################################################################################ START OF FILE: 2025-04-20 - Disagreements and Unity - What do you mean by 0139 - .txt ################################################################################ SERMON DETAILS ======================================== Date: 2025-04-20 Title: Disagreements and Unity - "What do you mean by" #0139 Speaker: Church: What Do You Mean By Type: Church Service Duration: 1h 41m Language: English URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggCzl8mtXdI ======================================== TRANSCRIPT ======================================== Yeah, welcome to what do you mean by episode number 139. We're talk about disagreements and unity. So, we're going to go through that. You can call the number on the screen which is 423 281 3680 to join. What's up, Gideon Watkins? How's it going man? Your dad is preaching at Louisiana camp right now. What's up, Peanut girl and Ruth? Join live. You can call the number to join live and ask questions with some of Ethan Watkins. We're going to talk about something non-controversial like disagreeing. I'm going for the I have to pick something else to do this week to go for the trifecta. I mean, I preached on something light Wednesday night, you know, the meaning of life. And now I'm going to do uh disagreements in unity. What should I do tomorrow? I don't know. Go the trifecta of controversy, I guess. I don't know. It's just it's a joke. It's not real. So today is a special day to me because 11 years ago tomorrow marks where I was at Louisiana camp when I was 13 and I went up to the altar and I got baptized and I I believe I received the gift of the Holy Ghost right then and there. So it's very special to me. In honor of that, I'm going to sing uh a song, one of my favorites actually, Jesus rescues me. in honor of all of that. So, we'll go through that. Let me drag over a tab to grab those lyrics. Now, I can't sing it quite the same way that uh the other great singers can, but I can do my best anyway. All right. Okay. Let's see here. Got those comments live. All right. So, I believe I do this in B flat, something like that. But they sang this and inspired me and it means a lot to me also because I went back and I listened to this song several several times throughout the years to be encouraged. What's up, Noah? 11 years ago tomorrow got the Holy Ghost at Louisiana camp. So it's very special to me. [Music] I'm going through so many changes. What's the news for today? Somebody's hurt. Somebody's a key. [Music] Somebody's trying to find a way. A heavy heart can break your will. A troubled soul leaves time standing still. If you're hurting, please don't hide. Lift up your head. I'm on your side. When every mountain seems [Music] to everywhere looks too high. When my ship is lost at [Music] sea, that's when Jesus rescues me. My faith is strong and carries me. [Music] Sometimes we I still believe life is built on this desire. Through the flood and through the fire, Jesus rescues me. I know you're looking for an answer. [Music] Searching for some hope to hold. Empty hands leave you waiting and praying for [Music] America. Jesus hears your every cry. He sees the walls you can't climb. He will heal your hurting soul and lead you safely to his home. Every mountain seems too [Music] high. Every river looks too [Music] high. When my ship is lost at [Music] sea, that's when Jesus rescues me. Faith is strong and it carries me. Sometimes we still believe. My life is built on this desire. Through the flood and through the fire, Jesus rescues me. [Music] Every mountain seems too high. Every way too [Music] high. When my ship is lost at sea, that's when Jesus rescues me. My faith is strong and it carries me. Sometimes weak, I still believe. Life is built on this desire. Through the flood and through the fire, she still receives me. All [Music] right. Very good. Jesus rescues me. Like I said, that was 11 years ago tomorrow when that happened in my life. 13. Regardless of what you believe, it was a it was a a change in my life that is still going on now and it meant a lot to me then. So you can join the number on this or you can call the number on the screen to join live and uh we'll do our best. I love everybody. Thanks for being on. We'll do our best for you guys. So disagreements, it's a big one. It's a hot topic. Everyone everyone disagrees about something at some point or another. And we'll get into it tonight. I will certainly do my best. I'm just going to uh pray quick and then I'll get into it. All right, let me just pray quick. Lord Jesus, thank you for this day and all that you've given us. Thank you for every good and perfect gift, Lord. I feel led to talk about this and I ask, Lord, that you lead me in the way you want me to go. Help me to say everything you want me to say. It would be edifying and good. Lead my voice the way you wanted to go. I ask you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. All right. So, disagreements and unity, it all it all matters. Every bit of it. whether it's uh so disagreeing is is something that is really easy to do. It's easy to disagree with somebody when they have a something. So the definition of disagreement that we'll go into quick is lack of consensus or approval, lack of consistency or correspondence. an an argument or a situation in which people do not have the same opinion. And so many times we can disagree on things. It's so easy to and you know what can spark a disagreement in the first place? You can usually hear someone saying something that it seems like you disagree with what they're saying. And so we immediately get into fight orflight mode. watching some videos and they said that you can often get into a tribalism mode where you not really defending your point of view but rather you're defending what seems to be like a uh your very identity is what you are saying it can be so so very easy to disagree with people but what's hard to do I believe is to solve that conflict is to change someone's mind or to make a friend out of a disagreement and you know why do we have them because we care about what we believe And they're usually approached with you have a belief, I have a belief. And the conversation is a lot of times, I believe, very unproductive. This is meant to be, you know, back and forth. And this is kind of meant to be for you guys to participate. So, anyone that's watching, please participate, send something in or whatever. It's uh in order to come to Christ, you have to disagree with the way you've been living. In order to repent, you got to disagree with it. And it's good to disagree with some people sometimes, but I believe that we can sometimes prioritize the technically right position over the person in the relationship because disagreement is not the end of the world. And um hold on, I'll be right back. I got to check something. I'll be right back. All right, I'm here. Sorry about that. back. All right. So, disagreements are fun. They're great. They're good. We should embrace them instead of running from them. And often how they come about is we attach our identity of what we believe to what we think is the right thing when really it's not. So, I'm going to pray again and give everything I've got. Lord, leave me the way you want me to go. Help me to say things just in the way you want me to say them. I surrender myself to you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Help this to be good and entertaining in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. There's a quote of brother Brandon where he says, "Oh my, how we want our differences." And it seems to me a lot of times that we'd rather have our differences with each other than to solve them. And the reason, what's up, spirits? The reason why we have disagreements still in the message, I believe, is because we approach them the wrong way. That's why. Why is it that so many of the people are so disagreeing with each other and all you hear about is the negativity? It's because adults have not gotten into a room and had a conversation. That's why. And we can get so tribal because we think if someone says anything we disagree with, we immediately jump to a conclusion that they're wrong and that there is no middle ground. What I want to say is that disagreement is awesome. If you ever been in a relationship with a girl as a guy or vice versa, you have the honeymoon phase where you love each other and everything's perfect all the time and then reality strikes and you find out that girl or that guy isn't perfect and you have disagreements and those disagreements either end the relationship where the person goes from relationship to relationship going through the honeymoon phase or it strengthens the relationship where you realize, hey, I have some faults and you have some faults and you can get somewhere. You know, my idea that I'm going to do on this live, Lord willing, on on one of these other upcoming lives is I want to bring someone on to the podcast that I disagree with in the message and bring them on and have a conversation with them. I reached out to some people and uh I told them, "Hey, I'd love to have you on." And I prayed to the Lord and I said, "Lord, would you please I said, Lord, what I hope they don't say is why would I have a discussion with you if I'm when I'm right and you're wrong?" Because my the point of the discussion would be, hey, let's have a good discussion and let's show the people the wrong way of doing it. We just yell at each other and you take the other person's point of view and you make it look awful. And then we would do a point where we'd say, "Hey, here's the right way of doing it." And show forth the right way to disagree because you say, "Oh, well, disagreement should be handled privately and in public it shouldn't be done. I would agree with you mostly, but disagreements still happen publicly." Where do they happen? Comment sections. How are they done? for the most part awfully. I know that because from ages 14 to age 18, I did them all the time. And it actually didn't help anybody. I never got anywhere. I was right, but I wasn't effective. And that's why I fundamentally, anyone that knows me knows that I will send voice messages out of the blue. I hate doing voice. I hate doing texts because you can't you don't know what someone's uh tone of voices. What's up, Stephanie Lur? God bless you. So, like disagreements are good, but when they're approached wrong, they hurt people. You block each other. You go against each other. But I think they're one of the greatest blessings because after a disagreement between a guy and a girl, what's up, Isaac? How's it going? After a disagreement between you and your girlfriend or boyfriend, whatever, you have a choice. Do we end this relationship over the disagreement or do we get closer to each other? And you can get closer and it's better. So, disagreements are good. And it's not about always agreeing. I used to think that we need to agree all the time. But I was wrong. Brother Brandham said, "And for him will I accept." He said, "I believe this that in the great realms of the church, the only thing, this is the only thing that's holding off the coming of our Lord Jesus for his church and setting up of his kingdom is the differences between the full gospel people." That's right. As long as one say I belong to this, I belong to that, I received this, I did that and don't recognize the brother as your brother. I think that's one of the hindrances we have now. One of one of the hindrances we of not re of not receiving or Jesus Christ is coming. So it's not helping to have all these disagreements. Disagreements are good, but the part that can get it wrong is where you say, well, you have your own belief. I'll have mine and agree to disagree. And one of the things I believe is that we can often approach disagreements lazily. It's lazy I believe to say, "Well, you just believe that cuz you're crazy or whatever." A lot of the discussion sometimes uses message people will be be trying to be too strict and some people trying to be too lenient. And instead of trying to find a common goal or a common solution in the middle, the