WHOA That's Good Podcast - How to Reverse Self-Loathing & Hatred — One Step at a Time | Sadie Robertson Huff & Louie Giglio

Episode Date: December 4, 2024

Sadie and Louie Giglio are taking questions, dropping some incredible wisdom, and looking forward to Passion 2025 in today's episode! Louie has some direct answers to audience questions about being worthy of God's love, how to get - and stay - excited about being in the Word and the things of the Lord in heavier times and dry seasons, and why we all need to stop arguing with God and start agreeing with Him! And Louie shares a straightforward way to stop the loop of self-hatred and loathing - one day at a time! Get your copy of Louie's devotional, "Grace and Glory" anywhere books are sold! This Episode of WHOA That's Good is Sponsored By: https://drinkag1.com/whoa — Save $20 off your subscription OR $49 off when you sign up for a double subscription, plus a free Welcome Kit, bottle of D3K2, and 5 free travel packs! https://www.trymiracle.com/whoa — Get 40% off + 3 FREE towels with code WHOA at checkout! https://www.12vc.com/sister — Commit to the 12 Verse Challenge and help fund 12 Verses of Scripture a year for people who have little to no access to Scripture! - Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Winners and home cents bring you Save the Holidays. A race to slay the season. Drama, romance, deals. A story that shows it's never too late to enjoy five-star savings on new gifts arriving daily. Christmas is coming and time is running out. Save your holiday with winners and home sense. What's up everybody? Happy Well That's Good Wednesday. I hope you're having a great week, but friends, it is about to get so much better. It's actually about to get so good because we have one of y'all's favorite guests to come on the Well That's Good podcast. Back on the show, we have the one and only Pastor

Louis Giglio. Welcome back, Louis. Hey, hey, hey. So good and congratulations, by the way, on an amazing milestone. I was just thinking, Sadie, I've done 30 podcasts, I think. And I was like, how do you do 300 incredible podcasts? So congrats and blessings on the next 300, but that's just amazing. Thank you. Your video and the montage of videos, it was so sweet because I didn't know who,

I didn't even know they were doing that, of course. And then they're showing me and it just meant so much, all of the different videos and I loved your, whoa, that's good comment there in the middle. So I appreciate it. It is crazy, 300 plus episodes. And it really does feel like in so many ways, we're like, just getting started.

Like, I just love it and am so fueled by it. And I was telling them this, you know, the day that we hit 300, everyone's like, thank you so much for doing this podcast. And I'm like telling everyone, thank you so much for listening to this podcast. Because literally it has shaped who I am. I get to sit here and listen to people like you

and learn and grow. And I really don't know like where I would be without the past six years of sitting right here and learning and growing. And so I'm like just so thankful. So thank you for saying that. And I'm so happy to have you back. You've been on a few times and you are like fresh

off the plane from the Middle East. So before we even talk all about the devotional book, which I'm so excited about in life, you have to tell us a little bit about where you've been. Yeah, I love that you texted me yesterday and said, hey, I want you to listen to this and blah, blah, blah. And I was on a plane and so I couldn't get it to stream the whole time on the plane.

Yeah, I'd been in the Middle East and I really can't say exactly where we were, but we got to be a part of something so special, Sadie. Back at Passion 22 and over these last few years, we've been inviting people into the journey of joining God in Scripture translation, Bible translation. And students at Passion have just blown us away as they've joined us in the process. And I mean, we're talking millions of dollars students have said, I want to be a part of what God's doing. And at Passion 22, we were funding the New Testament translation for a people group in the heart of the Middle East, in a very closed country where it's illegal to have a Bible, to worship, to pray, to meet together

with other believers, to share your faith. Any of that is prison or death. And there is an incredible team of people, Sadie, who are passionate about translating the Bible for all the people in this country, and they are getting after it. And the New Testament that we funded, or helped fund, got finished and was dedicated at this dedication service with about, I don't know, 50, 40 translators, I almost want to say the country, I want to say it, but I can't, from this country. And it was so powerful to see it happen. And two things about it, Sadie, they asked me to speak at it. And so I did with this amazing man who leads their organization was translating for me to be able to just explain passion. None of these people in this room knew who passion was,

had them a clue who I am. They just say thank you for helping invest in what we're doing. But to be able to say to them on behalf of the students of passion, how much we love them and how much we're for them and how much we're praying over the work that they're doing. And the guy told me that the guy that leads this whole translation organization, Sadie, I was telling you this earlier, but he told me, he said, the first thing one of my team does when they come on our team for translation is not to start translating, is to raise up their replacement because it's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when they get arrested and go to prison. And when they go to prison, they want to have already trained up the next person who can

continue the work. And so these people are putting their lives on the line. But the second thing that was cool about it was not only being able to thank them for all the, on behalf of all the people at Passion, but to see with my own eyes the fruit of what we're giving to. And, you know, there's so much skepticism, ah, skepticism, is that that word, skepticism in the world. And to be able to be there in the room with the translators to meet the guys who translated this New Testament. And to say, to see it with my own eyes, this is real. And that gives me, I mean, I was already confident because of our partners and who they are and our history with them, but just to see it in real life is a whole different ball game. Yeah, it's so true. It's so true. Like, we went to Peru, I mean, sorry, not to Peru, we went to Peru on a different trip. We went to Guatemala for the trip

that we were doing the Bible translation. And when we gave the Bible over to them, it was just like the coolest thing ever because these are people who literally, Esther was her name, Elias was his name. They had been translating, working to translate this for over 40 years. They were like in their sixties

and for 40 years of their life, they worked to translate the word and they literally were writing it with their hand because they didn't even have a keyboard. So they wrote the whole Old Testament by hand. And then the New Testament, they translated with the computer and she was saying how much easier that was and how grateful she was for that.

