Culture & Christianity: The Allen Jackson Podcast - The ONE Habit That Will Change Your Life [Featuring Dave Embry]

Episode Date: January 24, 2025

What happens when you begin to read the Bible every day? Pastor Allen sat down with his good friend, Dave Embry, to discuss how daily Bible reading significantly altered his life. While it may seem like reading about the historic wars, battles, and personal conflicts in Scripture has no significance to how we live out our faith today, Embry explains how it increases your understanding of God and His purposes for you. “Jesus says, 'If my words abide in you, then you are my true disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.' What is the opposite of free? Bondage,” Embry explained. “Do we want to be in bondage? That gives me the incentive to want to be in the Word of God. How else can I get His words to abide in me if I'm not in His Word?" Is it possible to know God intimately if we do not know His Word? Does it matter if we read the Bible daily or sporadically? Why is reading the Word of God so important? In this podcast, you’ll discover the answers to these questions and how God brought healing, hope, and transformation to Dave Embry's life through one simple, daily practice: Bible reading.More Information:Bible Reading Plan: https://allenjackson.com/bible-reading/ __ It’s up to us to bring God’s truth back into our culture. It may feel like an impossible assignment, but there’s much we can do. Join Pastor Allen Jackson as he discusses today’s issues from a biblical perspective. Find thought-provoking insight from Pastor Allen and his guests, equipping you to lead with your faith in your home, your school, your community, and wherever God takes you. Listen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3JsyO6ysUVGOIV70xAjtcm?si=6805fe488cf64a6d Listen on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/culture-christianity-the-allen-jackson-podcast/id1729435597

The first time or second time maybe I heard you preach, you said something that changed my life in a lot of respects. Because I was on my way back to really making a commitment to serve the Lord. And you said, it's not about your kingdom. It's about his kingdom. And I needed to hear that because my whole life, it was about my kingdom. And what can I do to get on God's good side to grow my kingdom? And I needed to hear that from you. Or hear from somebody.

I can be pretty annoying. You can, but it changed, it changed the direction for me because I'd never, you know what, Alan, and all my growing up in churches, I'd never heard that. Never that I could ever remember. Very good. Well, culture and Christianity, we don't want our faith just to live inside a church while we survive the next sermon or even enjoy the worship music. We've got to learn to take our faith outside the walls of the church, which is the point of this podcast. We try to meet some friends who are living out there. their faith in a way that brings hope and maybe even some suggestions for us. So I have a friend

and a special guest tonight. Dave Embry, welcome to Culture and Christianity. Pleasure to be here. Thank you so much for having me. I'm going to try to get you to tell a little bit of your story. And I know how shy and retiring you are, so I hope you can come out of your shell. I will try to come out of my shell, and I will try to keep it as brief as I can, but yet to share. first of all, I'm very thankful that you introduce my wife, Julie. I want everybody to know her. I'm here tonight because of her. And women that pray change the hearts of their families and of their children.

So ladies out there don't ever stop praying for your family, your husband, your children, because those prayers make a difference. And so I'm sitting up here tonight with you for that very reason. that my wife prayed before we ever met for a Christian husband. And the Lord brought us together is almost unbelievable the way that the way that the Lord brought us together. But she prayed. And we were married. She became a Christian.

She wasn't even a Christian whenever she prayed that prayer. But we raised our kids to know the Lord. And there was a season of my life where I walked away from that. Became selfish and I walked away. and I never left the Lord in a sense, but I just became a, I guess you can almost say a lukewarm Christian. I just kind of became a casual Christian. Okay, but let's give them a little bit of the backstory. How many children?

Oh, okay, okay. We got four daughters and 11 grandchildren and three sons-in-laws. And the reason why we ended up in Tennessee was because we have two son-in-laws that are musicians that play out of the Nashville area. And so the grandkids ended up in Nashville. And as you know, if the grandkids are somewhere, Grandma's going to be there as well. So anyway, yeah, that's kind of how we ended up here. And we found a piece of property and drove by this church.

And that was back in 2013. And since that time period, it's kind of hard to believe the years have slipped by that fast. That's true. But 2013, and when we drove by, we were on a way to meet the realtor. And Julie looked over and said, you know, I've heard some. good things about that church. And I looked at it and being quite honest with you, I was getting back to serving the Lord. And I'd made a commitment. I'd gone through cancer. I'd gone through some different things. And Lord was drawing me back to him. And I looked over and we had been involved with some bigger

churches in Southern Illinois area. And I just like, oh, let's just find something that we can get involved with. There's something 300, 400 people. And I said, and she goes, well, I've really heard some good things. So we decided to come here and we knew immediately this is where God wants to be. would have been here for since. So I choke up a lot, but when God changes your heart, folks, it makes a difference. So excuse me on that, but it's sincere and from the heart. I'm thankful that the Lord brought us to this place so many years ago. So I think there's a fun part of your story that kind of tracks the growth of McDonald's.

Your dad drove a delivery truck for Mickey Dees? He drove a delivery truck for a bakery. And it was in Louisville, Kentucky. And he wanted to be an entrepreneur, but every time he would try, he'd fail. And he'd end up back at the bakery. And it was a Jewish bakery. And the youngest brother of that bakery wanted to also have a business and knew that since he was the second son and not the first son, he would probably never run the bakery. He'd just be working in the bakery.

