Unashamed with the Robertson Family - Ep 370 | Missy & Jase Experience Greek Socialism, Facial Profiling & Courageous Underground Churches

Episode Date: October 27, 2021

Jase and Missy are back from their adventures in Greece, and they're appalled by the way socialism has ravaged the country. Jase gets facially profiled AGAIN at the airport. A yellowjacket creeps into Phil's beard, and chaos ensues. Jase delivers a message that gets transmitted to underground churches, and he finds inspiration in the people who risk their lives to share Jesus. Missy tells the story of a family who found God after an amazing journey to escape persecution in Afghanistan. And Jase describes one of the most phenomenal meals he's ever had. -- Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I am unashamed. What about you? Sounds about that. We may have a derail on that. I think Phil stories are better than that. That may be our second. Code open for the second. You want to save it for the second?

Let's say that for the second. Yeah. You ready? They're good. So we, so welcome home, Jay's. And we've added Missy, which is always a pleasure. People love it when you're on Missy. They love to see Jay's squirm.

which is funny because before we got started, Jay's is eating his customary Chick-fil-A chicken biscuit, because every podcast is better with Chick-fil-A. We need to get them as a spot. They need to pay me for something, right? So Missy says, you need to get that biscuit out of your beard. And then she looks at Josh and says, who's in charge of that?

I said, no one's in charge. Someone needs to me. There's no making Jay's look better. Then he starts talking about his hair, how frizzy is it. I had to tuck it. I had to tuck the hair because it looked like I just stuck my finger in a light. Well, we did a lot of debating on whether we should have hair and makeup or not.

Oh, no. I'm sure there was a big debate about that. Should we do it, you know, how to make up? I actually think something from Greece when I came back, there was something in the air. Probably there was one of the dirt. There was lots of things in the air. So when I got back, my hair just fried. So I don't know.

Maybe you're a woman. Maybe you can help me. I don't think I don't think I can help you. But what's interesting about Greece, and we're going to talk a lot about grease today because you guys were just... Hold on. Now, didn't they invent the Grecian formula? I don't know. Of what?

You put it in your hair and they called it a Grecian formula. Now I'm connecting all the dots. I went there. Research and development. You guys check on that. My hair fried. Isn't there a product called Grecian formula? There's a Brazilian blowout.

You might do well with that. I think Grecian formula. was the hair die back in the day. Jay's for you to become Vogue regarding hair. I'm not going to tell you, son. You ain't going to make it. I never think of Jays and Vogue in the same sense. No.

That doesn't really happen for me. I miss he could be Vogue. I have no idea what you are talking about. I know you do. Leaving along. So here's what's interesting thing about Greece. So, because dad and I went a few years ago. Where did you all go?

We just went to Athens only because we were film. But so Greece is an ancient empire that as we know from the Bible at one time was one of the, you know, greatest empires on the earth. I mean, they ruled everything at one period of time. And but now it felt to me like it's a third world country. I mean, it's not, but it felt felt. Did it feel that way to you? I mean, just because it's kind of there's a lot of third world country aspects. That's what I thought. Which is very strange. When you can't take toilet paper, and flush it down the commode. That's a trigger for that's third world country.

We're off to the wrong start. Did y'all have to pay to go to the bathroom? Because we had to like pay to go to the bathroom. Remember that day? First time we were there was, you know, we got to go to the bathroom. And they were, you had to put coins into a thing to unlock the door to go into his bathroom. I've forgotten that. I've never paid before that to go to the bathroom.

You got to remember. I learned, you know, we went with Larry, who we, Larry Bowles, who we had on a podcast with Ryan, look at back. about a hundred podcasts ago. He was on there somewhere. He was really good. He laughs a lot, big laugh. He's from Oklahoma.

That's a great ministry. The plan, what he did, he's been there 10 or 12 years, and all these refugees from surrounding countries come there to get away from these Muslim-controlled or just radical Muslim or radical religious. It's kind of a portal to the Western world from the East. Yeah. And so they come there to start a new life. Of course, how they got there, because we heard a lot of stories were rough.

I mean, we heard. These are the ones who survived the trip. Right, because a lot of people don't. No, they don't survive. So there, but he had an interesting point. He said in the 1970s and 80s, there were 60 to 70,000 people in Athens. Well, the government turned the country. into a socialistic type country.

Correct. Well, now, 2021, there's over 6 million people in Athens. That aren't Greeks. Well, no, just total. They are total. I'm saying we got 70,000 from the 70s and 80s. Now it's over 6 million. We got too many people in a tight space here.

And a lot of those were immigrated in, right? Now, a lot of them are refugees, but all the rural places, due to their structure of the government, couldn't make a living. So when you get out of the city, which we only did a couple of times because I literally was so claustrophobic, I thought, I have to, I just have to get out of this countryside. Well, it was awesome, but there was nobody there. A lot of abandoned, beautiful little villages just completely abandoned, houses, homes. Well, this staff. I'll move to the city where they could just try to... Well, because seven out of ten people in the city who have jobs work for the government.