But just hearing the wrestle and it was, but then this was really cool part of the story. So then that was about how grateful she was for that, but just hearing the wrestle. But then this was a really cool part of the story. So then that was about a year and a half ago. So I come back home, this is a couple months ago, I'm at a coffee shop and I never go and work at a coffee shop. That's just like not where I go to work because I'm way too like ADD. I wanna talk to people.

That would just not be a good place for me to focus. But this one day I'm like, I'm gonna go work at a coffee shop. I just need to like be around people. So I go and this girl walks up to me as soon as I sit down and she's like, hey, Sadie, so sorry, but can I share something with you? I was like, yeah, sure. And she's like, I just got back from Guatemala

and I went to where you went and met Esther and Elias. And I'm like, what? Like, this is so crazy. Cause like unreached people group are unreached because it's very hard to get to them, you know? And so it's very rare you're gonna run into someone like in your hometown that just met the two people in Guatemala that you met.

And she's like, it was so cool because they were talking about what's happening to them this year. And they were talking about all the Bibles they this year and they were talking about all the Bibles they have now and they didn't ever have them. They weren't so long to translate them. And then they said, this girl from America brought it to us. And they said, we actually have this video.

So they were given the Illuminations video. So they were so proud of it. They wanted to show this girl who happens to be from where I'm from. And she was like, I know her. Like she lives in my hometown. They're like, what? So then she's the one that I remember before.

So she starts praying that God would let her run into me so she can tell me that we have this connection. And then I'll walk in this coffee shop and I was like, okay, God, you are so cool. Like the fact, it just really puts into perspective like the body of Christ, you know? And to your point of like, they didn't know who you were, they didn't know who Passion were,

but they're so grateful that like people on the other side of the world are helping them do what like the work they're doing. Like they're translating it for their people. And so, you know, when you think about in a room at Passion or any room you walk in and we always say like, it's not the people on stage, it's not just like, it's the people, it's all of us, all of us, like that really puts it into perspective

because the people over there who are working day and night to translate, they don't know who me and you are. They're just like, thank you to whoever is like a part of doing the work we're doing too. Like we are the body of Christ. And yeah, like you said, the skepticism is real and it's out there, but to get to experience something like that, it like grew my face so much.

Cause when I know their names, I saw the where, I saw the people, and then I had someone else in my hometown locally doing similar work. Like it just blew my mind. So, isn't that cool? I love that. I love it. You know, it's so funny because, not funny,

but I was in Africa a few weeks ago and I was having lunch with some people and one of their friends from the way bush of South Africa had come to the town we were in and was at lunch. And this person lives way, way out on the edge of South Africa near Swaziland. And she said, Hey, I ran into some people the other day who live further out than we do. And they are doing Revelation along with you guys at Passion City. They're taking the Sunday Revelation talks, and that's their small group right now. And I was just, you know, once again, you just walk away and you're like, God, what are you doing? Who knows how

God is working? And that's kind of normal in most places of the world that something like that would happen. It's not unusual that someone would run into you in a coffee shop and there would be a story connection. That would happen in Chicago or LA or London or wherever. But man, where I was, it's a different world. And I walk into this room of about 40, 50 people and I just walking in going, I wonder if anyone in this room is there's going to be any connection. And I walked straight into the room right through all the people, not one person looks up and I'm like, oh, okay, great. I like this.

I'm in a room full of new friends that I'm going to get to meet. And there was one passion story as it turns out in there, but for the most part, it was just me, Louie, meeting these three guys that did this translation. And one of them, Sadie, I know we got to get on to stuff, but one of them, his dad had passed away when he was young. He had a brother that he was super close to. They both came to the country we were in. We were in an adjoining Muslim country to the country where the translation is happening. And they're both refugees there. Then his brother became a refugee to America. So he's living in America. So this guy, no dad, no

brother, his closest person. And he just, as soon as he saw me, I think he thought this guy could be my dad, you know? And we had this connection that was instant. And we talked for 15 minutes. And when I got ready to leave, he was like, he just said, Can I tell you something? I feel the strongest connection to you. Very special. And I knew it. And I was like, you know, now we're, we have a connection and he doesn't know about passion. He doesn't know about anything. He just knows a guy came over here and he loves Jesus. And I liked him a lot. And he seemed like he loved me and we're brothers in Christ. And that's the body. That's what this is all about.

So true. I love that so much. That is so true. I mean, even in like the prayer I was praying before we started, I'm like, thank you for how much Louie and Shelly love you and how that love pours out to other people. And I think that's like what our life should look like.

Like out of your love for God, that should pour out to other people. And you have this connection through, I mean, it says that in the Bible, like, you know, it's talking about how no one's ever seen God, but we'll know God through the way that we love one another. It's in like first John. And it's so true. You have those moments where you're like, I don't know you, I don't even speak the same language as you, but but we have this connection of love that's so much greater than what we can even say with words. And that's only from God. So that is so cool. I actually have been doing this thing on Instagram

before I have guests come on and I'm like, hey, what do you wanna hear about from this particular guest? And it's just been really cool because, like I said, we've been doing this podcast for so long. So now we have listeners who are just so engaged and so in these conversations. And it's interesting whenever we'll say like, this person's coming on, how there will be like a thread.

It's like, there are so many of the same questions that someone's asking that person because they obviously have learned that from you or seen that in you. And so of course, a lot of people were asking about how do you read the Bible? How do you get into the Bible? How do you get excited about the Bible?