So the opportunity came to have a McDonald franchise. And the gentleman Howard, he stayed at the bakery. but my dad ended up paying 10% to get into the business. And the rest of history, as I said, that was 1962. And by 1975, he bought hired out and grew the business to over 20 stores, 20 restaurants. Wow. So kind of changed. But you grew up with a Christian, Christianity wasn't removed from you. You said you took a bit of a walk, but it wasn't a foreign concept to you.

Not at all. My mom was a very strong Christian. And going back to talking about Julie and her faith and the prey, it really started with my grandma and my mother and how they raised me. I was raised in a house where the mom knew how to pray. And our story is parallel so much with your mom. And then I was raised in a barn in Illinois. And so you're in Tennessee with horses and I'm in Illinois with horses because my dad got very interested in throwboard race horses. And so. So we ended up having four farms and breeding horses. And so I found out what it was like to raise horses and take care of horses. I'm sorry. Yeah, me too. No, that was wonderful. It was a great experience. The nice thing about being raised on a farm is it teaches you discipline.

You don't get a chance to say, no, you know what, I'm not going to get up and go feed today. You have to get up and go feed. And I think that's part of the thing that we're going to talk a little bit maybe tonight about reading our Bibles and stuff too. It's extremely important to grow that discipline, to get into the Word of God. It's worth it. It's worth it. So you ran pretty hard. You had some success in business, but you like cars and boats and diving and chased a lot of things.

Yeah, I have. I have. I was interested in building my kingdom. That was what was so important about coming to this church. When I first came here, all my Christian life was to take care of my Christian. in business of being born again and serving the Lord in a sense of, you know, here and there helping in the church and paying my ties. But it was about, okay, I'd done that. Now then I want to get God on my side so he can bless my kingdom because it's about building my

kingdom and not his. And so, yeah, I've done those things. I've flown airplanes. I was a commercial pilot for a series of years when Julie and I first got married. I've got helicopters. I've owned boats and vacation homes and all those kind of things. And they're really in all sincerity, and I mean this with all my heart, they really don't mean a whole lot whenever it all comes back to what really is important in life. And that was what was so important when we came here because the first time or second time maybe I heard you preach, you said something that changed my life in a lot of respects because I was on my way back to really making a commitment to serve the Lord. And you said, it's not about your kingdom. It's about his kingdom. And I need

to hear that. Because my whole life, it was about my kingdom. And what can I do to get on God's good side to roll my kingdom. And I needed to hear that from you. And or hear from somebody. I can be pretty annoying. I can. But it changed, it changed the direction for me because I'd never, you know what, Alan, in all my growing up in churches, I'd never heard that. Never that I could ever remember. And it was about being born again. And then, okay, you know, that was it, basically. And, you know, that's the start. That's our birth into the kingdom. But that's just the beginning. There's so much more to this walk that we're on than just that simple birth into the kingdom. And if we're going to grow, then we have to make some decisions.

And those decisions are choices that we can make. We can all make. We have to figure out how we can work them into our schedule or what we can do. But, you know, one of the things I was thankful for for my dad, his mom was murdered when he was three. And he grew up in and out of family that would take care of him because he's all. all of a sudden he had three other brothers, and he had a cousin that was living with them as well. So they had four guys, four young men. And he was in and out of orphanages and stuff.

And he would always tell me things that were really biblical, but I didn't understand them at the time. And, you know, it was always like what goes around, will come around, those kind of things. And he'd always say, Dave, he goes, I'm going to tell you something. He goes, if you've got to make a decision in life, if there's two choices, take the hard one. There's more rewards and less people. And I look at that now and I read the word of God and here I go again. But Jesus says the gate's narrow. So take the narrow gate.

If you can work your way into the narrow gate, take it because the gate is broad and the road is wide that leads to death. And many are on it. But it's a narrow gate and a hard road that leads to life if you find it. And those are all kind of little biblical things that I didn't even know my dad was really sharing with me, but they stuck with me through life. And now that I'm in the word and read it on a regular basis, I see all these little things that God was planting seeds that I just didn't know he was planting. So.

How old were you when you lost your dad? I was 33. And I was a year, well, it was 15 months to the day after my dad lied, that I lost my mom. And to give you a little brief history since you brought that up, my dad, like I said, he grew up in an orphanage and didn't have anything, but he knew how to work hard. And so that's what he did. did. And when he was a young man, he got scarlet fever. And I mean a young man by like 12, 13 years of age. And he laid in a bedroom, he said, for about three weeks in darkness. And when he was 15, medical options would have been pretty limited. Limited. And he made a promise to God because he

liked to play hooky a lot. And he said to God, he said, if you heal me, I will never play hooky again. And when I get to work, I'll never miss a day of work. And he didn't. He unfortunately died at 61 years of age of a brain aneurysm. But he was still working. in 12 and 14 hour days. I never saw the man sick. I never saw. That's why I was such a shock when he passed away. I never saw any of that coming. And yet it was a sudden kind of a thing. Now, my mom had been ill for a period of time. And she just had her spleen removed. She had a disease called polycythemia, which is a blood disorder. And so she was in the rebound stage of getting through surgery and starting to gain her health. And when he died suddenly, she died.

She just literally existed for 15 months until she basically just gave up to be quite honest with you. She couldn't imagine life without him in it. And she just kind of gave up. And that was a tough time. But because of my dad's hard work, he had been very successful, business-wise, very successful. Not just as McDonald's, I told you we got into horses. He actually in his prime of the horses, he had 187 head. That's a lot of mouths to feed.