legalist says, "Well, you're just trying to put the world into your life. you're just trying to go as close to the edge as you can and you're just trying to be more like the world. And the person that's a little too lenient will say, "Well, you're just trying to make yourself perfect by your flesh." But both sides are approaching it wrong because they're trying to perfect themselves by their own flesh or they're trying to measure up to or to uh say, "You know what? The way that I can really achieve what God wants for me is by trying to compare my own outly desires and things like that to a rule book. That's not truth. It's not. We are to want to be more like Jesus Christ. To change who we are on the inside, not to change all our outside things. I don't believe in the technicalities of a skirt being this long or a movie must have this many words or whatever. I don't care. I care about the spirit behind it. This is why I don't want to say like people will say, "Oh, what's specific video game or whatever for things?" I don't want to talk about that. I want to talk about the spirit behind it because there's a spirit behind it. There's a reason why disagreements happen and why they continue to happen. It's because in order to have a a healthy disagreement, you have to recognize and say, "Hey, look, I'm not going into this discussion thinking, how can I prove you wrong?" I believe we should go into thinking, hey, what can I learn from this other person? There's a possibility that I'm wrong in my position. What can I learn from you? But instead, we go in there and think, I need to prove to this person that I'm right. I'm right because I'm right. Maybe I'm right because I have a couple quotes. Maybe I'm right because I have the most politically correct position or whatever else that it is. And often I think that we put way less emphasis on what the other person thinks and actually more emphasis on trying to preach to the other person why we're right and they're wrong. That's why we don't get anywhere. That's why I want to ask the question on the podcast, what do you mean by that? It's it's better to ask the question, what do you mean by that than to assume what they mean what they mean by what they're saying? And then what what will often happen is you will have a discussion happening where both sides are assuming that the other person thinks something that they don't actually think. That's what I see happening cuz neither one of the persons asked what do you mean by that? They heard one little thing they disagreed with and then went bananas with it instead of asking well what do you mean by that? Well, what does that mean when you say this? What what does that mean? I think that'd be better than all of this allout war. Every time you disagree with someone about even something so slight and small, ask more questions and you get more relationships. So, this is just the entry to it. And there I my goal is to have someone come on that disagrees with me and for us to show forth how not to do a disagreement and then to show how to have a good disagreement. Um, and the the way I see them approached on social media isn't getting anywhere because even creep people uh presenting themselves as Christians are approaching it with bullying tactics which is well if you think that you're just a failer. You're just a bad person. And it's not at all curious. There's a saying be curious not judgmental. I think we should be more curious of each other's positions. These disagreements can be a great tool of God to help us to say, "Hey, I disagree with you, but I still want to be in unity with you." What is And I think that this the best way of doing it is this or one of the best ways by God's grace. You ask them what they think. Go into the discussion thinking, "What can I learn from this person?" Not this person's wrong. Why would I have a discussion with you when you're already wrong and I know that I'm right? But rather, what can I learn from you? What can I learn? The reason why we have so many disagreements still among people that claim to be message is because everyone approaches it including me and with the intention of proving the other side wrong instead of being proven wrong themselves. Of course, brother Brandham said we should always put a comma on what we believe. Ask questions, have conversations, not dis dissertations of like this is why you're wrong in 80,000 different ways, but rather what can I learn from you? There are scriptures about it, too. Psalms 133 and1, behold how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity. So what does it mean to dwell together in unity? It's not to agree on everything. I can tell you that right now. And Philippians 2 and 2, therefore, fulfill ye my joy that you may that you be like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind. Let nothing be done through strife or vain glory, but in loneliness of mind. Let every each esteem other better than themselves. Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. It's not on your own. We can prove our own point a thousand different ways to try to but no, I need to look we I think we need to look into the why. Why does this person think as they think? And I I believe that we should try to understand their point of view completely and utterly to where we say, "Okay, so what you're saying is this." And then you have that complete discussion with them to where you ask them, okay, so you're saying this and then you keep on asking them questions until what you repeat back to them, they're like, "Yeah, so so you're so just so I got this right, brother so and so. What you're saying is this." And you repeat it to them. And you don't you don't take what they're saying and and say that it's uh and present it in a way that's going to make them look bad. But we I think we should present it in a way that makes their position even even better than what they presented themselves. Then they're going to say, "Oh, yeah, that's what they mean." And then when you do that, something magical happens. They actually ask you and say, "Hey, what's what's your rebuttal? What do you have to say?" And then you can tell them. And then it's their turn to repeat back to you what you're saying. And they can say, "Did I did I get it right? Did I get your position right?" Because we have this belief that, you know, what Satan can do to us is he can get us into right wars to where we're more right than someone else is. And we're not focused on, ooh, does this person have a point? We're focused on how can I prove them wrong because chances are they have a point. Every position, everyone's trying. And often times we get so uh so barricaded be in our own beliefs that we forget that that other person is a person and they love the Lord Jesus Christ or even if they don't believe in God they're given what they've been given in their life unless they're you know like smoking and drinking all the time or whatever within their own hierarchy of their life they're trying they're a son or daughter of God and I believe that we should recognize that and say hey look I can see that you're trying brother so and so or brother John or or whatever your name is. I'll just say brother John's the person. No one in particular, just Brother John's is generic. Brother John, I can see that you're trying. I can see that you're doing your best. I disagree with you on this certain certain point, but I I still love you, brother. So, when you say this certain thing, what what exactly are you saying? And then they'll look at you like they're shocked. They'll be like, "What?" And you'll be able to have a conversation with them. So, the difference though between a healthy debate and a destructive argument, I'm going to use a highly controversial topic here to try to show forth some opposing positions and some ways of approaching a discussion. Someone, let's see, pick a pick a topic, Noah. Pick a topic of what you want me to something we argue about in the message. um put it in the comments and I will try to show forth how people discuss that topic and how they do it right and how they do it wrong or what I've what I've observed. What's up uh Srirachuloo? So pick a topic any topic in the message or Sarah Louoo put it in the comments and I'll try to show you this is how people approach that disagreement. This is where they do it right. This is where they do it wrong. What's up Elijah Grammy? We're talking about disagreements. So any disagreement in the message you can think of, put it in the comments and I want to show you how I've observed it and the right way of putting it out and the wrong and I'll do the discussion. So if you I'll give you guys a second here. Think of any maybe it's uh movies and TV shows and hunting or maybe it's the tape only movement. Maybe it's that Jesus wasn't his own father. Or maybe it's uh what we should do about people leaving the message. Or maybe it's uh atheism. Or maybe it's uh women with uh short dresses at camps or whatever the topic is. Send it in because I've seen a lot of arguments happen. Please, the people that are on here, I don't know who's on Facebook and and YouTube because I don't I can't see them, but like Ruth, Noah, Sarah, pick one. And I'll show you because in these discussions things happen, good things, bad things, etc. And it depends on our approach. So pick one, please put it in the comments and I'll I'll go through it. This is meant to be interactive. So this way you'll like the topic and I'll talk about it. So any topic in the message or in Christianity or whatever that is controversial, please put it there. I'll give you a second. So, pick a pick a topic in the message. If you're new to this, pick a topic in the message that's controversial and put it in the comments. Witnessing disagreement. What do you mean by witnessing disagreement? Do you mean like watching other people disagree or how to witness to people? Tape only or live preaching? There we go. That's a big one. Uh Sarah, I need you to define what you mean by witnessing disagreement. Do you mean like watching other people disagree with each other or do you mean like uh um how you're supposed to witness to other people about the message? Which which of those two are you are you uh are you referring to? So, you know, is it like a oh well people are arguing this the way they do it? What should I do when I'm watching other people argue? or is it how you're supposed to witness to other people? But while they're doing that, I will uh I will do the tape only alive preaching here quick. This is how I usually see these these arguments go. There's two main positions in the tape only in in this thing and that is let me write this down. Let's take this patiently here and go through it the different aspects of it. And that is tapes should be played in church. And then there's the other side of preaching should be done in church. And I won't go to the super extreme of what these people do, but often here's what happens. One person says a a claim such as I would never play a tape in my church. That's quite a statement. The other person says, "Hey, you should be uh we're going to do it both ways. First, the uh tape only person will be the good will be the uh approaching a good and bad and vice versa." So, they say, "Hey, do you guys play tapes in your church?" You say, "No." And then the tape only person says, "Why would why would you ever want to listen to any preacher other than the prophet of God at your church?" But what is that? That is judgment and not curiosity. When we approach people with these statements, we're trying to say, "Hey, I want you to do this certain certain thing in this certain certain way." And it's not productive. When they approach it that way, why would you want to listen to any other voice? It's accusatory and it's from authority. There's nothing you can do. And then the other person says, you know, maybe the person that does preaching at their church, they'll say something along the lines of, let's see, um, what would they say? Why would you want to do something Brother Brandham never said to do? Why would you want to play tapes of a dead guy? Both people said something that's rooted