So that's what happened. So what I realized is whoever is for a socialistic society, go there and stay a week. And let me know. Because like you have severe homelessness. I mean, people, if they got to go to the bathroom, you're talking about bathroom, they just go right there in the street in front of. everybody we actually saw it. I hate to tell you jace but these united states of america people that want to do it here we on there we're on the way they're just not well informed if I i get it that

you know it sounds really great you'll always have a job you work with government you always have a job and you always be cared for and taking care of and health care is free but we all know that it's not free and that i i told jace on the plane back home i said why is it that some americans think that we're going to do socialism different. It all ends up the same, and it's really, really sad. And the streets, they're filthy, they're dirty, they're narrow, no one.

It's like what Larry and Kathy Bowles told us is there are not really laws here. They're just guidelines, you know? So you're seeing people just, you know, when they're driving, they're driving opposite way on a one-way street. They're cutting in through corners. They're going over, you know, the curbs.

And there's no police. Well, there's too many people to enforce. The roads, which Larry was driving, which he normally doesn't, but, you know, there was a little crew of us, so we had a van. And, I mean, he's both hands on the steering wheel. Like, here we go. It was crazy. The little motorcycles, they go in between the cars constantly.

I would say every 10 seconds. there's a motorcycle going in between you and the other car. And the lane is already too small. And I thought, he said, you know, you would think there'd be body scattered everywhere. He said, but they got it figured out. So I was like, where are they going? Because they're not going outside of the city. But that was kind of the backdrop, which I'm not a city guy.

So, you know, realize that this was as big a sacrifice as I could possibly have been told. I would say that we were shocked because when we, as Americans think of Greece, personally, I think of Mama Mia. I think of the movie. Mama Mia. That's the Greece I want to see. And, you know, the beautiful countryside and the white buildings with the blue domes and just the Bougainville everywhere and all the pots and cleanliness. That's not what we saw. Well, it's out there.

It must be there somewhere, but it's not where we were. And that's not where the ministry was happening. and that's what we were there to support and to witness and see. And Jace, I will say, it was shocking to me because, you know, we went with one kingdom who, you know, is under the eldership of our church. Ryan Lee, who were very good friends with, but Ryan calls Jace, which I would have said, never call him to ask him this. Because I know what the answer is going to be, but he called Jays and asked, told him,

you know, they're going to take a small crew to Greece to see what Larry's doing and check on the church there and all that would we want to go? And Jay said, yeah. I said, what? I mean, but here's the reason why is because what Larry and his crew is doing there is incredible. It's amazing. Yes, and we really wanted to see it happening. And once we did see it happening, I love it even more.

It's a hard, hard place to live. There is nothing easy about living there. Do you know why I said yes? because I've always thought, you know, we talk about the war on terror in these radical groups in these countries where they just don't value every human being. I know the greatest weapon, quoting Corinthians, via the Holy Spirit, that the weapons we fight with are not of the world. You know, they have the power.

Where is that at? First Corinthians, 12. They have the power to demolish strongholds and get into people's thoughts. and help them take every thought captive to Christ. And so I thought the best thing you can do is to change the heart. And Jesus is the way to do that. So for a guy, you know, Larry from Oklahoma in the rural areas of Oklahoma to go over there, I thought if he's willing to do that to try to bring these people to Jesus,

I'm willing to go over there and get involved. I'm not going to gripe and complain about, you know, people flying into buildings in our country if I'm not willing to risk my life to try to change something. Because I realize that even though it's a small group, that God does powerful things in small groups of people. That's right. And so I just wanted to go check it out and encourage. And so they asked me to preach on Sunday.

Was it Sunday that we did that? Yeah. And look, this is, I mean, a lot of, we're not. Was it Sunday when they met there? I don't know. We're not far in question. Well, you got to remember. Most people may don't say this.

We're not going to share every detail because what they're doing is dangerous. Right. These countries where they come from, you know, it all started with helping refugees from a humanitarian standpoint and then sharing Jesus with them. And look, some of the stories Larry told us, because a lot of these refugees, if they don't have their papers, they put them in prison. And he goes in there and shares Jesus with him. He just tries to befriend them and be good to them, share Jesus with them. Well, what happened? there's less refugees now, but these early converts have now turned into leaders.

And they have a lot of Bible training during the week. We sat in on, you sat in on two sessions. I won. I mean, it's hours of very good Bible training. Right. And they love it. It's actually like faith training. You know, it's not a whole lot about let's dig into the scripture.

It's let's dig into why you need to change your life and what it means. to actually change your life for Jesus because they understand Jesus because they came from a very rule-oriented way of life with religion. Can we say that religion? Yeah. Well, I mean, Muslim, Islam, yes. And so the women especially,

and when they hear about the love of Jesus, they're in, you know, the heart is turned for Jesus. But then they're like, you know, how do I live that now? Because they're so used to a completely different way of life. And so he talks about redemption. He talks about salvation in terms of how to encourage other people and share salvation with other people. So one thing that he, I learned a lot sitting there listening to him because it's just about how you live your life and the decisions that you have to make daily and parenting and, you know, reaching out with your family.

