So easy question for you to start this whole thing. Yeah, you come from California to Texas, the land of fruits and nuts, brother, and you go to In and Out for lunch.
Hey man, I had to feel at home. You know, all this Waterburger stuff. You know, we might have to get into a fight, but I'm like, I had a friend try to compare Waburger to In and Out and I'm like, yeah, you got problems, bro.
So I didn't say anything when you texted me that. You're like, I'm on my way, I'm making good time. I'm gonna stop buy in and Out and grab a little lunch.
And I was like, oh, I am man, he's going to do that. That's what he's gonna do. I was on my way and I'm like, oh, home, I exited, and.
Did it taste the same as California In and Out?
You know what it did? Man?
Okay?
And not just that, but I said to the lady at the count I'm like, every one of these is exactly. I feel like I'm literally at my in and Out in my neighborhood. You know.
But did you tell you said I'm from California and okay.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I said, yeah, man, and she was. She used to work at an in and Out in California. So yeah, bro, we call it the Lord's Burger.
The Lord's Burger, that's it. So it's like the Lord Chicken is Chick fil a. You get your chicken.
If you're saved, you eat it in and out? Are they a Christian based company and then out? Are you serious? I don't know you've net You've never looked under the cups, and.
I maybe it's embarrassing.
I haven't seen too much under the cups and under the fry thing of Majinga's Yeah, so get with it, man.
So now I feel really bad because I don't know this about Waterburger. I don't know they don't have scriptures on their cups. So yeah, that's a really good argument. And believe the gospel.
Man, there's still time saved. There's still time for you.
I get saved again almost every time in this podcast. We got somebody.
I love it, man.
I think I got saved with Ray a few weeks ago.
Yeah, multiple salvations.
Your father in law is Ray Comfort, Yeah, the one and only who we had him on here. Uh, you know, not not handsome sitting here in the in the seat like you are.
He was on the screen, he was he doesn't travel anymore, man. He put an end to that years ago. So yeah, you got to get them remote.
So I purposely don't know your testimony or how this even that your connection with Ray, I don't know, and I typically I will like dive in and want to learn everything about it, but I was, man, I have heard that you have quite the story, pretty crazy. Great.
So yeah, well let me say first of all, a lot of people don't know this, you know, but Ray is obviously my father in law. But what a lot of people don't know is Rays of Jewish descent and I'm of Arab descent, and together we are the solution to the Mid East crisis.
Wow.
And if that doesn't work, We're going to start a new mattress company called Easy Comfort, and just call.
It today.
Easy Comfort. It's a match made in heaven.
So let me get some context to what you just said, because it's it's by no coincidence that I was literally talking about this today with two friends that were here at the house, and we're talking about racism and how in America we have no idea, we have no idea hatred. And when I've been to Israel, in fact, a man who's sitting here with us on this particular trip I was telling them about. We had Rami with us, you know,
loving the death. He's an Arab Christian, but there were there were times when we would go eat at certain restaurants and he would not eat with us, and he would say, there is a Jew at your table. I would say, Rami, you're a Christian man. You've been you know, been set free from You've been set free from this in Christ and he can't. It runs deep, man, It's run so deep. He couldn't sit at the same table. So that this is what you're talking about with with
Arabs and Jews. There is something going on there that goes beyond what the American mind could possibly understand.
Yeah, there's a history, there's a lot of you know, acrimony, and yet I have seen, like with Ray and myself, you know, but even in the Middle East, the Lord take Jews, Arabs, save them and break down. As Ephesian talks about that middle wall of separation and that unity that we have because of Christ. Man, it's beautiful and you see that, you know, when two people get radically saved and were at enmity, and then now they have Christ as the bond. There's nothing like it. And that's
what the gospel does. You know, you think of Revelation five, from every tribe and tongue and people and nation, He's redeemed us to God by his blood. Yeah, man, so yeah, it's it's it all goes back to the gospel. But man, Ray, and I you know, he's been my father in law now boy, as of a few days ago, twenty nine years wow, and yeah, thank you. You know, he was my hero before I knew him, and then you know, I met him and then he became my father in law.
But you know the old saying never meet your heroes because you'll be disappointed. We always seen that we build people up and then we realized that were't all we thought they were cracked up to be, and that we get disappointed. But man, with Ray, it's been the exact opposite. I mean, my respect for him keeps grow and I know him. You know, he's not just my boss. He's my father in law. So I know him his family
and he's a real deal. I mean, what you see on our television program, what you see on our podcast what you see on you know, our YouTube channel the movies. This is Ray Comfort twenty four seven. I have never in my twenty nine years of him being my father, in thirty years almost of knowing him, I've never seen the man have an off day when it comes to
sharing the Gospel. He is on and always on. It's like his his face is set like a flint, you know, and he's just heading toward eternity and he's gonna grab whoever he can on his way. And I've never known anyone like him. His humility, his godliness, his generosity. Don't get me emotional, bro, Yeah, it's it's it's amazing. So
I'm humbled. I constantly pinched myself that, like, I get to serve the Lord with ch because before I met him, I dropped to my knees one day very distinctly, I said, Lord, I pray that someday in some way this man can disciple me. And so I first heard about him. This
guy comes up to me. I was visiting some friends at a Bible college and this guy that I just got to know a bit, he comes up and he goes, hey, man, you ever heard of this guy named Ray comfort, and he starts looking around like he's about to do a drug deal. He's like and he goes he's crazy. I'm like, no, I never heard this crazy guy.
I n even recover.
But he got my attention. So he sticks a book in my hand called Springboards for Effective Evangelism. He's, oh, man, you got to read this. I took it out of you know, courtesy. I'm thinking that's going to go on that stack of books at home. I'm never going to read. And but by God's providence, one day I picked it up and man, I couldn't put it down. I'm like reading this stuff he's doing. He's going up to strangers
on the street. He's doing a mock funeral in public with like these guys dressed up like Paul bearers and he's got a guyline on the ground, the sheet over him. He's talking to people about death. You know, it's going up to the cast of Jesus Christ Superstar preaching the gospel. I'm like, no, this guy's not crazy. He's clinically insane. You know, like what in the world. And you know he becomes my father in law and you got to fill.
In that gap right there.
Yeah, Well, before before that, before that, before that, I had started an evangelism team through a church that I had co planted, and we were about to go out for our first time and someone brings a VHS if you remember what that is, a VHS state and they're like, hey, man,
you ever heard of Ray Comfort. I'm like, yeah, I have pops it in and it was one thing that you know, read about what Ray was doing, but to see him in action, I mean, this little guy stepping up on a step stool, you know, yeah, right Tan and the Lord repent, you know, and he's just doing his thing. I'm like And so from that point I really got connected with the ministry. And then we uh I called to order some tracks one day and I heard leaving waters. I'm like, no, no, it can't be.
So we keep talking a little more and I'm like, I'm sorry, is this very comfort? Oh yeah? Right, yeah, yeah yeah. I'm like, no way, so personable, so down to earth, so humble, you know. And at the end of the conference, he says, you know, if you ever want me to come speak at your church, because the ministry wasn't far from our church, he said, you know, I'd love to, And so I said.
You're a Christian at this point, like you were a Christian before? The first guy says, have you heard of recovery?
Oh yeah, yeah, okay, I got yeah, I've been saved a couple of years, so we need to get to that.
Yeah.
Well yeah yeah, So I'm on, you know. I like, yeah, if you ever want me to come speak, I left to him like yeah, yeah, let me pray about it. Amen, yes, you know, like, where can you come? So a couple of weeks later he came spoke, and and then you know what's crazy is after he became my father in law, one day he came up to me with that book that I first learned about him through, and it was a reprint of the book, and he surprised me by putting a chapter of poetry I had written into the book.
So now I'm in the book that I first learned about him through. And then one year I went our way to Israel and we stopped off in New York. We had a long layover, and I find myself standing with him in that same park I watched him in the video preaching at and I was there with him, side by side, preaching the gospel open air in that same part, and so it was just like surreal, you know.