in something correct, but neither one's curious. Then they go back and forth. Well, I'm just trying to put the prophet of God's voice back in the church. Well, you're just assuming we're preaching all false. And that's what the comment sections do. You got the people saying, "Well, you don't want to put the prophet put the voice of the prophet of God back in the church." And the other person saying, "Well, you just you just want to say all preachers shouldn't preach." And neither side gets anywhere because you're focused on being right. And instead of that, what I believe could be done is like, "Oh, my dear precious brother, God bless you. How long you been the message?" "Oh, just give me God. That's great, brother." So, so brother, do you guys play tapes in your church by chance? It's like, "Oh, no, we don't. What do you mean?" He's like, "Oh, yeah. Uh, you know, I was just curious if you guys play tapes in your church or not." And then you say, "Well, why would it matter if I play church tapes in my church or not?" It's like, "Oh, well, my my church, you know, Brother Nathan Bryant's church, we we do play tapes, you know, every now and then. We think it's a good thing." It's like, "Oh, well, are you saying that I should play tapes in church all the time?" Well, no. No, of course not, brother. You still got to have a pastor. You still got to have preachers and stuff like that. But what'll happen is if you initially believe that that person is saying, "Hey, do you tape play tapes in your church?" If you assume that they're meaning to tell you, "Don't ever listen to live preaching." You're assuming instead of asking. And often times you can get into an argument that you think that other person thinks only only tapes and and that other person and that tape only person thinks you think only preachers when both of you love the tapes. But the devil got between you by baiting you into an argument by making it all about who's right or wrong. It's tough. So I think we should be curious. I think you should before as a general rule before you go, me included of course everyone before we go and correct me if I'm wrong here, but I think a better approach than just assuming what someone thinks and attacking it and then well you do whatever you want. I only want the prophet of God's voice in my home or whatever. Or you do whatever you want. I only I just want to hear live preaching. I don't need some dead guy. Before we do that, you can think, hold on, you can ask this question a few questions. Can this other person does this other person have the capacity to understand a different point of view or a different perspective? Even if you don't even if they don't agree with me, can they understand that it's a perspective? If they can't, don't talk to them. Next thing, um, you can ask, do I completely understand this person's position or am I judging what I think they mean based off of my interactions with others? So then you can come and say, "Hey, when you say play tapes in church, what do you mean by play tapes in church? How often?" Oh, we we do it uh every other week on Wednesday at Brother Joseph Ham's church or however often he does it. I have no clue. And you say, "Oh, interesting. Really? Well, what what made you guys want to do that?" Well, you know, we we want to do this and we thought it'd be cool to put the prophet's voice before the people be neat. And you can say, "Well, that's a good idea." Or you say, "Well, do you play tapes in your own church, brother David?" Well, I don't, but we preach the tapes. Oh, that's a cool position. What do you mean you preach the tapes? Well, we base everything with sick just off of what Brother Brandham said. It's the message of the hour, right? It's like, "Oh, that's interesting. We put quotes in our sermons and it's uh it's um we also uh we put quotes in our sermons. We that's what my dad told me, my pastor. He said, "We preach the tapes to the people, David." And they say, "Well, why would we?" And then instead of disagreeing with people on on the surface, you can actually get somewhere because if someone actually is actually tape only, you can say, "Well, what do you mean by that?" Because this is the layer on top. Only preach only tapes only preachers. But what's underneath that? Often we become the extreme of what we had to defend growing up. People think I'm oneness because I had to go and defend against uh Tunis. People think other people are trinitarians because they had to defend against oneness. People think so much tape only because they don't defend against people saying you shouldn't ever even quote the prophet of God in your churches. And then people think the opposite of say that you shouldn't play brother Brandham or that you only should play brother Brandham and shouldn't have a pastor at all. But instead we should be really curious and we should go into a discussion saying hey maybe I'm wrong. But often times we're so rooted in our own beliefs, me included sometimes that we have no interest in hearing someone else's point of view. Someone actually told me the other day someone actually told me. Why would I discuss something with you, David, when I already know for a fact that I'm right and you're wrong? Actually said that what what are you going to even do? What if I approach it as, hey, even if I'm not going to change my core belief, like I I can tell you verifiably, if I talk to someone that doesn't believe in God, I'm not going to somehow believe that there isn't a God somehow, but maybe I can learn something from them. If I approach a discussion as, hey, they have something I can learn, we'll actually get somewhere. But if I approach it as, well, they're wrong because they said something that maybe I disagreed. Like, no, actually listen to them and say, well, what do you mean by tape only? Oh, well, I mean we should listen to more tapes of brother random in our church. It's like, well, I'm not against that. Me personally, I'm not against that. Are you saying that we should completely replace preachers with tapes only? Well, of course not, brother. Well, okay. I I can agree with that then. But if you say, "Okay, well, we should replace all preachers with brother Bram." Okay. And even then, don't disagree with that statement because as soon as you say, "Well, I disagree with that. I'm not going to get anywhere. I don't believe in that." You lose them. Yeah, you're right. But you don't get anywhere. You should ask, well, what makes you say that, brother, of of type only? Oh, well, because believe in a one-man message and everyone's underneath their messenger and brother Joseph said this and that. Okay, cool. and brother, you know what made you come into this message? And instead of telling him, I'm going to sell him on a concept by asking him questions. What made you come into this message? Well, the voice of the prophet of God and he showed me the truth in these things. Well, great, brother. Okay. And in order for me to in order for you, what were you before? Oh, I was a trinitarian. What made you change? Oh, brother Brandham showed me according to the word of God and according to the quotes how there was a brother Brandham preached it and on the scriptures there was no trinity. He's like, "Okay, cool. So, could you show me where in the scriptures or in the quotes brother Brandon preached that the only voice we should listen to is his and we shouldn't have preachers and say it sincerely." So, instead of disagreeing with someone and explaining to them why they're wrong, I think we should ask them questions. Like we could ask an atheist like, "Hey, you think there's no God, right?" Well, yes. Okay. By what standard do you believe that? And if you believe that that by that standard then by what if if Jesus is knit then what is what standards does Jesus fail where your standards succeed at? It's interesting. We should in a correct disagreement, you can get the other person to talk most of the time to understand their position so well, but instead, well, you're wrong because of this reason, then you're wrong because of that reason. And each person only listens to prepare their point to tell the other person why they're wrong. And you don't actually get anywhere. You certainly understand why the other person thinks what they think, but you're not going to get anywhere. with them and they can know they're not going to get anywhere with you. But as long as we approach it though, when we approach disagreements, we can approach it with a kind of uh I believe it's lazy writing. It's lazy argument to approach it with an argument from authority. Here's what I mean. When someone says, "Why would you want to listen to any other voice but the prophet of God?" It sounds good, but it's nowhere in the scriptures. It's not an observable. It's not an observable pattern anywhere. And it sounds good, but we can't start discussions or doctrines or things we believe based on an argument from authority statement. It has to stay true throughout everything. Well, the reason, brother David, why I don't like any movie at all is because if there's anything evil in the any piece of poop in a sandwich, I won't eat it at all. That's what brother Brandham said. Okay, that that sounds good. But then when we take that same position, we say, "Okay, the Ten Commandments had C3 justice. Does that make it wrong?" Then I Someone told me, "Oh, well, Brother Brandham earned the right to have a hobby because he led so many people to God. That's nonsense. I can't believe that." But it's uh what do you want out of a disagreement? Do you want to just voice and tell the other person how they're wrong or do you want to learn where they're coming from? Cuz every disagreement when a person's really trying it comes from a place of truth. It does. So when someone's trying to say, "Oh, well there's three gods." They have a point. There are three main attributes of God. And you could interpret it as being three different persons. Someone says there's only one God. They have a point. Every single time quantity is ever mentioned in the Bible, it always says there's one God. So every point of view has a has a point at which it could be true. It's just when we get super extreme with it, it doesn't get anywhere. So ask yourself, where do I want this to go? What do I want to do with it? You can and you know, I have to be careful to not fly off the handle and get super mad at people and just like yell at them because then we're not going to get anywhere really. Not at all. You ask, what do you want out of this disagreement? Do you want to get somewhere with this person or you just want to prove to them why they're why they're wrong a thousand different ways? Ask questions. Learn as much as you can about their position and then say, "Okay, so brother Noah, what you're saying is this. What you're saying, brother, is that you can't do tape only because there's nowhere in the scripture of the Bible that says it." And uh, Brother Brham never practiced that in real life. He always encouraged preachers. Is that what you're saying? Well, yeah, that's what I'm saying. Oh, and what you're saying, brother, is that you believe that since brother Brandon, you said about you having church or in church order, he said, you know, can take this play the statement in your own churches and sometimes we need to have a reminder of the prophet of God. You know, what what's his voice sound like? Not doing that all the time, but we should play tapes every now and then in our churches to show the people the prophet of God's voice. And it'd be a good idea. Is that what you're saying? Well, yeah, brother. That's what I'm saying. And then you actually get somewhere. What's up, Gabrian? But when we get to a place where we say, "Well, what you're saying is there should be no preachers at all and the and the only persons that people we should listen to have the last name at Brandom." Some people are saying that, by the way, but most people aren't. They can't do anything then. Then it gets all defensive. Oh, so what you're saying is you don't want the prophet of God's voice in your church at all and you only want some man's idea. What do you expect when you take someone's