was perfection and he took
- 00:23:21.690 --> 00:23:27.395
- All the trash hypocrisy in your life and the life of every
- 00:23:27.395 --> 00:23:32.467
- Prodigal son or daughter upon himself and was nailed to the
- 00:23:32.467 --> 00:23:36.271
- Cross and died and paid the debt to god that you and i could not
- 00:23:36.271 --> 00:23:41.643
- Pay anymore the prodigal could pay the debt to his father and
- 00:23:41.643 --> 00:23:45.647
- He paid that debt.
- 00:23:45.647 --> 00:23:47.182
- And when we receive jesus christ, he puts in you and in me
- 00:23:47.182 --> 00:23:51.686
- Righteousness, he puts in you and me, jesus christ, and
- 00:23:51.686 --> 00:23:55.757
- Therefore those who are in christ.
- 00:23:55.757 --> 00:23:57.859
- God looks at you and god looks at me and says you're good
- 00:23:57.859 --> 00:24:01.563
- Enough, in fact, you're perfect just like my son jesus.
- 00:24:01.563 --> 00:24:05.600
- He paid the debt that we could not never pay.
- 00:24:05.600 --> 00:24:11.106
- That is grace and repentance is acceptance of being found.
- 00:24:11.106 --> 00:24:19.314
- Now the prodigal, now the prodigal he put on the robe
- 00:24:19.314 --> 00:24:25.220
- Right there when he came back home, he put the ring back on.
- 00:24:25.220 --> 00:24:29.791
- He'd left with a robe, lost it.
- 00:24:29.791 --> 00:24:32.727
- He'd left with the ring, sold it.
- 00:24:32.727 --> 00:24:35.130
- He'd left with shoes, he came home barefooted.
- 00:24:35.130 --> 00:24:38.466
- But now when he put the robe and the ring and the shoes back on,
- 00:24:38.466 --> 00:24:43.905
- He knew he couldn't earn his way back into the household of
- 00:24:43.905 --> 00:24:49.578
- The father.
- 00:24:49.578 --> 00:24:51.012
- He walked with new humility in his life because he knew that
- 00:24:51.012 --> 00:24:55.083
- Everything he was, everything he had, all the joy in his life was
- 00:24:55.083 --> 00:25:00.622
- A gift from the father.
- 00:25:00.622 --> 00:25:05.927
- That's why, that's why we call acceptance of being found,
- 00:25:05.927 --> 00:25:13.902
- Acceptance of being saved, acceptance of receiving
- 00:25:13.902 --> 00:25:17.238
- That grace.
- 00:25:17.238 --> 00:25:19.007
- That's why we call it, guess what?
- 00:25:19.007 --> 00:25:23.244
- Amazing.
- 00:25:23.244 --> 00:25:25.614
- Amazing.
- 00:25:25.680 --> 00:25:27.382
- Ed: there's never been a better time than right
- 00:25:29.751 --> 00:25:32.354
- Now to make god a priority in your life.
- 00:25:32.354 --> 00:25:36.024
- That's why we've created this 90 day devotional, "putting god
- 00:25:36.024 --> 00:25:40.362
- First," number one.
- 00:25:40.362 --> 00:25:42.297
- And when you and i do that, he is faithful to give the
- 00:25:42.297 --> 00:25:45.634
- Direction of guidance you and i need every day to walk
- 00:25:45.634 --> 00:25:49.237
- Through life.
- 00:25:49.237 --> 00:25:50.572
- It is my prayer that this devotional will help you to
- 00:25:50.572 --> 00:25:53.074
- Become all that god has designed you to become.
- 00:25:53.074 --> 00:25:57.579
- Male announcer: call today or go online at winningwalk.org to get
- 00:25:57.579 --> 00:26:01.349
- Your copy of dr. young's 90 day devotional "putting god first."
- 00:26:01.349 --> 00:26:06.154
- Pastor ed: before my freshman year at the university of
- 00:26:08.923 --> 00:26:11.192
- Alabama, i worked in a tunnel.
- 00:26:11.192 --> 00:26:14.162
- In those days, i thought i'd be an engineer.
- 00:26:14.162 --> 00:26:17.432
- We were boring through an alabama mountain where a big
- 00:26:17.432 --> 00:26:21.002
- Water conduit was to be placed.
- 00:26:21.002 --> 00:26:23.738
- One contractor bored from the east and the other came in from
- 00:26:23.738 --> 00:26:27.275
- The west and they had to meet and then we knew they were
- 00:26:27.275 --> 00:26:31.513
- Getting close and we were running the lines and the grade
- 00:26:31.513 --> 00:26:34.749
- To make sure they'd meet, but we weren't sure, sure, sure.
- 00:26:34.749 --> 00:26:39.020
- I remember one morning asking have they broken through yet?
- 00:26:39.020 --> 00:26:43.024
- And then they answered, yes, they broke through last night on
- 00:26:43.024 --> 00:26:46.995
- The graveyard shift because they worked that mine 24/7.
- 00:26:46.995 --> 00:26:52.200
- They broke through on the graveyard shift.
- 00:26:52.200 --> 00:26:56.171
- Years later, it hit me.
- 00:26:56.171 --> 00:26:58.273
- Jesus worked the graveyard shift at the cross.
- 00:26:58.273 --> 00:27:02.310
- He broke through the tunnel of death and defeated death
- 00:27:02.310 --> 00:27:05.847
- Forever, for those who receive him.
- 00:27:05.847 --> 00:27:09.584
- We can be confident in our future, knowing that jesus
- 00:27:09.584 --> 00:27:13.421
- Christ will carry us all the way through this life and then he'll
- 00:27:13.421 --> 00:27:18.359
- Carry us all the way to heaven.
- 00:27:18.359 --> 00:27:21.896
- ♪♪♪
- 00:27:21.896 --> 00:27:29.010