The Bryce Crawford Podcast - Are You Truly A Christian (EP 51)

Episode Date: October 29, 2024

In this video, Bryce talks about true christianity. Filmed By; Josh Rodriguez @whitehorse.studios MERCH👉 https://www.jesusinthestreet.com subscribe for more! Sow Into My Ministry One-Time or Monthly! Visit 👉 https://www.equipnet.org/missionaries/bcrawford   (all donations are tax deductible) Download Our FREE Bible Plan https://growinfaith.readytoconnect.com/join-the-one-year-bible-challenge (https://growinfaith.readytoconnect.com/join-the-one-year-bible-challenge) follow me on other platforms! Podcast Instagram 👉https://instagram.com/brycecrawfordpodcast Personal Instagram 👉 https://instagram.com/brycecrawford Merch Instagram 👉 https://instagram.com/ilovejesus Tiktok (main) 👉https://www.tiktok.com/@brycecrawford Tiktok (2nd) 👉 https://www.tiktok.com/@adventuresofbryce Snapchat https://snapchat.com/add/brycecraww Twitter 👉 https://twitter.com/ibrycecrawford #christianity #christian #Jesus #BryceCrawford #christiantiktok #christianvid eos #holyspirit #Jesusheals #viral #christianvideo #venicebeach #evangelism

What's going on, guys? Welcome back to another episode of the Bryce Crawford podcast. I'm Bryce. And in today's episode, we're going to be talking about, are you really a Christian? How do you know if you're following the Lord? What areas of your life are you able to identify that you actually don't just vocalize Christianity with your lips? But there's been an actual heart change in your life. I'm super excited to talk about this. Before we get into it, guys, you see the hoodie I'm wearing the lovely merch. We always always. where go to Jesus in the street.com, get some merch for yourself. Now, we're just going to dive into scripture. What does scripture say about Christianity? Are we really a Christian? Well, here's just four ways that you can just identify naturally in your life if you're really a Christian. Faith in Jesus Christ, transformation, active obedience,

and a relationship with the Holy Spirit. And we're going to see in scripture what this looks like. to be a real Christian. Well, Jesus right off the bat, in Matthew 16 says, if anyone would come after me to be my disciple, let him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me. So Jesus is actively giving a differentiation here between people who say they believe in Jesus

to people who put their actions where their mouth is. And there's even this thing where even the demons believe, in Jesus Christ. So what separates the demon's belief in Jesus from your belief in Jesus Christ? It's simple, active obedience. And we're going to dive into scripture and what that says here later on. The first scripture I want to dive into right now is Galatians 5 19 through 24. Because in Galatians 5, you have almost two different trees are displayed in this passage.

You have a tree that bears one kind of fruit and a tree that bears another kind of fruit. He says, now the works of the flesh are evident. Sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, that's new age. Emnity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. but the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

So here's the reality right off the bat. What makes someone a Christian? How are Christians justified? Faith in Jesus Christ. The same way Abraham was justified, all the people of old were justified. all the people of old were justified they weren't justified by their works they were justified by faith

if you don't believe me go read Hebrews 11 the cloud of witnesses you have guys like Abraham Moses legends of the faith someone like Rahab the prostitute how could Rahab the prostitute be amongst the cloud of witnesses it was her faith that justified her

and so we know that faith and trust in Jesus Christ is what justifies us if we believe in him with faith we're going to talk about what that looks like later but when you put your faith and trust in Jesus, there's actually a promise that we receive. We see in John 14, and we see it in Acts when Jesus Christ ascends in heaven. And it is the Holy Spirit. In the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit was for select people, but now that the veil is torn because of Jesus Christ,

every human being that puts their faith in Jesus can have access of the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit isn't just for intimacy. The Holy Spirit is the seal on your heart so that you know that you know that you know. okay so when it says in galatians five the fruit of the spirit it's saying look if you are bearing these fruits this is an identification factor that you know that you have the holy spirit in you okay if you want to know that you have the holy spirit in you here's the fruit of your life love joy peace patience kindness faithfulness genleness and self-control then before that he says hey listen if you are on the verbs like I don't know if I have a heart change, if I've had a transformation, or if I haven't had a transformation, are these the fruits in your life?

Sexual immorality, impurity, idolatry, sorcery, indity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like that. Now, here's the reality. Here's the difference here. I got to make this very clear, all right? There's a difference in being in active repentance, all right? To repent means to turn the opposite direction of the life that you once live.

live and start to chase Jesus. When we're born in this world, we're born into a sinful nation, and we are actively sinning. We are chasing sin. That is our desire. But when we repent, we turn away from sin and start to chase Jesus. Now, if something is a fruit in your life, it is constantly, constantly coming to fruition. All right?