So, yeah, okay, there's a lot of a lot of gaps to fill in. Yeah, I do want to say that's how older, you know, nine? Yeah, let's I'll say this as respectful as I can. You and I we will. We Lord Willing will have a lot of years without Ray here. And there is a generation of faithful Bible teachers that right now is kind of at the at the later years of their life, the twilight years of
their life. Some of them. I think we'll probably lose some within a year or two, not Ray, but we will be You and I will be a generation to tell our children and our children's children we knew this man. Yeah, you walked up the hallway with a lot of men on my that have passed from years past that that we don't have any connection to, right but we will
with this particular generation. And Ray is right there in the middle of this small group of faithful men that will be remembered because of the Lord's work in their life.
Yeah. You know, Paul Washer. We spent about an hour and a half with Paul Washer recently at the Shepherd's Conference, just you know, hanging out in a boardroom and and to see his because he's a giant amongst us, you know now, but to see his excitement about Ray and he just looked at her, I said, you're my hero, Like, you have no idea how much you've impacted my life.
And he has said before publicly, Ray Comfort will never know how much impact he's had in this world until he reaches eternity, you know.
And Arsi Sprolls teachings are still people still watch those videos. Yeah, and that will happen even more with Ray. Yeah, so many more videos.
And man, the older he gets, the more passionate he gets, the more jaddicky becomes. I'm like, Ray, what in the world. You know, he just I mean, he keeps discovering he has these abilities. You know, it's like that are just insane. You know, he gets saved and before he got saved, he saw this leather jacket and he thought, oh, I can do that, makes a leather jacket. Next thing, you know, he has a leather jacket shop. He's got like made
like over a thousand jackets in his time. Then you know, he gets saved and he's like, oh, you know, he almost failed English and he stood up in front of his class one time to give a speech, and he dried up. Everyone started laughing at him. He sat down. He said, I will never speak in public again. Get saved. Next thing he knows, he's open hair preaching. He's speaking everywhere, you know.
Jeremiah, Yeah, I give you your mouth right. Yeah.
And then you know, one day he just decided to try his hand at painting. He discovers he's this brilliant painter. He started painting these portraits and we started making putting them on eBay and and getting money for the ministry. Then in his late sixties, he thought, you know, I can't wait for my team to finish editing. I'm gonna edit. He learns to edit, starts editing most of our videos and movies. Yeah. Yeah, and now yeah, he's been watching a lot of ballet. I'm getting scared. Bro Oh great
comfort the ballerina. No, so tell me about how you got saved. Yeah. So I was born in Lebanon. Immigrated to the US with my family in nineteen eighty. I was about four and a half. Lebanon was a real It's a city called Junia. It's near Bay Route. I mean Lebanon's so small, but yeah, about probably fifteen to twenty minutes from Beirut coastal town. Immigrated nineteen eighty with my family. A couple of my uncles had come ahead of us,
and so by God's grace, we ended up here. And you know, as a kid, I had this sort of chip on my shoulder soldier mentality. You grew up in the midst of war. You're always hearing about the enemy, and you're just kind of sort of almost influenced with this aggressive kind of fighter mindset. And so Muslim family, no, actually Catholic Catholic, Yeah, yeah, Lebanon is unique in the Middle East in that regard and that it was almost
a majority Catholic population. So grew up Catholic. We had priest nuns, we had a monastery that was run by our family forever, you know, and so my dad almost became a priest. But we move here and man, I just I had this again chip on my shoulder, and so early on, getting into trouble in school, getting in the fights. Eight years old, I did my first Holy Communion in the Catholic Church and I decided, man, that's it, I'm changing my life I'm going to reform this thing.
And I got cleaned. I got to reform again. Bro, the easy reformation. I thought, you know, I thought, I'm gonna I'm gonna, yeah, change my life.
So I cleaned.
I cleaned up the outside of the cup really well. Stopped lying, stealing, cheating, robbing banks all at eight years old. But you know, I really cleaned up my life. Became teacher's pet, mama's boy, stopped cussing, go to local Catholic gift shop by crosses, you know, do all my rituals. But you know it was the outside of the cup. I wasn't regenerated. And so I hit high school and just things just started to spiral out of control, peer pressure, and I had my long list of dos and don'ts.
It now was a distant memory, you know. So freshman year in high school, became my class president, sat on my throne, started wreaking havoc. Fight after fight, ended up vandalizing a classroom, threatened to kill a teacher, got kicked out of my first high school, sent to my second high school. At this time, believe it or not, I was a rap artist. Ray was my backup dancer and beat boxer. I was a rap artist. I had my artist producer contract signed. My producers produced some of the
top artists in the industry. I don't if you remember Montel Jordan. This is how we do it. So my producer wrote that song, and then O. G. Pierce was his name. And then is this where easy came from? Well, they're my initials, man, But I know it worked. It worked. Yeah, people thought, oh, you're taking an easy eas name. I had it before him, an Easy anyway. And then my producer also produced if you remember Leio Gang's for Paradise album, he produced Smoked most of the songs on that, not
that particular song, but most of the other songs. So they took me on. I'm fifteen, you know, and and I was on my way man, and so I just thought I was cool fifteen yeah, and then and then I end up at this other high school. This was a gang infested high school. So firstdy on campus. I connect with this guy. We're walking. I used to go on the local you know radio station, CAISSEFM. At times I do like rap battles and you know, so, and
I'm doing my album. So I started talking to him, was like, hey, man, come hang out with us at lunch. I did, and that day turned into a week, a week, and now a month, and one day we're walking off campus to go to lunch. He's like, hey, man, we want to jump you in. And these guys were crips and so I'm like, all right something. They jumped me in, man, and it was so surreal.
You know what does that mean?
So mean, Yeah, that means that it's it's an initiation into the gang. So that means you get beaten to a pulp by you know, I think four guys that were part of it with me, And so they beat you to a pulp for a certain amount of time and and then that that initiates you into the gang. It just shows like you're really you're dedicated to be in. It's all biblical. I was a biblical gang stuff, you
know what I'm saying. So anyway, so yeah, the dust settles and I just stood there like kind of man, what I'm a crib like you know what I mean. As a kid, you'd hear about the bloods and the cribs. It's like so from there, man, things just I started doing stuff that I just never would have fad them doing. You know, and things got out of control and I get kicked out of my second high school. And in the midst of all that, I, you know, I one day I tried to commit suicide in front of my
family and just was in front of your family. Yeah, yeah, there was just an altercation. I just ran for the kitchen drawer, grabbed a knife, and I just started stabbing at my wrist, you know. And I didn't, by God's grace, I didn't look at what I was grabbing. But it happened to be a dull knife or I don't know what would have happened.
But where's the Catholic church in this part of your life?
So I still believe in God. I would pray every night, I do the sign of the Cross when I'd passed by a church. But that's all, you know. I had gone to an Evangelical church with a friend of mine a number of times growing up who lived in my neighborhood, and and I actually stopped certain christ Catholic practices. I just it made sense. I'm like, yeah, praying to marry my friend's like, man, we should only pray to God. We shouldn't pray to like statues. And I'm like, oh yeah,
it was like the that makes sense. And I would pray at night and I'd say, God, I know I need to give you my life. I know I need to stop this stuff, but I just can't, you know, and.
And then tell me. It seems like there's a big difference between the Lebanese Catholic Church and the American Western Catholic Church, at least from what I've seen when I've been in the Middle East. It's very different, and it's very different pretty much in Latin America. And is there is there?
Yeah? There, I mean there's overarching, massive similarities, right, you have some differences. And the part of the Catholic Church that I was a part of is called Maronite, so it's a sect within the Catholic Church, but it's under the pope and everything. It's it's Catholic. But there were Yeah, there were some differences there, but but but still the same the same sort of spirit and the same false doctrine.
You know that basically we're not just saved by grace through faith alone Christ alone, but our works play a role in that. And then of course you have the idolatry and the marriology and a whole lot of other dangerous things, you know.
So you go a few evangelical churches, yeah, and so then drop a few practices, yeah.