We were standing stallions like Seattle Slew's Folly and stuff. and breeding and folling probably about 60 horse a year and actually folling about 30 to 35 but we were breeding about 60 and that really is what opened the door for me to get in aviation because he was flying all over and he was chartering planes and and is this is getting more into the weeds that probably you wanted to go but julia and I when we got married we were right out of high school and everybody said six months and you guys will be divorced and we just celebrated 47 years this last Saturday that's God that's God so he said, hey, you know, I'm chartered these planes and you always had an interest in aviation.

And I dropped out of college in order to have two and three jobs to support a wife and have a baby on the way. And so I said, sure, I'll be happy to do that. So I went and did it on my training, became a commercial pilot and started a charter company. And then I flew for him as well as flew for other people, other corporations and stuff. But, yeah, and then he got into other things as well. We owned a radio station. He had a sign company. We owned a printing company.

it was never about the money with him. He never chased after dollars. He always wanted to create opportunities for people to have an opportunity to grow and have a job. And so when he died suddenly, and I was 33 years of age, I wasn't involved. I was in McDonald's. I was already approved operator. I became approved in 1989. I had two stores.

And then I worked with him. But I wasn't involved with all these other businesses. And if you can imagine, all of a sudden, at 33 years of age, being thrown into a situation where you're starting to let people go and shut down companies. and it was a tough time for me. And for about three and a half years, I literally was dissolving companies and sending people on their way more or less. At the meantime, I was trying to keep my mom alive,

and we had a couple of different lawsuits that were going on at the same time as well after his death that had to do with life insurance and stuff. And so after that time period, I just started, what about me? What's in it for me? And that's what started me down the wrong road to becoming casual with my...

I never walked away from God. I prayed a lot whenever. I was living a life that I shouldn't have been living. But gradually, it's important with who you hang around with because it's very easy if you hang around with their own crowd. Things that you really in the beginning thought, well, no, I don't want to be part of this, start to become like, that's not that big of a deal.

Dirty jokes here, a little of this there, a little that there. Next thing you know, you're in the bars, you're drinking, you're doing different things. And it just led me down a path that I really shouldn't have went down. Well, and I know you and somebody's got into working out and lifting a lot of weights. I did that for a period of time for all the wrong reasons. It was all about vanity. That was in 2000.

five and I worked out two and a half years. I was in the gym six days a week for all the wrong reasons. I would tell you it was for my health. I was in my mid-40s, but it was really about vanity for me. And but I was eating right. I even had the college team in town, Greenville College, the coach come out and work out with me. He said, man, I wish you get into my college group and get them to work out as hard as you do. Because if I'm into something, my wife will tell you, if I'm into something I'm in. And so, yeah, I had a gym at my house. I built a gym at the house. had a full gym, all the weights, all the sleds, universal gym and all that. And what's wonderful about that whole story that you brought that up is that about two and a half

years into that, I ended up with cancer. And I ended up losing a kidney to cancer. And I was really, I thought I was pretty buffed and looking pretty good. Everybody's telling me about how great I was looking and stuff. So you can't judge a book by its cover. But Julie and I came off of a dive trip because that was another thing that her and I like to do was go scuba dive. and we've traveled the world going to these wonderful exotic places. And we came off a dive trip, and I had a charity golf tournament on a Monday.

We got in on a Saturday. And after that event, I was just not feeling well. So I came home early and went to bed, told her I wasn't feeling well. Just thought maybe it was, you know, something I'd ate or just whatever, coming from the trip, whatever. And about two hours after I went to bed, I had an extreme pain in my right side. And the first thing I thought was I pulled my oblique muscle was because we were, because we're, When you work out a lot, sometimes you'll end up having muscles that'll cramp on you and tighten up on your stuff. So I got up to stretch and it's like, no, this is internal and I'm on fire.

And I thought, okay, right side, the appendix is probably ruptured. So I woke her up because she had just come to bed and I said, I'm going to the hospital. Something's wrong. And she got up and I drove myself to the hospital and tried to make a long story short. I was diagnosed with kidney cancer and it was two weeks later. They removed the kidney. Thank God that I went five years. I didn't have to go through chemo or any of that kind of stuff.

everything was taken, but I went for five years to verify there was no spreading the cancer anywhere else. And right after the surgery, about 3 o'clock in the morning, I woke up and I had this still small voice. And I said, how's it working out for you? And I cried. And I said, not very well. And the Holy Spirit said, you start to take care of your spiritual strength. Don't worry about your physical. I'll take care of your physical health. You take care of your spiritual health. and that was the real turn that started turning me back to the Lord. And so that was, I'm a stubborn man, and I didn't turn as quick as I should have. It still took me years, a few years to really fully come back.

But that's about the time that God brought us here and about the time that I heard, it's not about me. And I hadn't heard that before. So that kind of changed everything. Well, excuse me, I started off this year. I really felt like I had an assignment, and that was to invite as many people as I could to read the Gospels with us. And I've been pretty transparent about that. I really want them to read more, but I'll be thrilled if we can get the folks to read the Gospels. Amen.

And you and I have done that Bible reading thing for a while. Quite a well. And you picked up that discipline with your normal half-baked approach to things. and because of your business circumstances, you've got some time, you've got some free time. So you kind of outperformed what most of us pedestrian people do. Tell us a little bit about what you did with your Bible. Well, right after you told me, it wasn't about me. It was about his kingdom and not mine.