But one thing that he said that really stuck out to me was even a lot of Christians do this. it's not about adding Jesus to your life. You don't add him to your life. You empty your life and fill it with Jesus. He wants everything. And so he's really going deep with them in ways that will really help change their entire way of thinking into a new world. And it was really amazing to hear. One of the things that I'm always impressive about Larry is he understood that the gospel of Jesus and him is multifaceted.

So different aspects of that affects different cultures. And so he really zeroes in on him coming to earth and why. Remember when he was talking how important the idea of Jesus coming here was to most of the Muslim world that he speaks to? Whereas in an American culture, that's not, I mean, that's important. But, you know, we focus much more on the cross. You know, everything here is about what happened on the cross or what happened in the tomb. And so it's just a different mindset of how you came to Christ, which is the, the, I think, I mean...

Hang on, let's take a break now, yeah. I mean, the key thing is these are radical movements that people are escaping from. And the group that we met with, because they had these rules, they're still pretty well at early stages of the coronavirus rules there. I mean, you couldn't have more than 25 people in a room. You had to wear a mask pretty much everywhere. And a lot of the other rule-oriented things they had about, places we went. I mean, you couldn't touch a statue or take a picture of some things in, or they

blew the whistle. I had like a lifeguard. It's like a lifeguard. Yes. You think you're just out. So you're walking around. There's lifeguards everywhere. But that doesn't even surprise me in a heavy government society. Of course you're going to have this. Of course. The number one job I've noticed in Athens is whistleblower. Because everyone's funny. Not like the kind of tell a story. I mean, literally whistleblower. With 10,000 people, you know, and all of a sudden I hear the whistle, I think, some old boy, you know,

they're looking at me. Sir, do not take pictures of the artifacts, but they said that in some kind of Grecian you weren't getting it. Oh, I was, I blow no Grico. Every time

they came in front of me, I But they were speaking Greek, but the refugees were all speaking Farsi. Yeah. They all speak Farsi. So we were kind of like, okay, then I thought, I think I would learn, you know, thank you in Farsi and I would say it in Greek. And it was like, I don't know who's Greek. When you reached, how many interpreters did you have? I just had one.

Oh, usually there's like two. Well, they were Farsi. I mean, there's different people, but like I said, when the rules were down to 25, which we slightly probably broke that. We had mainly Iranians, which they preferred to be called Persians, which I learned that, and Afghanistan, Afghans. Only a couple, though. Most people were from Iran. That was the group.

And what's ironic is when I got there, like day two, I get sick, I mean, violently sick, which I thought, well, it can't be the coronavirus because I got, you know, I had the vaccine and then got tested within a 48-hour period, which is what the rules were. So then when we get to the airport, when we land in Greece, I get out and lo and behold, I've been chosen randomly to get tested again.

And I was furious because I was like, I just got tested. I mean, I have the document. You know, random. And I was furious because I was like, Facial profiling is alive and well. They saw me and said, right this way. That guy looks like.

The next thing I know, I'm being taken off by a bunch of Greek police way away from the herd. And I just didn't like it. Yeah. And I was tested. They saw that frizzy hair and beer and they were like, there's a lot of places for coronavirus to hide right here. I just, I just was thinking this is spiritual war right here because I was tested vigorously. I mean, I said to the tested agent. because he couldn't understand English.

I said, you should have been a butcher. And he's like, I blow no English essay. Well, they just run a thing up your nose, right? Oh, yeah, but it was with force. And there was no care and concern whatsoever. And I was wanting to abort the mission right then. But anyway, what I'm saying is I got sick. And I thought I can't speak because one day I just could not move.

I could not get out of bed. And I really think that I was because of the prayers of people, because the next day that I was going to speak, I got up and I could barely walk. I was dizzy. And I was like, I'll tell you what, Lord, I'm going to go if I can make it. And if I can't, if I pass out, I'm going to consider that. This is a no-go.

But I'm headed that direction, anticipating healing. Because my whole deal is I get one shot, which is what I was. It's not like you're coming back next Sunday. I ain't coming back ever, Al. This is my contribution to this ministry. And so unless I go on the fringes. That was a bee.

No, it lit on Phil. It's a bee in your beard. No, it's a bee. It's on your shirt now. I'm not getting that. It's crawling up the back of your shirt. Phil. It has a stinger.

Don't, don't. It's flying around. That's why the clout. Hold on. Oh, my goodness. I was trying to crush the bar. Oh my goodness. I'm out of here. Hang on. All right. Stand back. There you go. You made him mad, Phil. Yeah, he's looking to

time out. I meant to do worse harm than that. Jay. You know, give me one more shot. Okay, can we edit this out? You got it. He go! No, step on him. This is much too much exciting thing that's happened here. The Almighty sent the wash to show you something. Now, I heard your speeches. Now I'm jumping at everything. I heard your speeches.