But still not saved, but had more of an understanding, a little bit of Okay, there's a difference here, you know. And so anyway, one day, my friend was invited by his parents to go to an evangelistic event. It was like a big one and at a big stadium, you know. And so they invited him, told him to invite me. So he invites me, like a month before we're supposed to go, and so I said, all right, I'll go. I had no idea then why, I said yes. Now, I know it is God's profit. But I remember that
day rolled around that we were supposed to go. It was actually like two in the morning. He and I were at a party. We're drunk out of our minds, and I remember we went and parked off a street in our neighborhood, and I mean I was. I looked at her and I said, man, I feel so good. And I said, this is the best feeling I've ever had. I said, I want to feel this way for the rest of my life. I having no idea how the
rest of my life was going to be transformed. Hours later, I go home, crash, get up the next day, do my same stuff. Said to my mom, Hey, I'm going to some Christian thing with my friend Buill to night. She goes, yeah, right, you liar here I am I first time in my life telling her the truth that she's not believing me. And so I got angry. My bedroom walls was full of rap posters. But it wasn't because I just liked those artists, but it was because I had holes all over my bedroom walls. I just
had a real, real anger. I'd go in, I just punch holes into the walls, you know. And so I started to hit the walls. I'm getting mad. My friend pulls up and I was this close to not going with him. I was about to go and do what my mom thought I was going to do, go party and whatever. But I get in the car and the whole way there, I'm fuming, you know, And we walk
in and and man, it was just I couldn't. The atmosphere was so foreign to me, you know, people just full of joy, and they're looking up toward the heavens and singing as if though God was like, really there little I know he was, you know. And then the preacher got up and began to preach the gospel. And man, it's as if though he had a hidden camera following me around everywhere, he had a chip in my brain. He was reading my thoughts. I mean, everything he was
hitting on. I had been thinking about, you know. But when I heard that salvation was a free gift. You can't earn it, you can't work for it, and you can know for certain you have everlasting life, and that God was willing to forgive me no matter what I had done, you know. And when that call was given to repent and trust the Lord, Man, I did immediately and instant transformation, brand new creation. Everything about me changed
and that split second. Different people have different testimonies, but that's mine. You know. We get in my friend's car, we're heading home. He turns on the same filthy radio station we used to listen to. I go, whoa, bro, what are you doing? I go, We're Christians. We don't listen to that stuff anymore. He's like, whoa. It's like this guy got over saved yea. Yeah, you know. And so so that was man, that was, and everything the way I thought talked acted felt I was a brand
new creation. You know, I got kicked out of my first high school my second. After my second high school, I had a great point average of zero point three to two.
Yeah, it's not about you know.
At least what was oh right, but that was four f's two D minuses, and the D minuses were in pe and drama. I think it's illegal to give anyone an F and those. Yeah, and so so I get back into my first high school, and I prayed for some specific I went from that zero point three two GPA to four point zero, started teaching Bible study at the Bible Study Club on campus, graduated, went to a Christian university, ended up co planning at church at twenty,
which is crazy. I don't recommend it, and then met a crazy guy named Ray Comfort.
Okay, so you're twenty years old. Right around this time is when this guy comes up to you and says, have you heard of this guy Ray Comfort?
Is that yeah, I'm prout, Well I'm about no, I'm about probably eighteen, okay, Yeah, because I got saved a month before I turned sixteen. Yeah, a couple of years later, Yeah, I talked talk to this guy and then yeah, then I meet Ray when I was about nineteen and then yeah, and that was and he came and spoke at our church, and then came a second time, and his daughter came and uh, she took one look at me, proposed on
the spot. Are we are? See? I can say that ravely because she's not here, you know, I'm saying.
Yes you can, yes you can. So what happened to what happened to the Catholic Church in this this transformation?
Yeah?
So like in your mind? Yeah. And part of the reason I ask it is because people, you know, love our Catholic listeners, but they get we get pretty defensive, yeah, saying that Granger, first of all, you don't understand and you should maybe and maybe we should one day have a Catholic apologist where we could actually have a good discussion because they say you're misrepresenting us every time. You just get it all wrong. Yeah. And so so I'm
trying to be in this conversation unbiased towards yours. Is your story mind? Yeah? So what happens in your mind? You're you're not converted, everything's new. Why don't you go back to the Catholic Church?
So honest question, Yeah, yeah. Well my family was curious about that as well. First it was like, man, we don't care if it's Buddha that saved you. You know, you're you're a different person. But then after a while it was like, hey, what's wrong with our church? And so you know, they said, hey, the priest said he'd like to meet with you. Obviously they put him up to that. I went to the priest's house, we sat down,
and I just gave him scripture after scripture. He wasn't expecting that, you know, and I said, well, what about this and what about that? And so you know, look, I the majority of my family's Catholic. I absolutely love Catholics. We've done a lot of videos on our YouTube channel
regarding Catholicism. We do it respectfully, humbly, because our call and scripture is to consider others more important than ourselves, and if we don't have a spirit of love and kindness, then it's contradictory to everything we claim to stand for as Christians. But love has at its core truth. You can't have true love without truth, and so we have to speak the truth in that regard and the Catholic Church. I say this, you know, with humility has a false gospel,
you know. And as far as where they stand, you just have to look at the councils. It's clear in there that if you believe you're saved by grace alone, through faith, learn and Christ alone, you are anathema. And that charge, you know, came from them. And so like Martin Luther said, here I stand, I can do no other unless I'm convinced by scripture. And so Galatians makes it clear if we preach another gospel, then we are anathema. And it's clear what the gospel is.
But as an eighteen, when were you converted? Month before I turned sixteen? So yeah, about sixteen? Okay, So let's like just look at this with a microscript. I think it's interesting you go, you have this meeting the priest. Yeah, and of course I agree with your what you're saying about Galatians. And what is it that he said that made you say, I think I'm not going to this church anymore as opposed to agree to disagree see it mass Wednesday?
Yeah, Well I had, I mean I had already come to that conclusion before meeting with him. So it wasn't and it wasn't right away. It might have been maybe maybe a year later or so. So I had already really i'd really jumped headlong into apologetics, and I had this this heart and mindset of like, well, man, I want to know for sure, why you know this is what is supposedly the truth that I've now committed myself to. I mean, I believed enough of what I heard at
that that night to believe, but then I wanted. I wanted to know because truth is important.
You know, was there a hinge for you? Like, you know, Martin Luther Romans one seventeen. Is there something that you go this was? Maybe it?
There doesn't have to be something sure? Well, yeah, I mean again for me, I mean Ephesians two, eight and nine is so clear. You know, you got on Timothy one, you got Titus two, Titus three, You've got I mean Romans four, Romans eleven. The scripture is riddled with verses on the fact that we're saved by grace through faith and that faith is in Christ alone, and so all of that combined the systematic teaching of the doctrine of
you know, of salvation, it was just clear. And then and then you know, also the idolatry is so blatantly clear. I mean when I level with my Catholic friends, I just have to look at them say, I mean, you must know in your heart of hearts that this is wrong, and you know they won't call it worship. But the analogy I use is it's like it's semantics, right. It's like the doctor says to you, Hey, granger, you got you gotta know surgery tomorrow, so you can't eat any solids?
You okay, no problem, doc. You go home, grab some chicken, steak, fries, vegetables, you throw them in a blender, right, you goz them down, you go the next day, doesn't xtra, Hey what did I tell you? No, doctor, I didn't eat, I drank. Come on, we don't worship. We venerate, Yeah, bowing down right, lighting incense, kissing, holding up, praying to what do you call that? If that's not worship, what is? And so so you know, I level with them, and you just
know that their conscience bears witness. But the tradition has such a stronghold that I think it leads to unfortunate's blindness. And it breaks my heart, like this isn't something I glowed over, Like, no, man, it's like I was there, and there's liberty, there's freedom in Christ. He can set you free from that, and he's the only mediator between God and man.
Amen. Yeah, as I think about it, I saw a meme one time that said that had you know that veneration and the picture of the idolatry in the Catholic church, and then side by side it was a Protestant church with everyone has their hands up, and there's bands, and there's there's a fog machine and lights and they're all kind of and and so how do we address this?
