Hi, I'm Sam Hunter. This is 721 Live, the media arm of 721 Ministries. I'm glad you're with us. Thank you for joining us today. We have been talking for the last several weeks about three words, guarantee, loyalty, and partnership. Think about that guarantee loyalty and partnership and you would do well to go back and watch the previous Videos and or the listen to the podcast because it'll explain a lot and while I'm thinking about that you might want to just press subscribe on your podcast platform or your video platform so that you can receive these as soon as they come out and But these words at the end of the summer, the beginning of the fall for our 721 men's ministry, I think the Holy Spirit gave them to me because these words, I believe, can have a major impact on the way we live our lives day to day. If we can learn to appropriate that everything God says to us, everything Jesus says, everything we read in the scriptures is a guarantee. It's a guarantee. And if we can learn to combine loyalty with love, I think it'll change our perceptions of that. And then partnership. Now, it's an interesting test that they did in psychiatry. It's a well-known phenomenon that expectations shape experiences. Expectations shape experiences. And you see this often with the placebo effect. You think something's gonna help you, and it ends up helping you. So if we took these words guarantee, and we expected that everything we read in the scriptures, every statement Jesus made, everything we saw, every promise that God Almighty made was a guarantee, not just a promise, but a guarantee, I think it'll change the way you respond to crisis situations, to difficulties, to temptations. And that same thing with loyalty, adding loyalty to love. Will change the way you do respond to temptations as well as other situations So they ran this test they brought in 20 ladies and they put fake scars on them They said this is what we're going to do We're going to put these fake scars this makeup on you and then we want you to go in for these interviews and then we want you to take note of What you've perceived as being negative responses from the interviewer because of the scar on your face how it might have affected your interview Now, so they put these, the makeup, the fake scars on these ladies' cheeks, and before each one went in for the interview, they had the makeup artist step over and go, now let me touch that up a little bit. But instead of touching it up, she actually removed it. So now the ladies go into the interview thinking they have a scar, expecting a certain kind of experience. They do not have the scar. They come back, they offer their feedback, and 18 of the 20 had specific times during the interview where they were absolutely sure. Certain beyond any possibility that their scars were producing a negative effect that the interviewer was Responding reacting to their scars in a negative way and they didn't have them. So yes expectations shape experiences and what I want you to hear what I want to learn to appropriate in my own life is no matter what situation I'm in if I think back to what I've read in the scriptures what Jesus has said to me or What my heavenly father said what I've read anywhere throughout the scriptures. It's a guarantee That he's going to be with me He's going to bring good out of every situation that he's going to help me that the Holy Spirit is going to guide me That we're never alone These things are guaranteed Loyalty if I'm find myself in a situation of temptation and we'll see this I'm going to recap these before we finish today today We're going to talk a little bit more about partnership But we find ourselves in certain situations if we think in terms of loyalty as well as love Now partnerships, that's what we talked about in our last session. Let's spend one more day on it because it is such an important topic because I don't think many of us, matter of fact, I might say none of us think in that in terms of us being partners with God Almighty. We may think of ourselves as his children maybe, probably not. We may more likely think of ourselves as servants or hourly employees, wage earners, doing our part, making sure, you know, he's the boss, we're the employees. But that's not how God designed it in the beginning. In the beginning and all the way through, it's been for us to be in partnership with him. As a matter of fact, where was the first partnership? Think about that for a minute. Where did we see the very first partnership? And it's right there in the beginning of Genesis. God creates, he has the Holy Spirit first hovering over, and then he says, let us make man in our image. Let us, the partnership of the Trinity, let us make man in our image, and then let's put man to work as a partner with us. We've created it now. Let's let him tend it as one of our partners of course. We're junior partners We're not senior partners, and it is such a relief to be a junior partner to my heavenly father But if I think about it in terms of that it's going to change the way I perceive things now I'm going to read to you from my Bible Romans 12 and If you want to read about spiritual gifts, you go to 1 Corinthians 12, you go to Romans 12, and then you see some of it in Ephesians 4. But let me just read from Romans 12, and as you listen, just hear the words of partnership in here, that we all have a role to play as partners in advancing God's kingdom. Romans 12, verse 3. For by the grace given me, I say to every one of you, do not think of yourselves more highly than you ought. but rather think of yourselves with sober judgment in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you, the talents, the spiritual gifts. Just as each one of us has one body with as many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ, we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. We have different gifts according to the grace given us. If a man's gift is prophesying, let him use it in proportion to his faith. If it is serving, let him serve. If it is teaching, let him