We turned January of 2014. And you said, we're going to do something as a congregation. We're going to invite you to read your Bibles. And we're going to read our Bibles in a year from you. Genesis to Revelation. And, you know, I'd heard people that had done that before, but most of them were elderly and they were little ladies, little ladies in the corner of the church or this guy over here has done that. And people whisper. Nobody with a real life would read their Bible. You know, he read the Bible from Genesis. Really? Yeah. I mean, you'd be in church and people would be like,

he read the Bible, really? It's like, it was just, it was strange in that way. And I love your line the other day that you said that you studied history and now you are history because I feel the same way. very much. I say the old guys and then I look in the mirror and say, hey, wait a minute, that's me. But Julie and I, when we left the church that morning, we looked at each of her and said, yeah, let's do this. I mean, it was just a, it was not even a question. And so we decided to go ahead. Now, one thing you'll learn about me is when I make a commitment, I was taught by my dad to have integrity. And when I make a commitment, I'll do it. And so I started reading the Bible, Julie read the Bible. And we struggle like everybody else. There would be times where you would

miss a day or two or three and you'd get behind. But because of the commitment that that I made, my commitment was to the Lord, it was about his kingdom. I would spend time to catch back up again. Well, it turned out to be a blessing. Getting behind can be a blessing because what it did, it opened my eyes up that 15 minutes is not that much time. And if I'm four days behind, I can spend an hour, 15 in the morning, 15 at lunch, 15 when I get home and before I go to bed, and I'm caught back up again. And so after two years of doing the Bible reading 14 and 15, 16 wasn't enough just to do the Bible read with the church. I had to do the Bible read the church and start doing more. And so I started doing 90-day reads, and that led to 60-day reads.

You'd read the whole Bible in 90 days. I did that four times, and then from there it grew. In actuality, and I shared this with you a few years back, but in actuality, when COVID hit, we had kind of shut down my office. I've got five restaurants in Southern Illinois, and I would manage the storage through from the drive-thew, but we tried to keep, you know, because we heard all these different things about, so we tried to only the people that had to be in the store, working and everybody else kind of out and we shut the office down. We work from home. And it gave me time up in Illinois to sit in my apartment. Well, what am I going to do? And I can share some things with you that will happen if you start to discipline yourself to read your Bible on a regular basis. And one of the things is God will free your calendar if you have the desire to spend time in the

word. And so I'm sitting here and it's like, well, what do I do? Well, I guess I'll read the Bible. I'm done it before in 90 days. I'll do it in 90 days. Well, after I got done, it's like, well, what I do now? I've 90 days into the year and I've already read the Bible once. I've never done it in a month. I'll just read it in a month. So I did it in a year or I did it in a month. And then after that, it's like, well, I've done it in 90 and I've done it in a month. I'll do it in two months. So then I'm half a year's done. And I thought, well, I'll just do this again. So I ended up doing the Bible six times and I was doing the reading with the church. So that's seven times. Well, the next year, I thought, you know what? I still got time and it's really not that

difficult. I'm going to just read the Bible every month. And so the next year, I read the Bible for 12 times. I read it every single month. After that, I decided, you know, really four times a year is about right for me. It's enough time in the word, and yet it's not overwhelming. And so last year, I'm really kind of almost ashamed to say I only read it twice. And so this year, I've made a commitment that I'll at least read it four times. Because I feel like that I'm step up, dude. I feel like I am a slacker in that respect. So, um, but, but, but, I feel like I'm a slacker. But here's what happens. What's amazing is, and if you've done the Bible read before and you've done it two or three times,

challenge yourself to do something a little bit different. Continue to do the Bible read with the church, but try to do it in a 90-day period of time or try to do it twice a year. And what happens is when you start to read the Bible on a little bit quicker scale, you'll start to see the pieces come together better. And it'll give you a better outlook and a view of what your Bible is all about. When you read it over a course of a year or 15 minutes here, and please do that if you haven't, and continue to do that as well, because I also continue to do it. But you'll start to see a different picture because by time you get from Genesis all the way to Revelation,

you pretty well forgot what you read back in Genesis and Exodus and Leviticus. So it's important when you start bringing those together a little quicker. And it really only takes about an hour of day to read the Bible in 90 days. It's not that difficult, folks. It really truly isn't. Okay. I have a line I use a lot at this desk that it's inappropriate to out-preach the preacher. But if you take your Bible reading and you shame him completely...

I'm not intended to do that. Good. We have a live audience. You may be able to hear them. We have a room full of young couples, which means they have a lot of small children, many of them, still at home. and I want to see if we can come up with the plan that will be a bit more accessible to them because when you were doing your monthly reading,

you didn't have a lot of little people. No, absolutely. You were at a time and a season where you had that space, but I think the value of it when you have little people at home is extraordinary. So can we talk about some ways, whether it's the 15 minutes a day or you include your kids in some portion of it?