Yeah, that's a that's another big problem today as well. And I do I do remind my Catholic friends that there's there are a lot of unsafe people in the Evangelical church. Amen, A lot. I mean, Jesus Matthew seven. Many will say to me on that day, Many will say to me, on that day, Lord Lord, have we not? You know? Prophesidecast out dem has done many wonders, all these religious things. You say, I never knew you, Titus once sixteen. They profess to know God, but by their
deeds they deny it. First John, by this one, we've come to know them if we keep his commandments the one who says I've come to home but doesn't keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him. God is light, and then there's no darkness at all. We say we have fellowship with Him, but walk in darkness. We lie and don't practice the truth. So it's not a Catholic problem. It's a human problem.
That's it. That's it. That's good.
That's important to realize. I mean there's pastors that aren't saved. I personally know pastors who were not saved and in the pastorate chain of Christ.
Oh yeah, oh oh yeah, yeah. I mean John Wesley is a great example.
You don't.
Yeah, John was preaching till the Moravians the truth.
I'm going to convert the Heathens. Who's going to convert me?
It's like, okay, so Rachel comes with the picture Ray first. Yeah, okay, you meet Ray, tell me about that, because I don't think we got to that. You meet, You're on the phone with him, that's the last you heard. Yeah, when you meet him, then what happens.
Yeah, he came that first time to the church and spoke and it was weird, man. I mean, you know, I just all I'd seen him on was a television screen and read his books, but to like meet him in person, it was just it was really cool. It was it was a special moment for me, you know. And then the second time when he came around, and what happened was, you know, I meet Rachel and we just really hit it off, you know, I mean she
came to pick him up. His wife dropped him off at our church that morning and Rachel came to pick him up, and she came up the stairs to the second floor where sanctuary was, and he introduced us. You know, he was always trying to match make you know there, and we just hit it off. I said, hey, we do Evangelis on Fridays, if you everyone to come join us. Gave him my card and he was.
Trying to match make it oh yeah, yeah, yeah yeah.
Because you know, I was a pastor and he you know, got to know me a little bit, and you know he wants his r to get married and you know, so so anyway, so then I I remember I called Ray to thank him for letting me for speaking at our church, and I said, hey, if you ever need anything, let me know. I was actually when moving this weekend. If you want to help us like I'm there. Yeah.
So yeah, so I go and I do that, and that's where we really connected, Rachel and I. And then just from there she she actually started to fellowship at our church and we just yeah, just went from there and ended up getting married April sixth ninety six. So yeah, man, you were young twenty. Yeah, I'm doing it opposite of my dad. You know, my dad passed away last January at one hundred and thirteen. Wait what Yeah, yeah, I'm
eighty three. But plastic surgery. Bro, Come on, it's gonna be a whole podcast.
Yeah.
So my dad is a Mediterranean diet I was telling me, man, I'm telling you to buoy. It's all about Tabulli.
Yeah.
He was born nineteen eleven and my mom he was sixty five when I was born. He and my mom were like thirty five years apart in age. He's a really good looking guy. And yeah and so yeah, he one website had him as oldest man in America. He was in the top five in the world. So I come from old stock, brother, Yeah, you do that deep wisdom that is that I need, that I need.
Tell me about your parents? Did they ever? Did they ever?
Except both of them came to know the Lord.
I'm trying to see that. I want to say that in the most respectful way to uh yeah.
Yeah, my dad. Uh my dad cried out to to to God at one hundred and nine. So there is hope. There is hope.
Praise the Lord. Now we know why the Lord sustained his life.
Or so, I know people were praying for him all around the world, you know, and.
Some people are more stubborn than others. The Lord would have done that to me, like all right, great dreams going to hold you around for a long time.
It's like, all right, God, I believe, now take me and then my mom on her deathbed, you know. So that's that's a joy for me to see that the Lord did that.
And so you get married to Rachel. Moving moving down the timeline here, Yeah, when do you start working for Living Waters?
So I was pastoring, I said, I co planted that church, and it was a real growing, real real dynamic church. God was doing some great things. And I remember one time I was I was talking to one of the vice presidents at Living Waters now, but he was also one of the pastors at the church, Mark Spence. I said, Mark, what do you what do you sense? Like the Lord my half for my life? Like you know, so I see you, you know, working at Living Waters serving, I
see you serving in leadership. I mean, and what did Mark smoke this? I mean, man, this dude's so lod because it's funny. It never ever came into my mind like to serve at Living Waters. I mean, you know, I was pastoring. I was I had not my own itinerant ministry. I was traveling speaking, and I thought, all right, whatever man. But then years later, uh, the ministry started to really grow. And so on my day off from the church, I think it was Mondays, I would go
in and just help, you know. And so a week after week after week, eventually my Lord began to knit my heart with the ministry. And I called Ray one day because he raised very non administrative. I mean, you talk anything administration. His eyes we rolled back glaze over. He just he just he's a creative genius. He just wants to yeah, right, he wants to create. He doesn't want to deal with any of that that that falls more. I mean I'm a visionary too, but that falls more
within my skill set. So I called I go, hey, Ray, the mystry was starting to grow at this time, more staff were coming on and he just, yeah, so, Sarah, what do you think about me one day? Maybe you know, possibly like sort of a kind of in a way, you know, serving at Living Waters. He's like, are you serious?
And he say, yeah, bro, yeah, when can he get down here?
And he was flipping out. He just I'm like, whoa okay, And so yeah, So I came on in two thousand and three and just hit twenty two years at the ministry, and and so you know, I started as kind of the general manager, became the vice president, executive vice president. Now I'm the president. You know, succession is important. Sure, a lot of organizations and ministries don't plan ahead, and so the ministry dies with the founder. So we're trying
to get away from that. So it's not just myself, but but a few other guys within the ministry are are more public now and so we can keep the vision going.
You know, it's so important because we mentioned the older guys, So we have desiring God grace to you. Liganeer still going nine marks. We see a lot of these Living Waters organizations that are now thinking to themselves, what what's the future of this. Yeah, I think Desiring God is an example of an organization that's going uh oh, yeah, we need to really figure out the succession in the now.
Well, you know, let me say, Liganeer did a phenomenal job. I'm good friends with Nathan W. Bingham, you know, who's who's one of their vps over there and does their podcasts and different things. But they're so they're so smart because they diversified so the ministries. I think it's stronger even than when doctor sproll. It seems like it, yeah, was alive, and that's that's what you want. So that's what we're trying to do. And again, I don't say
this like lightly or or like out of exaggeration. I regularly like just step back and in a sense pinched myself and I'm like, I can't believe I'm here. Like you know, the old illustration of a of a turtle on a fence post. You know, it didn't put itself there because it's impossible, And so I just look and I say, lord, I you know, I summed up my testimony years ago in this little verse. I once was but a lump of coal upon a heap of Meyer. Yet Jesus Christ redemed my soul and saved me from
the fire. And that's it.
Man. We have a guy sitting in room with us right now. Remember at our church that was saved through Living Waters. And in fact, I didn't even know that until we were just talking before church one day and and this came up. And he's just his his testimony is is pretty unbelievable. Through the work of Living Waters in this case, simply publishing a well edited video of the gospel through with Ray. It was the Which one was it? I think it was. It's the most viewed one.
Oh, Mario, Mario, Mario Ray, Praise daily Lord, give me another Mario. Yeah, that's video is like at five million views or something.
Just so if you guys, if you search on YouTube, if you search Living Waters or Ray Comfort and put in the search criteria most viewed, you'll get this video of Mario. And that video saved my friend here. The Lord used that and and that's just one example. And I thought it's encouraging to have him here with us now. Someone who listens to your podcasts, all of them, and it's we all, we all well, we have a love, a special love for the the Lord used to save us,
whatever that way might be, or whatever ministry or whatever church. Yeah, mine was desiring God, you know, as we as we mentioned that, and and those guys all desiring God, they all know that, you know, and and it's it's it's so important for us to remember that as you're working doing the grind, you know, thinking creatively, going through administrative things that we're talking about real people, yeah, that are getting the Gospel, and it's incredible. Yeah.
Yeah, we we always try to remind ourselves of that. That's why I love to read feedback from our listeners on every podcast, because it reminds us this is why we do what we do, and our aim is to decrease so that He might increase hman to hold up Christ like Moses did the serpent in the wilderness, so that people will look under him and be saved. So yeah, we were. We're blown away by what God has done with the ministry and the reach He's given us, and and that we get to be a part of it.