teach. If it is encouraging, let him encourage. If it is contributing to the needs of others, let him give generously. If it is leadership, let him govern diligently. If it's showing mercy, let him do it cheerfully. Let him do all these things in partnership. You can't miss it. It's throughout the scripture. What I want to do is just take a moment to give you a little bit more scripture and then to convince you yet again that this whole design has always been for us to be in partnership and then look at how we could actually live that out. You know, C.S. Lewis said, you know, you will surely be used by God in his plan, but it makes a big difference to you whether you're used as a Judas or a John. We want to be helping in God's kingdom. We want to be used as children of God, in partnership versus tools of God. So, Jesus on his last night with his disciples. You cannot escape this. John 15, 15. I no longer call you servants, or I could say employees. I no longer call you servants because a servant does not know his master's business Instead I have called you friends for everything that I learned from my father I've made known to you you did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you and I might add as my partners so that you might go and bear fruit in part and I'm adding in partnership with the Holy Spirit fruit that will last I Jesus sets it up for the very beginning with his disciples as he's sending them off. He said look I Appointed you I've got things for you to do and I'm gonna go with you the Holy Spirit I'm promising you is going to be inside of you He's going to be your number one partner, but I've given you things to do. I'm not hiding anything. You're no longer an hourly employee I'm bringing you up into partnership status and I'm giving you a bit of the ownership so that you can have that sense of pride and proactivity and desire and energy to expand the kingdom. In Ephesians, we see another statement that is very obvious. For we are God's handiwork. Now, that word in Greek is really fine craftsmanship. It actually comes from the Greek word poetry. So we are God's fine craftsmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works. There we are, created in Christ Jesus to do good works. And I added, in partnership with him, which God prepared in advance for us to do. There we have it. God prepared in advance for us to do these good works. From him, the whole body joined and held together by every supporting ligament grows and builds itself up in love as each part does its work. And I added again, in partnership with him. It couldn't be any more clear. the whole design from the very beginning all the way through our lives and into the next new heaven and new earth for eternity, it's always been a partnership. And if I have convinced you through the scripture, I did not have to go proof text. Proof text means you've got something you wanna prove so you go find the text that supports what you're saying. I had to cut out many, many scriptures that all give us this idea of a partnership. I just gave you a select few. So what would it mean as you learn to appropriate the idea of being a partner? How would it change your day-to-day living? I think it would give you more energy, more focus, more proactivity, just like if you worked for a company and they gave you a bit of ownership, they made you a partner. You wouldn't just go home at five o'clock and clock out and forget about everything. You'd have a vested interest in how things went. You'd be thinking about ways. I would hope that you would start each day asking the Holy Spirit to show you anything you can do for the kingdom. Maybe it's a small little thing, and we'll talk about that in just a moment. But you would have this idea, I want to be a part. I want to do my part. I want to play my role. I see that you appointed me with things designed for me to do. I want to do them. Show me. Help me. Now, there's a really interesting passage in 1 Corinthians chapter 3 where Paul is dealing with the fact that in Corinth, they're starting to take sides. They're forming cliques, and they've got their own leaders that they adore, that they've elevated to a higher status. Some say they follow Apollos, who was a great speaker. Others say, no, I still follow Paul. Peter came by, so Peter's the head guy. We follow Peter. Even some said, no, no, it's still Christ. But Paul writes this letter and he says to him, don't divide us up. We're just doing our part as partners in the kingdom. Here we go with 1 Corinthians 3, 5. What after all is Apollos? And what is Paul? We're only servants through whom you came to believe as the Lord has assigned to each his task. You don't miss that. We saw that in the previous scripture, as the Lord has assigned to each his task. I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but it is God who has been making it grow in partnership with our efforts. I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God made it grow. So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything but only God who makes things grow. Now, I would put a but in here, but verse 8, the one who plants and the one who waters have one purpose, and they will each be rewarded according to their own labor. For we are God's workers in God's service. You are God's field, God's building. I don't know how it can be any more clear that we do have this role to play in planting seeds and watering seeds. Search Ministries, which is a men's ministry that's national, and I had some affiliation with them early on. They're just a wonderful ministry. They've got this presentation called Evangelism, and it's as simple as one, two, three. One, one. One person matters to God immensely. One person. So planting seeds and watering seeds can be as simple as a kind word. I'll pray for you. I've been thinking about you. Can I help? Just planting seeds. Watering seeds you may come along somebody else has already planted the seed and you see an opportunity to to just be kind just to show grace Just to show Jesus's love or