Welcome to Keep It 100 podcast with Sean and Christa Smith. Join us in this space where we take on real issues with real insight and real inspiration. This podcast is for those not looking for temporary relief to change circumstance, but revelation to forever change lives. Hey everyone, welcome to another episode of Keep It 100 with Sean and Christa Smith. She's Christa, I'm Sean. We're excited that you're joining us this week. This is going to be a great conversation.
I love this episode because we just have an incredible special guest with us and he's just going to bring such truth. I'm so excited for you guys to hear the conversation that he has with Sean. Before we dive into that conversation, we have some really cool, exciting announcements of some things that are happening in the Bay that we really want to invite all of you to keep on our tribe to join us. For some of you, that's going to be getting in the room.
For others, that might be an online virtual experience. We want to encourage you to get involved in what we're doing here. Yes, on October 20th, Friday night at 7 p.m., we're having a Momentum Night in Oakland, California. We've been doing these things pretty much monthly. These are free events. So join us. We have just been seeing God do some great things and the whole aspect is to gather the hungry to shake the Bay.
We're just believing that God would release something that would just be mighty. It is a night of signs and wonders. It's a night of extended worship, preaching and just going for it at the altar and just lingering and praying for the sick, prophesying, getting people free, filled with the Holy Ghost. Come out October 20th. And now we also have great announcements. Speaking of momentum. Oh my gosh. Okay, so this past January, January 2023, we had the incredible momentum conference.
God blew our minds. I mean, it was absolutely incredible. We kept saying it wasn't a conference and it wasn't. It really was a corporate encounter and it really proved to be this catalytic gathering where it ignited so many people with a move of God continuing for revival and carrying it to their region. We had somebody fly in from out of state to be a part of it. Well, we've been having so many people ask us, are you going to do a momentum 2024? And the answer is an absolute all caps.
Yes, we're doing momentum 2024, January 18th through the 20th. And so consider this your personal invitation, your save the date, get your seat. All the information is on our website, momentum 2024. And Sean, we have a theme for it. We really are intentional about theme. Tell us about the theme for momentum 2024. The theme for momentum 2024 is where we've never been.
And we're believing that many times we look back past moves, we look back at things that God did in a service in our lives and we're looking for God to do those things again. Nothing wrong with that. We're believing there will be some of that, but we're really asking God to do the unprecedented. You know, when the Bible talks about in the book of Acts, unusual miracles were taking place. Unusual means there weren't the run of the mill miracles. They were unusual.
We're asking for God to do the unusual. We've got some phenomenal speakers, which we're going to be letting you know on them in some episodes to come. But trust me, we have a power pack lineup. You want to get January 18th through the 20th, 2024 on your calendar to come into the Bay area and join us. Literally, we're going to see a packed out room of people. So you're going to want to register early and we're just asking God to mark people.
And as Christa and I, we love to tell folks it's a conference, but it's not a conference. It's a gathering. That's right. I mean, I tell you what, get in the room because it's going to be a powerful time. I'm so expectant because I truly felt changed. And that was the consistent testimony from everyone that came to Momentum 2023 that everyone's like, I feel so different. And that again is going to happen.
Momentum 2024 will be announcing speakers, worship leaders who are going to be having gatherings with Sean and I help minister with Sean and I. We're of course going to be speaking and ministering. We're bringing some of our dear friends, prophetic voices that are just going to be powerhouses. So get in the room and get your seat today for Momentum 2024. Okay. In this episode, we're super excited, Keep 100 Tribe. We're going to be talking about this theme of swearing saints or salted saints.
And this comes from the fact that we've just noticed that there has not just been a laxness in terms of the vocabulary used by a lot of people professing faith in Jesus Christ. We're here folks, just outright cuss and own it. It's like stuff that when I was a kid, it would get me slapped by my Southern black grandmother. It's coming out of people's mouth. I mean, stuff is coming out of Christian's mouth and Christian leaders. And that's why I really feel like we want to talk about it.
There's been numerous ministers. There's one guy called the Swearing Pastor. It's another pastor that has a pretty popular podcast out of the Dallas area. He dropped the F-bomb on his podcast. And as a result of that, he's since come back and apologized, but not so much that he felt bad about the language, but how it's impacted other people. And I was thinking about this quote, Christa.
A few years ago, there was this guy, John Lucas, who spoke on the campus of Eastern Nazarene College in Quincy, Massachusetts. And a part of what he said, and it's featured in an issue of books and culture. And this is what he said, and I love this. He says, language is a very mysterious gift from God. He says, in the beginning was the word, not the fact, not the picture, not the number, not the image. It is the words that we relate to one another.
And he goes on to say, it is through words that we can give pain or pleasure to each other. And because of this, and every historian's worth is salt, ought to know this, he said, the choice of the word is not only a matter of accuracy, not only a matter of aesthetic choice, it is a moral choice. So what he's saying is the words that come out of your mouth is a moral choice. And there's so many scriptures, for instance, Christa, Jesus taught in Matthew 12, 36.
He says, I tell you, on the day of judgment, people will give account for every careless word they speak. So it's not just about cussing at this point, saying bad words, letting corrupt stuff come out of your mouth. But it's really a question of what should our speech be like? And so some people right now, I find out that there are people that are saying what's wrong with using the language.
And so we want to give you some scriptures, because if you're following Christ, you got to follow his word. And the word of God says several things about that. And so you had some scripture in particular, Christa. Yeah, I think this is really powerful. It's James 1, 26. And it reads, if anyone thinks he's religious, and let me just give a little bit of definition to the word religious.
If anyone thinks he's a disciple of Jesus, if anyone thinks he's a follower of Jesus, if anyone would say, I'm a Christian, I give him my life to Christ. So that's what it's referring to. So I want people to understand as you read this scripture. Let me just start from the beginning again.
James 1, 26 says, if anyone thinks he's religious and does not bridle his tongue, but deceives his heart, this person's religion, this person's commitment to Christ, this person claiming to be a follower of Jesus is worthless. I mean, think about that. So it's this scripture when you understand it, because if you just read it with the word religious, you think, oh, well, I'm not a Pharisee. No, no, this is talking about being a follower of Jesus.