Yeah, the 15 minutes a day, really in all sincerity, and I don't mean to be harsh with this, but I really think that that's a pretty easy target for anyone, even families with small children. If you have the desire to read the word, because the word will even read itself to you with the apps and the stuff we have nowadays. So it's really, you know, I mean, I don't know too many people that doesn't have 15 minutes in the car that they can spend time in the word or 15 minutes while the kids are taking a nap or whatever. It really comes down to can you create that desire and that passion to want to know the word? of God and then try to figure out a way in your schedule. You make that happen. I think it's important to put the Bible out to where it's, you see it. It's not just sitting on a shelf somewhere where you kind of forget about it, but you put it out on your coffee table,

or you put it out on your dinner table. Put it in a place where it reminds you, hey, I need to do my Bible reading. It's important to have those reminders on a regular basis. But the real thing is, you know, let's bring a little scripture into this, just to give you an ideal, in my opinion, of the reason why it's so important for us to be in the word and be in the word daily. And John, chapter 8, starting with 31 and 32. That's in the New Testament. New Testament. And we're into the New Testament right now. We'll be there before very long.

But Jesus says, if my words abide in you, then you are my true disciples. And you will know the truth and the truth will set you free. Now, we've heard that before, but listen to what Jesus says. He says, if my words abide in you, then you are my true disciples. And the truth, you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. What is the opposite of free? Bondage. Did we want to be in bondage? That gives me the incentive to want to be in the word of God, because Jesus said it, I believe it. And Jesus said, if my words abide in you, well, how else can I get his words to abide in me if I'm not in his word? And Alan, I've probably been through the Bible. I don't know exactly, but probably 40 plus

times now. And every time that I read it, and I pray and ask God to show me, but every time I read it, he slips something new in. I don't care how many times you read the word. He'll slide something new in that you've never seen before. And the reason why it happens is because one of the things that I can share with you as you read the Word of God is there's some things that will start to change in your life. And one of the things that will change in your life is you'll start to see how holy God is and how unholy you are. And it'll bring you to a place of repentance. I find myself repenting more now than I did back 10 years ago. And I'm not in the bars and I'm not out doing the things that the big ones, as you would say, you know, lying, coveting, all these

different things. But God will start to convict you, the Holy Spirit will start to convict you of little things that we think nothing of. I travel a lot. I'm on the road a lot. Somebody catch you off. You want to shake your fist. Anger rises up. It's just something that you do. And the Holy Spirit started convictomy of getting angry when that happened. He said, you don't know what's going on with them. That guy just might have got a call from his wife that his infant child quit breathing and she's on the way of the hospital and he's trying to get there. or maybe it's a woman and she just got a call from a nursing home that her elderly mother fell down and broke her hip and she's asking for her daughter as they get ready to load. You don't know. Of course, then again, he might be a jerk and that might be a different story as well. He needed a gesture. But he did, but he needs salvation as well. And I don't know why he's a jerk. I don't know why he's driving the way he's driving, but it gives you an opportunity instead of getting mad to pray. Pray for the people around them. they're not going to be involved in some kind of an accident. Pray for that the Holy Spirit would

direct someone that maybe is cutting you off for the wrong reasons, that the Lord would send labors into their life, that they can find salvation, that they can find truth, that they can find peace, and they can find happiness. But let's go back real quick to John 8, 3132. Bondage is something that we look around all the time, and as Christians we shouldn't be, but yet we are. We have anxiety. We have fear. years. We struggle with all different types of sickness and different things. I'm not saying that, you know, Alan is so good at explaining this. It doesn't mean that it's going to be an easy road. Jesus said there's trouble in this world, but don't worry, I've overcome the world. And so it

doesn't mean that, but it gives you the faith to be able to stand in those times of adversity and be able to have a peace that you wouldn't have unless you're in the word on a regular basis. I think the context of your life is important. Because conventional wisdom says that if you're spending time reading your Bible and depending on God, it's because you don't really have the skills to do it any other way. So you've kind of used it. You know, it's a crutch. And you don't seem to me, I've known you a while, you're not a guy that I would think of.

You need a crutch. You like to collect muscle cars. You scuba dive all over the world. You'll land your plane on a grass in the middle of grass field. which I think lacks some intelligence, but you do that. I probably would agree, but no. You know, I know a bit about what it means to grow up around all those horses and just the physical work that comes with that.

So it wasn't like you lacked strength or energy or ability or capability, and yet you made space for God. And the part that intrigued me is I watched it change you. And when I knew you, you were already a believer. You and your wife were coming to church. You lead a small group. If I called on you, you would help with whatever. But you rolled in for one of our meetings, and you knew Isaiah and Jeremiah better than I did.

And you were jacked up about it. I mean, I didn't have to talk. I just sat there and they kept refilling my coffee cup. And I think that's really important for the people listening that the Bible's not just for times when your world is collapsed. Not at all. Or when you've got a child that's desperately ill. I watched it change how you see the world, enough that it made me go back to my Bible and change my reading schedule.

Good. Isn't that good? Good. And I was going to, you're absolutely right. We've known each other long enough that you have witnessed the change that it's made in my life. And, you know, I can't stress enough how important it is to make that commitment and create that desire. you know, can I tell a real quick story about my family? I had an uncle.

I don't think you can tell a real quick story. I probably can't, but I will do my best. I had an uncle that we, I grew up in Southern Illinois. We were originally from Kentucky, and I had an uncle lived in Kentucky, and he was definition alcoholic. I never saw him without a beer in his hand. We would visit about two or three times a year, and from 8 o'clock in the morning until 8, 9 o'clock at night, he always had a beer.

I never saw him drunk. He's just stayed pickled. I don't know if you know what I'm talking about, but there's people that drink enough that they just don't, he didn't slur his speech. He didn't stagger around. He talked like you and I are talking, but he just always had a beer in his hand.