position and you repeat it back to them in the dumbest way possible that makes them look bad? It's easy for you to do that, but you won't get anywhere. The question is, do you want to be right or do you want to be effective? Because if you want to be effective, you can't get there by taking your your friend's position and making it look bad. We also can have arguments from authority. So it depends on what you want out of the interaction with the person, you know, cuz arguing is wrong when done in the wrong way. Brother Brandham said there was a guy he disagreed with and you know, he he stayed true to what he believed, but he also gave that other that brother room for his belief. You got to give the other person room for what they're saying. So if after you the whole focus of the discussion should not be hey Noah I'm going to tell you why you're wrong and I'm right. It shouldn't be that. It should be hey this is what I'm learning from you. This is what I think your position is. Am I right? And then once you define a person's position you can say okay cool. What is our absolute in this discussion? What is the what's the final word? If the final word is a certain man that isn't the prophet of God that preached in 1965, then we can't get anywhere because that's your absolute. But if it's what brother Brandham said on tape, we can't definitively prove tape only. We can't. But once but you can only get to that place if you treat that person with respect from the beginning of the discussion and you ask them a lot of questions. What usually happens though is people retreat back into their tribal identities and they say, "Well, you do whatever you want. I only want to listen to the prophet of God, which is a a false statement wrapped in religious clothing. It's an argument from authority." And it sounds really religious, but it's nowhere in the whole scriptures. Hey, Jesus, you're the best at preaching. So, Titus, Bartholomew, Judas, John, Peter, uh, Thomas, all those guys, I don't care what you have to say. Your voice doesn't matter because you're not Jesus. Paul, I only was want to listen to you. You're the messenger for the day. But Titus, Timothy, uh, Desimus, John, what you have to say, Peter, I don't care about it. Paul's a better preacher. It's not there. What also is there though is that they did read those those letters that Paul sent word for word and then they preached from them. So both are right. That's what you'll find in often a lot of discussions is both sides are right in their core belief. What they're really wanting is that we preach the message. Is it possible to preach the message without playing visible audible tapes in a church? Of course it is. Then why in the world is it put on audio for us? Why in the world's Bible put on print if it isn't possible to preach the revelation of it from a pulpit? Why in the world did God give us the Holy Ghost and say, "Hey, I will lead you to preach." If there wasn't a Holy Ghost to lead us to say things. So, it's interesting. You know, you do whatever you want, of course. So, remember, if you're talking to an atheist, someone that doesn't believe, they have a reason why they believe that way. And their reason isn't because they're bad people. They're trying within their own structure of their life. And you got to be nice to them. Well, I'm right. You can be right and still be a a jerk and you're not going to get anywhere. And you get to heaven and say and say, "Jesus, I was right." You're like, "Yeah, you were right, but you were a jerk. No wonder you didn't have any converts. You were a jerk." Or you can say, "Yeah, I listened. I tried. I did my best." You'd be so surprised what would happen if you just listen to people. If you just listen. It's such an amazing thing to listen to people. You have no idea what they're going to say, what they're going to do. There can be ego in a disagreement because some people have no interest in in talking to other people. Maybe they're younger than them. Maybe they're more successful than them, whatever, because they don't have the ability to say, "You know what, David? I don't think that I was fundamentally wrong in my initial belief, but I was wrong in what I perceived about you. I was wrong in my initial approach. I still have my same belief, but you know, I was wrong here. Most people, and I say this based off of my my uh interactions with people, most people don't actually have that ability to say those words, I was wrong. It's all here's all the reasons you're wrong, and here's all the reasons why I'm right. But I believe if we spent more time learning about the other person's position, we would identify and realize, oh, they're actually really trying hard. Even if they don't believe in God, they're trying with what they have. And I don't think that's inherently evil. And I don't believe in this message or in Jesus Christ because he proved himself to me through intellectual means, but because he's an actual physical person. He's real. And if he hasn't revealed himself to someone else yet, that's not my fault. I can show them Jesus Christ through me and Jesus will reveal himself to them. Not through a seminar, not through a an education, but Jesus an actual person and I'm part of that. But if I just go railing on them, explain to them 18,000 different ways why they're wrong, I won't get anywhere. That's why I stop doing Facebook arguments a lot of times because every argument that's that can be made has already been made. The question of well, is there any free will or is it all pre-planned? That's been argued about for thousands of years. There's a cool quote actually brother Brandon that I really like to uh quote a lot that reminds me of what we got to do. He talked about how Satan is the greatest sofus. He said, "What is attained by it? Has a single learned strife ever been settled? I'll replace that. Has a Facebook argument ever been successful?" Never. The number has their number has only been increased. Satan's the greatest sophist. What is a sophist? I have no clue. I think it's a person with words. Sophist definition. So the definition of a sophist is a paid teacher of philosophy and rhetoric in ancient Greece associated in popular thought with moral skepticism and and specious reasoning. It means uh wisdom and wise. It's uh it's someone a person who reasons with clever but facious and deceptive arguments. So that means they're not getting anywhere. They're but they're very good at arguing. You can talk to people who don't who are very good at trapping you and getting you into a reaction, but they're not actually good at having a discussion. What's up, you like cross? Welcome to the live. So, Satan's the greatest. He has never been overcome in a strife of words. In divine service, the words of men are usually heard more than the word of God. Each one chatters as he pleases. Like, oh, but I'm right. God is real. Well, yeah, and if you if you tell if you tell the atheist that they're that they're going to going to go to hell and they're just worthless and all these different things, you're not going to get anywhere. They have reasons why. But if we spend all of our time proving to them why they're wrong, we won't get anywhere. Oh yeah, great. Thanks. You told me I'm going to burn in hell for all eternity. Yeah, I really like your God. You're not going to get anywhere. You're not. They're people. I'm not more of God's creation or God doesn't love me more cuz I believe in him. That's the cool thing about God. He doesn't love my dad anymore now than he did when my dad was a sinner. He loves him the same. So all I should do is do my best to be a showcase of God's word of Jesus Christ. Brother Brandham said deity is not in heaven it's in you. The Jesus you say oh there I'm trying to prove to this atheist that God is real. You know who God is to them? You are. When they think who is uh what's up Mary Beth? Who is Jesus Christ? They're looking at you. They've seen religion shown a thousand different ways. Who is Jesus to them? You are. And if you just focus on proving them wrong, they're like, "Oh, great. Another Christian proving to me why I'm wrong." Because there's there's Facebook arguments and there's YouTube arguments done in a thousand different ways online already. Every smart creationist has already having a smart debate with an evolutionist. And at the end of the day, everyone already believes the same way they did in the first place. But this Jesus is a real person. So when it comes to disagreements, you know, we got to identify the core issues and we got to learn from that other person be respectful. A lot of times we derail because we get so baited into a reaction or I'm guilty of that. Lord, help me. Or we just get so stuck on no, I'm right, I'm right. But I'd rather be wrong in my right wrong in what I'm saying and be a nice guy than to be right in what I'm saying and a brute about it. God doesn't want us to be right more than he wants us to be successful and effective in witnessing his truth. His truth isn't always technically the technical aspects of everything. It's a relationship. The urge, there's an urge to be right at all costs. I would say being right is not being technically right. It's being effective with the person. Every living breathing second you have is showing Jesus Christ to everyone around you. What's up, Emanuel Irish? Congratulations on your engagement. You know, one of the things people struggle with. What's up, Anonymous 73? Is public displays of failure. It's weird. You, David, you did wrong. So, you made a video saying you were wrong. That's a little weird. Like, yeah, it is, but it's part of life. That's once I got to a place in my life, thank you, Lord, where he revealed to me. It's not actually an evil thing to be able to say the words, I was wrong. It's actually a superpower. Hey, if you get me cornered, I'll just say I was wrong. What in the world are you gonna do? I was wrong. Get the pitchforks. Get get the tissues. I'm going to cry about it. You know, it's we're not going to get anywhere. But disagreements are often approached with here's why you're wrong and here's why I'm right and if you don't believe it the same way I do, you're just backslid. That's usually how it's done. Like, and often times we'll block each other and not even realize why. Like I remember brother David Summerl and I we blocked I think I blocked him or he blocked me and then I saw him years later and we couldn't even remember what we were arguing about. They were like, "Oh well, God bless you, brother David. God bless you, brother David." We hugged. We had no idea why we even disagreed in the first place. But the reason why was because instead of being curious about the other person's position, we explained to them why they were wrong based on something that they said. And that's the funny part of it. You can be technically right, but instead you should say, "I'm going to learn everything I can about this person's position." And then you what you'll identify is are they really wanting to learn in this discussion? Do they have the ability to understand a different point of view in this discussion or are they just wanting to rail on me and tell me how I'm wrong and challenge anything I say? Because if their motives is just to challenge you, you'll realize that pretty fast. But if their motive is to learn, you'll realize that too. But I think we should be curious, not judgmental in these discussions. The thing that got me going on this message of the hour is when I was in a a discussion with some friends and this is about a year after I received the Holy Ghost at uh Louisiana camp and someone said, "What do you believe in the Godhead?" I said, "I don't know." And they said, "Well, I believe in God the Father and his son, the Lord Jesus Christ." I was like, "What? Two persons in the there's not two persons in the Godhead." I didn't know any scriptures or quotes. Something in me said no, though. And I started compiling scriptures and quotes and thousands of them. I got thousands of scriptures and quotes in my Evernote account. I can show you if you want. But something about it got less and less about an argument more and more