This is an interesting, this is an interesting little point. 700 years before Jesus came and those refugees y'all are mentioning are coming across and they're hearing the message and they're turning to Jesus. Isaiah 53, 700 years before Jesus came in flesh. Who has believed our message? to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed. And then he goes through this long thing about an individual coming up like a root out of dry ground,

no beauty, no majesty. He was pierced for our transgressions, put in a grave, a rich man, and suffered, put in a grave. But after the suffering of his soul, he'll see the light of life. So the gospel is priest in advance. 700 years, give or take it to you, before Jesus. You turn over and another one of the prophets,

we're 100 years closer now. This is like 6.30, 6 BC. Here's what Habakkuk said. How long, O Lord, must I call for help, but you do not listen. And remember, who's believed our message? Look, we're spinning our wheels here. Watch.

or cry out to you violence, you know, that's all we see. But you do not save. Why do you make me look at injustice? Why do you tolerate wrong? Destruction and violence are before me. There's strife, conflict abounds. Therefore, the law is paralyzed, the wicked, him in the righteous, so that justice is perverted.

There's no way out of this thing. I mean, Habakkuk gets singing the blues. Yeah. The Lord's answer, and then I'll move to that, what Jay saw in Athens. Look at the nations. Just take a look around at the nations. Y'all were talking about it.

Socialism, the downside to all that. Look at the nations. And watch. and be utterly amazed, for I am going to do something. And I just think about this, going into Matthew 16, about Jesus from that time on,

said, I'm going up to Jerusalem to die. Three days later, I'll be resurrected from the dead. And from that time on, he kept bringing it up. Matthew records it. Mark records it, Luke records it, John. I'm going to do something in your days that you would not believe, even if you were told.

Well, right in the middle of that, when you get over here to the book of Acts and the Apostle Paul, they're trying, the brothers, children of Abraham, you God-fearing Gentiles, it's to us that this message of salvation has been sent. now we're at a time frame 637 years from Habakkuk now God has become flesh he has died on a cross like he said and he was resurrected from the dead so the apostle Paul hammers that the people of Jerusalem and their rulers did not recognize Jesus remember in Matthew he was trying to tell him

he performed the miracle no what was that act he to kill him Acts 13 yeah get rid of him Paul said, yet in condemning him, they fulfill the words of the prophets that are read every Sabbath. Well, I just gave you some of them. Though they found no proper ground for a death sentence, there was no way to kill this person. It's like Jason is talking about blow the whistle. Pilate for a desert. They asked Pilate to have him executed.

Well, then he goes through the resurrection of the dead. He's been raised from the dead, and he gets down at the bottom. This is Acts chapter 13, verse 41. Look, you scoffers, look who the Apostle Paul goes to, Al. Wonder, meaning wonder and perish. You just don't get it. Watch. For I'm going to do something in your days that you would never believe,

even if someone told you. Yeah. Well, now the Apostle Paul is, dealing with the same thing, Habakkuk is saying, and Isaiah said. Well, here's what's interesting. It's right in front of them. Jesus is death, barrel, it's right in front of them. And they're saying, the Jews were plotting away.

When the congregation was dismissed, all of them got it to got together, said, we're going to get rid of him. We know that guy, it never ends. Well, fast forward to his trip in Athens, Greece. And fast forward to what we do on the first day of the week. week and we have the gospel and signage above us actually written down with Harrah's so you can't miss it. But it's still like pulling teeth to this day.

The message of the cross and the resurrection. Hang on just. Let's take a little bit. What's interesting is I, when I got up to speak, I actually read Isaiah 53 and Larry read Habakkuk and his Bible clap. It goes. Which was a similar synergy. I didn't know that, Jace.

We do. It's amazing. So I get up and I had the interpreter and just a piece came over me because I was a little worried about having the interpreter. But we never. By now you're feeling good. Peace came over me. By the way, they sent out a prayer chain here. I was praying for it.

I mean, like it went to a lot of people. It's like what we talk about. You know, was it a miracle? No, but it was it supernatural? absolutely what kind of response did you get in Athens Greece well told them what they dragged him through the city I was dragged him at the no here's what because we're you got to remember this is kind of an underground operation and we had we only had one non-believer there but just to show where they're at in their ministry you know we had some

who they consider leaders they had a woman who had just been converted was it two weeks two weeks before from Afghanistan. Her husband had been killed in Afghanistan, and she had two little girls, and you have one person who they've been studying with. Well, when I got to the invitation, of course, I just introduced Jesus. I went through Acts 17 because I'm in Athens.

I'm like, I got three questions, and that was pretty good set up for your lesson there. Perfect. So when I said, you know, is there anybody here wants to respond? will the one non-believer raised his hand. He actually stood up. Yeah, he stood up. He stood up.

He's like, I'm in in whatever way, you know. Yeah. Yeah. So I was like, so we was looking around. I was like, we're going to baptize this fellow. And he was like, well, it takes three hours to fill up the bucket. Because you got to remember, this is kind of a desert area. In our city.