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Granger Smith. In fact, I just literally got a message from Cameo that says a guy named Ian now has a request for me. So what I do is I open this up and I go check out what Ian wants me to say for him, and for this it is a happy birthday to Melinda. So I will reach out to Melinda. I say happy birthday. It's Granger Smith here. I hope you have an amazing day. And I'm gonna tell her what else that I have here on the
little list that Ian has given me. And then I send it back to him and then he has a video message from me that then goes out to Melinda. It's really cool. It's super easy. I've been doing this for about six years now. So if you want to find me and get a special video message of any kind, go to a cameo dot com slash Grangersmith. So that then fast forward many years, and somehow our wives become friends. Yeah, I know, I don't know how that happened.
You know, my wife, Rachel has has a social media presence. She has a little ministry called Joyful Mothers, and she started it, you know, just to minister to women. She just had a heart for women. So she did it for like kind of her friends at first, and it just started to grow. So now she's got about one hundred thousand, you know, followers, and it's been amazing, and I think Amber might have connectedly there.
I don't think I've asked for specifically who found who or how that works, but they they started chatting and then they're like, you know, we get got to get our husbands together one of these days. And so at some point I end up getting a request if I would check out your book before it came out, latest book, which is called Fight Like a Man. Holding it right here. You read this, Jesse, right you read this, and you have not read this probably, but I just gave you
a copy, so fight like a man. I got this probably in I want to say, December or maybe late November, and that's the first time we actually were texting. And so I read this book and it's it's a there are there's some older books that talk about the purity of a man, and this is a culturally relevant book for that, for a man to pick up a book like this and to walk through it seeking godliness, seeking
purity specifically in godliness. And we live in a world that probably is more difficult for a man, with more temptations readily available than ever in history. Is that Is that too bold to say?
Oh, that's the truest thing anyone could say in this context. You know, when I was a kid, and probably the same with you. How old are you going er, I'm forty five? Okay, yeah, so you as well. Probably you know when I was a kid. Man, Look, you wanted to look at pornographic images, you had to have a friend who had a dad maybe who had a stash or a buddy stole a video from a liquor store that you know you used to carry them. Now we
all have these supercomputers in our pockets. At the click of a button, you can have access to millions, maybe billions of images and videos. I mean, it's insanity. So the accessibility has accelerated the degeneration in this area. And it is a problem. And it's not an epidemic, it's a pandemic. It's a destructive worldwide tsunami that is ravaging men, it's ravaging families, it's ravaging the church. And Granger, I'm a humbled brother that you would want to talk about
this because it's not a popular topic. It's a prevalent one and probably the issue of the day when it comes to the sin that is destroying men and the church. But it's not comfortable. Who wants to talk about that, you know? And it comes up when a leader falls in the body of Christ, and then we talk about it and everyone's alert and then right back under the radar.
And yet at the same time, it's like a hidden cancer that's eating away at the moral fiber of the church, which is weakening it spiritually, which is limiting its impact, which is dishonoring God. And so I was passionate about this subject as a pastor. It was like the number one counseling topic. And even now I'm counseling guys constantly, and it's become so prevalent that men have become desensitized.
People have, wives, have It's like everyone does it. Yeah, I'm struggling with it, and no man, this has to be dealt with head on, and hence the title fight like a man. You know, men are called to fight, and a man isn't just someone who's masculine and athletic and physically strong so on. But a man has courage, conviction, devotion, dedication, character, and more importantly, a man is willing to lay down
his life and love for others. And that should be for the Lord and for people, especially his family, his wife, his children, and his whole circle of influence. And so we have to recognize that, and we have to have a battle plan because the tragedy is is a lot of men are acting as if though they're they're living in peacetime, and so they don't have a wartime mentality,
which is what we need. I mean, imagine World War two, right, Imagine a soldier being deluded into thinking that he's on a luxury cruise ship heading for the shores of Bora, Bora to an exotic resort when in reality he's on a Higgins boat heading for the shores of Normandy. I mean, this guy's gonna saunter off the Higgins boat clad in a bathrobe, some fuffy slippers are remote in one hand, a latte in the other end, and probably some skinny, you know, pink polka dotted jeans, and he's gonna get
smoked in the great illustration. And that's what guys are doing.
You know.
It's like, oh, yeah, bro, know this thing's kind of hard, and you know, it's just like he prowls about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. And then the world system that is massive and enormous is all rallying against you and your your flesh, which is the true adversary, is coming against you, and you're just kind of yeah to do, dude, tiptoeing like you're in a field of lilies, you know, with a feather duster in your hand, like, and that's what's happening.
So tell me, how does when we read Greater Love has no Man than this, that he lays down his life for his friends, where does sexual purity compromise that idea?
Yeah, because sexual impurity doesn't just affect the person who's being sexually impure. Sexual sin has ripple effects that creates havoc across the spectrum of life. First of all, you're you're dishonoring the God who gave you life.
You know.
First Corinthian six eighteen says, every sin that a man commits, he commits outside that the body.
You just said, you just sounded just like great comfort. No God that gave you life, But the God that gave man been hearing the guy for so long.
But you know, he who commits sin commits, you know, every sin the man commits commits out side of the body. But you commit sexual morality, sins against his own body. What that passage is doing is it's it's highlighting sexual sin as a distinct sin with greater repercussions and ramifications. I mean, it's part and parcel with reprobation. If you read Romans won, I mean the ultimate giving over of those who have hardened their hearts against God is sexual immorality.
And so you know, we have this mindset as believers and we say it sin a sin, sin a sin, Well, sin is sin in terms of it being all a violation of God's law and being wrong, but not all sin a sin in terms of its its ravages and its repercussions and its seriousness and its impact. I mean, you may ask me to help you move house, and you know, I may lie and say, yeah, I got something going on this weekend. That's a sin. It's inexcusable,
it's wrong, it's reprehensible. But it's different than if I went and murdered your entire family and burned the house down with them. So men need to realize that sexual sin biblically does have a certain dynamic and element and facet to it that is distinct and has massive ramifications and repercussions associated with it. And we need to realize that, and we need to fight. You know, we fight not with carnal weapons, but in a spiritual sense, and we're
willing to again lay our lives down. The standard is death. If the standard is death, in terms of our love toward the Lord and others, anything beneath that standard should be a given, should be a given. I mean, imagine a platoon of Navy seals up on a hill on an island looking at another island with a hill on it, and the commander says to his men. Hey men, your mission is to cross the waters, scale that hill and save the President of the United States who's been taken hostage.
Can you imagine if and while you do it, you need to be willing to die in the process, be willing to lay your life down to save the president. Can you imagine if one of the seals looks at his commander says, yeah, but Commander, I don't know if you realize this, but there's some jellyfish in that water. Are you saying that we're Are you saying that we're
to risk getting jellyfish things? The other one's like, well, you know, sir, there were some you know, some steel traps that we saw there on the sand as we were servying. You know, you're telling us to like get our feet hurt, and the other ones like, you know, sir, I saw some poison ivy on the side of the hill there. You want us to get poisoned? Did you not hear me? Soldier? I said, the mission is to
be willing to lay your life down. You're talking to me about jellyfish and steel traps and poison ivy, And so our call is to die for the sake of others, to die for the sake of the glory of God, and we're not to fight. And I ask him in this, I say, look, if some dude came up to your wife right now, cocked his fist back and was about to pop her in the face, would you jump in front of her and absorb that blow and then fight
that guy off if you're not knocked out. I say, look, if some guy was aiming a gun at your children and was about to pull the trigger, would you jump in front of them, absorb that bullet, and if you lived, fight that guy up. I mean, which guy would say?
No?
Of course, you know. And yet we're not willing to fight to save our wives and children and friends and the church and the world from the ravages of our sexual sin. Were the ones cocking our fist back? Were the ones getting ready to pull the trigger? And we're not willing to stop that. There needs to be a massive wake up call.
Just a little porn. Are we over exaggerating this? I mean you're talking about you're talking about killing and yeah, but just a little porn just to relax.