about Jesus Christ. And I got closer to God through that argument. And it wasn't about I'm more right than you are. It was about, hey, that's not right. And you know, I've never actually had a full discussion with any of those guys since. But it got me into this to where like, hey, being right does matter. It does. And then as I got older, you know, I'd rail on people and argue all the time and and and I'd really line people out. And I noticed people didn't really like me very much. I didn't have relationships. I had people blocking me and I'm blocking people back. And wait, don't I have to spend eternity with these people? And I realized, you know what? I need to be effective in the way I approach these things. What's the way to do that? Oh no, I might spontaneously combust and catch into flames. Oh, you know what the way is? Saying you were wrong. I actually reached out to somebody saying, "Hey, let's have a a discussion on my podcast saying how how to show a correct debate, how to show not a debate, how to show the right way to have a discussion." And you know what they responded with? Why would I have a discussion with you when we already know that you're wrong and I'm right? And they were serious. And it's not their fault. That person's just the person trying. But it's the modern, it's the social media has enabled people to accept all of the the um the benefits of being right and none of the responsibility of proving it. Because what you'll often notice on Facebook is one person baiting the other person into constantly defending themselves. Well, you're just wrong. You're just wrong. And the other person so intensely wanting to prove themselves, it's just a a collection of a bully. Usually, you see a bully and then a person defending themselves. someone making holy statements and someone who defended themselves. What's up, Shelly? God bless you. So, I can we can ask, what do you want when you disagree with people? Do you want to be right? Do you want to be effective? What's another disagreement that someone has had with someone? Put it in the comments. Any controversial disagreement you'd have with somebody, I don't care if it's LeBron versus Jordan, I don't care what it is, put it in there. And I'd like to show you the different points of view of how one person approaches it in the right way and the wrong way in disagreement. So please put it in the comments any discussion you've ever had with someone where you didn't get anywhere with them but it was about this certain certain thing because another thing that can happen in a discussion is raising your voice or becoming aggressive. You know why you'd raise your voice and become aggressive? is because when I have a discussion with someone, I can have an image in my head of what I think that they think. And if I don't if I don't ever ask them to clarify their positions, I'm actually intellectually justified in my approach to them because what I think they think is worthy of that kind of a response, but it is isn't actually truth. What I should do is say, "Hey, so and so, when you said that, what did you actually mean by that?" And they say, "What do you mean? What do you mean by that?" And get curious. and I want to actually know their position just as much if not better than they do and then repeat it back to them and say, "Hey, so what you're saying is this to the atheist. What you're saying is you're not saying that you completely don't believe in God. You're just saying that you haven't seen enough to know that you do believe in him. Maybe you had some tragedy. Maybe you had some hardship in your life and you just you just don't know, but you want to. Is that what you're saying?" And they'll say, "Yeah, pretty much." But if I say, "Well, you're what you're saying is you want to live any old way you want to and you're an atheist." Oh, yeah. That's just the way to be successful. If I really want to get somewhere with with them, that's what I should do, right? Maybe you're right. But you won't be effective, which I don't think every atheist is like that. Don't worry. But I want to be effective. I want to actually get somewhere with these people. So, whoever is here, um, Noah anonymous, Mary Brewer, what's a position? What's a controversial thing? something you can argue about where something can be done. Another thing you can do is interrupt and talk over the other person. You know why you'd interrupt? It's because in your mind you think the other person thinks something that they don't think. What's up, Jenny? How's it going? Or you can use generalizations and absolutes. You always do this. You always do this. You never do that. I was actually talking to uh one of my friends earlier and it was about a trivial it was about a sports video about uh Mark Cuban destroys Skip Bis and I had a pro and you know he it was funny cuz I put both my position and John's position into Jeep uh AI and it said you both are right and so it was fascinating to see different points of view. So what I said though is that Mark Cuban came to me and says all you ever do as as sports people is all you ever say is overgeneralizations and you never speak in facts and you never speak in substance and guess what no one cares what you think. What's up Eagles Rock? How's it going? And of course you know that's the way to be accepted. Skip Ellis didn't quite accept that. And my point was to say, and John point was to say that even though he said all, everyone knew what he meant. And my point was to say, well, if he was just going for clicks, that was the right way to do it. But if he was trying to change the other guy's mind, you can't take the other person's position and say, well, you know what? All you ever do is you never speak in facts. You never say anything of substance. And you think people care what you think. People don't care what you have to say. Oh yeah, that'll be really that'll that'll really get somewhere with people. No. What? So before we have discussions with people, I think we should consider a few things. What do I want out of this interaction? Do can this other person understand nuance and understand someone else's point of view? Or do they just want to argue or play holier than now or play right wars? Because I've done that a lot. getting bit so focused on what's right to where you're actually saying the technically right things but it's you're not helping anybody because you're on your they just see you as oh he just wants to be right great we can't get anywhere cuz the oneness positions have some points the trinity positions have some good points they all do every position has started in the foundation of some truth but we don't get anywhere when we get into the landlasting war of telling them why they're wrong a thousand different ways. I wanted to do this podcast because I think we overgeneralize stuff and sometimes we do that and I said that uh you know we should say ask what do you mean by that because what Mark Cuban did escape balance what I was telling my friend was that what he should have said is hey sometimes you guys overgeneralize stuff sometimes you don't speak in facts sometimes you don't say anything of substance such as when you say that this person was didn't play as hard as this other team what are you talking about how can you quantify that would have been more effective But when I I've done it too where I say most people all people doing this and everyone does that. That's easy. That's lazy arguing. But you won't get anywhere. So what do you want to get out of that? It's ironic. The best way of changing someone's mind is not to tell them how they're wrong. It's not even to tell them how you're right. It's to listen to them and ask clarifying questions and repeat their position back to them in a way that they that they even say, "Wow, you said it better than I did." And then they'll literally ask you and say, "Hey, what's your position on it, David? What's your position?" And you can say, "Well, glad you asked." And then you can say, "Hey, I was fair to you. Can you be fair to me?" And repeat it back to you. Repeat it back to me. And then everybody gets somewhere. But you know why people used to you don't usually don't want to do that? It's cuz pride. It takes some humility to say, "You know what? I was wrong." And you were right in some ways. And we get to such black and white thinking, well, either I'm all right or I'm all wrong. No, you're not. There's nuance, which is subtle meanings. Subtle, small meanings. All evolution is wrong. Like, no, it's not. I've evolved my entire life. You know, noses get bigger and smaller depending on how much you breathe through your nose. That's why so many people have smaller noses is because they breathe less through breathe less through their nose. But if I make an over generalization, say all evolution is false. I'm not going to get anywhere cuz parts of it are true. But what do you want? What is your desire? If it's just to be right, you won't get anywhere. But if you're not willing to say you were wrong or at least say, "Hey, I was wrong in this certain position." Don't. That's another thing to consider. Can this other person consider or believe someone else's point of view? And can I personally say I was wrong? Or do I think that maybe there is something I can learn out of this interaction? If you don't think there's something you can learn out of the interaction, don't talk to them. Because if I I said to that person, I said, "So and so respectfully, I think it's very immature to say, why would I have a discussion with you when you're when we know that you're wrong and I'm right, I'll give them credit." I talked to them and they said they changed their position to a little bit, but it wasn't quite, you know, I was wrong or anything like that. But it's pride. I got to get used to that, though. I'm a young kid and I'm pretty small in some people's eyes. And that's okay. So there's another thing we can do. We can focus on proving the other person wrong instead of understanding. There's a rule I can give to you. I learned it from one of my old one of my old managers and he said, "David, when you're talking on the phone with people or really people in general, there's a rule you can give or do. It's the 3-second rule, which is when they say something and they're talking to you and it's a long discussion, don't just blur it in the second there's a second of a silence, stay silent. Once they're done saying what they're saying, do three 1000s, three Mississippi, three a long three to five seconds of just pure silence. And a lot of times I'll have more to say. And you know, it's easy for me to say what the right way of approaching this is rather than just to do the right thing. It's a lot harder. But what I believe we can do also is to break the fourth wall. When we have discussions with people, sometimes what we can do is to is to make it too much the make it a little too too much theatrical and not enough about, hey, look man, I'm just trying to do my best and I know you're trying to and we're doing our best and we just want to help people and and you know, maybe I'm wrong. Who knows? I just want to have this conversation. I'd love to learn from you what I can. That's way more success successful than what what we usually do. You can also ask yourself, what is this other person's absolute? What's up, Sister Chloe? God bless you. I was once on uh Facebook and someone posted a proabortion post. It was one of my old co-workers. I commented on it and him and I had a a constructive conversation back and forth. Then some of his friends commented and I was called a misogynist, a racist, a sexist, a homophobic guy, a bunch of other things all at once. And I realized I'm not going to get anywhere with these people because an argument, a discussion that starts that way, we're not going to get anywhere. So I uh I commented and I said, "Look guys, fundamentally we have different absolutes. You judge things based on the structure of how you were raised or how you look at things." And my absolute the Bible and yours is I don't know what yours is, but I know it's not the Bible. So fundamentally, unless we have a conversation about, you know, the