You're saying if you are a follower of Jesus, but you don't bridle your tongue and you deceive your, this deceives your heart. This person's commitment to God, this person's commitment to Jesus is worthless. That is sobering, right? We have a responsibility and a moral obligation. I love the quote you read. That was just so profound because it's really true.
Our words absolutely impact the world around us in a way where we have to understand, because I think there's a lot of people that go, well, it's just words. It's just, it's semantics. It doesn't mean that to me, or I don't think it's that big of a deal. I think we've created definitions for those words. Well, if society and culture defines the word as that, we have to understand it comes with that weight and that baggage every time it's spoken, right?
And we know that historically the African-American community has a word that starts with an N that no one should be ever saying, right? It is a derogatory, demeaning, hateful, evil word. No one can just be casual with that word. It would be ignorant to think they could just say that word, that anyone could just say that word without it having massive negative impact. The same goes for any word in our society and culture that is defined as a derogatory, degrading, demeaning, filthy word.
We all know what they are. And if we do not understand the weight and the responsibility, our responsibility as our witness of Jesus really becomes massively tainted, ultimately worthless scripture saying, I think we're so casual with our mouths because we live in a peanut gallery culture.
Meaning we live in a culture where people say whatever they want, whenever they want, however they want, not really understand the repercussions because we really live in a culture where people spout off their opinions and they rant. And we really have to understand there is a consequence and there's a ripple effect and there's impact of our words. I think sometimes it just as simple as, and your point you made is very profound. I think it's simple.
Sometimes it's just recognizing the Bible says do not grieve the Holy Spirit. And you got to understand, I think there are three categories of what we're talking about when we're talking about profane, unwholesome talk. Obviously number one is the Bible says do not use the Lord's name in vain. So obviously there's a whole category about, you know, in movies or different people in music industry or people just on the street wherever you're at, they'll use the Lord's name in vain.
So the Bible speaks against that. That's obviously something. Do not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain. That's one of the original commandments. There's another category of unwholesome talk, which is cuss words. It's many words that we use today that are words that are usually hatred, vitriol towards people. Like you said, you know, certain racial words, they're also words for refer to their anatomy or something.
But then there's a third category of unwholesome talk and that is simply using your mouth to tear people down. So it may not even be a cuss word, but the way you could begin to describe people and speak of people in a way that is a word that uses a malice, anger, you're slandering people. And a scripture for that is Colossians 3, 8. It says, but now you must put them all away, anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth.
But you know, I was thinking this scripture, and this is the one that really stuck out to me and it's Colossians 4, 6. And it says, let your speech always be gracious. So we're held to a higher standard than just not cussing. Like we're supposed to always have speech this gracious. Then it says, let your speech be seasoned with salt so that you may know how you ought to answer each person.
And I feel like this is so important because at the end of the day, we don't go into interviews for jobs and start dropping cuss words. We don't go if we're seated and we're trying to apply for a certain college. We don't sit there and write profanity in our application. Everyone tries to present themselves in the best way possible. And I just think you need to understand just by honor and just by the virtue of the Holy Spirit and angels are taking literally a journal of every word we speak.
Jesus said, we'll be judged for every idle word. So every word that's coming out of our mouth, but then the aspect of we're prophetic. I want to use my words to prophesy something. I want to call out the gold in people's lives. And I can't ask God to make my words carry a level of authority to raise the dead if I'm using gutter language day in and day out. And then I want, you know, it's kind of like I want hellish talk, but I want heavenly exploits. I mean, that's not how it works.
And I think you have to have your tongue, your tongue has to be set apart. James talks about who can bridle your tongue on the day of Pentecost. It was flaming tongues of fire. They spoke in new tongues. What comes out of your mouth is so key. I love that. It's really well said. I think it's this is today, I think a sobering reminder for all of us, the importance of our words, what we speak and that just that reminder of every idle word is recorded in heavens.
It's just, it's a powerful, powerful reminder. And I think today for the Keep it 100 tribe and for ourselves, it's just this sobering reminder that we have a higher standard that is required from our mouth and not out of religious duty, but out of sheer devotion to Jesus. Yes. And right now, gang, get ready. We're about to go into this incredible interview we have with Vlad Savchuk.
The guy has like crazy number of following on his YouTube channel, but he, he pastors Hungry Gin Church in Eastern Washington. He's a mighty man of God. So go with us now to this interview with Vlad Savchuk. Hey, Keep it 100 tribe. You guys are in for an amazing treat. We have Vlad Savchuk here. So we just want to jump right in this Vlad. How you doing, bro? Well, Sean, pleasure to be here with you. I am doing very well. Thank you. Awesome, man.
Now you're up in the Pacific Northwest, which my wife has her roots up in that area. She was born and raised in Oregon and then she went to Seattle Pacific College. She worked her first in of ministry and I'm forgetting it's one of those cities up there. But how you guys doing up there, man? Tell us about it. We're doing well. You know, you guys are in California. So I feel like sometimes Washington and California is competing. Who can be the dumbest?
Sometimes I'm looking at the news and I'm like, man, Washington is winning. And so, yeah, I'm in Washington state. I'm an eastern part of Washington, so like behind the mountains. And then my wife is actually from Vancouver, Washington. So she's closer to the Portland area over there. And so but we're doing good. We're leading a local church here and God's been doing incredible, amazing things. We're in a small city, but, you know, salt is small.
It still makes a very big difference when it's applied to necessary places. So that's why I always tell our church, you know, we're positioned here strategically. I love that. And I first became aware of you in the sense that I saw just some teachings that you'd put out on various different topics. Some of them really was piqued my heart, my interest in a sense that it just really resonated.
You know, the things you did on deliverance, because I've been saying for a while that the church has lost discernment and the demonic has gotten better disguising, which has been a bad mix. If the enemy is disguising himself better and the church has lost discernment. But I love the fact that you do it, you do it with dignity to the people you're ministering to. And it's amazing. And you've just done some great teaching all around.