Which I was like, man, they know who to ask this question to because you're the perfect person to ask this question to. So before we get into everything, because I think this will lead us to the Devo perfectly, I just want to start by honoring everyone who asked the question, Louis, when you're in a dry season of your faith, how do you get excited about reading the Bible? Let's be real, sticking to your health goals during the holiday season may not be super easy but with AG1 it at least is simple. Christian and I love AG1 and

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to get this offer and start your new year off on a healthier note. Drinkag1.com slash woe to get this offer and start your new year off on a healthier note. drinkag1.com slash woe. Well, A, you know, I think that's the coolest thing about that question, Sadie, is it's acknowledging that there are dry seasons in our lives. And somehow I think we got this mindset along the way that once we follow Jesus and put our trust in Him, that life is just going to be this rollercoaster ride with God. And it is. It literally is a rollercoaster ride. Sometimes it goes way up and sometimes it goes way down. And when you follow the characters through Scripture, you see times where they

struggle, times where they feel that the wind isn't necessarily at their back. And I know that I've had a lot of those. And the phrase that comes to my mind, Sadie, is from the scripture, we walk by faith and not by sight. And that's not a cop out. That's not a little cliche that you just throw at the situation. It really is a mindset of saying, okay, I'm not feeling it right now, but here's the key, I'm going to keep showing up even when I don't feel it. And what does that mean

to show up? It means just to stay engaged with God. Even telling that, God, you know I'm in a dry season, you know I'm not feeling anything right now, you know I don't have all the feels. You know that I'm reading your Word, I'm showing up again today, I'm here for my reading today on my Bible plan, whatever it is, I'm showing up again today, I'm here for my reading today, on my Bible plan, whatever it is, I'm doing a soap with a friend, and we're reading through Mark or through the Gospels, I'm in a soap with a friend of mine doing Kings and Chronicles and Samuel, because of all these leadership things that you learn when you're trying to do the right thing. So I showed up, did I feel like it? I didn't even ask myself if I felt like it.

I didn't wake up and go, do I feel like doing my soap today? It was like, no, today, it's a new day. So, where are we today? We're in this chapter, this verse. I'm showing up. So, show up, number one, and you do that in a relationship. You and Christian, do you feel like it every day? Do you wake up every day and go, man, I'm going to be the best partner, the best spouse, the best friend today. I feel it. Christian, come in here. You know? No. You wake up and you go, I'm Christian's wife and friend and partner.

And therefore, that's what I'm going to do today. I'm going to show up. And eventually, and this sounds like a non-helpful answer, Sadie, but eventually you realize I'm not in the dry season anymore. And I've got the feels back. And if somebody said, how did you do that? How did you go from not feeling it to feeling it? You'd go, I don't know. I'm not even sure what day it happened. Maybe it was yesterday or the day before. And so, show up in faith, tell God, hey, I'm here. And if I don't feel it today, I'm still going to get in this word today. I'm going to ask

you to move in my heart. I'm going to ask you to move in my heart. I'm going to ask you to stir it up in me in a fresh way. And I'm going to walk out what you show me today. Feelings or no feelings, because I walk by faith and not by sight. It's great. That's so good. I love that. I love that. I don't even ask myself if I feel like it. I just do it. That's so true. We lean. We have. We give our feelings way too much value. We put that way too much in the driver's seat.

I cannot be the driver of our life. And I was just telling a friend the other day, I was like, you know how you hear some messages sometimes and like, it's a great message, but you just know like, oh, that was really good message. I don't know if it was for me right now, but it was a good message. And then later it's like, you remember that message

when you need it and you're like, oh yeah, I remember that time it wasn't for me. Okay, well today it is for me. And I was using that example to, oh, I was telling her, it was just a friend moment. And I was saying, I remember when Christine Kane preached the message about drifting. And at the time I was like, this is so good, but I didn't really feel like it was me.

And she said this line, she was like, you know what it takes to drift? And she's like, nothing. Takes you doing nothing to drift. And I remember feeling like, man, that is so powerful. And then, and lately I told my friend, I was like, all of a sudden, I have been hearing that in my mind

because I haven't been feeling like getting up and reading. I haven't been feeling like, you know, staying up later when the kids go to bed to like actually just talk to God. Like stuff that I used to would do more naturally, now it feels like, it just felt harder because I'm tired and all this stuff. And then I kept thinking of Christine's words.

It takes doing nothing to drift. And I'm like, I don't want to drift. So I'm gonna do something. I don't want to get lazy with this. And so anyways, it's just so cool because even in that, it speaks to it. You might not think you're getting it at the time, but even just putting that into you, you know,

the word that is, you know, Christine's word, not the word, but the word is active and alive. And so you never know when it's just gonna come back alive in your heart at the time that you really need it and the conviction that you really need. And so I'm so thankful for moments like that where I was like, I didn't know I was getting it. But then a year later, I'm like, I get it.

I hear that. And that's so good. You know, you just wrote this devotional book and you're gonna laugh because we didn't have a copy, but we go hard over here. So we have a full printout of grace and glory. So if you get your copy in the mail, grace and glory will not look like this.

This is because my team is so, we prioritize so much whoever's on the podcast, making sure we've read their material and know what they're putting out there so that you just feel like you're not coming on a podcast and getting asked the same questions. We're like, hey, look, we value the words that you've written and the time that you've put into it.

And so I just think it's awesome. Maya. Well, I want you to know, our team does the same, Sadie, and the time that you've put into it. And so I just think it's awesome. Maya. Well, I want you to know our team does the same, Sadie, and I've got a one sheet right here. I love that. On your book, it's called The Next Step. I love that. And this is Sadie's 50 Day Devotional.

That's so sweet. And we're so excited about it. It's not a full printout, but hey, it's something. Hey, that counts. It counts. I just love that because, you know, when you come on people's podcasts, you wanna know like they care about what they're putting out.

You spent so much time on this. And so- Well, I knew that you had a devotion coming out because ours was supposed to come out a couple of weeks ago, maybe last week or something. And as it turns out, it got printed overseas and it got shipped here in these big shipping containers all the way from southeast

Asia and every single copy except 16 got ruined in the shipping containers. Oh no, well they did say that something happened. I didn't know what happened. Oh that is such a bummer. I'm not throwing any shade anywhere. We got a copy mailed to us that didn't come from a shipping container from overseas and this copy is great. That's awesome. I only have one copy of my book too. So you gotta, I actually gave my one copy away and then I asked the publisher, do we have one more? Because I actually gave it away to somebody. I got my new one so I do have one copy. Well I want you to do a giveaway on that big thing you just held up because I want to enter it and try to win. Oh my gosh, this does need to be a giveaway.