way we look at the meaning of life, I can't sight to authority. We're not going to get anywhere. And you know, they put more curses on me and told me I was the worst guy ever than I deleted my original comment, which which actually deleted all of theirs. It was kind of funny, actually. But you're not going to get anywhere. But if you can recognize, hey, so and so, I can recognize that you're really trying, you'll get somewhere. You can focus on understanding them before them understanding you. That's how you can really get somewhere. You can tell them, one of the things you can say, and I've got this from Jefferson Fischer. He's a a a lawyer. He said, you can tell someone that's definitely a perspective where you're recognizing, hey, that's a that's a legitimate point of view. Even if you blatantly disagree with it, you can at least say that's a perspective and that I don't agree with it. But hey, I can see how according to the scriptures and quotes you provided or the worldview that you gave me that that is a perspective. It could be. It's so important to ask people, well, what do you mean by that? Because otherwise you're having an argument with what you think they mean instead of what they actually mean. And then both people end up having an argument based on what they think they meant and they don't actually think it. It's not helpful. Another thing you can do is look for areas of common ground. Look, look to where you can agree. I was like, "Hey, could you agree this?" Like, you can talk to talk to an atheist and you can say, "Hey, even though you don't believe in God, would you agree that a lot of the ideas in the scripture of living for others and the golden rule and and and and you know, feeding the poor and the hungry and uh doing good to those that do bad to you, would you agree those are good good ideas?" And you know what they'll say pretty much every time? Yeah, those are great ideas. You're going to say, "Great. We have some agreement." Because the same way a lie and Satan's program to give to us is 99% true and only 1% false, your disagreement with just about anybody is they agree with you 99% only that 1%'s false. I was telling someone recently that a Catholic or someone like that, a lot of what they believe is wrong. And I'd rather have someone be a an atheist than to be a Catholic because a Catholic is trying to present Jesus Christ as a certain something. And at least at least an atheist is presenting something that has a lot of the similarities to Christianity in the way that they live their life. They just don't go to church or pray or stuff like that consistently. But the way they treat others, the way they treat themselves, the way they live their life is so similar to Christ the right way of doing Christianity. I'd almost rather them be that way. Actually, no. I would rather them be that way than to be a full-blown class Catholic because at least they're not trying to say this is the right way to ser this is the right way to be a Christian or a Catholic, whatever. That's what I would say. Satan wants to be worshiped, right? So, he's going to present a false gospel through a denomination of this is the way you should do it. And people think they're worshiping God when actually they're worshiping the devil. I know that sounds a little weird, but it's true. And so like the way Jordan Peterson says it is an atheist will often pick out a a a Christian worldview and all of the moralistic points of their way and their moral way of living, live it out and call it atheism, which is fine. Honestly, in a lot of ways, it's 99% true. It's just that last little percent of going to church and Jesus as your savior and everything. But their way of living is so close to what's right. It's honorable and it's something worth looking to because often they have a better approach. I I've used this analogy with people. Some people like say a Sam Harris or a Neil Degrass Tyson have more respect for a Christian's point of view than some Christians do. What is Jesus going to say in heaven? Oh, well yeah, you know, you uh you know, you were supposed to have discussions with my friend with my people about stuff and you couldn't even manage what hobbies you liked and which ones you didn't. Like what I mean Jesus looks into the eyes of Judas being fully this my favorite scripture in the whole Bible is when Jesus looks into the eyes of Judas betraying him and Judas is you know possessed of the devil and he's betraying God himself and Jesus looks at him and he says you thief in the he doesn't say any of the terrible things you know what he says to Judas he says friend wherefore art thou come he calls him his friend what's up James how's it going he calls him his friend. So any way I treat anyone, I want to compare back to that. Am I treating them like my friend? There's a quote that my dad likes to use. He says, "No matter how hard you try, it's someone in general. No, no matter how hard someone tries to make me into their enemy, I will always try harder to make them into my friend." Another important thing that I don't like doing very much, but I have to recognize that it's a good thing, is you got to recognize, hey, we're getting too emotional and we need to back away from this discussion in order to get our emotions to come back to reality. Like, we can get so intense that we need to just for 20 minutes so we can get our emotions back because us guys want to think that everything's all immediate. It's not always true. But online, it's un a social media argument is like a it's like an abortion in my mind. Let me let me explain. You get all the pleasure of sex with an abortion, but you get to kill the baby. There's no audio on the YouTube stream. Huh, that's weird. Fix that. But the scriptural the scriptural part Why is it doing that? This is doing here. Huh? Let's see. You get all the So, my point is that you get all of the What's up, sister? God bless you. You get all of the reward, but you just get to fill the baby. And what social media provides is you get all the reward of getting to tell the other person that they're wrong 80,000 different ways, but none of the responsibility of being a nice human being. So, let me make sure this uh What's up, Malachi Page? God bless you. So, what do you guys think? What are some discussions that you've had that didn't go well, that were controversial, that were an argument? Put in the comments, please, while I fix this here. Let's see here. Let's see if I can fix this guys for the people on the other places. What's up, sister Jerica? God bless you. So, what is a discussion you had with someone where there was a disagreement? What was that topic and how did it derail? How did it go into something that was not actually uh was not actually good? Put in the things for me. ities. There we go. It should be back now. It should be back now on uh on YouTube cuz disagreements are tough and they're part of our very identity. We can get into tribalism where it's like, "Oh, well, you said somebody disagree with you're the worst, whatever." But it doesn't help. It does not help. Brother Brandon, you say, "Well, we have to see face to face and all these things." Like, I I know all these things. Like, no, you don't. Here's what Brother Brandon said. Let me uh let me pull it up for you. Make sure all the stuff is still working here. Very good. Brother Brenham said, "Shake hands with the holiness, the Baptist, the Methodist, the Pentecostals, the Nazarene. He longs to get into fellowship in his people. Come to commune and to bring you something good." But the church and the people keeps them away to coming down because you say, "Well, that group don't believe just like I do." What difference does that make? That has nothing to do with it. We are Christians born again in the same family, a bunch of pilgrims. Will never, we will never see eye to eye until we see him face to face and be changed and made like unto his own glorious body. So, we're never going to see eye to eye on everything until we get to heaven. So, you might as well stop worrying about seeing eye to eye on everything right now. What's up, Sister Anna? God bless you. So Jericho, what was uh I need a specific of the position of what it was. You know, it can be something where you believe this is where it went wrong, this is where where it went right, etc. It's up to you. It could be a controversial topic that you had a conversation with someone with. The basic thought is this. You give me the topic and I will tell you that you know this is the way to approach it to be unsuccessful and the other way to be successful. So in on Facebook or through comments you can't judge tone and you can be having a nice discuss discussion with someone and uh someone else that's a random dude from Africa or some random dude from Australia comes in and just calls you a devil and you don't know what to do. Jerica says it was with my dad and his decision to leave my mom and get remarried. Oh, that's tough. I'm sorry. That's really tough. I can't quite talk about that. I was talking more along the lines of a spec earlier we talked about tape only and live preaching. It could be about any other controversial topic or whatever. So there's a challenge also of nuance and short form text. Uh see he was finding loopholes and trying to justify his actions. Golly, that's too bad. We can als we can al we can a lot of times get into self-preservation mode and discussions. It's really tough. Which went against the Bible? Oh, that's tough. When when someone can show you a clear path of, hey, the Bible contradicts what you're doing and you don't change, that's a different problem. That's that's tough. Another one is modesty. Here's here's a good one. So, let's take give me two positions. What would those two positions be? Actually, brother Trevor already gave them to us. So, we got two positions on this. There is modesty should be as strict as possible. Why would you want to change it at all or to go close to the edge? Not all people believe the same when it comes to modesty and sandwich. Yes. And let's see the other the other position is modesty needs to have metrics. and we aren't Amish. So, a lot of times how this discussion will go. Let's take two people. Let's call them David and Jericho. Jericho doesn't actually believe this, but I'm going to use her name so I can actually show forth. So, Jericho, you're telling me, and I'll give you the position of the the one that looks more correct or the one that looks more religious. We'll give you that. This is based off of a sermon of Brother Trevor Emancy hottie. Hu G-H. He says, "There's one person, this one girl, Jericho, she wears skirts down to her feet all the time because she wants to be quote unquote as far away from evil as possible. There's another girl, we'll call her, I don't know, uh, Jenny. I won't go Jenny. I uh I don't know, uh, call it Joy. Joy thinks that it's actually okay to wear a dress or wear a skirt that goes right above your knee whenever you sit down. you can just push it back over because technically it's still below the knee and both have their own positions and uh you're like, "Oh, well, this is the way to do it." Well, why would And then you have this discussion between the two people. Um let's do actually not between two. Let's do a woman and a man. A man says, "Hey, you guys need to be more modest." And then the girl says, "Why are you judging me? Why are you judging me?" And so like you don't know what to do. It seems strange. I'd ask you between the person that uh that is trying to be as strict as possible down to their feet all the time and the person that wants to be on the edge as much as possible to be as as sexy as possible. Which one of those two people is the legalist? Please tell me which one of those two people is the legalist in this situation? the person that's trying to be as strict as possible and saying, "Well, why would you even want to wear anything that it could even show even your your shins or even your calves at all?" And the person and the other girl saying, "Well, it's below my knees. Why would it matter?" Which one's the legalist between the two? Is it the super strict one or the super