Even though we had a flood in like day two. We'll get the hose on the bucket. Well, they got the hose in the bucket, but we left. But here's what's interesting. what I wanted to say. So I'm speaking, well, this is being broadcast in Iran, Afghanistan. There's some of the Syria, other European countries, North Africa, in a lot of these radical towns. So there's people listening, which that was exciting. That's why I wanted to do this. Of course, I'm out there now. I'm sure I'm on a poster somewhere, but which is fine.

they are. The leaders there have received many, many death threats. And that's why we won't get too much into the details. But what I found fascinating is later on they showed me a video from one of the underground churches where this is being broadcast. And they were baptizing a guy in Iran. So somebody said it looks like they're baptized him on the moon because it was just rock. No trees, no grass, a little puddle of water. But I. I don't know it moved me in that moment because I thought, now here's some people who are hearing this message in a country where this is frowned upon and they're out here baptizing a guy where if someone saw them doing that,

they would be shot dead immediately. And it was just, to me, it was powerful. So Larry said, what has happened? At first, the refugees were coming in. They brought them to Jesus. They took care of their needs. They developed relationships. now it's more of them sending them back out.

Now they're so hooked on Jesus that they're like, we'll risk our life. Now they risk their life to get out of there. Now they're risking their life to go back. And Sheridan is really powerful. That's why I went was to answer. More powerful than the U.S. military or any other military. That's exactly right.

The only way he changed hearts of minds. Remember how he kept saying for 20 years, we could just change the hearts of minds, but you can't do that by power. passing out suckers and having, you know, guns. I'm going to tell you some of these, there's one family that got here. Their story is quite amazing. Tell that story.

Well, so they pay smugglers. They're from Afghanistan. They pay smugglers ahead of time. You give a deposit, basically, to get you so far. And by the time you get to the coast of Turkey, you hook up with the smugglers that are going to take you or actually put you in the boat and send you out. and you've got to get the mile and a half over the GNC to get to the island, the first Greek island. And look, let me tell you this.

When he was telling this, he was like, they give you like a crash course tutorial on how to operate a boat. You know, you don't know how to operate a boat. It's a raft. Yeah, they're like, here, here's how you do it. And good luck. And it's at night mainly so they're not seen. So this guy, he couldn't speak English, but his daughter had been. hear long enough where she was translating and she was precious. But she was telling us that once they

got there, they had the money, so they got to get into a boat. And they were pushed off, but he said the sea was really rough. And they ended up on a different island than they thought that they were going to be on just because the sea took them a different way. And it was a rocky island. And there was like 40 people crammed in this raft. And so it's him and his wife, their eight-year-old daughter, who she was now 16. And then they're eight week old. I think it was eight weeks. Maybe six week.

He said 40 days. So that's six weeks. Six week old baby. And the mom had him and her arms. And so she fell out and they started trampling because they were trying to, you know, people are trying to grab on the rocks. I think she handed it to the daughter, the old daughter. Yes.

So he's helping to save the wife. And so she hands the baby. to the eight-year-old so they can get her up out of the water and all that. And people are trampling and running and trying to save themselves out of the water. And he looks at his eight-year-old daughter and she's, her arms are empty. No baby. Baby's gone. So now you're like at night, in a sea, middle of nowhere.

People are trampling each other just trying to save themselves. Well, at this point, babe. Yeah, the boat's turned over there. The boat's got holes in and it is gone. So he looks and they just, they couldn't, they couldn't find him. And he said, just he said, he gave all glory to God. He said, the Lord showed me something white in the water. And I guess that's what the baby was wearing or a blanket.

He dove in the water, grabbed the baby, not breathing, totally blue. They thought that he was completely dead. They tried to do CPR as much as they could. No one's trained. Yeah, I mean, he's like, I pushed, you know. He said, nothing. He said he's dead. He's dead.

and they went into a cave. They found a little cave to try to warm up, built a fire, got the fire going, and then all of a sudden there's movement from the baby, and he starts coughing. Yeah. And he's alive. And he was sitting in the living room with us.

Well, yeah, he was telling the story, and we're looking at the seven, you know, eight-year-old kid. But he said, I made a vow right then. He said, I'm going to find God. I mean, that was like, he said, I will, I will search. And so, of course, they were really good believer.

He's leading, actually, that family is leading the Afghan part of the church. Because I guess with so many different cultures, you kind of have to be able to work in the different cultures. And they're doing a fabulous job. Oh, my goodness. Oh, my goodness. Yeah, I mean, there's multiple interpretations going on like at the, where we were at the group, the underground group. because everybody there's different people from different countries

right so I'm saying it's and they're very tribal within their own countries well and so another thing you know let's take another break another reason you know I said this in Israel you know about the Jewish culture and then also now with this culture and in meeting some of these people

that verse when Jesus said unless you hate your mother and your brother you cannot be my disciple and for us it's like well you know That just means love less, right? These people are really turning their, they have to turn their backs on their families

because now their families aren't just mad at them. Their families now are out to kill them. Right. Because of this Muslim culture. Yeah. And so, you know, this one man I told you the story about, he actually got rescued his mom and had his mother living with them

and was sharing Jesus with her. And she is a believer now. I'm not sure if they baptized her or not. I know she was believing in Jesus. But his brother found out about it, who's a part of the Taliban, came and got her, basically kidnapped her and took her off. And so they don't really, they don't talk to her. They're worried about her.