And you really have been impacting the emerging generation, which is probably predominantly our audience on this podcast. I want to jump in this. We love to ask this question on our podcast. Give your 100 Vlad. Give us an origin story.
Just something about either how you came to Christ, how the Holy Spirit made himself real, your call, just anything that you feel like man was just something that God gripped you and just marked you in such a way that God set you up to do the things you're doing now. So I come, I'm a fourth generation Christian and fourth generation actually minister on both my father's side and my mother's side.
On my father's side, they became a Christian, you know, three generations ago when American missionaries came to the village and my grandfather had leprosy, they prayed for him and God supernaturally healed him and the whole family became Christian. And my grandfather actually became a pastor after that. His grandfather, his father also was a minister and that whole village was, I would say about 80% of that village is still till this day follows Jesus goes to church.
And so my grandfather just passed away about two years ago, 90 something years of age. So from my mother's side, the three generations ago, my grandma, she comes from like 16 kids. She has, she had 16 kids. And so her father, which is my grandfather, my great grandfather sat in jail for five years. He was sentenced to 10 because communists, you know, persecuted preachers. And so he was released after five years. Then they cut the story short. He pretty much was martyred.
He died shortly after that. They beat the living lights out of him, the communists. And so he suffered for the cause of Christ. And so the persecution living for Jesus and paying the price following Jesus kind of runs in our family lane. And so a lot of things that happened to me, I would accredited to me standing on the shoulders of previous generations.
You know, I talk a lot about generational curses, but I also like to talk about generational blessings that, you know, we can experience those things because generations before us paid the price. And so I grew up in the Ukraine. I was born in the Ukraine. I was born around the Chernobyl nuclear explosion. I was actually born around the time, very like within a month. So the chemicals and all of the stuff was still all around in the air.
In fact, it's probably one of the things that caused the one of the birth defects along with the mistake of the doctor that was performing the delivery. And so as I was growing up in a Christian household, you know, when you're a kid, everything's fine. But then when you hit about, you know, the middle school, you start getting bullied, made fun of based on your appearance.
And that's what happened to me, which I thought it was normal because I kind of accepted the stigma that was attached to me that I was deformed. Something was wrong with me. And so I was made fun of, bullied, punched, hit, all of that stuff. And my parents saw that. So they tried to kind of fix the physical appearance. I was scheduled for first eye surgery in the Ukraine, had a second one.
The moment I arrived in the States when I was 13, because when I arrived in the States at 13, I didn't speak any English. It was a culture shock. I didn't have any friends. It was extremely, extremely difficult. It got so bad, Sean, that I was actually I wasn't contemplating suicide. I knew better growing up in a Christian home. And I had a very healthy environment that I grew up in. And those thoughts didn't penetrate my mind. But I wanted to die. I wanted to die.
And I prayed that God will cause some kind of a sporadic accident where only I will be killed and so that the world will be a better place with me not in it. And so I was involved in a few accidents, came out of it without a scratch. So I was deeply disappointed. And so that wasn't happening. And you know, I started to close myself in my freshman high school every day after high school and locked myself in the room for about 40 minutes.
I was dealing with a lot of number one, I had extreme migraine headaches because optical nerve was damaged during birth. And the other stuff that I believe that happened to the nuclear explosion, I had this weird headaches that couldn't have a cure for it. They didn't have an explanation for it. Every time I get exposed to the sun, I have this like painful I would hit my head in the in the wall just to relieve pain. I would pop pills. They wouldn't work.
And so and on the top of that, you know, I'm chronically insecure. I can't fit into this culture. I don't speak English. I don't have any friends. I'm like, it's emotional and physical problems all at once. And I couldn't take it anymore. So I would actually my outlet was crying out to God. It was not a prayer as more as more it was like complaining and whining to God why he allowed me to be born like this. What did I do? What did I deserve to all of this and stuff?
So I would kind of like vomit that to the Lord, just kind of vent that to God for about 15 minutes. And then I end up worshiping him after that. And so it was actually my routine as a freshman high schooler, because I was so loner that I found myself like in that secret place, not by choice, but almost driven into that by the pain of life. And as a teenager, trying to process all of these challenges. And that's what I actually found God.
That's what I found God for myself, not just my parents, God, my grandparents, God, I discovered his presence. The first thing that happened is my headaches were gone supernaturally, no medical intervention. They just stopped. But before that, I felt the Holy Spirit lead me to make this promise. And I knew it was God leading me, but I made this promise.
I said, God, if you take away all of my chronic insecurity and you take away my headache, I give you the rest of my life because I don't have any plans for it anyway. I'm just surviving here. So whatever you can do with it, you can do it. But you need to take these two things away because they will hinder me to serve you. Headaches and the second one is this chronic insecurity. I was so scared and shy of people.
Sean, I skipped a keyboarding class when I found out I had to do a presentation in front of 20 students for a minute and a half. I was chronically scared of people. And so after about a year that I don't have any headaches anymore, like my self-esteem just kind of changed and I started to get straight A's. My pastor uncle starts the church and he gets me involved right away on the stage. And I'm like 14. At 16, I become a youth pastor. And so like all of this stuff just really gets transformed.
And from 16 to 30, I was a youth pastor. And so that's when I started to get to know the Holy Spirit more and the reality of His presence became more real. And that's where a lot of the miracles started to break out in the youth group and the youth group started to really see salvations of people, people getting delivered from demons on youth services and then healings.
And that's kind of pretty much, I would say, the origin story of how I started from my family to overcoming the insecurities and then meeting the Holy Spirit. Man, Vlad, I tell you what, man, first of all, when you talk about in your lineage, leprosy was healed. I mean, that's one of those miracles that you don't find too many people that have that kind of immediate testimony in their family.
And then for you to be by Chernobyl, for you to have the battles and all the things, but you could totally see where God branded you with this radical, because you came to this point of total surrender. I kind of feel like part of what I'm getting from your story, and I love this, is that there was a sense of ultimate abandonment because there wasn't, you know, like the rich young ruler, right? He had all this stuff and all this stuff to Him represented.