help with time with money with effort, whatever One person matters immensely to God evangelism one two, three two Evangelism is a process and God is responsible for the results. You're not So you can relax and plant seeds and water seeds. You do not have to close the deal because evangelism is a process and God is responsible for the results. Now in a moment, I wanna talk about the next thing that we can do, but before we leave this, I want you to look at Romans 8 28. We talked about this in our last session, but this is such a game changer that I wanna touch on it one more time before we move into my next topic. And this is the way your Bible reads it and my Bible reads it. And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him who have been called according to his purpose. The better way that the Greek should read is, and we know that in all things God works with you, with you, for the good of those who love him and who have been called according to his purpose. God works for the betterment, but he does it with us. So now, as we do this session today, we've just had Hurricane Helene come through the upstate of South Carolina, Florida, and then on up through Georgia, and then it hit western North Carolina, just catastrophic. We can bring good out of that by the efforts that we put in. We can help bring good out of this. If you have your own catastrophe in your own life, you with your Heavenly Father together can bring good out of it. So it's such a game changer to think of Romans 8 28 is yeah, God's gonna bring good, but he's gonna do it with you Okay What can we do? How can we do this? How can we be partners in? planting seeds and watering seeds and I've often thought over these 20 years of 721 ministries that probably our biggest role is knocking down barriers and knocking down the barriers that people have erected against Christians or against Christianity. I want to take a minute and tell you what I'm talking about when I say this. There are three barriers. See, evangelism is as simple as one, two, three. One individual matters immensely to God. Two, evangelism is a process, and God is responsible for the results. But three, there are three barriers. There's the emotional barrier, there's the intellectual barrier, and there's the volitional barrier. The volitional barrier just means they have a hard heart, and you're not gonna break through that hard heart. And what we can do for those folks is just pray for them. But the first emotional barrier They've had a bad experience with Christians, with church. I mean, how many times have you heard that? I certainly, doing what I do for a living, have heard it over and over. I don't want to have anything to do with church. I don't want to have anything to do with Christianity. I've seen all these hypocrites. done wrong in a business deal by somebody that called him, had a fish on his business card. I don't want anything to do with Christians. I went to church and they did me wrong, they did my wife wrong, they did my mother wrong. I mean, I hear it over and over. I don't want any, it's an emotional barrier because they've had a bad experience with church, with Christians, with people who call themselves Christians. What can we do? We can replace the bad experiences with good experiences. It's just that simple. Replace the bad experiences with good experiences. When they say, I've had that bad experience, you might say, I have too. And quite frankly, I may have done it myself. I may have been one of those that somebody else had a bad experience with. We're just human, we're just human. But I've had that experience too. I understand how you feel. And show them the grace and the love of Jesus just by understanding, just by listening, just by smiling. There's a great passage in Colossians 4, 5 through 6, Be careful in the way you act towards outsiders. Make the most of every opportunity. Let your conversations be full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to relate to anyone. Let your conversations be full of grace. Overwhelm people with grace. That's gonna knock down these emotional barriers, these bad experiences. Full of grace. And when you get a chance, season them some salt, some truth. But remember, evangelism is a process and our role is to help get these barriers out of the way. Help these folks knock down these barriers so they can move forward. We replace bad experiences with good experiences. The next barrier is an intellectual barrier. They have bad information. Maybe someone has taught them the wrong things about the Bible, about the story, about Jesus, about God Almighty. Surely you've heard that He's a judgmental God, He's all about rules, He's angry, He's an awful Old Testament God, and yes, Jesus is a sweet Pillsbury boy type, you know, New testament full of grace and love and and I don't you know I don't even I think it's all about rules and you can't do this you can't do that as a matter of fact when they When they did a poll across the united states as to what word first comes to mind When you think about christians that word was against against Christians are against everything god is against everything jesus is against everything anything that anybody might want to live out That's bad information, and we can replace that bad information with good information. Peter in his first letter says, always be prepared to give an answer to anyone who asks you, to give the reason for the hope, the confident expectation that you have. You don't have to be a Bible scholar to be able to help people get beyond these intellectual barriers. You can just say, hey, I can understand why you'd think that, or why you'd feel that way, or let me put you with a friend who really can answer these questions well, or let me just give you a couple ideas about some of the things that I've learned. But I think that the way we plant seeds and water seeds, the way we work our role in our partnership, is most effectively by knocking down these barriers. Okay, so now what I wanna do is I wanna recap what we've talked