It's actually really nice, because it's easy to read. The pages are really great and really big. But I love that you- And handy too, you can just carry it with you. I know, you can just put it- Because it won't fit in your purse or your backpack. Yeah, in your backpack. You're definitely gonna need a backpack for this one.

But it's so good though, because this morning I was sitting here and I was just reading a couple. And you know what is so cool? Devotional sometimes, you don't have a lot of room to work with. I actually struggle whenever I'm writing devotionals versus books, which will be no shock to you, because I cannot wrap up a message into a sentence,

which I can now, actually. I'm not gonna say I can't. I used to cannot do that. It does not come naturally for me to use fewer words to display a message. I want to give you the whole picture and tell you the whole story. And so to fit it into just a day as opposed to a chapter

is really hard for me. But as I'm reading, I'm like, you do such a good job of fitting in so much meat into one little moment. And so talk to me about writing this devotional, why grace and glory, and what was your thoughts towards the days that you were writing? Well, you know, grace and glory

is the first 365 day devotional that we've done. And I don't know, it's a big undertaking and our team has been amazing. Some of it is fresh material, and some of it is material, Sadie, that we snipped from a little bit over here, or a talk that I did over there, or a message that was over there,

and kind of weaving it all together in a fresh way. And I don't know, for me, just working through this, it's just beautiful just to see that a sentence or two, I love the way that you said that, a sentence or two can really shape your day. And you don't, yes, we need to read the whole Bible, and yes, we need to dig deep, and maybe we'll talk about that in a few minutes, but just a sentence can change your outlook on a whole day. And so, just like you said, seeing a sentence, a thought, a focus for the day, that you know that that's going to stay in my mind and it's going to stay in my heart all through the

day to day, it really is inspiring how powerful God's Word can be in a very small dose. It's true. It's so true. Man, I, Donna Stewart got me on a 365-day devotional, and it is amazing how that one thing I read in the morning, it really does shape it. And if I don't get up and read it, I feel like, oh, I'm missing something. You know, like I didn't get fed this morning. And so I love that, you know, y'all took all this and you can tell it's like just, like I said, it's me. It's so much great material from all the different things

and kind of currently where you're at now into that. I love how you said like digging deeper into it. One thing that I've noticed in your preaching, and I don't know, I mean, I've listened to you for a long time, but I haven't listened to you the whole time you've been preaching your whole life. I don't even know that I was alive when you first started preaching.

So I don't know how much your preaching has evolved as to whenever I jumped into the scene and started following along. But I feel like lately you have been, and when I say lately, I mean like the past few years, like all of your messages are like building upon each other, but they're all centered on Jesus. It's like Jesus is always the focus,

but it's always, it's the same, but it's different. Like there's new content in it. It's another angle of looking at the cross, but it's the cross. And so was there ever like a shift in your preaching where it was like, okay, from here on, like I'm gonna make the cross the centerpiece of all of these things,

or is that something you've naturally just always been very Jesus-centered messages? Obviously all of our messages should be Jesus-centered. I'm just asking because I feel like there's been more of an emphasis and it's cool because it's like, it's going deeper and deeper and deeper on the same thing with just different angles. Wow, that's an amazing observation.

I need to think about that for a second. But yes, I definitely have been preaching longer than you've been alive by a long shot, unfortunately, or fortunately. That's fortunate. That's good. I don't know about where you live, but in Louisiana, the temperature is all over the place. Finding a comfortable attempt for sleeping makes such a huge difference, and it can be hard when the outside weather is crazy. Thankfully, Miracle Sheets are here to fill in the gap when it comes to getting deep, restful sleep. They're self-cooling with the silver-infused fabric

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but I don't think you're gonna have any problem. Upgrade your sleep with Miracle Made, go to trymiracle.com slash woa and use the code woa to claim your free three piece towel set and save over 40% off. Again, that's trymiracle.com slash wo to treat yourself today. But I've been preaching on a few themes, Sadie, and you'll, I think maybe in about 10 more years, you'll realize, oh, I only have like three messages or, and maybe you've already

realized that. I mean, I know what one of your messages is already. It's true. And you, and we have life messages. And so, if you're not an expository preacher, like we're going to preach from Mark chapter one to the end of Revelation, you know, and that's the preaching for today. But if you're more of a message carrier like myself, yes, God's Word, but carrying messages, I have four messages, I think. Intimacy with God, knowing God, that was my first message. And if you heard me preach when I was in my

thirties, you would just hear that everywhere. And grace, radical grace, not grace I got saved grace, but grace that empowers me to live a life. Grace, the new identity in Christ, grace, second message. Third message, worship as a lifestyle. And there was a whole season of my life and every message was about worship, no matter what I was preaching on. And then the fourth message is the glory of God. And that was a big, huge, eye-opening revelation for me about 25 or 30 years ago. And the glory of God is seen, Paul said in 2 Corinthians, in the face of Christ. So, that's where the glory of God is seen, is on Jesus' face. Not literally His face, but the face of Him. And so, you can't preach on the glory of God without preaching Jesus. And you can't really preach Jesus without preaching the cross. And so, you can't preach on the glory of God without preaching Jesus. And you can't

really preach Jesus without preaching the cross. And so, those are my messages, knowing God, worship, grace, which is cross-centric, and glory of God, which is a whole lot, but it's all around Jesus. And, you know, say to the other side of it is that times are getting dark and crazy, and you want to have an opinion on everything, and you want to take a stand on everything, and sometimes you, that's not the most productive thing. I'm not saying it's not important, I'm just saying that ultimately, I believe what's happening, this is a big statement for the Whoa That's Good podcast today. Ultimately, all these issues are not

the issue. Ultimately, the enemy at the end, he's called the anti-Christ. So, he's not anti a political party. He's anti Jesus. He's not anti this position or that position. He's anti Christ. You die at the end for following Christ. And so, why not just jump over all of the stuff and put the spotlight on Jesus and really make Him the centerpiece in everything we're communicating because that's where we're going to be ultimately. So, let's just jump there now and let's build as big of a flame of glory at the face of Jesus, the feet of Jesus for the world to see. Wow, that's so good. Is that what inspired you to start on Revelation right now, just

with everything going on in the world? I thought it was a good thing, you know, people are nervous. Sometimes I'm nervous, anxious about the wars that are happening and about climate change and about all these hurricanes coming crazy. And people are nervous. And so, how do you speak to that? Well, I think, you know, maybe just letting God tell us how it's all going to play out would be encouraging.