If I let go of all of that, I'm at a loss. So do I give all this up to follow Jesus? Obviously, you made the wrong choice. But I think sometimes maybe it's a blessing to feel like you've hit the rock bottom and really, you know, Catherine Coleman would often say that, you know, she didn't have anything or anyone but Holy Spirit. And I think it caused an abandonment and a velocity to go after God. And so your youth group started to grow and it started to multiply.
So what do you, what's going on while you're seeing this growth? Because I understand it at a certain point, it even surpassed in terms of the youth group and those attending, those that were coming on a Sunday morning to the main church. Man, how did you kind of negotiate and handle those kind of things? That's a challenge, man. Yeah, it is. So, you know, I got filled with the Holy Spirit with the evidence of tongues at the age of 14.
But Sean, I would say I did not know the Holy Spirit as a person. I didn't have a relationship with Him. In fact, I wouldn't be able to distinguish the presence of the Father, the Son and the Spirit. I know all of just like anointing presence and I've always made a reference to that. But the Spirit was not somebody that I knew a Holy Spirit. I didn't know Him personally.
And so because of that, I really think personally that I was like that lame man who was carried to the gate, beautiful, who had legs. They just didn't work. I had the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit didn't have me. I had the Holy Spirit. I just didn't walk with Him. I didn't know His voice. And so it happened on my flight to California, Sacramento. I was preaching already at the youth conferences. I had 30, 35, 40 kids in our youth group.
And it was actually around the same amount that our church had people. So I was technically successful youth pastor because we had about the same amount of people as we had at our church. But I knew that this is not what God had for us. I knew we were not reaching people. I mean, we went for two years, Sean, without baptizing anybody. We would go for six months without seeing people getting saved. That's not normal. People are going to hell every single day and we're not seeing the breakthrough.
Something is not right. And I knew that something was not right. I mean, and I was seeking power. I was seeking the breakthrough and flying to Sacramento, I sensed the Holy Spirit listening to actually one pastor on the podcast and he, his mom died. He gives $10,000 of the apartment that his mom left to him as an inheritance to the ministry that saw salvations and he didn't see anything like in his ministry. His ministry was struggling.
And so I'm hearing this testimony and Sean, I hear this thing in my heart. Do the same. Take your savings account. And I had exactly nine and a half thousand by the end of that month, it would have been $10,000. And we've been saving on the pastor's salary, youth pastor's salary. I've been saving for like three months, Dave Ramsey style envelopes and not eating out, cutting all of this stuff out. So like it took, it's a big sacrifice for me to do that. And so at first I resisted that.
I was like, that's not God. God will never ask to take my money. Plus, you know, anointing is not for sale. The whole stuff, I brushed it off. Three days later, it just, the thought would leave me. So I talked to my wife, my wife agrees to do it with me. We fly to another country. We take all of that money that we had, all of the money that we saved. It represented our future. It represented our past.
It honestly represented, it actually was harder sacrifice than to kill my life when I was a teenager, because at the time I had nothing to lose. Now I have something to lose. And I did that for one simple act. I wanted to get breakthrough from my ministry. So I'm giving this sacrifice to this particular ministry. A pastor looks at me and he says, you don't need breakthrough in your ministry. And I was like, I do. He says, you don't know the Holy Spirit. And I said, I'm a Pentecostal.
I'm a Semilies of God. I speak in tongues. I know the Holy Spirit. Tell me how to get that impartation. And he says something that honestly provoked me, left me angry, a little bit upset. And he said, you need to meet the Holy Spirit. You need to know the Holy Spirit and your life will change. And I was like, I'm not sowing 10K to get something I already know. So he prays for me simple prayer. I go back home and honestly, I take this instruction seriously.
And I started to ask Jesus, did Jesus reveal your Holy Spirit to me? And next six months, my world started to change. The Holy Spirit became real. For the first time in 10 years, I started to see people getting healed. I started to get words of knowledge. And then about four months into this, first person gets saved. I remember it like yesterday. He's still part of our church. This happened about eight years ago. He invites all of his coworkers. So the next week, one of his coworkers gets saved.
And since that day until now, there has been not one service where somebody doesn't get saved. Because to me, the greatest sign of the anointing is not just a miracle. It's the greatest miracle of people meeting Jesus. And so three years or two years into it, my uncle, my pastor says, hey, you need to step out of the youth ministry and lead the main church. And so I actually had this brilliant idea to close down Sunday morning church. I was like, it's not growing. It's in bilingual language.
We could just keep the youth ministry on Wednesday night and just close Sunday morning. So my pastor is like, no, you need to transition. You need to raise now 15, 16 year olds to come after you and lead the youth. And you need to lead the main church. I was like, no, that's not what I want to do. But I'm a submissive guy. So I yielded to my pastor and transitioned out of the youth ministry. And then in the last seven years, I've been the lead pastor.
And so I would say that the relationship with the Holy Spirit has really been the catalyst. You know, I was seeking the power, the miracles and the breakthrough. But in reality, all I needed is the Holy Spirit that I had in me. I had to develop that friendship, that relationship with Him, that intimacy with Him. And then the miracles, the deliverance and all of this stuff would flow out of that. Jesus says you receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you.
So the power is connected to that person. And to me, honestly, even though somewhere in the head, I knew that he was a person, because I read Good Morning Holy Spirit, I read Robert Morris's book, I've read the stuff. I wasn't ignorant in that, but it wasn't a revelation. I still treated him like a dove, like a wind, like an experience, like a tingling feeling, like an anointing, a presence, an aura, an atmosphere. It's really how I related to him that I feel like it was a hindrance to that.
And so when he became the boss and the pastor of my life, things just changed. Oh, I love that, Vlad. That is so powerful. And I know you've written a book on that. We're going to get you a chance a little bit later to talk about it. Hey, Vlad, I want to shift now because it's been an interesting phenomenon. And I guess I first picked up on this.
It's been some years ago, maybe about five or six years ago, because the people we run with are people that are really running after God and they have this fire and they really are conscious to raise the bar and raise the standard of personal consecration, holding this living like Jesus. And so I remember I was someplace and I was around a contemporary Christian artist and he actually wasn't speaking directly to me, Vlad.