He couldn't hold a job. He lost his license. His wife had a good job. Unfortunately, she took care of him as he would stay home because that's just what he did. Well, as you can figure, and as he got a little bit older in life, he started having some health issues.

Went to the doctor. They did some testing. This was back early 80s. and determined that he had cirrhosis of the liver and liver disease, and they gave him probably about a year that he would probably live. And went home. As soon as he got home, he went straight to the kitchen, went straight to the refrigerator, opened the refrigerator, went over, popped open the beer, and poured it down the drain.

He went back to the refrigerator, got another beer, opened it, poured it down the drain, went back to the refrigerator until he emptied all the beer out of his house. And this is a man had been drinking for 20 plus years. Let me ask you a question, what changed? His prognosis didn't change. When he got done draining all that beer down the sink, he still had therosis of the liver. What changed was his desire? All of a sudden, in a moment, his desire went from he wanted to live more than he wanted to drink that beer.

And that's what we have to learn to cultivate. What is the thing that's stopping us from wanting to have the desire to be in the Word of God. That's the thing we've got to answer. And whatever that thing is, we need to repent and turn away from that thing and make a choice to make the effort. And if it's 10, 15 minutes a day, praise God. That's wonderful. Whatever it is that works for you, make an effort to start moving in that direction. You eat an elephant one bite at a time. So don't think that you need to eat the whole elephant in 30 days or 60 days or whatever. Down the road of God leads you to that, praise God. It's wonderful. It's a great experience. make a decision to start moving in that direction. I will go on to tell you that my uncle lived

for about another 18 years. Wow. And he told me on several occasions that he never had a desire to drink after he poured that last beer down the drain, that it was gone. Now, my mom was a good Christian woman and my aunt was a good Christian woman. They've been praying for him. But the point is, is that he made a decision and his desire changed to want to live versus to want to drink. And we can do the same thing, folks. It doesn't take. months and years to make a decision. If we want something bad enough, we will figure out a way to make it come true. And so we just got to somehow, some way, collate an ideal in our mind that it's important to read the Word of God. And I, like I said, trying to show the fact that I don't want to

live my life in bondage. I want to live my life free. And if you are free, you are free indeed in the word of God. And Jesus is words true. He said, you know, it's best that I go, because if I go, the Father will send the comforter, the Holy Spirit. In my name. and he will lead you in all truth and remind you of everything that I have said. Now, when Jesus, that's in John too. That's in John as well. John 14, John 14, absolutely. And so I'm glad you know that.

I was going to have to talk to you if you didn't. But absolutely. And the point is, is that we have this Holy Spirit. He's a person. We need to become so acquainted with him. He is here to help us. And that is the thing that makes the biggest change that I can think of is becoming closely acquainted, being baptized in the Holy Spirit because it changes everything.

If you haven't done that, I suggest that you seek that because it's there for you to do. You know, it goes into what we just read yesterday. We read yesterday, we read Matthew 25. And in Matthew 25, one of the first things that's in that chapter is the Ten Virgins. and of course five took a flask of extra oil. Five did not. They all fell asleep. When the bridegroom was delayed, they were awakened. The five that had the extra oil trim their lamps, the other ones that well was run out. We know the story. We've heard this before. The oil in that representation of that story is the Holy Spirit. And by the time the other ones went to get oil, it was too late. So we need the Holy Spirit.

And that's why Jesus said it's best that I go. Because if I go, the Father's going to send you the Spirit, the Holy Spirit, and He will lead you in all truth. So cultivate a relationship with him. He is good. He'll never make you do anything you don't want to do. He'll never force you to do anything that would embarrass you. But he will lead you.

And by his leading, you will come closer and closer to the Lord. And that's what I was talking about earlier, about the repentance. Because the closer we get to God, the holier he is, and the more that we see that we lack that holiness. And so therefore we start to repent more. And then faith builds and we move closer to the Lord. And then the Holy Spirit will start to remind us of things that we don't even think or sin. Just somebody drops a vase and you go, hey, way to go, genius.

You know what that caught? You know, just making smart remarks to people. And then I walk away and guys like, that wasn't the right thing to say. I know it sounds silly. But that's the way God starts working in your heart as you continue to pursue a relationship with him. And you get closer and closer to him that way. I like the paradigm of how you think about sin and pleasing God. If we brought it into our marriage, and if I said, you know, I'm a good husband because I didn't break any of the Ten Commandments,

that doesn't really make me a great husband. No, no. You know, okay, I didn't commit adultery, but I don't think I'm going to win the prize. No, no. And honoring God is like that. You know, I don't honor God just because I don't break like the high-profile issues. it's the desire of my heart to be pleasing to him. Amen.

But we've got a room full of young couples. And there are people listening to us all over the country that have little kids at home. So I want you to think, I want to step back a few years with when you've got little people at home and all the demands that come with that and your calendar is crowded. And your resources are probably spoken for before you get your hands on them. from the vantage points you have today, what would you say to Dave in that space? Well, all I can tell you is this. Whenever I lost my dad, I was 33, and we had young kids at home. And I wish at that time I was in the word, and that was the goals of my life.

It wasn't. But I will tell you this. I learned that people would call and say, hey, we need to do this meeting. I'm going to be in town. And I'd say, oh, you know what? My child's got a game that night. Well, it's the only not I'm going to be in town. Well, okay, I'll skip the game and I'll go to that meeting.