And so, that's why we got into Revelation. And it's been a good, a good journey to remember that He's the one who's writing the story. Yeah, it's so good. I've been tracking along and it has been so good. And just to everyone listening, you can go to Passion's YouTube channel and watch the message that Louie's been doing on Revelation, which is so helpful because I'm sure we are not the only people feeling anxious about everything going on in the world. And yeah, it's like, if you're not anxious, then you're probably ignoring it. You're probably just trying not to think about it, probably just ignoring it.

Because if you look at what's going on, I think naturally it just causes some anxiety because it's unsteady. It's scary. And so to hear these messages have been so helpful because it's anchoring in the hope that you have in Jesus. And I love how you get to these controversial moments in Revelation and you're like, well, some people will say this

and they have a really good argument. And here's the argument. And some people will say this and they have a really good argument. And here's the argument. And I know you're dying to know, what do I think? And you're like, it doesn't matter because this is what Jesus says

and this is what the word says. And it's just been so helpful because I'm like that. I'm like, what does Louie think? But then it's like, it's not about that. It's what does the word say? Where's your hope? Where is it? Yeah, that has been such a tightrope to be on

because I don't know if I wanna say this out loud or not, but I might. There are some of the things in Revelation, Sadie, that I'm not 1000% on. You know, I'm not like the one person on planet Earth who knows the right answer to every single thing that's in the Bible. I'm not that guy. There are people you'll meet that kind of seem like that person, but I'm not there. And there's some things in Revelation, I'm like, it could be this and it could be this. And you know what? I'm not 100% sure, but I'm kind of leaning this way. Well, I'm not going to really say it out loud to people anyway, if there's a big, you know, like one of our best friends just wrote a book on the

end times, he sees part of it differently than this pastor over here, who's been a big mentor in my life and Matt Chandler, who just wrote a book on Revelation, they all see it differently. These are all people I love, know, follow. So, I don't want to just throw my opinion in the ring. I just want to keep putting people back to the Word of God and let the Holy Spirit through the Word of God, not the opinions of men, anchor our hearts and hope in what Christ is doing. And so some of the places, I'm not sure. And I just haven't, I don't know if that's good preaching or not, maybe people would be very happy to hear that sometimes.

You know what, guys? I'm not 100% sure or whatever. But another thing, Sadie, that's disheartening, I think, or encouraging, I think it's kind of encouraging on Revelation is that some of these, almost everyone I know that's writing right now on Revelation, not everyone, but some people have changed their view recently, like in the last two, three, five years. I know a guy that is an expert in theology who's over

his lifetime changes view on Revelation timing several times. So, let's don't get caught up in the details. Let's just keep it on the main. And I'm going to end this collection this Sunday with the very last bit of Revelation 22. Then we're going to do a talk the next week on, okay, what are the takeaways? What should we, what's, what is it that we want to carry away? And I think that's going to be helpful for people because it's, it's the main thing. That's great. Well, I actually think for me, it's very refreshing to hear somebody say,

I'm not sure because you're saying I'm not sure, but you're still confident in what you do know. And I think that's the beauty. It's like, yeah, I'm not sure about the details and how this works itself out. And I don't have all the answers, but I'm confident in what I do know that when Christ returns, I'm coming with him.

Like I love that line because it's like, yeah, it's actually okay to not be sure. Like that's where faith comes in. Like you're not gonna know everything, but what you do know is enough to be confident in what's to come is going to be good if you love God, you know? And so I just love how you wrote that all out

and you spoke that. It actually gave me a lot of confidence because yeah, I think sometimes you feel like you have to have all the answers and then you'll have peace about it. But that's so in our flesh, in our humanity. We wanna have it all figured out, but then that's eliminating faith.

That big part of the picture, that's just like the faith aspect. You're not gonna see it all. You're not gonna know it all. You're not gonna have all the answers and that's okay because what we do know is enough. What Jesus did is enough. And so, man, I've just been very encouraged by that.

I want to ask you about grace in particular too, because a lot of people did ask about grace and obviously the book title is grace. You said one of your biggest messages was grace. One of the things that I thought was so fascinating, like C.S. Lewis said, there was like a shift in his life. And it was after he had written so many of his very well-known books.