Yeah, just a man and a woman eating a little piece of forbidden fruit in the garden. Thousands of years ago. Come on, what's a big deal? And here we are with a fallen, broken world that's ravaged by sin and devastation and death. Right, Like, it's like what Nathan said, you know, to Tasaul, It's like, what's this bleeding of the sheep? I hear? Oh, yeah, they're for the Lord. You know, obedience is better than sacrifice.
God.
God wants us to recognize the value of yielding to Him. And you know, the pendulum swings right. And so the overreaction of you know, I mean, the proper reaction to a workspace gospel, which is good, has turned into an overreaction to where now like we we ignore the parts of scripture that tell us to exercise ourselves for godliness.
That's good. Over emphasis of grace, yeah, is a problem.
Yeah, the call of scripture to to put off the old man, the call the scripture to flee youthful lusts, you know, to to be passionate for the Lord. I mean, we can do those things because we are saved, because we are redeemed.
And and so that's the distinction in the in the Catholic conversation we had earlier, is that one gets you redeemed and the other what you're saying is because you're redeemed, absolutely, But either way, stop sinning.
Yeah, that's the call scripture, what we're called to do that. And it's like, look, it's amazing, isn't it. Granger? You know when you think about how, in a secular sense, people respond to those who are going all out on something right, like you'll hear, oh, man, you know Kobe Bryant, he was so dedicated the Mamba work ethic, and you know, and and look at Chris Curry, Steph Curry what he does on the court and all his regimens. Who looks
and goes, dude, you're over doing it. Stop man, just chill. No, It's like, oh, that's admirable.
It's crazy.
Who says to a guy who's who says to a guy who quit smoking, what are you doing?
Dude?
He relaxed, don't worry about that. Noh that's cool. Oh he quit smoking. That's good. You know. I mean, you got campaigns across different states. Smoking is bad, you know, But you tell a guy, hey, bro, you know, you might want to be careful with what you watch, what you listen to, because that gets stirredy you up sexually, I'm not talking evening about porn, but the movies you watch with crazy steamy scenes and you know, and hey, dude, chill,
don't get legalistic, brother, you know. And and at the same time, we're getting ravaged by the sin that is wreaking havoc and destroying people, you know, And so wow, we've got so good man.
I occasionally we'll hear from country artist country music singers that they'll turn to me because I guess they think, well, Granger could help me, because he understands. I had this one guy who's had quite a bit of success and he's like, hey, man, I need I need to talk. I've got a bad problem. And I was like, yeah, man, He's like, when can we talk? And I'm thinking, did you know, as he did he get upside down financially? Is he lost everything? Maybe he's you know, he got
in trouble with some prostitute. I'm thinking, really crazy, you know. And he says he ends up saying I'm addicted to porn, and we shouldn't we shouldn't underestimate what he means by that, because all all these other things on the outside seem really bad and this is the same and he's saying, and I feel like a dark cloud is over me
and I can't stop. He said, In fact, my dad, who's a Christian, had a dream and he said to hey, man, I I son, I had a dream that you know there there was that you were in trouble and you were running, and there was there was blood and it was he had this big, elaborate dream. And he goes, I know, I know that God put this dream in my dad's heart and I can't get out of it.
And he's on the outside, I'm smiling, and I'm living my life and I have success, and I have a girlfriend that I love, and but deep down I can't stop this stranger help me. Wow, And and this is happening everywhere. Yeah, these people people listening right now that are in the same dark cloud and on the outside they're smiling and and if someone finds out, they cover it up with what you said. Yeah, go easy, man, man, it's not bad.
Yeah. And you know this this book is it's not a beat down book. It's I give guys a kick in the pants because we need it. Like, hey, like, sober up on this. This isn't a joke. There are ravages that will result from your sin. But it's a book of hope. That's the whole point. Like Christ can set you free, He's done it for many men, he can do it for you, and so so men need to recognize that there's hope in Christ. No matter how bad you've fallen, how far you've strayed, the Lord can
totally deliver you from it. I tell guys, look, it is possible, starting today for you to never look at porn again. Never. There's a difference between that and like a flash of lust. I would never tell man, you're never gonna have a flash of lust or struggle with you know, your eyes wandering. But there's a big difference between that and porn because porn is a process. You have to decide number one, I'm gonna look at porn right now. Then you have to you have to execute
another action. You have to go and sit down at your computer, or you have to pull your phone out. Then you have to open up the browser. Then you have to put in a search word. Then you have to start scrolling. Then you have to start looking. It's a process, and it's possible to kill that process and never do it again. One of the problems is a lot of men say I can't help them, I can't stop, I can't help them. And then I give him a challenge.
I say, look, if Elon Musk came up to you and put up one hundred million dollars for you, if you didn't look at porn for six months, one hundred million dollars guaranteed. I mean, it's made official, it's an Escro account. The money there, one hundred million dollars. Ranger. You and I both know every single man, everybody their dogs will do everything possible and they will succeed.
Then he and Elon saying, and I'm monitoring all of your device.
You're gonna be monitored, right, And I tell guys too. And also let's add to that, Okay, every moment of your life is gonna be video recorded, right, all the time. And then all your porn times and all the stuff you do, that's all gonna be played in front of your church, in front of your wife, in front of your kids, in front of your mom, your dad, your family, your friends. Give me the money, right, or I tell you, guys.
I tell guys, if you know you're gonna have different parts of your body fall off every time you look at porn, there goes the right ear. Next time there goes the eyeball, there goes but see, but that's not happening. So guys aren't seeing physically what's happening. So it's like, ah, yeah, it's it's like it's I've said this often. You know, if our lungs were sitting on the outside of our chests instead of being covered by these walls of flesh, you would have a lot less smokers in this world.
You've seen them before and after picking pictures of lungs, or like the healthy lung and the smoker's lung, and one as pink and you know, full of life, the other one is charred and black. The problem is is that guys don't see what's happening to their lungs, and so they some of them are evenly physically fit and healthy and everything looks fine. But inside, man, they're decaying.
And so so if men could see what's happening to their their spiritual man, the gaunt and weak and emaciated spiritual man, if they could see the ripple effects of what will happen to their children in the future because of their sin, to their wife, to the hindrance of the spread of the Gospel and be a wakem call. But now they're just going about everything seems fine, and you know there's no I mean, seriously, imagine every time you looked at porn one of your body parts were to fall.
Off, and you're just echoing Jesus when he says, if your eye causes you to sin, couch it out. Yeah, your hand caused cut it off? Yeah?
Oh ge. This is a legalist bro. So you know it's that call to recognize, no, we're called to do war with the sin and to recognize that God has given us all that we need for that. And that's why the book's called the Bold the subtitles a bold Biblical battle plan. Guys need to give their heart and mind something to do before the battle during the battle, and oftentimes, again they're not equipping themselves like soldiers, and
so I get really practical in the book. What I wanted with the book was I wanted a book that was biblically based but also theologically sound, because anyone can quote scripture and say this is in the Bible. If it's not theologically accurate, it's not exeguted properly, then it doesn't matter. But then I wanted it to be hyper practical, because you have a lot of books on the subject, but there's not like practicality, like how do I biblically
carry this out? And then I wanted it to be memorable, because if you don't remember all the stuff you learned that was even practical, what's that going to help you?
Jesse, what are the steps in the book? The ones that I remember? Tell me? Oh?
Yeah, so that's that goes with the note Yeah, yeah, so you know, the most the practical, the real practical section is called the you know, the Six Seeds to Succeed, and that's where I have you know, six biblical principles and then each of them is attached to an alliterated sentence that men memorize and they're you know, each chapter in that section is packed full of truth, and then you memorize the sentence and then that triggers so when
you're being before you're tempted, you develop what I call preventative preparedness. So it's like the US doctrine of peace through strength. You bolster yourself so much at the enemies even hesitant to attack you, you know, and yeah, and so and and then when you do get attacked, you go through the six seas and then that strengthens you. But you do it beforehand too. Like you know, I'm going to go into the gym, I'm going to meditate on the sixth seas before even go in there, so
that I'm my strength is bolstered. I'm ready, I'm equipped. And then if I'm in the midst of it and the temptations arise, I give my heart and mind something to do. I go to those six sees and I go through them.
Which are creation, cross, crisis, crown, crowd in christ right, six sies, and a note. I love the note. Yeah that that got me too, because it's, like you said, it's so practical. Yeah.