lenient one? Which one would it be? It's both. They're both the legalist because they're both trying to justify themselves by the law. Oh, well, it's okay for me to wear this skirt the certain way because it's down to the floor. Oh, it's okay for me to wear the skirt the certain way because it goes below my knees still. They're both trying to testify themselves to the law. The real answer is the spirit of modesty. We don't serve this message or do the correct modesty. Sister Jericho, I'd say you don't do it out of, okay, it must be at least 3 in below my knees and I must have this certain level of separation on my hips. it must be this and that. No, it's actually the spirit of modesty. So, brother Trevor talked about that. He said they're both legalist. And my position in my way of approaching that is cuz some people are going to say the person that is strict will be talking to the person that's not strict. So, you're trying to see as close as you can get to the world, honey. Why would you even want to mess with with looking with putting your skirt up close to your knee? Are you trying to be lustful? And then the person that's all what's up and waves the person that's trying to uh go super short will say what you trying to be Amish? You trying to kill yourself with how hot it's going to get in that dress? You think you're an Amish person? What in the world do you think you are? This isn't the Middle Ages. We have modern modern things. Did you see brother Brandham's brother Bam's daughters in the way they were dressed? Each person said their position, but not one of them was curious. But you could ask, well, why? See, we just talked about the what, but not the why. You could ask the person, why do you wear your skirt down to the feet your feet all the time? Well, because I want to be as far away from sin as I can. Do you have a scripture for that? Well, brother Bam said stay as far away from the cliff side as he could. Well, did brother Bam's wife do that? Well, well, no, but I just want to be as strict as I can. Well, sister, does but does our uh salvation come from that? Well, well, no. Does our modesty come from that? Well, no. And then you tell the girl, you ask the other girl, "Why do you go? Why do you wear things that are so tight? Why?" Oh, because I want to be seen. If they're really honest, people, they usually don't. But we need to be curious. That's how we can approach disagreements is I want to learn as much as I can about this other's person's position and why they do it. What's up, channelers? It's my name. God bless you. So why do you why do you wear skirts like that down to your knee? Down to your feet. Oh, because I want to be justified by the law. But sister, it's impossible. Could I introduce you to this skirt that's 3 in below your knee? It won't be immodest, but it'll be comfortable. And then they see it and they're like, "Wow, this is amazing. What's up, Ben?" And hint returns. God bless you. But if you just go on there playing the uh religious card of, "Well, you're just trying to be as close to the world as you want. Well, you're just trying to uh you're just trying to be as holier than thou. Both sides have a bit of a point, but like Jericho just said, honestly, I would try to listen, give some encouragement, and pray for the other person. Exactly. Listen, give some encouragement, and ask them questions because what you'll find often is there's a reason why underneath the what every time. That's why. So, be interesting. Very, very interesting. Disagreements. Disagreements can be fun. Disagreements can be awesome though. There's a really good script, really good quote actually. Brother Brandham said, "If you if I Let's see." He said, "Can you see why I'm standing for the unity of every church, every full gospel church, every believer, we ought to be one heart, one mind, and one accord, no matter how much we are different in the scriptures." That might be one might see this that way or that has nothing to do with it. But in principle, we ought to stand one great mighty army of God marching on because because each one of you in your peculiarity, God has proved that he's ignoring your doctrine. He's proved that he's ignoring your doctrine because he gave you the Holy Ghost. And the Bible said he gave give them the Holy Ghost that obeyed him. Now, if I obeyed him in my peculiar way and you obeyed him in your peculiar way, he'd give us both the Holy Ghost. So, we ought to be Christian brethren and sister enough to arm up together and march on for one great purpose, the gospel. So, as long as that one person is saying, "Oh, well, you're just trying to be perfect in your flesh. Oh, well, you're just trying to be on the edge of the world." That removes the possibility for nuance. and it assumes that the other person has only negative motives and then you're both just defending each other or defending uh yourselves instead of actually a a fruitful um straightforward and productive discussion. This is a good quote. I'm going to send it to a friend of mine actually. Very good quote. All right. Jericho says disagreement can tell us a lot about ourselves and others and where we can improve and become more like Christ in order to handle disagreements in order to in how to handle disagreements. I I believe that we got to approach it with with curiosity and you know this person doesn't think this because they're evil. Often we can get into like oh well because my position on the skirt thing is technically more strict than yours is. I'm more right because I'm trying to be more strict. Like no strictness does not equal rightness. We are not saved by the law. We cannot be. We're not. You are not more right because you're more politically correct. You're not. It just doesn't get anywhere. Right. Being right should not be the goal. The relationship should be the goal. Well, I'm all I'm right and they're wrong. So what? Are you still in contact with them? Because I believe that the relationship should be the focus, not the uh the rightness of your points because that's easy. Everyone does that. Total agreement in all things is not what we base our unity on. I'd say this. The same way that uh Denzel Washington said, "If you're not failing, you're not even trying." If you're not disagreeing with your friends, you're not even trying to get along. What's up, Jaden? How's it going? If you're not disagreeing sometimes with your wife or your husband or your brothers or your sisters or your or your relatives or your friends, if you're not disagreeing sometimes with them, you're not even trying to get along in the right way. Because disagreeing with them is part of getting along. The same way failure is part of success. But if you always agree all the time and your friends always tell you everything's right all the time, they're not your friends. They're yes manning you. You might be their friends, but they're not yours. A real friend tells you when you're wrong. And people get mad at me like, "Oh, encouragement is supposed to be encourage." No, encouragement is not always you're perfect. You're amazing. You're incredible. Satan couldn't stop you if you tried. Sometimes encouragement is get up and fight. Well, where is that in the Bible? I'll show you. What's up, Gideon Huffman? Remember when uh Job's entire family died except for his wife and she was really mean to him? His livestock's gone, his money's gone, everyone's gone. And then he complains about it to God. What's up, Joseph Cochman? He complains about it to God. What does God tell Job? Oh, I'm so sorry you're going through that, Job. Oh, I'm here for you. Oh, let me get you a prayer. Let me get you a a therapy group. Let me get you some some Kool-Aid. No. You know what God tells Job? Man up. Be a man. Literally. Literally. That's what God tells Job. God being as encouraging as he could be to Job. He says, "Gird up now thy loins like a man." That means get up and be a man. That's sometimes the best encouragement you can receive is men up or woman up. Grow up. Oh, it's all it gives me. Grow up. That is sometimes the best encouragement you can receive. Love is not just, oh, you're holy or righteous. Satan couldn't stop you if he tried. We're in the greatest thing ever and you guys are amazing. That's easy. The hard part is, hey, get out of the road. That's encouraging. It should be. This is This is good news. Jerk says we can be a good example to others instead of always making others believe or do what we do. Exactly. You can be a good example. You can be salty. You can say, "Hey, you can live in such a way like when I'm thinking like, oh, this person does this wrong or that person does that wrong in my life. I'm I'm going to try to think, hold on, I cannot I can't force them to change, but I can force me to change. Could I change in such a way? Could I get so close to Jesus Christ? Could I know so much about this message be and have such a filling of the Holy Ghost in my life that people want to be what? more like me because I'm like Jesus. Not can I prove everyone wrong all the time, but can could I live my life in such a way and get so close to God that could help others? That's a better approach than, oh, you're wrong and I'm right. And that's just it. Like, congratulations, you're right. Sure. And you lost a relationship. Brother Brandham said the greater than Solomon is here. He said, "But our petty, a little petty differences between our organizational offenses and so forth." Let me give you the picture of Brother Brandham. He's preaching all over the world, all over the nation with the oneness, the trinitarians, everybody. And they're disagreeing with him. And he's and he will preach to an audience of oneness and trinitarians all at the same time. And he's trying to get them to get along with each other. But our little petty differences between our organizational fences and so forth has separated them as far as the east is from the west. And God will never be able to do nothing to us until them walls are broke down and we become one in Christ. That's right. Ministers break down their middle wall. Let's see what if the put the what the Pentecostal church and all other churches needs tonight is to lay aside every weight and every and the sin that does so easily beset us that we might run with patience the race that's set before us. We need a conference, a universal prayer meeting for the church of the living God to be called together. Don't think I am angry or beside myself. I know what I speak of. The need of the church tonight is a conference, a prayer meeting, a get together, called together. Ministers break down their wall, their middle wall of partition. Church members that'll forget the diff church members that'll forget the differences. Forget the differences between the denominations of churches. These aren't little differences. These are differences like I believe in her rapture. You don't. I think there's three persons in the Godhead. I think there's one. Those are some big differences. He said, "Forget them. Forget them." Church members and ministers hold at the horns of the altar with one accord and pray until the fire of God begins to fall again. God knows the the stubbornness, indifference of men is broke up. Ungodly fear and brotherly love takes its place in the human heart. Then you'll become salty. Then the message will have its preeminences in the heart. It'll have its influence in the city. Christianity in action, not just taught in the pulpit, but acted among the members, among the pastors. That's when you see Christ living in the church. Decisions made. This is one of my favorite quotes actually the whole all of it. It was not so from the beginning of 1059. A minister, this is in closing now. We've been here like an hour and a half. A minister called my wife about a month ago, and he and I had been talking on some scripture. He firmly taken his stand that my belief in divine healing was wrong, that the scriptures did not support what I was teaching, that Christ was the same yesterday, today, and forever. Well, he is an American and got a right to his own beliefs. But I tried to talk to him nicely. No matter how much he tried to argue, I just talked to