He was speaking to someone else that was also going to be a part of kind of us coming together for a meal. And the guy just like he doesn't know me from Adam out of no place. The guy says, you know what, there's nothing wrong with just dropping an F bomb, except he didn't say drop that bomb. He said the word. He says, you know, nothing. Sometimes that's just the best way to describe what's going on in your life. And I'm kind of like looking around and I'm thinking nobody's shocked like this.
And I just thought, man, what you know, what's going on with this guy and what's what's happening? But then I began to notice after that consistently, it was like the vulgarity and the profanity of of culture, whether it's the hip hop culture, whether it's motion pictures, whether it's entertainment or what's just the language of what's going on in the world today at schools or whatever.
I began to see this profaning of the language of saints to the point where you got this guy out there called the cussing pastor. He's developed a following because he just, quote unquote, keeps it real and, you know, appeals to a group of people that just want to have that base nature express. There's another guy out of Dallas that on his podcast, and he's got a lot of listeners. He also dropped the bomb in some other words.
And I think I most recently came back and only for the purpose that it offended some other believers that he kind of say that was a mistake, but he's not pulling back on the language. I know that you've talked about this, Vlad. So we want you to address first of all, maybe the first question is, why do you think that all of a sudden there's this fascination with profanity or why it's become such a temptation, such an attraction to believers today?
What from your perspective, what do you think has become the appeal of that? Or how do we get here to where pastors now are using that kind of language? I'll share my story. I was younger, like maybe 11 or 12. I was actually I fell into cursing. I remember it like yesterday. If something came on me, it was mainly because of culture. I was around school and so it was pretty popular at the time to use sewer. I call it Goddard language, you know, the garbage language.
And so and I just kind of fell in love with it. And I don't know what came over me. It was a demon or was some kind of a demonic influence. And I remember like yesterday, I couldn't stop cussing. I would just go everywhere, anywhere. And I just like a like a sailor. I just cussed and cursed. And of course, I grew up in a very strong, healthy Christian home. So I knew that I will get in trouble as a teenager. And my parents definitely were not afraid to use the belt to discipline their children.
And so, in fact, this is funny, I was milking a cow. So I knew how to milk a cow. So I was milking a cow and the cow with its leg hit the bucket. So all the milk spilled on me. And I gave that cow so much of my I mean, I just I cursed so much. And I didn't know my dad was walking by the barn. So my dad walks in, sticks his head in. He's probably thought some kind of a demon was in the barn because his son never speaks like that. And he's listening to me.
And so that day, I received double portion of spanking. I never cussed after that. Come on, man. I was delivered, man. I was delivered. I sometimes tell people, I was like, I was delivered by the with the belt, with the by force and power, I was delivered.
But looking at what's happening in our culture and I see something in in the United States, special Western culture, there is the teaching on Christian liberty that I feel like has been stretched to the extreme, to the point where the Christian liberty and the abuse of God's grace has become, I call it greasy grace, where grace is no longer the power that enables you to walk holy. Now it has become an excuse to do whatever you want. And you want saved, always saved.
You will never lose lose your salvation. It's just an expression. And it's almost like we live in the generation today that have a relationship with God and have no reverence for God, because to have a relationship with God, you confess your sin, you pray a prayer, you know, you do you do that thing. Reverence for God, Holy Spirit brings that. The reverence for God, the Bible says the fear of God causes men to walk away from sin, to run from sin.
But when there is no reverence for God, we begin to flirt with sin. And instead of asking how far can we get away from reflecting the culture, we actually ask the question, how close to hell can I get without going there? And it's really what I see that with young people, I see that also with pastors. And some of them really and it scares me because it's almost like this life on the fence. You know, we profess Christ, but we don't possess His character.
We have just enough of the world that we don't go to hell, that we don't enjoy Jesus. And we have just enough of Jesus that we don't enjoy the world. It's kind of like that in the middle. We have both. It's the culture now has become a standard. And it's really because people do that in the culture as well as it's a human nature. It's like what you said, that base nature, that human nature that needs to be crucified. And many times what it begins to happen with that is we satisfy that.
And so, and just because you're a pastor or a leader, it doesn't necessarily mean you stop having that human nature. It doesn't mean that now you don't have those weaknesses. And I think pastors, instead of submitting those things to Christ and repenting of those things, renouncing those things and getting help if they cannot stop, they use enough scripture to justify the Christian liberty that's been stretched to the thin.
And this applies to a lot of other things, alcohol and so many other things that we can touch on. But today, I know we're dealing mainly with cursing. You know, that's so right on, because I think about that, Vlad, just about that, you know, your dad helped you with that with me. It was the same. I grew up in inner city Oakland, California. And so it was the language of the streets. I get saved. I go to college.
But with the whole thing with profanity, it was interesting because the Lord literally knocked the taste out of my mouth. I was raised by a southern black grandmother. She would wash out my mouth with soap or she would give me a spanking. And she heard me do that. Of course, I wouldn't do it around it, around her. But it's very interesting. You know, there are various. And I'm thinking in particular, the Welsh revival, when the revival broke out, obviously it impacted the entire community.
But it had a unique impact in the sense that many of them, the predominant occupation, if you will, in that area was coal mining. And a lot of the coal miners had such a foul mouth that the mules were trained to respond to curse words, what your dog would read, he will come, whatever. But they had a backup in the mine because when the coal miners got saved, they quit cussing, bars shut down and Bible sold out.
And so when the power of God comes, you know, it is quite the opposite of kind of the trend of sexy hipster Christianity today. What would you say, Vlad, to believers that feel like, well, what's wrong with cursing? What's wrong with using profanity and swearing? It's just a word. What's the problem, you know, with that? And why is that even a big issue? You know, I was thinking about apostle Peter. He walked with Jesus for three and a half years.
And then when he denied Christ in Matthew 26, verse 74, it says this, Then he began to curse and swear, saying, I do not know the man. I find that interesting. Cursing and swearing. Now, cursing, of course, is defined as using profanity to bring evil upon. And then swearing is to make an oath or a vow to swear falsely. And so while swearing, you know, includes curses and oaths, cursing mainly involves only curses.