A tree bears fruit in season. All right? So when the season's over, it prepares itself to bear that same fruit again. Okay? So to identify if you are really living out the Christian faith or not, look at your heart for a second. Ask God to reveal in your heart. Is sexual immorality, impurity, idolatry, jealousy, fits of anger, envy, and drunkenness, are these things in my life fruits that are constantly producing in my life?

Or is there something that is mentioned in that passage that is you have actively turned away from that you are chasing Jesus with the possibility of if, not when, if you fall back into it. There's a difference in falling than there is in repetitive, unrepentanted sin. And that's the differentiation he gives here. The fruit on your tree is unrepentantant sin or repentant lifestyle. Here's an example. Unrepentant sin fruit would be sexual immorality. Repentive lifestyle of Jesus would be love.

Love versus lust. You bear in lust in your life or you bear in love? And so we have to identify the fruits on your tree. They will know you by your fruits. Same way you identify false teachers is by their fruits. So we can look at Galatians 5 and say, what fruits are you bearing in your life? All right?

Like Proverbs says that the righteous man falls seven times but gets back up. So is it in your pursuit of Jesus Christ with the possibility of falling? to an old sin pattern, not because you're doing it on purpose, not because you're repetitively doing it because you don't care about changing. It's you're actively trying to change. If you accidentally fall into sin, you ask God for grace and mercy and you keep chasing Jesus versus continually sinning over and over and over and over and over and they're not being repentance.

And because of that, that is bad fruit you're bearing on your tree. And that is the works of the flesh. as constantly bearing bad fruit. Let's look at some other scriptures. 1 John 2.3 says, and by this, we know that we have come to know him if we keep his commandments. And Jesus Christ himself,

he says, whoever has my commandments and keeps them is he who loves me. And he who loves me will be loved by my father. And I will love him and manifest myself to him. Now, we've got to steer away from this thing. I've got to be careful how I say this, because oftentimes when I talk about identifying if you're a real Christian, people think that I'm preaching a works-based salvation. I'm not.

The Bible is very clear. It's by grace through faith that we are saved. What is James 2 says? He says, but someone will say, you have faith and I have works. Show me your faith apart from your works, and I will show you my faith by my works. When I stand before Jesus Christ on Judgment Day, and I look at him in the face, I'm not going to say, well, I was a good person. I did all of these good things. I prophesied in your name. I cast it out demons in your name.

I healed the sick in your name. So those are the reasons why Jesus, you should grant me eternity with you. Absolutely not. It is by grace through faith in Jesus Christ that I am justified to be in the presence of God. But in this lifetime, someone's actions can identify that they actually believe what they say they believe.

And so the fruit of our faith and trust and belief in Jesus is what we're doing with our actions in our mouth. A lot of people talk nowadays, but very few people will put their hand to the plow. And James 1 says, religion and undefiled before the Lord is this, to visit widows and orphans in their affliction. And so when Jesus Christ says, if you love me, you'll obey me. my commandments. And he says in 1 John 2, we know that we've come to know him if we obey his commandments. We don't obey his commandments because we have to. We don't listen to Jesus because we have to. We don't read the Bible or pray because we have to. We obey Jesus because we want to because we love him because he's a good father. That's the same way I listen to my parents. I don't listen to my parents because

I feel like I have to. I listen to them because I love them and I care about them and I care about what they say. And in the same way, that's why we listen to him. And so the reason that we do, do good deeds, the reason that we are actively obedient to the Bible and to Jesus Christ isn't because I'm trying to organize some master plan to get into the pearly gates of heaven. No, I'm actively obeying Christ because I have faith in him. And our faith and trust in Jesus Christ and trusting in his words should motivate our actions to look and serve like him. And in Luke 3, John the Baptist rebukes the Pharisees.

the guys who were the outside of the cup was clean but the inside was dirty those same guys who were proclaiming christ with their lips with their hearts were far from him john the baptist says hey show me the fruit of your repentance he says show me the fruit of your repentance is there fruit in your life that you've changed if you're someone that wears a cross necklace around your neck and says i'm a christian if you're someone that says oh well i go to church every sunday or i do a devotional every morning and so i'm a christian i would actually challenge you the day that you claim to have become a christian is there a a change in your lifestyle before and after you met Jesus. And if there isn't a change in your lifestyle, if there isn't a transformation, Ezekiel says that he turns our heart of stone into a heart of flesh, an active transformation. Would people be able to tell that there's something different