And after my dad died and realizing how he was 61, my mom was 60 when she passed away. And losing him so quickly, it opened my eyes up to the fact, folks, that we make those choices of what is important in our life. And so all the sudden, those meetings, I'd say, hey, you know what? I got something already. I didn't tell him what it was because if you tell them, hey, my kid's got a game. Oh, you can miss your kids game. that's not important. He'll have other games.

You know, this, I'm only going to be in town tonight, and I need to get with you or tomorrow night or whatever. But if I just tell him, hey, I've already got something playing tomorrow. I can't do it. Oh, okay. Well, I'm going to be back in town next Tuesday. Can we get, yeah, it works out. So the best thing, once again, is all I can go back to is the fact that you just have to

want it enough that you can figure out a way for what works in your family to put that time aside to read the word as a husband and a wife. Put your children in the room with you and read the word together. Every individual and every family is different, but you can figure it out, figure it out if you have enough desire to do so. But it takes that, first off, it takes that desire. People tell me all the time, well, I'll try. I run a business. I have over 400 employees, and people say, well, I'll try.

Well, I've got news for you. Most of the time people try, they'll fail because try doesn't give you the commitment to finish. Desire changes everything. We just witnessed four years of an unbelievable, and I'm not here to get in politics, but we just witnessed four years of a man, that had a desire that he went through everything that you can think about going through. And he ended up becoming the 47 will be the 47. But that's a picture of what desire will do when you're not willing to back away because you have something that if Scott Hamilton, you got the ice rink open.

If Scott was here, I think he could probably tell you a lot the same thing. Nobody wants to get up and go to training like Scott did all of his life. But he had a desire to be an Olympic medalist. And he competed and he did. But it takes that. And I don't know how to tell you to get that other than the fact that you have to replace whatever is stealing the time away from spending your time in the word and replace that with spending the time in the word. Let those other things become most important. I like your commentary on trying.

I don't quote Yoda a lot. But one of my favorite Yoda sayings is do or do not, trying doesn't matter. Trying doesn't matter. My dad would tell me, he said, Dave, he never let me use the word key. He'd say, Dave, can't doesn't exist. Can't's just another way of saying you don't want to. If you don't want to, say you don't want to. If I say, Alan, I can't miss the game on Sunday.

What I'm really telling you is, I don't want to miss the game on Sunday. And so when I, somebody uses that term to me, it's just basically telling me there's other things I want to do worse than that. And if I wanted to do that enough, I will figure out a way to get it done. And that's my life. That's what the way I've accomplished things in my life is that I have created things that I wanted to accomplish and I set the desire to do something. And whatever it takes to do it, I do it.

And that's just, I don't know how else to tell you. It's not, that's why a lot of people, unfortunately, are not as successful. It's because they try. And trying's good if trying makes you become more committed to develop that desire to continue to push on. But usually trying, you've already decided you really don't want it anyway. If I put mushrooms in front of Allen right now and say, try these, he's like, ain't no way I'm going to try those. You made your mind.

You don't like mushrooms anyway. If you don't know Alan, he's not a mushroom guy. It's fungus. It's fungus. But I will tell you something about Alan Jackson that he doesn't even know himself. So he's going to be scared right now. But I will tell you, if God sent down tonight, the 11th commandment says, thou shall eat mushrooms or you will not enter the kingdom of heaven,

he'd figure out a way to eat mushrooms because this man wants to serve the Lord. And that is desire. You would do something you didn't want to do. in order to please God. I know you. And that's the same thing that we have to determine for ourselves. What is it that is most important to me? And then how do I accomplish that? And if pleasing the Lord and living in life that honors him, let our light shine for the Lord, exercising our faith into public, that's what it's all about. And so we have to, we have to conflict that, you know? It doesn't come easy. You know, you go back to Genesis chapter 4,

verse six, and we're talking about Cain. And God told Cain, he said, you know, sin is knocking at your door. And it wants to destroy you or desires you. But you must overcome it. Who's got to overcome it? We have to make those choices. God will help us once we make those choices. But he doesn't make them for us. So it comes down, folks, to do you really want to spend time? Do you want to get closer to God? Do you want to please the Lord? Do you want your family to serve the Lord? Do you want your children to grow up. Those are all the things that you have to start to cultivate to say, yeah, that's what I want. And so what do I have to do to get it? And then you have to start scheduling yourself to be able to get that accomplished. I'll tell you real quick, I know

know where we're at with time and stuff, but tell you a real quick situation here as well. I told you, God, it would change your schedule. There's a lot of things that happen when you start getting into the Word. And God will change your schedule. And that first year, in a half, two years that I was in reading the Bible, 15 minutes a day. And I get behind. I try to catch up one thing and another. And I would keep telling the Lord, you know, Lord, I want to, I want to do this. I'll get up early tomorrow, Lord. I want, you know, and it just wasn't happening.

It just, I kept stumbling through different things. And so I told the Lord, I said, Lord, I'm really serious. I'm going to do better. I'm turning away from this. I was just making excuses in all sincerity. And all of a sudden I started waking up at three in the morning. And God said, you're not busy right now. Thone's not ringing.

And I said, yeah, that's true. Well, maybe, nah, I'll just go back to sleep. And over a period of several weeks, that started becoming my life. And it changed everything because, you know what? When I got up, I'm a busy man. I got a lot of things going on. I got a lot of people to count on me. I got a lot of things to do.