I know, we're running out of time, but maybe I could at least hit we have time here, I forget time, but like, if I could hit on at least to begin with creation, let's do that.
Yeah, let's do that. Do you need this?
No, i'ven't meditated on this for years about that?
No?
So creation? You know. One of the things that makes sexual sin exceedingly sinful is the fact that we are using certain features and faculties to engage in that sexual sin that should be blowing our minds and causing us to worship God. So we begin with vision, right, think about what's happening with LUs. First, it's vision. Your eye has one hundred and thirty seven million light sensitive cells. The focusing muscle moves about one hundred thousand times a
day each one of your eyes. Granger has a built in super sensitive light meter, im media, automatic focusing, wide angle lens, and full color instantaneous reproduction. Sounds like I'm talking about a camera, but the camera was patterned after the human eye. This is a marvel of ingenuity like this, the human eye. I mean, even Darwin said, to suppose that the human eye could be informed by natural selection seems I freely confess absurd. In the highest degree of course.
It's absurd because it didn't happen. It was fully designed by God. You think of just vision and all that is entailed there.
Have you seen those pictures of up close the eye up close? Oh?
Yeah, it just it's it mind blow unbelievable. Yeah, and this blind process called evolution decided to give sight. Yeah. So but yeah, vision, But then your eyes are connected to your brain, right, something is processing these images so it's not just vision, but it's cognition. So you think about the brain one hundred billion neurons or microscopic nerve cells, has got more nerve lines and all the telephone lines
in the whole world put together. Right, You've got electrical signals from two hundred thousand living thermometer cells, a half million pressure sensing cells, three to four million pain sensing cells, plus all the signals from your eyes, ears, nose, and taste buds that are working in perfect order and harmony. Then you've got imagination, you've got creativity, you've got memory, you've got recall, like what computer can you compare the
human brain to? Right? And then you have coitionion, which comes from the word coitus, which is the mechanism of sexual intimacy. I mean you think about all that's involved in that, from desire to pleasure, to anatomical compatibility to dynamic emotional unity to procreation. Every human being that's ever existed has come through this process, billions of image bearers. Like I mean, when you pause, and that's what I tell guys, you pause and think about what you're using
to commit these sins with. These things have God's fingerprints of design all over them. They should be leading you to worship. And you know what we do. It's like we pull the Mona Lisa off the wall of the loop and we throw it down on a dirty table and we use it as a place mat. We take a live grenade and we play catch with it casually.
That's what we're doing. We're tampering. We're tampering with something that is loaded with so much beauty and power and you know, God oriented design and we're tampering with some heavy stuff. And so this principle is, you know creation and that alliterated sentences wield wonders as well springs for worship, not weapons for wounding, because that's what we're doing. We're taking them and returning them and using them as weapons to wound the Lord. Others and ourselves.
Will willed wonders as well, springs for worship, not weapons for wounding. Yeah, so you know it's got the soldier mentality here, yeah.
You know, and it goes on from there, and you know all those different principles in there.
Cross Yeah, stop spitting and stomping on such a sacred symbol.
Yeah, right, because when we commit sexual sin, we're doing it in the shadow of the cross, and we're saying in essence that Christ's priceless sacrifice means nothing, and we spit on it, we trample it beneath our feet.
Crisis, consider the catastrophic consequence of compromise.
Yeah, that's right. I mean, you think about what's happening. You know. I keep a list granger of different Christian leaders and men who have fallen into sexual sin. And the list is long, and it's tragic. But a part of that principle is remembering those seeing those tragic examples and avoiding them. And then I think about all the other crises that result from sexual sin. The crisis of conscience. You know, first of all, a wounded conscience limits you
in so many ways in life. That's that saying that says, there's no softer pillow than a clear conscience. When you don't have one, you can't be a person who is at rest, who's filled with the peace of God. And then a seared conscience is unbelievably dangerous because then you'll do the unthinkable, and then you have the the crisis of moral authority. How are you going to speak into the life of your son, of your younger brother of
a dear friend who is being destroyed by pornography. When you yourself are tampering with it, you won't Then the crisis of leadership capacity. You limit yourself from being used as a man in all these leadership roles, or at the very least, you're limiting your effect and impact because you can't be thriving and being a good leader. You won't want to lead anyone, and no one will want to follow you because even though they might not know you're doing that, they see the weakness in your life. And
then you have the crisis of witness. How excited are you going to be to share the gospel when you're tampering with porn and living in a way that's contrary to the gospel. And then the crisis of joy, which is really the spice of life for the Christian. I mean, it's a it's a part of our inheritance as believers to have the joy of the spirit.
He's my friend, that's saying I have this dark cloud over me. He's basically saying my joy is gone, right, Yeah, exactly, That's that's what happens. And you know, and and that desensitization. I remember one time counseling a young man when I was pastoring in the prayer room and he said, Man, I'm reading the word, I'm praying, I'm going to church, he said, but I feel so weak. I feel so I don't understand.
And I just looked at him and I asked him if he participated in a very specific Lewde sexual sin. And it's like he's just he looked off to the side, and then he like the light bulb started to go, you know, on, and he goes, yeah, I do do that. He's like, you think that has something to do with it? So desensitized because it became such an habitual part of his life. He's not connecting the dots. You're living in constant, flagrant rebellion against the Lord, and you expect to be
thriving spiritually. No way, That's where that crisis.
This crisis also if run to its logical conclusion, and if it's uninhibited by morality, basic morality, then I've seen where it goes. Oh I've been to Thailand. Yeah, and you get these men, these older men, flying to Thailand to these remote places to take little boys to a hotel room. Absolutely, and you wonder what sicko would do that. Yeah, it's sicko that a long time ago started with just a peak of porn.
Absolutely, because because what happens is, you know, with with with your endorphin levels, it gets to a point it's like with drugs, you need more, and before long the stuff that would would cause you to get aroused doesn't do it anymore. So you know, a.
Little bit more, a little bit more weird, weird.
I mean, I won't even say any of the stuff I've heard is out there because I don't want to stumble anyone. But it's so it's so reprehensible, but that's that's how well, that's how sin works. It's progressive and destructive, and so people have to understand what they're opening themselves
up to. And that's why we see marriages destroyed, because I mean, basically, a man's committing adultery with hundreds of women constantly in his imagination and through images, and now he's expecting that kind of performance, which is totally unrealistic from his wife. And he's also depleted because he's giving his energy away there. And so man, the repercussions are so multifaceted and so numerous. It's tragic, such a good book, man.
I wish everyone could have this crown envision endurance, ensuring eternal enrichment.
James one twelve blessed as a man who endures temptation, for when he has been approved, he'll receive the crown of life, which the Lord has promised to do his love them. And that crown of life is not the crown of salvation. But when you study it out, it's dealing with eternal reward. Look. Two Corinthians five says we will all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. We're going to give account for our lives. And even though for the believer that's not a judgment under condemnation, it's
still a very serious and intense day of reckoning. And we will suffer loss of what what rewards we could have had in the eternal realm. And anything God wants for us we should we we should want, and so that that's an important one, and so we need to we need to think on rewards. I mean, you look at Hebrews, and I mean you talked about Piper earlier, right, I mean, Christ, for the joint that was set before him, endured the cross, and it's speaking of Moses. You know that.
You know, he was looking to the reward and so on. So away we're called to do that, and we want to understand that our temporal sins will have eternal ramifications for you, for us as believers.
You're a good talker. You talk as well as you right, you should have a podcast or some good Yeah, you should be like the president of like a big minister wuary crowd, do as the departed did, and don't dispense devastation. Right.
So Hebrews twelve to one says, you know, because we're surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us set aside the weights and the sins that so easily ensnare us. And that word cloud that has been translated in some places as crowd. And so that's really referring to Hebrews eleven, the previous chapter, the Hall of Faith, and all of those saints that went before us, and all that they endured, but all that they persevered through because of faith. And at the end it says, and
we're tempted. In the last portion, some of them were tempted and they persevered, and so we need to think of them because we're surrounded by so great a cloud when it says their testimony of faith trusting the Lord, and we need to cast those sins aside. And then we need to think of the crowd of our children and our grandchildren, and our wives and our friends as
I alluded to before our sin affects them. And so we need to wake up and say, wow, I can't let myself do this because of love, and I'm going to fight and so yeah, that one is due as the departed did the Hall of faith, and don't dispense devastation to those that you love.