And he talks about how there was a shift whenever he actually finally understood what grace was. Up until that point in his life, he never understood grace. And so he wrote from a perspective, lacking the grace aspect, but when that changed, everything about who he was changed, his writing changed. I thought that was so fascinating that he knew so much

about God, but he didn't understand the grace of God until way later. What was that like for you in your life? Like, did you have a moment where you kind of more so understood the concept of grace? Yeah, when I was in college, actually, a guy came to our church, and our pastor had sort of a renewal, if you will, in that season, Sadie. And then our pastor started preaching on our identity in Christ. And I had, you know, obviously I was not that old, I was in college, but I had never heard a message on our identity in Christ. I didn't even know what that thought

meant. Now, it's very common if you say that most believers go, oh, yeah, I know what that means. And all I knew was we all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. That was the sum total grace theology. And so, we all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. Amen. And I learned, Sadie, that there's not a period after glory of God, there's a comma. It's a glorious comma. It's the most incredible comma. It is to be celebrated, this little comma, because what Paul wrote was, we all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, comma, being justified by His grace, which is in Christ Jesus. And all you have to do is just finish the sentence. If you don't finish it, then both halves of the sentence are right. We are all sinners, but we all have been saved by grace

and are powered by grace. And if you just chop that in half and take either half, you don't have the gospel. And so, all of a sudden, our pastor started preaching this full grace. And I mean, I had an awakening. And my life before that was just pull yourself up by your bootstraps. Christ died for you. Don't you think you can get out and go share your faith for Him? That was kind of the mindset I grew up in. And then it was like, oh, no, that's not really the way this works. I can't, but Christ can. And it's not I who live, it's Christ who lives in me. It's great.

And the second part of that, you know, Sadie, for me was I learned that you live free when you agree with God. And a lot of people listening to us right now are still arguing with God or refusing to believe what God says is true about them in Christ. If they put their faith in Christ, they put their trust in Christ, they're changed. They're new, they're different, they're free, and there are people listening right now that are carrying shame and guilt and self-hate because they put their opinion of themselves over God's opinion of them. And that's pride. That is not humility. That is pride. And so, God's got to break through that to cause us to open up our hands and say,

God, I'm going to agree with you. Whatever you say is true about me, I'm going to say it's true about me. Whatever you say I can do, I'm going to say I can do. Whoever you say I am, that's who I'm going to say I am. And that's the fullness of God's grace at work in us. Wow. That is so good. If anybody, you just might need to pause and rewind that for a second and truly listen to what he just said and really take that in. Friends, I really can't stress enough how important it is to get the word out there about Jesus,

especially with all the uncertainty going around the world today. So I wanna invite you to join the Scripture Translation Movement with Illuminations 12 Verse Challenge. It's a challenge and an opportunity to help fund 12 verses of scripture a year for people who have little or no access to a Bible.

You might not know that there are over 3,000 different people groups, which is equal to about a billion people, that is a billion, which is absolutely crazy to think about, that don't have access to scripture in their native language. And there are more than a thousand people groups without any scripture at all, so if you just stop to think about that for a little bit, that's absolutely devastating and really hard to even wrap your mind around. So we are actually partnering with Illuminations, an alliance of 11

leading Bible translation agencies, to totally erase Bible poverty in our generation. What they used to think would take over 150 years is now possible by the year 2033, which is so crazy. So here's how this works. Your gift of $35 a month will fund 12 verses of the Bible per year for people who don't have access to it in their heart language. Together, we've already funded the equivalent of the four gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, for an entire people group. Y'all, well, that's good fam, is crushing it. That honestly is something to celebrate and I'm super proud of that. So I think we can do it again.

So many more people need to hear God's word in their own language, and you get to be a part of placing that Bible in their hands. It's the importance of where your money is actually going. So how do you join the movement? Well, pull out your phone right now. Odds are you already have it listening to this podcast. Click the link in the show notes or go to 12vc.com slash sister and commit to the 12 verse challenge. That's the number one, the number two, vc.com slash sister.

Y'all, we are in this until everyone everywhere has access to God's word. So visit the number 12vc.com slash sister to join the movement today. I remember not too long ago actually, it was Passion. It was the one that was in Dallas. We had the Dallas and Atlanta one. And Ben was talking, Ben Stewart,

and he was talking about having the mind of Christ. And he was like, you have to put on the mind of Christ. Like you receive the mind of Christ. You might need to walk outside and say like, no, my thoughts align with Christ because I have the mind. And he just kept, like, it was like the emphasis on like, it doesn't matter what you're thinking right now. If you align with who Christ is and you identify as Christ,

you have the mind of Christ, so you put that on. And it wasn't even like his main talk, I think he just said it in his talk. And I have like really resonate with that because my thoughts are crazy, I'm sure most people's are. And sometimes like you beat yourself up for the thoughts that you have and oh, like how can I not just get it together

and just like think the right thing or not be so anxious or not have these crazy thoughts? And instead of like beating myself up from that point on, I just started saying like, no, I have the mind of Christ. I identify with Christ. And just like inviting the thoughts of Christ to invade my mind, like I'm receiving the grace instead of like beating myself up for what I should think

or what I shouldn't be thinking. It's like, no, God, just give me your thoughts. I want to align with who you are. And it's just so, it was just so beautiful. And so I think grace is hard to understand because it's just, it's very, it's too good to be true, but it is true because it's who Christ is. I see you putting your glasses on.

That's why it's so good, it's too good to be true. I see you putting your glasses on. I want you to say what you're about to say. Yeah, I just wanted to make sure that I got that verse completely right. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, comma, and are justified freely by His grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. That's not even the end of the sentence, either. So, the sentence keeps going. It's a long, end of the sentence either. So the sentence keeps going. It's a long, long sentence. But I invite people to both sides of the gospel and agree with God that yes, I sin, and yes, I fall short of the glory of God, but agree with

God that you've freely been given grace through His redemption work in Christ Jesus and take hold of it and walk in it and live it and put it on and wear it. And as you say, put that mindset on, put the righteousness of God on, put, I'm loved and I'm a son, I'm a daughter. And stop arguing with God, stop telling Him you're not worthy. It doesn't honor a man, I mean, a son of man, doesn't honor the son of man who was pierced for our transgressions to show us the depth of the love of the Father, for us to say then to the Father, I'm not worth being loved. And that's not honoring to God.