And I find it interesting that Peter's fall, Peter's departure from Christ, Peter renouncing Christ involve these two characteristics, cursing and swearing. I can't say that a person is genuinely walking with the Lord and have these two things that they practice. And that's one thing. If a person is struggling, they just came to Christ and they're still learning how to crucify the flesh and renew their mind.
That's a different story. But when the person begins to practice these things, justify these things, I absolutely, based on the authority of God's word, can say that this man, this woman doesn't know Christ. They don't have Jesus said to people who practice lawlessness, not those who struggle with sin and are seeking help, but practice lawlessness. And yet they profess Christ and yet they practice lawlessness. But they still have some gifts on the side that they operate in effectively.
And Jesus says, I never known you. I don't know you. And that's what Peter said. He says, swearing, cursing. He says, I don't know that man. Now, of course, he lied about it. He knew of Jesus. But to have that relationship, that new birth experience that I believe after the resurrection of Christ, the experience he didn't have that. And I think that when people do that, it right away shows and their mouth betrays their heart. Because whatever comes out of the mouth, their heart is filled with.
You know, you will not know my bad breath until I open my mouth and I open my mouth and you can catch a bad breath. And that's exactly what happens with people. What their heart is filled with that bad breath, their mouth betrays it. You can hide all you want about your profession and other stuff. But what you truly possess will be betrayed by what comes out of your mouth.
Man, it's so good. It's so true, man, because you see that so often that a lot of times when I think of people cursing, it's usually venting like there's a rage, there's an anger. They've been insulted. They want to strike back at somebody. And then obviously after a while, it becomes such a common place in your language that, you know, it just begins to find.
What biblical passages or principles would you help lay a foundation for someone to begin to develop a conviction in that area of saying, hey, cursing, swearing, or for that matter, just unwholesome talk in general? I mean, actually, the standard for a believer is higher than me not dropping the whatever bomb or this word or that word. It's like I want words that bring grace to people. I want words that incur. I want to prophesy to people.
I want to speak the life. I want the tongue that God has given me. I want to speak and see the Lazarus come forth and the devils come out. So it's obviously even higher than that. But what biblical passages or principles and obviously you've you've begin to touch on some Vlad, would you share to build a foundation for people in this area? You know, Sean, I find it interesting when the baptism of the Holy Spirit happens,
what one thing that it changes, it's our tongue. God gives us these new tongues and so on. I find it interesting because, you know, it's one of those things that a lot of times we build with our hands what we destroy with our own mouth. You know, because these curses that we release, cursing, it's releasing curses. These curses are now coming upon people's lives. They're coming on their life and around.
Colossians 3, verse 8, it says, But now you yourselves are to put off these things, anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, and filthy language out of your mouth. You know, many of the words known as cuss words are descriptions of immoral acts, filthy omissions of waste from the body or private body parts. And Paul clearly states filthy language. Matthew 12, 34, Jesus said, Brutal vipers, how can you, being evil, speak good things? For out of the abundance of the heart, mouth speaks.
When a Christian uses a foul language in public, in private, they waste the opportunity to set themselves apart from many unbelievers who commonly say these things. Even the world knows to brand movies as this is R rated for language. The world already understands this. So for us to be able to justify that and to try to find loopholes, there is none. The Bible says for by your words, you'll be justified and by your words to be condemned.
Matthew, chapter 12, verse 37. In infusion, chapter four, verse 29, dealing with the grieving of the Holy Spirit, it says, No, let no corrupt word proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good for necessary edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers. Now, the word corrupt here is seprous, and that's the word that's used for rotten fish, rotten fruit or warm eaten olives. That means that our speech should not be morally rotten.
When we use profane language, when we use profanity, when we use language that maybe doesn't have cuss words, but it doesn't have edification, it's just rotten. It builds no one. It hurts people. That language grieves the Holy Spirit. And in the same reference where Paul is talking about grieving the spirit, a few verses before that, he talks about open doors to the devil.
And I really believe that when we grieve the spirit and we don't repent and one of the ways we do that is by running our mouth in a way that does not glorify Jesus. It opens the door for demonic spirits to begin to affect us. We grieve the spirit through that. The Bible says what comes out of our mouth defiles us. Matthew chapter 15 verse 18. And then we see that the Bible tells us that we need to submit our mouth.
If you read the Proverbs 10 and then it goes in through verse 11, verse 13, verse 14, 18, 19, 20, 21, 31, 31, 33 and 32 and 32. He keeps talking about the mouth of the righteous. Talks about the violence that covers the mouth of the wicked. The wisdom that's found in the lips of the righteous. The mouth of the fool is near destruction. He who hides hatred has lying lips and multitude of words sin is not lacking. He who's restrained his lips is wise. Lips of the righteous feed many.
Preverse tongue will be cut off. So there's this continuous contrast. And one of the things that contrast the righteous and the wicked is their mouth. So to say that I'm righteous person, but my mouth is not righteous. That is not biblical. It's contrary to the Old Testament teaching, the New Testament teaching of Jesus and the teaching of the apostles. Man, I mean, that is profound.
And those scriptures, those principles and even that revelation of Peter at that point of, if you will, Peter backsliding and beginning to use that kind of language. And perhaps sometimes it lands for me like this and it's even more frightening because I feel like what we're really describing is that there's been a loss of awe and reverence in the house. It's one thing for the world to talk like that.
And, you know, I outside of when I play hook with some dudes and they're dropping the Lord's name in vain, that's probably why I just say, hey, man, that name is so precious to me. Can you? But, you know, I'm not there to police them dropping the other language and stuff like that. I just try to let my light shine and witness and share with them about Jesus. But we're going to be held accountable. We're going to be judged.
And even as believers, obviously, you know, the eternal damnation has been passed over because of the blood of Jesus. But at the beam of seat or the judgment seat of Christ, our works, our motives, our language will be judged. And just to understand that, man, we have to take stewardship of what comes out of our mouth.
And it's funny because I feel like some of the best communicators, my observation of being in the kingdom for a while, people obviously have served the Lord way longer than I. But I feel like some of the best communicators have emerged in this season.