And then your booke end. You know, you start with creation and end of course with Christ always that's the book, in the beginning, in the end, and seek the sweet Savior for strength, satisfaction and sympathetic support.
Yeah, so it all comes down to Christ. He's everything, and apart from him we can do nothing. So he has to be the source of our strength, and we need to recognize that our calling is to have an intimate, personal,
close relationship with him. You know, there's a there was a Christian hip hop artist that did this song that had a really powerful line in it and it said this said he was giving this sort of this kind of Pilgrim's progress, scene of a guy running toward the kingdom and the porn monster is coming at him like a dragon and trying to attack him. And he had this line that was so powerful. He said, with my sword, I hacked it to pieces because I'm way more attracted
to Jesus. And He's got to be our everything. Man, when you fall in love with Christ, when you taste of him, you don't want to wound such a savior. You want to you don't want anything to interrupt that sweet fellowship you have with him. And often we're not pursuing the Lord, we're not seeking after him with our whole heart, and so so there's that danger. So Christ
has to be or everything. You have to feast on him, you know, he said, you know, if we drink of the water he gives, if we feast upon him, we'll never hunger and thirst again. So what happens is if we deprive ourselves of Christ as our spiritual sustenance, it leads to a process of spiritual starvation. I mean it's like in the physical right you see physical starvation. It starts with deprivation. You're first deprived of your normal sustenance.
Then it leads to desperation. When you haven't had what you normally have, you'll get desperate to where you know you're willing to do the thinkable. Then it leads to deviation. Now you deviate and you actually begin to eat things you would never eat. Here about people in starving countries. They're eating grass and tree bark and rats and cockroaches. The story alive that rugby team that crashed up in the Andes. They ended up eating their friends. Remember who
in their right mind would do that? No one in their right mind. But starvation is a state of it's an altered state of mind. And then obviously it ultimately leads to deterioration. And so in the same in the spiritual, you deprive yourself of feasting on Christ. That deprivation leads to desperation. You get desperate, you have to satisfy. Then it leads to deviation. You start satisfying yourself with physical stuff in the place of the spiritual, and it leads
to deterioration. And so we have to feed on Christ. He sympathizes with our weaknesses and causes us to come boldly to his throne of grace. He doesn't break a bruise. Read he doesn't quench a smoldering wick, and it tells us first John, these things were written so that you may not sin. But if anyone sins, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the Righteous is a propitiation for our sins. So we're not to sin. But if we do. Christ paid for those sins. He's our advocate,
our attorney, the one who comes alongside to help. He paid for those sins with his blood, and so he can set you free.
Not the confession booth.
God forbid.
Okay, you are the man of alliteration. Should be a country music songwriter.
Yeah, we need to do a rap and uh.
So you finished this idea with Nope, I love nope yeah, not one peak ever.
Yeah yeah, so so I am so practical.
Not one peak ever.
Yeah it's even but ever works?
Sorry sorry sorry I do say I do mess that up? Yeah it works? Not one peak even even? Yeah, yes, yeah, ever works too. I have other people right and say, hey, should be ever ever even? I think I saw someone say that.
Yeah, so so let me give you the backdrop to that real quickly. So I was counseling a young man. I said, hey, man, how you doing with porn? You said, I'm doing pretty good. I said, how you doing with lust? Because this is the right A lot of guys say, well, I'm not looking at porn, but we have a porn machine in our brains, you know, from images we've seen or ones that our minds can conjure up. And there are women walking around everywhere we could lust after. And
so I said, how are you doing with that? And he kind of hung his head, sort of in defeat discouragement, say I'm not doing too well there. And as he said that, granger, I felt this sort of zeal for righteousness and purity rise up in my heart and I just said, brother, we just need to say, man, enough is enough. I am done with this. I said, you know what, we just need to We just need to say nope, this is over. I said, in fact, we should. We should say that word nope out loud, because you know,
nope has has an attitude. It's different than no. Say hey can you do this for me?
Yeah?
Can you do this for me? And I go no, But if you can you do this for me.
I go Nope.
It's like ooh, all right, that's got some attitude with it. He's serious about this. So anyway, I said, we should say that word out loud. You know, I felt it resonated with him, resonated with me. Next day, I'm leaving home, driving in my car, heading toward the office. I'm still in my neighborhood, and these two girls come jogging by,
wearing barely any thing. Caught a glimpse of them in my periphery, and instinctively, without even thinking, I go nope out loud, And as soon as I said it, I thought, man, I wish there was some kind of a crosstick that went along with it that could help me and men. And so then that popped into my mind right away, not one peak even, and so but later it progressed, and I thought, okay, but why not one peak even? Why what fuels that well? Like we talked about before,
it's love. It's the five main things that I love. And so you know, Jesus said, whoever puts his hand to the plow and looks back isn't fit for the kingdom. And so I envisioned my hand going out to grab a hold of the plow, and each one of my fingers as it wraps around the handle represents one of my main loves, and so not one peak even Why. Because I love my Lord, the one who paid the highest price ever paid for anything ever purchased in the history of the universe, to redeem me. I don't want
to wound him. I love my Lady, the one that I vowed before heaven and Earth to be faithful to my soul companion, the one I'm called to lay my life down for. I don't want to wound her. I love my lineage, my children, my grandchildren, successive future generations. My sin will impact them. I love his lambs. I love God's children, the ones that I'm called to be
an example to and to lead and influence. And finally, I love the lost, the ones I'm called to be an example to through the Gospel and to reach with the truth. So because I love my Lord, because I love my Lady, because I love my lineage, because I love His lambs, because I love the lost. Nope, not one peak even or ever the glory of God.
So we talked about that literally in our church building the other day. Wow.
Yeah, And you know, Grangel, let me just say, man, I've been humbled by the response. First of all, that doctor John MacArthur endorsed it, said every man needs to help. This excellent book offers. Kirk Cameron endorsed it. Ray comfort. Of course, ken Ham wrote the wrote the foreword to the book, but in an Australian accent, so you need translations understand it. And then the success of the book
has has blown my mind. You know, Debut is a number one best seller, number one new release on Amazon in its category, and the number one best seller out of you know, all categories. It was one of the top books, and so and and I have an email address at the end of the book that tells men to write in if they have a story of how the book has impacted them. And I have been blown away by the emails. I'm getting a guy saying this has changed my life. This has really helped give me
practical tools and biblical insight into it. And so it's been humbling and I'm encouraged to see what God's going to do through Amen.
You are a modern day Puritan. They you know that the Puritans talked about these things and they they fought viciously against sin. Yeah, and we've really we've lost that. I think I think you nailed it. Where we have I said it wrong. We have an overemphasis of grace. You can never overemphasize grace. But what I mean is the teaching of the doctrine of grace. Yeah, it overwhelms the man's responsibility to fight sin, to fight like a man. Yeah. And the Puritans knew this.
Yeah. Well, look and Titus tells us the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that denying on godliness and all worldly luss, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age. The grace of God to bring salvation has appeared to
all men teaching us these things. So if you're saying that, oh I'm under grace and you're living in sin, you have not been tutored by grace, because grace teaches you to deny on godliness and all worldly luss to live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age. So no be killing sin, or sin will be killing you. We have to do war with sin. We have the weaponry to do it. It's now to stand. It's time to stand up and be men and fight.
Amen. Will you come back ever to Texas? And brother, or maybe I'll go to you.
Come on, let's do it. We want you, We want you to come in the studio and do a podcast with us as well, and we'll do that country and rap. So yeah, yeah, man.
You gotta grab some unholy waterburger maybe on your way out.
Oh don't even say that, brother, Thank you, easy, appreciate it. Been a pleasure.
Brother.
Thanks for having me.
Yeah, thanks for joining me on the Grangersmith podcast. I appreciate all of you guys. You could help me out by rating this podcast on iTunes. If you're on YouTube, subscribe to this channel, hit that little like button and notification spell so that you never miss anytime I upload a video. Yi