It honors God when you say, I don't feel worthy of love, but you showed me that I am worthy of love, and I'm going to agree with you, God. I'm going to agree with you. And it may take a little incremental process, Sadie. It may not be an overnight change. A lot of people have hated themselves for a long time, and it might not be, hey, okay, I heard the podcast. I'm going to love myself, and I'm going to believe that God loves me. But just incrementally, just start agreeing with God. God, I don't feel it, but I'm going to agree with you. I'm going to show up and agree with you. That's great. That's so good. This is life-changing stuff. If you're listening to this, you know, we were talking about this the other day, sometimes you read scripture and just because you're in the habit of reading it, you

just read it and not realizing like you just read a life-changing statement, you know? Like, let's just back up and meditate on that for a second. We did that the other night. We have a little Monday night Bible study thing. And a person who was talking read through, who was like, just a little section in Colossians. And he's like, we just read that as if that wasn't like earth shattering, you know? So let's just read that again. And it was like so good to just call's like, we just read that as if that wasn't like

earth shattering, you know? So let's just read that again. And it was like so good to just call out like, hey, look, this is life changing. If you actually get this, it would change everything about your life. And then we read it again and it was like, everyone heard it different.

Everyone's lens was different just because you postured yourself to actually see it for what it was. And so I just wanna tell you guys, listening to this podcast, this isn't just like a casual podcast conversation. You're on your walk and you're like, cool, good talk. No, this is like, think about that, meditate on that.

What does that mean? Go read that scripture for yourself. Louis just put on his glasses and got the book open. Let me read that again and make sure I said that exactly right, because this is a true thing. And man, I was reading this book, it's talking about truth and how, not everybody values the truth

because everything's become the truth and all that stuff. And they gave the best example. They were like, it's like a prince who walks through a town that no one knows him in. He's like, no one honors the prince because they don't know he's a prince. And it's talking about like the truth. It's like, if you don't know the value of the truth,

then you don't honor the truth like it should be honored. And so sometimes like when, if you don't know it's a prince, if you don't realize what you're saying, then like you just miss it. You just walk by a prince. You just walk by the truth and let it pass you by. And so I just want people to really get that. You know, you mentioned this earlier and this is so true about you.

You're like, I'm not the guy that has all of the answers. But a lot of people do put you in that seat. They're like, what does Louie think? What does Louie have to say about this? Because you are so well-respected. You have been preaching the word for so long. You are very knowledgeable. You have a lot of wisdom.

So it's natural that people would come to you with questions. I wanna ask you this in this way because I think so many people asking all these questions were really rooted in like, I wanna know God in a deeper way. How do I grow more? How do I read more?

How do I get inspired? How do I get disciplined? For you, do you feel like that because people put you as that person because you're a pastor, it has caused you to stay in the word, to be motivated. And I say that because like my dad says this, he's like, I wish everyone had to prepare a sermon

every week because it would keep them in the word. It keeps them accountable to it. He's like, every time I have a sermon that I have to preach coming up, like I am all in the word. And sometimes when you don't, you kind of are like off, but it's like, no, don't get off. Like we need to be on because we should always like be in this.

But do you think just being that person in your life has helped you? And what would you say to other people to gain that same motivation? Who's not a pastor, who people aren't always looking at them for the answers, you know? Just 30 seconds left on the clock and the home team is moving forward confidently

after securing the family with life insurance from Sun Life! Wow, what a play! Talk about a smooth transition, Gary. They clearly have their coverage in check. As the proud life insurance partner, the Toronto Raptors, we've seen a lot of support from Sun Life over the years, folks. Great stuff, Gar. Looks like Sun Life is the teammate you can trust. Head over to sunlife.ca to get your game plan for life and protect What matters most yeah, man? I like your dad saying that because you know people say to create all these false dichotomies

and in other words They want you to get in box a or box B and normally it's box C and a lot of these things like for example people say if you're preaching every week, and you're, for me, I'm in Revelation and supporting texts, because a lot of other texts, you know, are involved in what we're teaching in Revelation, then you need to have this time over here. That's just your personal Bible study. This is not for church. It's not for a talk. It's not for a message. And I get that. And then, seasons of life life I do that, but why can't I just feast on the Word of God in Revelation that I'm working on for the talk? Because it is the Word and the breath of God, and why do I have to walk away from that and

go, okay, that was for the people and that was for church and that was for my message, but now I have to go over here and read in Psalms just for me personally. I want to just dig into whatever I'm digging into. So yes, is the answer. Preaching every single week or very regularly has kept me in the Word of God. I don't know where I would be if I wasn't a preacher. So I can't honestly say, I don't know how good of a Bible student I would have been if I wasn't a preacher because I didn't have that choice in life. But I do know this, Sadie, I know that it's not complicated to dig into God's Word. And people, I think, are intimidated if they, you know, what's the next step? And I don't know the Greek and I don't know Hebrew

and I don't have any good commentaries. I don't even know what a commentary is. And, you know, now we live in a world that everybody has such access to resources at their fingertips. You don't have to know Greek and Hebrew. You can click on your computer and say, what is this word in Greek? And it will tell you. And then it will explain it to you. And I do that all the time. And the thing I'm studying on my computer, I just click on the interlinear and there's

the Greek word and I click on a little number above it. And then it explains to me the root of that word, the tense of that word, and some other meanings of that word and some commentarial thoughts about that one word. And then just like that, I know a whole lot about this English word that I didn't know five minutes ago and I click three buttons on my computer to do that. The other thing that came to my mind, and this is not what you asked me, but when you were talking about just meditating on the Word, is I spent a lot of time, Sadie, in my life, not so much right now, but over the last maybe 10 years back and 10 years behind that, doing one-word Bible studies. And I did them for a whole lot of text. And you mentioned Colossians.

And I remember walking through Nazareth one day, and there's a church there, and above it it says, And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, because Jesus' house is right up the street. And I'm so stunned by that. And starting that day in Nazareth, I started a one-word-a-day Bible study on that verse, and you're people thinking, well, that's the craziest thing in the world. How are you going to do a Bible study on and? You know, so day one, I just wrote and at the top of the page. And I just sat there thinking about and. Wow, He has made an earth, He has created a world, He has formed a people, he parted the sea, he killed a giant, he's given us profits. But that's not all.