him like a Christian should talk. Stay on what I believe. But give him tell him if he's if he sees it differently than I do. He's wrong and I'm right and he's going and he's just backslid. He's just trying to make an excuse for sin. No. No matter how much he tried to argue, I just talk to him like a Christian should talk. I stayed on what I believe, but I gave him room. I gave him room for his belief. He called my wife and he said, "Brother Brandon, I'm at home this afternoon." So, he gave him room for his belief, meaning that he actually gave room for it. Well, I believe we should do that with all beliefs. I don't care if they're a Satanist. I'm not going to say believing in Satan is right, but I can say, "Hey, there's part of you that wants Jesus or that wants something better and I'm here for you and I love you." Not you're a Satanist, so you're wrong and you're going to go to hell. Yeah, that'll be effective. Like, no. I I maybe you're an atheist, but I believe God can reach anyone in any condition, anywhere. Like the Psalm says, "When I make my bed, when I stroll through the streets of heaven, you are there. When I make my bed in hell, thou art there. give them room for their belief to say, "Hey, maybe you're right. Maybe you're right. Maybe there is no God. I sure hope you're wrong." But we want to be effective. Maybe you're right so and so. Maybe there is a trinity. Maybe there is a oneness. May maybe there is a a uh maybe Jesus was just an angel. Whatever. Maybe. But I'm going to give you room for that. I think you're wrong. But God bless you. Maybe you're right. Maybe I am wrong. I'll pray about that, brother. even if you know they're wrong. A super sun 1959. But we're grateful for every one of you. I'm very thankful to God for every member of the body of Christ everywhere and in all different phases of faith. No matter how much they might disagree with me, I'm still grateful that somebody even if I'd think they'd be a little in error in the scripture, but yet trying to earnestly stand for what they believe, I'm certainly willing to bear with those brethren and them bear with me in my errors and things because there's none of us perfect. James Cinnabon says one one thing I have ever observed that in every revival of pure religion the spirit of toleration revives with it and as religion declines intolerance increases interesting there was another quote hold on there was another quote that's really really good that I wanted to read and it is from uh adoption number three I Um, Barton Stonestone. Pure religion expands the souls of Christians, but bigotry contracts them. Barton Stone. Very interesting. Adoption number one. Brother Brandham said, "I would by no means ever try to doubt anything that anyone ever told me that God told them. I believe it even if it didn't even if I didn't see it in the scripture. I would still want to believe that brother's word. I I might just stay right along with the Bible, but still I would believe that maybe that brother just misunderstood it some way that he might have it just got it mixed up a little and still I would believe he he to be my brother. That's really good. So the the um the real unity is not in agreeing all the time, but it's in loving your brother anyway. Brother Brandham said, "And I will restore." I believe we have to go through these things before we can really get to the real meaning of them. John, who was the one who wanted to call fire down out of heaven and burn up Samaria that day because they wouldn't give them something to eat, the same one become the very fond of love. I wonder, brethren, if someday when all of our differences, when we really see the vision that God's trying to get before us, if it just won't break us right down one of those feet. Stupid alarm. Uh, so it's interesting. Anyway, I love you guys. I mean, it's uh we got to approach these things with love and care and wanting to understand people, not just wanting to prove them wrong, cuz it's it's easy to get into a position of, well, here's here's all the reasons why you're wrong. Like, wow, you're so creative. But it's hard to approach it with love and say, "Hey, maybe I'm wrong. Could you could you tell me how you think I'm wrong? Could you could you tell someone about it?" Sister Jericho says, "Uh, talking to someone who you know is going to disagree is something you got to walk into prayerfully. I do believe God can give us the words we when when we need to speak. We sometimes like Elisha need to get into the right spirit to be able to have a conversation with this person who disagrees. Yes, sir. Sister, that's exactly right. Because, you know, it can get tough. They can get all nasty and it's uh it's tough. I would say as much as we can, we can avoid conversations with people that don't have that if they approach it with um well, why would I have a conversation when you're right when you're wrong and I'm right? Don't don't talk to them. If they're not willing to be wrong, it's not it's not any use. If they're just going to find a problem with what you're saying, regardless of I I once told someone, "Hey, I feel like you're going to uh I feel like you're being a contrarian and regardless of what I say, you're just going to find a problem with it." And they told me, "That's not right." I was like, "Oh, great." That's when I walked out of the room. So, prayerfully and we want to be effective and learn as much as you can about the other person's point of view. Repeat it back to them in a way that they like it and then say what you think. And I think that would be a better way doing it rather than what people usually do. [Music] So this is a nice little music. Thank you everyone for being here. It's an honor and a privilege to people came, people listened. So I'm going to pray and then we will uh tell you good night. Gracious Lord, thank you for this night. All that you've given us. I pray that what I said would be encouraging and helpful and people would hear it and it would be something that would help Lord to for us to approach your disagreements in the right way to stay in unity regardless of them. Give us more of your spirit every day. We ask in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. That's nice. Uh Noah says, "Great episode. Love you, brother." And since Jerick has something she's wanting to say before the end, we'll we'll wait for it. Love is what the Wait, we'll wait for you, Jericho. Take your time. Love is what the ones who disagree need. Amen. Yes, it is. And leveling with them. It's important thing is like, "Hey, I see that you disagree so and so, and that's all right. I hope with all my heart that I'm wrong. Maybe I am wrong, and I love you." Um, and it's okay to say, "Hey, look, you're yelling and you're intense and I I can't I can't engage in that conversation, but I sure do love you, and you're not being mean to them. They'll come back later at a later point, whatever." It's uh we want to be effective more than we want to be right. We'll have future episodes where I'll talk about religion where it's very disheartening to me to see the same people a lot on Facebook where their entire existence is just lining out a bunch of people all the time. It's not helpful. It doesn't do anything for anybody. It doesn't. Or I'll do one on how uh what brother Brandham said, closed clos line pre uh if it's not clos line preaching, it's not preaching where it's a uh if if your if your approach is just to tell people all of the good news and none of the bad news, none of the the the things that make it balanced, it's not real preaching, it's just motivational speeches without the hard parts. If I tell you that we have a message we can shout about and a message that we can live about and a message that changed our lives, that's a good thing. But I'll also tell you that that we have a message so good that you can get over your differences and your petty grievances and that you can uh it's so good you can get over your grudges. I'm not preaching the whole message. I'm just preaching the part that people like the most and that's the most popular. Little stuff like that. Um James says, "Happy Good Friday and happy Easter. God bless you." Um Jericho says, "I've proven this in my own life with people. Loving them is so important." Yes, it is. And break the fourth wall with them. Say, "Look, man. I think you're crazy and I hope that I'm wrong, but I love you. And you know what? Show me how you think I'm think I'm wrong. Explain to me. So, what you're saying is this interesting cuz once you repeat back to them what you think they're saying, they will uh they'll ask they'll ask you for your rebuttal and they'll feel listened to. They'll feel respected. But if you just tell them how they're wrong, you won't get anywhere. Sherica says, "These people often respect me because my life preaches for me. Instead of me necessarily telling them, I often wait for people to open the door." That's right, sister. And you know, women don't preach beyond a pulpit, but they certain certainly do preach in the way that they live. You women, the way that you dress, the way that you live your life, the way that you talk to others, the way that you love others is a more effective sermon in a lot of ways than any sermon I'll preach. I can preach be behind a behind the pulpit. Sure. But you can reach people at Walmart that'll never even step foot in the church that I can't reach with the way that you walk and the way that you talk and the way that you conduct yourself. I can't I'm just a I'm just a dude in a Walmart with some jeans and a t-shirt. But these message, these girls, these Christian girls, these beautiful girls dressed like queens and not dressed like the rest of the world, that's very effective. So you do have a sermon to preach that the way that you live. So you pray guys and next Friday, I don't know what I'll talk about. I'll I'll figure something out. We got I want to have guests on. It's not uh Jericho says it's not meant to scare people, but people watch us more than we realize. It is. So, it's uh it's interesting. I had a live similar to this called uh the power of differences and the power of unity, but I just read a bunch of quotes and I didn't put very much prep time into it. So, um you know, I'm going through some of these old things to, you know, the power of being willing to be wrong, etc. We want to be effective. It's easy to want to be right. That that's the easy part. But approaching it in a way where people know you're willing to be wrong is such a superpower. Like Jenny's father, you know, he's a he's very high in the Baptist hierarchy of preachers and stuff like that and he him and I were talking and he told me, David, some people pride themselves on their ability to separate brethren and it doesn't help people. He said someone once bragged to him and said, "Oh, I chased off nine families in the church last night with how much I corrected them." He said, "What? Are you kidding me? That didn't help anybody. you were maybe you were right in the technicality of what you were saying, but you weren't right in chasing them off. He said, "We want unity. We want to change people's lives more than we want to be right." And people will know if you need to uh listen to them or you're trying to prove your point. Cuz if you just try to prove how God exists one thousand more times and all the different things now atheism is wrong, oh great, another Christian trying to prove it wrong. But if you say, "Hey, this is how God impacted my life. This is how he proved himself to me," you will be effective. Cuz even if someone disagrees with you entirely and tells you that you're the devil or whatever, what you say, they will review over and over again in their minds. They will the p the the kind of person that you are in some ways will have more impact on an atheist than all of the greatest arguments ever made by the most smart preachers that ever existed. Sister Jericho says some people see a light around us. Yes, they do. And Lord help us to be more like him. I love you guys. Thank you for being here. It's an honor and a privilege to be here with you all. We will see you guys in the next episode. God bless you.