So you talk about not just radical Islam, but then they choose this guy's brother is in the Taliban. And he's chosen Jesus and wants to lead his family to Christ. These are just one of the stories that we heard. And there's many out there we didn't hear. Oh, the other, another story we heard from kind of the Persian leader was he was just telling the story. And he had some, I mean, it was a long story. But at some point in it, he ended up on the bottom side of a dump truck, literally just holding on.

That's how he was smuggling his way out of that country. Yeah. And, of course, they stopped at some checkpoint and had dogs and all. Because he said that the bus driver was putting it in gear. And he was holding on and he was under the gears, under the bus. So it would kept hitting him in the chest and the bus couldn't go. And so. I thought it was a dump truck.

Maybe it was a bus. It was a bus. Yeah. And so he just bruises, you know, but he's still holding on thinking, I'm going to make it. I'm going to make it. And they, you know, the mirrors and the. But he said they were making fun. Yeah, they put him in jail.

And he's like, they were making fun. I mean, he said, I couldn't figure it out. I mean, he's like, every time people saw me, they would laugh. And although, I mean, he was scared. And he's like, why they laugh when when he finally look. looked in a mirror. He just said he had oil all over him and he didn't realize it. So it's like the only thing when he opened his eyes, it was just the white of his eyes is all

you could see. Of course, here he's telling this story and we're kind of laughing about it. But I'm thinking, man, what a rough. But now he's leading that entire church of Iranians. I mean, just a warrior. And he's awesome. Just the sweetest nature guy. He loves the Lord, loves people.

We concluded, you know, it's amazing. what Jesus does and the Holy Spirit-filled people, you know, it took away nationality, color of skin, all these differences that we put on people. And we experienced it because he said he shared Jesus. They brought people to Jesus from 22 different nations of these radical groups. And I thought, wow.

I mean, but when we were there together, it was just like family. I mean, I saw no different in the house church we were with, although the language barrier was tough. A lot of them who've been in the Lord seven, eight, ten years, they actually know some English. And their kids know English. Yeah, their kids were the translators for sure.

Well, you definitely understood, and we talked about this before days, that how the gift of tongues would have really come in handy in settings like that. Of course, you guys are right there where we're, where we read about where this was happening, but you understand the why of it now because you had all those different cultures mentioned. It's the same thing in Acts. I mean, Corinth was this draw.

What you guys went to Corinth, too, tell us about a little bit about that. Yeah, let's tell a little bit about it. That was so heavy. Corinth was like the first day that we were there. Yeah. And it was amazing to me because I kept, you know, I thought Corinth was bigger. I thought Corinth was a larger city

than that. But when we walked the old ruins of it that are still there, You can see like when Paul was pulled out of the home that he was staying in in Corinth and dragged down the street and then brought in front of the council. Well, I just thought, I guess because of Jerusalem, I just thought, you know, that's probably a ways away. He was dragged. It's right there. Yeah. And he's pulled right there.

And the council is kind of raised up on a platform. Yeah, you actually showed us a picture of it. Yeah. We saw the little canal, which you're talking about a crazy site. took a picture on it. The, I don't know what canal. They call that. It's the Corinth, isn't it?

The Corinth Canal. But you realize that this place, and it's just surrounded by water, you realize this was the shortcut for all these countries coming through here. This is the largest seaport in the world at that time. Right. Yeah. So I just mean you had such a various difference in the type of people that were there. And then when we saw the little town there, you know, you read,

about the history of having the bath houses and they took these, you know, people walking around naked in the bathhouse. I mean, you see it and you can picture it. And it was like, hello world, here I am. There's different rooms for different activities, you know. But when Paul was dragged through the street, he was dragged right by that bathhouse, which is just right there in the middle of the town open. And so it made me realize, you know, whenever he addressed the Corinthian church in two long,

letters, there was a lot to address. I mean, they had a lot of sin going on. And the way that they glorified their bodies, the way that they glorified women's bodies, you know, to a whole other level. I mean, we're talking, I mean, Athens is named after the Greek god Athena. Yeah. And temple was built out, you know, because of her. And when you, we, we visited up there. And when you're, you know, there's a, it's a 60-foot statue that was there of her with the Parthenon built around it. But when you're standing up there, you look down on the Zeus, Temple of Zeus. Well, you know, they're kind of supposed to be equal in stature. But Athena was way, way larger in scale.