about you? Then I would actually call you, my brother or sister, to call upon the Lord and reflect on your life and ask Jesus Christ to do a legit heart surgery on you. He is the great physician. And if we truly believe and put our faith and trust in Jesus Christ, there will be an active heart change. Faith in Jesus Christ causes an active heart transformation, and because of that active heart transformation, we are actively in submission and obedience to Him. And because of that active and active obedience to Jesus Christ, we cultivate relationship with the Holy Spirit. The last thing I want to close out, well, yeah, the last thing I want to close out with here are two scriptures. 2 Corinthians 5 says if anyone is in Christ he is a new creation the old has passed away behold the new has come like I said earlier if you can't identify a life change from before

you claim to know Jesus to after the day you claim to gave your life to Jesus then scripture here is very evident that when you submit to Jesus Christ you will actively become a new creation you don't have to identify with your sin anymore you identify with being his adopted son or daughter into the kingdom there's a scripture i want to read to you guys um to kind of close this out that gave me a really big fear of the lord my friend shared it with me before we started this and i had to add it in here luke nine 26 jesus says for whoever is ashamed of me and of my words of him will the son of man be ashamed when he comes in his glory and the glory of the father and of the holy angels

there's a call for every believer to preach the gospel boldly. The reason we preach the gospel is not because we feel like we have to again, but because we're motivated by love, the reason we serve and do actions out of obedience to God is because we have been moved by the love of Jesus Christ itself. Everything is out of love, faith, and belief in Jesus, every action that we do. That word ashamed in the Greek and Hebrew translates to reluctancy,

to hesitancy and humiliation. So when you're walking around with that cross necklace on and someone comes before you and says, hey, what does that mean? And you just go, oh, it's some silly religion thing. Or you're wearing a WWJD bracelet. Someone goes, hey, what does WWJD mean? And you mean like, oh, it's nothing like I'm a Christian,

but it's just something that Christians wear. Right? When the rubber meets the road and there are opportunities where people's eternities have been presented to you and you have the opportunity to share the gospel and you are hesitant, feel humiliated about your faith, ashamed. It says that on judgment day that we will be held accountable for that reluctancy that we showed Jesus on earth. And I'm not saying here, you have to hear me carefully. I don't have to work for Jesus to love me.

I don't have to work for him to let me into heaven, but we've got to be very clear here. If we really say we believe in Jesus, if we really claim to be Christian, then we will be joyful and proud of our relationship with Christ. So much so that we want to tell everyone about him to invite them into that same relationship that we have with them. That's such a cool thing. The term Christian means little anointed one. And are we going to wear that title proudly and see, man, I'm a Christian. Like, I want to serve and love like Jesus. I want people to see the heart change in me.

Like my, a goal of mine that I've had ever since I became a Christian was letting my shadow spark conversation of someone just, man, man, like, hey, I know that sounds crazy, but the way that you walk, I can tell there's something different about you. My goal, like a goal ever since I became a Christian was to let the way I walk and look, touch someone's heart so that they have to come and ask me, oh, the way that you look, the way that you walk, there's got to be something different about you. What is it? Because I can tell you one thing.

People aren't going to come to Christ by how often you talk about Jesus with your lips, how close you are to Him. People aren't going to come to Christ with how often you say, oh, I'm this close to Jesus. I'm this close to Jesus. because the same people that talk about how close they are to Jesus are the same people that misrepresent Christ to people and then those people get a bad taste about Jesus in their mouth. I'm tired of Christians talking about how holy they are.

I'm tired of Christians talking about how close they are to Jesus. Why don't you just go meet with him in private and let your personal relationship with Jesus reflect in your actions and let our actions be a testament to the work that Jesus has done in our heart so much so that people say, what's different about you because you're doing X, Y, and Z, and normal people don't do that. And that's where we get to go, Jesus Christ has changed my life.

God, I just pray that you will speak to us and go, God, like, are we really serving you? Like, this is more than a title. This is more than just a label. Like, God, do we have real relationship with you? If we do, God, thank you for the Holy Spirit being this healing. If we don't, God, would you just reveal to people that don't have real relationship with you that have been mistaken, and that they think that just because they believe, like God, even the demons believe. Like what separates us from the demons, God?

We reveal to people if they don't have relationship with you, tug on their heart and say, man, come to me all who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest. Jesus, thank you for personal relationship and the opportunity to be close to you. We love you, Jesus. And it's in your name. We pray. Amen. Guys, thank you so much for watching and listen to this episode.

If you like it, follow us on all platforms, Bryce Crawford podcast. Love you guys. visit jesus in the street.com. We'll see you guys next episode.