But at the same time, I don't know, although they're able to twist phrases in words in a way that communicates well, I don't think they understand the power of language and the principles you're talking about that we have to get back to that type of language. And, you know, when I first got saved, I was influenced by reading books by Leonard Ravenhill and A.W. Tozier, and I was getting David Wilkerson's newsletter.
And I really felt like that diet of the awe and the fear of the Lord were very key in a formulation of who I am. And this generation, man, we just need that type of teaching, those kind of voices, because I feel like we've gotten on this slippery slope where all of a sudden we don't realize it, but we've kind of adopted this deluded Christianity, particularly in North America, where we've set the course and we've left this biblical worldview to we measure ourselves by ourselves.
And I think some of the cussing with some of the pastors, quite simply, is they have fallen in the trap that there is this kind of overreaction to maybe religious types that have preached, that have been overly religious, but rather than respond to the true plumb line of truth, they've overreacted in a way that, OK, we're not going to be, let's say, that ultra fundamental Bible thumping, ultra religious. So we're going to prove it to you that we're not.
We're going to swing the pendulum way over here. But the truth be told is it's not a response to the Holy Spirit. It's reaction to a religious spirit. And a reaction to a religious spirit is typically a religious reaction because it's not a Holy Spirit response. If I can, Sean, mention also on how to deal with people who struggle with cursing. Oh, do that, please. Somebody is listening right now or watching and maybe you're struggling with that.
I would just give you just six practical things that you can take and apply today. Number one is to take your thoughts captive, because before there are curse words, there are thoughts. And these thoughts, they get formulated into our words. And the Bible says there was a spiritual warfare taking place in our mind. So when we take our thoughts captive, they will never become words. And so that helps us to win that battle right here.
When you don't win the battle right here, you lose the battle with your mouth. The second thing is the Bible clearly teaches us to control our mouth, to muzzle our mouth. James 1, 26, the Bible tells us that our mouth, it's not just our thoughts we need to control. There are times we need to zip the lip. There's a time we need to put a border patrol over this. And we need to check the papers of every word that's about to pass through.
OK, do you have the legal right to come out of this out of my mouth? Are you going to defile me or are you going to hurt other people? So we have to control. We actually have to take control over our words and over our mouth. Number three, some of us have reached that point where our tongue and our lips need healing. Isaiah did that. Isaiah, when he encountered God, what did he ask God to do? He says, I'm a man of unclean lips. Now, he was preaching. He was a pastor. He was a preacher.
He was a prophet. Yet when he got close to God, he realized his lips need to be cleansed. And some of us need to actually ask to the Lord, say, Lord, cleanse my lips. Lord, heal my tongue. Lord, restore the soundness in my mouth so that the words, the syllables that come out, that they glorify you and that they bring you honor.
The fourth thing I would say is to change the environment, because a lot of times, if you are in the environment that you are being influenced in all the time and that environment uses profanity and you can instruct them, say, don't use it in front of me and once or twice a third time. But if that's the environment you're being influenced by or not influencing them sooner or later, you will pick up like how do you get fever? You don't get fever when somebody lays hands on you. You get fever.
You catch it. You hang out with other people who have it and then you catch it. It's the way the influence work. The word influence has this three letter there, flu. Influence has a flu component to it. You catch things. That's why even they say anointing is, you know, is caught, not taught. You hang out around people that curse a lot. It's a matter of time. You will get desensitized with it before you start cursing. And then you will start. It will start first. You will start defending it.
You say it's not a big deal. You won't curse. But then it'll get to the point. Once in a while, you slip one, two, three words, and then it would just be a gushing water or sewer coming out of your mouth. But it's really the environment. That's why I always tell people, you know, bananas do not grow in Alaska because of the environment. There are certain characteristics.
You got it when you choose your environment, when you choose, you know, to go to a local church, to go to a small group, surround yourself with godly people. It will help you to steer toward godliness. The fifth one is to season our speech. The Bible clearly states that let your speech always be done with grace. Colossians 4, verse 6, and it says seasoned with salt. This is very important. Something that I had to learn, Sean, is that when I was younger, I used to think that be real, be raw.
But the Bible says the world doesn't need you always to be real. You need to be seasoned. Yes, be real, be vulnerable. But if everybody hears my rawness and my how I am, how everything comes in my mouth and in my mind, how I think, and I release that without any filter, the Bible calls it without any seasoning, I could come out as harsh. I could come out as immature. I could come out as rude. People need tasty words, not raw words. So the Bible says that seasoning takes time.
That means you have to take time to put that seasoning into your mouth and you can't release the words. Well, I just want to be unfiltered. You know, people need to hear the way it is. Ah, biblically speaking, not really. People need to have stuff seasoned. You're salt. I am salt. That means my speech cannot come out raw and real, it needs to come out seasoned with salt because it needs to bring results to people.
That means sometimes there are certain things I want to say, it's not the right time to say those things. There's an appropriate time to say those things. And the last thing that I would encourage for people that battle with it or struggle with it is to, after all these things are done, to really spend more time speaking in tongues. We have to speak in tongues because that purifies also things and then brings wholesomeness to our tongues.
So that's when it comes to overcoming the cursing habit or the swearing habits that people have developed. When it comes to what you just mentioned about what I see happening with our generation, I just preached that we just had a youth conference, we had an unashamed conference. And we're currently in about six public schools and we have about eight clubs. In fact, as I'm speaking right now, our Tuesday is our outreach in our middle schools and our high schools.
And our goal is to spread these clubs to all around Washington state. We have the legal precedent from our law that we are actually able to do these clubs. Some principals do not allow that, but we bring a little bit of attorney help and then we're able to press in. We're seeing a lot of kids, Sean, give their life to Jesus in schools. And I have a very strong burden for the next generation and for us to specifically go to schools. I'm not against homeschooling.
I'm not against pulling kids out of high school or middle school and have private schools. I'm not against that. But I believe, remember in that story in prophet Elisha where there was barren land because the water was poisoned. And prophet Elisha said this, bring salt and put it at the source of the water. The source where leaders are produced is our colleges and our schools. That source is polluted. That source is poisoned in the United States.