And she looked down on Zeus. You know, they're all mythical. But to them, these were real. That's why they honored them so much, which is so messed up. Yeah. And then there was such a sexual connotation to the other thing. Let's take our last break. We saw that in Corinth, though.

What they would do is they would, first of all, all they had all these sculptors that were headless and I was like somebody took all the heads off and they were like no you just if you so when they have the election and you lose they cut your head off of the sculptor and just put somebody else's head up the party so the party whatever party is in power that's the party's heads that go on the sculptures so that party loses power and another one comes in all those heads go off and they're replaced by the new by the new heads but i tell what else phil look we they found at where we were at in the corner,

they found all these, they basically made sculpted mannequins of humans. And you could sacrifice whatever part of your body that you weren't happy with. Because we're looking at, remember that wall we looked at and all the body parts? It was kind of crazy.

And because I looked around, I was like, well, I'm feeling way better about myself here. I mean, from head to toe, anything they didn't like. Well, they found it and they would like sacrifice it, hoping the gods would supply them with a better body part if they go through this process. But I wanted to get to, you know, and you were talking about that tower of Athena, when you look down and you see Mars Hill, which is just a rock.

And even when we were there, there were thousands of people up in the main, where all the Greek gods were. And there's just a little handful down there on Mars Hill crawling around. And so we made our way down there, which Missy, read Act 17 while we there and got a little emotional about it. I mean, I've used that passage so many times and studying with people to actually be there. I mean, I was trying to get, who's going to read it? And finally, I said, you just read it.

I was like, okay, I'll just read it. And it was, I don't know, I got emotional, you know, actually reading. And there's people all around, you know. People were stopping to listen. You know, there wasn't a whole lot. And some were just there for the view because they wanted the Parthenon in their background. of their pictures, you know. So I actually preached that sermon.

I memorized it for, I got over there. I just went verbatim, just like the apostle. A lot of people were crying when Dad was quoted. Here's what I was going to tell you what happened. How slippery is that right, though? Yeah, it's every man for himself. Yeah, and I like to get in trouble there because they were digging up the parking lot right at the base of it.

And I'm like, there was the dirt. I was looking at all these treasures laying in the dirt. They were just digging it up. I said, you know what? I'm fixed to sift through that dirt I mean, I mean, I know they're going to blow the whistle But they would have been whistle But as I approached, there was like 10 law enforcement

They came out I mean, if you, they start digging into dirt, The law enforcement shows up Because they don't want you touching anything Well, the reason I'm saying, Yeah, Ryan told me you asked if you could take your metal detect Yeah, they said, you're free to metal detect here Because when I was going through the, what I needed to do

And they're like, and we'll let you know If you're approved in three to seven months I said, okay, there went that. We're leaving next week. So we're on Morris Hill. Missy reads that. She gets emotional. We're all feeling good.

Well, all of a sudden, this Russian voice comes up because he heard the tail in of Missy Reed. He's like, I don't, I forgot what his first line was. It was something to the effect of I don't care about God. Well, he said, your God doesn't care about me, so I don't care about him. That's what he said. He said, your God doesn't care about me. so I don't care about him.

Now, this is, you got to remember, now when he did that, because I thought, ooh, let me get my phone out because I knew I could tell Missy was passionate about what she had just said. And then that moment, and now we have a response. So I got my phone out because I was like, I am fixing to record what's happening here. Like a cage, man. A viral moment. Yeah, it did.

And they heard the Apostle Paul. Same thing. It said some sneers. Oh, this is what happened. The engineering going on. Exactly like what Missy heard. But I thought. But something believes.

But I thought Missy and Larry, they kind of, I stayed out of it, but I filmed it basically. Well, I looked around. I've got like three ministers with me. So I'm looking around like, who do I need to make waves for? You know, none of them moved. And I was like, well, I can't, after reading this out loud, and we have actually the sneering and they're confronting my faith, what I believe, 100%, I can't, how can I just, you know, ignore what he's saying?

I can't do it. I felt like this was a whole God is right here moment, and we're busy to take this stand. You're having your Athena moment right there. Yeah, the godly Athena. It was awesome. And I thought, of course, it was, you know, they teamed up on him. And he was, we all concluded that he had,

because he had been in a war he got, you know, he got into... He's been shot four times, he said, and, you know, he lives in. Where was God during that war? He just had a hard time. It was a very, very hard time. And all I could feel for him was sympathy and love.

That's what I just, there was something in me saying, I know that debating up here is not the answer. This is not the answer and this is not how we're going to win him to Christ. But I want him leaving here and leaving our little group feeling like, you know, those Christians weren't as bad. I've always thought they were. Like I feel like they might have actually cared for me. Yeah.

Well, I think since I wasn't involved in the conversation I was watching, I had a different perspective than them because they were all lathered up because this guy was really, he was tough and he was bitter and he was loud. He was. He kept raising his voice. He was intimidating. Was it American or Russian? He was in the Serbian war.