about when we talk about guarantee and loyalty and partnership. And what I wanna do is show you some passages that I think will give you an idea. We'll start with guarantee. The setting here is that Jesus has gone back to Cana with a few of his disciples, and he's getting ready to leave. This is not the wedding. He's gone back for another visit. We're in John 4. And a royal official arrives in a huff, in a hurry, with his entourage. He's a royal official, which means he works in the palace of King Herod. And he's in a panic. His son is going to die. And he comes to Jesus and says, I know I heard you around. I know what you can do. Please come save my son. And this is what happens next. It's always intrigued me. It's always really touched my heart. The royal official said, sir, come before my child dies. Go, Jesus replied, your son will live. The man took Jesus at his word and departed. The man took Jesus at his word, and I've added, as a guarantee, and departed. Jesus said he's going to live. He said, OK, that's a guarantee. I'm gone. I don't have to ask questions. If it were me, I'd say, well, wait a minute. Aren't you coming with me? How is this gonna happen or what do I need to do or I'm not going without you any number of things I would have been questioning, but this man took Jesus's Word as a guarantee And he left and of course his son was healed. Could we do that? Could you do that? Could you take Jesus's Word as a guarantee no matter what the situation is? how How bad it may look, how dire it may look, or confusing, can you just take his assurances of his love, his presence, and his power as guaranteed? The royal official could. Loyalty I've got contrasting stories here Joseph of the Older Testament Genesis 39 we know that Joseph is working for Potiphar His wife and Potiphar has elevated him to the number one guy in charge He's certainly working in partnership with with his with his owner Potiphar Potiphar's wife wants to Having an affair with Joseph, Joseph says this to her, my master, that'd be Potiphar, has withheld nothing from me except you because you are his wife. How then could I do such a wicked thing and sin against Potiphar? No, sin against God, no. I know that God put me in this position. I know he's been taking care of me. I know that he has given me all of these gifts. I'm gonna be loyal to him. How could I do this wicked thing and be so disloyal to my Heavenly Father? Imagine when you're tempted to, for any type of sin, a real egregious sin or just popping off or just doing things that you know displease your Heavenly Father. You know they're not walking in the light. That you could think in terms of, you know what? I want to be loyal. Or you hear from the Holy Spirit a conviction to do something that you may not want to do. But I want to be loyal. He's been so loyal to me. I want to be loyal to Him. But King David did not think in that way. And let's look at this. He's been with Bathsheba. We know that whole story. Nathan the prophet comes and says this he says here's what God Almighty is saying to you King David I gave you your master's house to you. That'd be King Saul's and your master's wives into your arms I gave you all Israel and Judah and if all this had been too little I would have given you even more Why did you despise the Word of the Lord by doing what is evil in his eyes? Why couldn't you have been more loyal David? Look what I've done for you Joseph, he processed the temptation of Potiphar's wife through the lens of loyalty. David did not. And look what it cost him. Guarantee, loyalty, partnership. Genesis 15 18. This is God's original covenant with Abram on that day The Lord made a covenant isn't a covenant a partnership agreement. You're gonna do your part I'm gonna do my part made a covenant agreement with Abram and said to your descendants I get this land from the wadi of Egypt to the Great River the Euphrates a Covenant is a partnership and from the very outset God Almighty said to Abram and then to all of his descendants and to us I'm forming a covenant and I'm going to do my part and you do your part and we'll do all this together Joshua they're entering the promised land. Moses is no longer alive I will give you every place where you set your foot as I promised Moses as I was with Moses So I will be with you. I will never leave you nor forsake you Have I not commanded you be strong and courageous? Do not be afraid do not be discouraged for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go What a promise Now they are going into the promised land. God has told Joshua, you're going to have to defeat seven nations. You're going to have to fight them. You're going to have to defeat them. But I'm going to be with you. We're going to do this as partners. Couldn't be any more clear. I'll be with you wherever you go. And of course Jesus as he sends his disciples off in the same type of partnership Therefore go and make disciples of all nations baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son of the Holy Spirit and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you and surely I am with you always to the very end of the age I'm gonna be with you. We're gonna do this in partnership My friends, what I hope is that you can learn, and it'll take practice, that you can learn to put these ideas of guarantee and loyalty and partnership into your day-to-day living, shifting your perspective. It's going to change the way you live. It's up to you to do it. I can present this information. I can tease it out for you, explain it, give you examples, but unless you put it into practice, nothing's going to change, and I want you to live this way. Jesus wants you to live this way, with this type of perspective, that everything he says is a guarantee. The way we live our lives is with love and loyalty, and we're in a partnership with God Almighty, with Jesus Christ, the Messiah. to advance his kingdom. What a wonderful concept. I hope that you will take this and put it into practice because there's more. You know it. Come and find it.