Critical race theory, evolution, all of that garbage, the woke stuff that is being pushed on. You can choose your gender. All of that stuff that's being pushed, the well, the source of where the future governors, teachers, pastors and leaders are being produced from. The source is the school system. And I have a burden and I sense the Lord is going to be moving. I see this happening at our church already. That he will take the salt, our students, and put them at the source of the problem.
The salt doesn't have to be big. Elisha didn't dump a truckload. He left just enough that the waters were healed at the source. And the Bible says the land was healed. And so I remember last Saturday I was even teaching to our students. We had hundreds of students that came out for that. Most of them from our high schools. And I said that God is sending you back to school to be the salt at the source. So we can bring healing to our land, healing to every department of our community.
Because these students are the ones being poisoned by the demonic doctrine in our schools. And so we have to send our students filled with the Holy Spirit, filled with the authority of Christ, to heal the sick, cast out demons and preach the gospel unashamedly. That's why we call the youth conference unashamed. We want them to stand up for Christian values. We want them to stand up for the spiritual supernatural part of the gospel without any shame. And win their students for Christ.
Half of our youth ministry I would say today, their parents do not serve Jesus. And they just got saved at our clubs. Now they're working on their parents. So what I see happening with the next generation, I see revival happening. I see God will pour out his Spirit upon all flesh. I see God is going to be raising the themethies who will be studying the scriptures from childhood. God will be raising these young girls who were telling Naaman about the prophet in Israel.
God will be raising up Samuels who will be hearing the voice of God, audible voice of God at tender age. God will be raising up these lads who will give Jesus their lunch and he will feed masses with it. God will be raising up these lads who led Samson to the pillars and Samson had his greatest victory. But who led him? It was a lad. It was a teenager.
So I see there's an attack on the young people through the school curriculum, through the Disney agenda, through the woke agenda, through the critical race theory. It's to brainwash them. But the reason there's an attack on them I see is because God has a specific plan. He wants to use them in these last days to bring his revival through this generation. That some Christians think they're victims. These guys, they won't make it. Like Israelites thought in the wilderness about their kids.
Our kids won't make through this. They'll die. And God says these things, these people you think are victims. I'm going to raise them up as victors and they will possess the promised land. Vlad, that is so profound, man. I almost got up, threw off my earpieces, ran around the room, shouting, waving. Hey, Vlad, you've got some projects. You've got a brand new book I'm super excited about. You got some other things. We've got a lot of people listening in. They're going to want to get your book.
And I highly recommend you guys, I started perusing this book. This is a now book. You literally will only go as far as your understanding of Holy Spirit and how to walk with them. That's what makes you a true son and daughter of the most high God. And just ways that we can follow you and stay in touch. So Vlad, go for it. Give us kind of a pitch on what's going on. I have a host, the Holy Ghost book I just released. And it's also in Russian and Spanish, Romanian, German is being translated.
It's an audible Kindle paperback hardcover. And I am self-published. It's my fifth book that's self-published. So it's also available on my website for a free download. No strings attached. I have an online school. We have about 100,000 students in it right now. It's free school as well. So we have about 10 courses. Courses are downloadable. But if you upload them to YouTube, you'll get flagged by me. So it's only downloadable to be used in churches and small groups.
But not to be re-uploaded to YouTube. Because it's exclusively made for people to grow in Christ. And for people to download them in parts of the world where they do not have access to internet. And so it's called Vlad School. So courses on deliverance, on relationship with the Holy Spirit, dating without fornicating, marriage. So a lot of other things. It's not just on deliverance and the Holy Spirit. And I pass through a local church where we have services every Sunday in the mornings.
A few services. And then in the evening we have our youth service. And we're about to launch a college service here shortly. And so for those people that are maybe around this area, they're welcome to come and visit us. And yeah. And what city is that? What area you were saying? I am in Pasco, Washington. But this area is called Tri-Cities Washington. Tri-Cities Washington. Awesome. And hey, any of your socials? Because I know some people love that we get on. So I have a YouTube, Facebook.
Pretty much any social I'm on it. YouTube is the most prevalent one. Instagram and Facebook and TikTok and Twitter. And all of them have one username. It's Vlad Hungry Jen. Vlad Hungry Jen. So I'm a church guy. I love church. I bleed church. Even though I have this expression on my ministry that reaches people online, books and everything. But I'm a regular dude who just loves the local church. And I believe that Jesus wants to. Jesus died for the church. He loves the church.
He's building the church. It's his body. It's his building. It's his bride. And I have to be around what Jesus cares about. And that is his church. Wow. That is absolutely an incredible conversation. That's one of those conversations you want to go back and listen to it again. I think this is going to be a repeat episode for a lot of Keep It One-Hundred Tribe listeners. Because I think they would all agree that was just rich. It had just profound revelation.
So my goodness, that was just incredible. Pastor Vlad, he is amazing. I love the way he just addresses it with such honesty, such integrity in terms of using scripture. And he's just straight. And I love that. Because I think part of it, you know, but we live in a time where it's seemingly become taboo for Christians and believers to state what you should and should not do. And as it were, as though that people are afraid to tell the truth. And I love Pastor Vlad.
He's not afraid to tell the truth. And we've got a bunch of people walking around claiming to be Christians, but they have no root in the Word of God. They're not led by the Word of God. They're not led by his spirit. And so they just do and say and watch what they want. And they think that they're going to be right with God.
But I just want to challenge our listeners as we head off and just let you know that right now, we live in a day of excuses and false assumptions of right standing with God. And the truth be told is that we're going to stand before the Lord. And I don't want to be surprised when I stand before the Lord because I lived for a small G God of my own making, not the God of the Bible. If you're going to serve the God of the Bible, then the Bible has to be your standard.
It has to be your plumb line for what it means to serve God. And it's so important that we stop when we ask Holy Spirit, not only are there words that are obvious cuss words we should not use, but also what are the words that should be coming out of our mouth that could build people up that can prophesy and release God's purpose in the generation that we live. Thanks so much for tuning into the Keep It 100 podcast. Make sure to rate, review and refer us to your friends.
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