And he'd seen atrocities. And he's like, and where the church did? He had had bad church. experiences, you know, because he's like, the reason I don't believe in your God is because the people I went to church with, I'm better than they are. And that's not saying much, you know, because he, so evidently, he had had a history. But from my perspective, I thought, well, why is he here? He could have been up there with everybody else looking at the, at the Greek God. Why is him, Mars?

What's he doing on Mars? I think he was searching. I think they did a fantastic job of introducing the grace of the better way than just saying, hey, Vladimir Putin, that's why you people are going to hell. You know, that probably wasn't the best approach. No, and that's not what happened. I mean, we told him that God does love him. And we also, I just kept thinking, he knew enough about God, the God, to say he doesn't care about him.

He knew enough about him to not like God. And so I just kind of went from that. I said, you've obviously been reading and you've been searching. I hope that you'll just keep reading and searching because the truth is out there. And I want you to know that we love you. You know, we ended up like we all shook hands with him, you know. And like even Robert Ables, who was with us elder in our church, soft-spoken guy. And he said later, he said, you know, I prayed for him tonight.

I said, so do you know, because I said, I'm going to be looking for those white pants in heaven. Because I feel like that this was the seed planted and that it's not up to us anymore. Yeah. So he was a Russian wearing white pants? He was. Well, he's from Siberia. Oh, okay. I want to end this on some positive stories.

So I kept griping about the food because it just wasn't good. And I was like, we have to get out of this city. We have to. There's fish everywhere around this. You can't go. What, they say, 13 miles without running into a major sea, bottom water. So they finally, the last day, had found us a place. And, of course, Missy had our own fish story, which, you know, the one day I was sick,

they were taking advantage of because they went back. and saw this little booth where they could pay money to have fish eat the dead skin off their feet. Have you ever seen that before? You put your feet in this water and the fish eat your dead skin. They just nibble at your feet. And they all did it. Look, they, I was like, why would you, they should have paid you. You fed their fish.

Look, we were out there. It was just, it was a shopping day. Jays was in the bed. So we were just getting out, you know, and we're, we're shopping in Robert Abels, who's how old's Robert? 70? 70-ish.

So he's very quiet nature guy and he's looking at it. And I said, what he said, what is that? I said, oh, we're saying there.

I think that's where the fish eat your feet. I can't do that. And I looked at him and he's just kind of standing there. I said, are you thinking you want to do that? And he looked at me.

He kind of shook his outside. I'll do it if you'll do it. So me and Robert start going in. Of course the lady is there. That's a famous last words. It's a big, large Greek lady and she's looking at us thinking I got to get these Americans money and she said do fish a very hungry I was like what she said they're very hungry come on in I was like oh my goodness

they pay them ten dollars to have fish eat their skin so what I was going to say how was that sensation I'll do it again I said I may not last long but actually don't ever do that again there's a new business out at your out at your plantation you're going to have a little coy pond with skin about a racket. They're feeding their fish off of your dead skin. Look, it actually worked. And then you're paying for it. It worked.

And then you can go back and buy the fish and have it for supper. And then I said, what do water look like? I was like, and you stuck your feet? I don't look too close in the corners, everyone. The mold was starting to grow. So finally, look, I was going to say they found this place on the edge of the sea. And I could just tell it had a different vibe because now we're out of the city. And I said the waiter.

I was like, look, where's the fish? And he's like, I'll bring them to you. And so I thought, what does that mean? So he brought this platter and he had three fish. He had a red snapper, a C-ram, and he had a grouper. And he said, which one you want? I said, I'll take that grouper there. And he, look, he peeled back the gill.

And I thought only a commercial fisherman would do that. He showed me that gill. And I said, oh, yeah. He said, so you want to share that with somebody? I said, no, I want that. Actually, you shared it with me. Yeah. Well, I meant.

It was amazing. Phenomenal. One of the best things I've ever eaten in my life. It's amazing. They cooked the whole thing. The head and everything. It was phenomenal. And I thought, boy, it's amazing what you can do if you get something fresh and you know

how to cook and you get out of this doggone city. You got to find some fish. You got a birthday shout out today. Oh, today will be Karina's 22nd birthday. Happy birthday. The up in Minnesota. Two things I want to clear out. One is the earlier passage from earlier in the podcast was 2 Corinthians 10 is the strongholds.

And the second thing was, I thought it was interesting that Missy said when she thinks of Greece, she thinks of Mama Mia. Did you know what she was talking about that? No. I didn't either. Mama Mia, Mama Mia. I had no idea. Jay said you understand that. It's a musical.

Yeah. So I thought it was interesting because you said it and I thought, I don't know what that means. I guarantee you they don't know. Well, a lot of your listeners will know with that. you meant your mom and Nia. It's a movie. That's a perfect ending. Welcome home.

Thank you. Thanks for listening to the Unashamed podcast. Help us out by rating us on iTunes. And don't miss an episode by subscribing on YouTube and be sure to click that little bell to get notified about new episodes. And for even more content that you won't get anywhere else, subscribe to Blaze TV at blazedtv.com slash unashamed. Thank you.