There's more. That's so good. And this is an amazing story we're in, but there's more. And it inspired me that day, I wrote a whole Bible study on it that God's not finished, the story's not over. Don't put a period where God puts an and. And the was the next day. The. Oh boy, this is going to be exciting. But how great that it wasn't a word, it was the word. It wasn't some word, it was the word. It wasn't my word, it was the word. It's great. The unique, you know, and you work your way all the way through like Colossians that way. Take you forever. Not forever, but it take you a long time. And at the end of it, Sadie, you really have, you know, it's like putting the meat in the baggie with the marinade and putting it in the refrigerator for an hour. You got a good grill, but for a day, it's even better. For two days, it's like banging.

And so, there's a lot of different ways, is what I'm trying to say, to slice up studying God's Word and do a soap with a friend, a verse a day, or a section a day, whatever you decide, and then talk to them about, here's what I read, here's what hit me, here's the one thing I think I'm supposed to take away from this today, and here's a way you can pray for me in doing that. Do that every day for six months with a friend, pick a text, pick a passage, do a one-word Bible study, do go online and learn some Greek words by clicking on the resources and there's just so many ways to know more about God's Word. It's so great. It's so great. I am like, like I said, I'm such a story person. So I love hearing stories, diving into someone's story. What were they thinking? What's their perspective?

And just at a little conference this year, I talked about the woman at the well. And I was like, before I started reading about the woman at the well, I was really intimidated to even think about preaching about the woman at the well, because I felt like I've heard so many people talk about this story and they're all so good. And I've never had like another thought than what I've heard, you know? And I don't feel like God's really spoken to me specifically on that at a different angle,

but I just kept feeling the Lord put her on my heart. And so I started reading it and oh my gosh, like every day I just read it again. And I was getting so excited about it because it was like every day a new angle, a new thought and it might just be one little thought but it was a new thought and it got me so excited. And so when you meditate on it,

for me it's like watching a good show. Like you can't even wait till the next episode comes out because you're just like, I can't wait to see what else is gonna unfold and it's kind of like that as you relate what else is going to unfold. And when you think about it like shows, people watch the same show all the time,

over and over again, like Christian watched The Office once, that wasn't enough, three times then, now he's quoting it, now he's acting it out. And so, you know, there's something to coming back to it and seeing it again. I know we're coming short to our time, but I just wanna talk for just a second about Passion this year.

I know it just sold out, which is very exciting, but also kind of a bummer for those listening who didn't get a ticket this year to Passion. But there's always next year. But what are you kind of feeling for Passion 2024 this year? Wow, that's a good question. I was going to ask you the same thing. I don't know. God is stirring, Sadie, that's undeniable. There's a stirring happening. I'm very cautious. Some of the guys at Asbury, where there was a real outbreak of God's Spirit last year, they said to me, we're not calling Asbury a revival, we're calling it a stirring, because it's up to history to say if things were revivals or not. I think that is one of the smartest things anybody has said to me in a long, long time. We have a great, you know, five o'clock gathering

and 40 people get saved and we're like, revival broke out. And you're like, I don't know, revival means the streets are going to change, the neighborhoods are going to change, the city is going to change, lives are going to change. So let's let history judge that. But there is definitely a stirring happening. And it's happening everywhere on planet Earth, not just among University-age young people in America, but it is definitely happening among University-age young people in America. And so, I just want to be open-handed, Sadie, and not say, here's our agenda. Our agenda is to meet with God, be with God, God be with us, Spirit move, Word preached, God honored, and then let the Holy Spirit do what He wants to do in the midst of that to animate us to be agents of the kingdom

wherever we are in the world, to boldly proclaim Jesus and be light in darkness because the times are getting darker, the light must shine brighter and brighter. So that's what I'm hoping for. And by the way, if you didn't get a ticket and you're frustrated, college students are resourceful. And I don't know anybody who wanted to get into passion, Sadie, who literally when it was all said and done could not figure out how to get there.

So keep trying, keep looking on Ticket Spice or whatever that is, go to Passion and you can find a link to it. People sell their tickets right up to the last minute. There's got to be a way if you really, really want to be in there. And we're getting close to maybe announcing something about next year and our gathering is going to be a little bit larger next year and potentially, Sadie, in a city we haven't done in a city that's not Atlanta

But where there will be a lot of room for people So stay tuned and very exciting. It's exciting. Very very exciting I'm so looking forward to to the future and for what God's doing right now. I feel so Yeah, just that stirring. I feel I feel that I feel like teary in sermons and just all of a sudden, like, ugh, just so excited for a group of people to get together and be encouraged in the Word and in worship and go out next year being the light. I mean, that's always something that's important. And I feel like, again, like you said, the darker it's getting, the more important that is,

the more emphasis on the light. And so I'm so looking forward to it. And like Louise said, really there are ways to get into Passion, especially if you follow on Passion's Instagram account, you'll be able to see if people are selling their tickets. That's a great way to just kind of like be on the lookout for that.

We would love for you to be in the room. I've heard so many, so many stories, Louis. I wish you could hear them all about people who listen to this podcast and heard about Passion. So they went to Passion and their life was changed and God met them there. And it's just so cool. So I would never stop saying it.

You need to try to get there if you can get there, if you already have your ticket, just start praying for it. What God's gonna do, not just in your heart, but in the heart of everyone around you. Like Louis said, revival is not just what happens at passion. It's really what happens after passion. What happens throughout the year at the universities

that you guys are at and the cities that you're at and the families that you guys have. And so, Louie, thank you so much for being on the podcast. Guys, go get grace and glory. Hopefully the copies will be in very, very soon. But Louie, thank you for all that you do. I so appreciate you. You're welcome.

I know everybody knows about it already, but the next step, don't miss out on it. Hey-o! Love you, Sadie. Thank you, Louis.