And it's very easy to not be able to have that time. Even though I don't have small children home anymore, we got grandkids. Got 11 grandkids and they're wonderful and they do come over. But I don't have the commitment. I have the commitment to them, but not to have to take it. take care of them like their mom's doing and their dads and that. I get to spoil them and send them home. But the Lord, it was kind of, it's like, yeah, right here at three o'clock, right across your calendar for the next three months that I see, you don't have nothing at three o'clock in the morning.

So I started getting up and spend time in the word. And once again, I go back to what my dad said. If there's two ways to go, take the hard road. And it's more rewarding. So I've cultivated that into my, nobody has to do that. It's just something between me and the Lord that that's something and I want to do now, and it's become part of my life. I've been doing that since 2016, and I've got two other men that we text each other just for encouragement to kind of, you know, let each other know how I'm up to. But it's changed my life, but what's funny about that is that there's times that I'll go to sleep, and I always pray when I go to sleep, Lord, make sure you get me up before three.

I set the alarm, but he always does. He wakes me up before three, and there's some times that I'll get up and I'll look at the clock, and it's 1.30, 135, 1.4. I said, oh, I got a few more, and it's like, no, I need to get, you know, I just got this pulling like I need to get up. And it's like, it's, it's almost like, I got something I want to share with you. You need to get up and spend time in the word. And so, uh, uh, I lay there and toss a little bit and saying, okay, I'm awake now. I'm like, get on up. I say that to say God is good. And if you desire him and seek him, he chases after us before we chase after him. Amen. And so it's worth,

you know, I'm in a different stage of my life. I know you guys are young and you got everything ahead of you that's pulling at you. But it's worth the effort. I promise you. It'll change your life. I wish I would have done it a lot a long time ago. Didn't know. At that time, I can't go back and change it. And they're really isn't the perfect life season. Every season comes with all the reasons to be selfish. Amen. Amen. You know, when you're young, your kids want your time. When you're older, you think it's my time I've earned it. I'm not giving it to anybody else. Amen. Amen. One of the mentors in my life said something to me when I was young, that God will be no man's debtor.

And I'm sure I didn't understand it at the time, but I have come to understand that whatever we give to the Lord, he gives back to us in a most remarkable way. Absolutely. Whether it's time or excellence or attention or resources. And I think your story highlights that. You know, you chose to make a priority out of the, to the Lord in a different way. You had a faith. It was real. It was legitimate.

It affected your family. But you changed the nature of how you. responded to him and he met you in a remarkable way. He continues to do so. Thank you for sharing that with us. Thank you very much for having me. I appreciate you. Appreciate you too.

I want to be sure you get the invitation. I've been giving it in every place I have had a platform since this year began. Join us in reading the Gospels. First four books of the New Testament, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. We're not going to start out on the Bible in a month plan. We may, but we're not going to do it this. year. But in about 15 minutes a day, we can read through those four books in a 60-day window of time. The characters are pretty familiar. You probably know who Jesus is. I suspect you've

heard of Matthew or Luke or John. The cities are familiar, Jerusalem, Bethlehem. You know those from our holidays. So it doesn't feel as strange to you as some portions of Scripture, but he will open your life to God in a new way. And I am without question. convinced that if you'll do that, God will meet you there someplace. Spoiler alert, when we get to the end of the Gospels, I'm going to ask you to read the rest of the New Testament with me. We'll have that done before Memorial Day with the same time commitment, and we'll see what's next after that. I'm believing that there will be tens of thousands of people across the nation. Join us in doing this.

We're recording this just on the eve of the inauguration, and some people have great hopes that there's this new team of leaders going to Washington to change our nation. I'm grateful that they're going and I have some expectations, but our nation won't change unless we change. And the best way I don't do that is to begin by opening our lives to the Word of God. So get you a Bible. I'm grateful for all the digital approaches, but if you're going to embark on this journey, get you a paper copy. Amen. And when that won't work, get out your phone or however you want to listen. But if you'll do that, I believe God will open doors that I wouldn't even have the courage or the wisdom.

them to ask for as we're taping this. Culture and Christianity, our faith's got to get outside our churches, and it's got to be more than a private part of our lives. It has to affect every part of who we are, or it won't prepare us for eternity. Dave, thanks for your courage and your transparency. Once again, thanks for having me. I've enjoyed it. All right, God bless you, and I'll see you soon.

As we begin a new year, we have new opportunities unfolding before us to grow in our faith and make a difference for the kingdom of the world. of God, and it has never been more vital for us to lead with our faith at our kitchen tables, our workplaces, and our communities. Join us as we read through the Bible cover cover. Making a commitment to read your Bible daily will significantly transform your spiritual life. As you read, you'll gain a deeper understanding of the character of God and a greater

awareness of what he's doing in the earth. We want to support and equip you to stand firmly in truth so you can boldly lead with your faith. You can download the app or go to the website at wchurch.org for more information. Let's make an intentional effort to seek the Lord and invite the Holy Spirit to work in our lives as we read the Word of God together this year. Hey, thanks for joining me today. Before you go, please like the podcast and leave a comment so more people can hear about this topic too. If you haven't yet, be sure to subscribe to Alan Jackson Ministries YouTube channel and follow the Culture and Christianity podcast on Spotify, Apple, Apple, podcast or wherever you get your podcast. Together, let's learn how to lead with our faith and change

our culture. I'll see you next time.