Stop Trying So Hard to Be Good Enough

Well, good evening and welcome to Crowd Church. Great to be with you this

evening. My name is Matt, and beside me on my left I have the beautiful Anna.

Anna, good evening.

Good evening, everyone. Nice to be here again.

Yeah, it is.

It really is good to be here. Good to have you. And on my Right, is equally

beautiful, Dave Connolly.

Oh, thank you. It's great to be here.

Oh, so that was an interesting shot there of the corner of my ear.

I was going to say someone's knocked the camera.

Yeah, I reckon that would have been Dan.

It wasn't me.

I definitely wasn't me. I haven't moved. Oh, it's all getting already—

they're all taking responsibility.

There's Dave, not to be confused with me or Matt. Yeah, yeah.

And it's just, I just felt like Adam in the garden.

Did you?

Well, in the sense of it wasn't my fault, it was Eve's. I'm just like, it wasn't

my fault, it was Dan's.

Yeah.

Straight away. If you're listening to this on the podcast, by the way, catching

up and you're wondering what is going on, the cameras just got bashed. And so

when we went to Dave's shop, it wasn't Dave, it was Anna's ear. Anyway, we're

back to normal. Good to be with you all. Make sure you say hi in the comments as

we will love to hear from you. Let us know where you're watching from in the

world. What things are going on. And of course, today is a very special day,

Dave. Today is Father's Day.

It is?

It is. And, uh, I, I quite enjoy— I was talking about it earlier— first time

ever on Father's Day all my kids are out of England.

Wow.

I don't know what that says.

It either says you're a really bad dad or you're a really good dad and you've

launched them well. I'll go with the latter.

Yeah, yeah, I'm gonna take that.

Yeah, yeah, it's okay.

It's all right, it's all right. So if my kids are watching, which I highly doubt

because they hear my voice enough— uh, all right, kids. Um, but yeah, if you're

a dad, happy Father's Day. Uh, I know Father's Day is not easy for everybody,

um, but I'd like— I think it's good to celebrate Father's Day where we can, just

because God is Father, right?

Yeah.

And so, um, yeah, whatever relationship you did or didn't have with your dad,

uh, you can have a great relationship with God as Father, and it's probably just

worth saying that.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I think that's so true.

Fantastic. All right, well, on that bombshell, um, should we get on with it? So

today Dave is speaking. Uh, we're going to start— we're talking about Jesus

being the revolutionary. That's the whole series that we're in, and we're

starting a sort of little subsection. Can I say that?

Subsection?

The subsection?

Uh, you can say what you like, you've got the mic.

That's true. Yeah. I can, although Dan's got the power because he can turn me

off at any point. Um, and so yeah, so anyway, we've got this little subsection

going on where we're going to start to look at, um, the community that Jesus

sort of calls and brings together. And so tonight we're looking at the calling

of the disciples.

We are.

And what Jesus did there, what we can learn from it in today's world and for

ourselves, for our own lives. We're going to get into all of that. So that's

kind of where we are as we go through. If you have any questions, thoughts,

write them in the comments, because after the talk, we all 3 of us, we kind of

talk about the talk. We call it conversation stream, and we go through any

questions that you've put in the comments that we can answer on the, on the live

stream. We will do that. So yeah, we will quite happily do. Let me just go, in

fact, to the comments. We've got Lady Burkeby. Hi, Lady Burkeby. Hi, Ade. Hi,

Ellis. Alice says, sorry, I'm late. It's 2 minutes past.

He's not missed anything important yet, has he?

I mean, let's be honest.

You'll be forgiven. Basically just technical problems.

It's not a problem. We've on the mobile, we've got Alicia. We've got Julie, Mrs.

Connolly. So no pressure, but the wife's, the wife's watching.

It'll be good.

You've got to be on your best behaviour, Dave.

So good evening, everybody that is in the comments. Sharon's in the comments as

well, and obviously Crowd Church is in the comments. Roz is in the comments.

Roz, good evening. Uh, it's great that you're all joining us from around the

world, no doubt, uh, on this beautifully hot day here in the UK. But without

further ado, um, we will hand over to Dave, who is, uh— I sent Dave a card on

Father's Day. I've mentioned this before, haven't I, on the show? I always give

you a card on Father's Day.

You do.

Dave's like my spiritual dad, and so I'm all— I'm very grateful for this man

who's an absolute legend. And gives a lot to crowd, don't you? And you're so

into it. And, um, so always love to hear what Dave has to say. So let's, without

further ado, hand over to Dave, and then Anna and I will be back with Dave for

Conversation Street after this.

Cue Dave. Good evening, folks, and it's great to be here. I am on Father's Day,

and just one thought on Father's Day. I was preaching on, um, Fatherhood: God's

Design, um, this morning at a wonderful church called Open Well. And in

preparing for that, I, I got this real revelation, and that was, you know, until

we really grasp the fatherhood of God, there'll always be a part of us where we

live like orphans.

Oh, love that.

You know, and it was— and, and it is such a pain. I mean, you know, for me, I

didn't have, you know, opposed to dad in my life. Um, probably did his best from

his brokenness. Well, because of the ongoing going with the Holy Spirit in my

life, I was able to help lead them to Jesus. I don't think you can do that

unless you get a hold of a good design of fatherhood. And it is real, the pain

and things, but that's not this evening's talk.

That's all for free, is it?

Yeah, that's just a throwaway. Yeah, that's just a sidebar. Yeah, yeah. Yeah,

buy myself some time. Yeah, I'm wanting to change the talk slightly. Same topic,

but just our approach to it, you know. Um, we're talking about how Jesus starts

to gather these guys, gather his community, and, um, but you know, this is a

call that changes everything. Yeah, it changes everything for these guys. And,

um, we're going to be— if you've got your Bibles, um We're going to be looking

in the Gospel of Mark, and, um, we're going to look at chapter 1, verse 16 to

20, and we'll reference chapter 3, verse 13 to 19. And, um, I love the different

writers and what they bring.

Yeah.

Mark, there's always— when you read Mark's Gospel, there's a real urgency, and,

um, that you don't pick up in the same way in the other gospels. So here in this

story, and we're not talking about science fiction, but you know, we took the

story, um, of this. Jesus is walking along the shoreline, okay, um, and it's the

Sea of Galilee where he's walking, and he saw some ordinary fishermen going

about their daily work, ordinary people doing a daily job. And we got Simon

Peter, Andrew, James, and John, and they're mending their nets, they're doing

fisherman stuff, and they're just probably expecting another hard day's toil.

And Jesus spoke two life-changing words to them. He says, "Follow me." And

that's Mark 1:17. The two words that jump out here— follow me— everything

Mark 1:17

changes on what they do or do not do. And, um, you know, you— we just need to

appreciate that at this time, um, the Jews were expecting a messiah. They

probably weren't expecting him to come as in the form of Jesus, okay? Yeah, you

know, according to— they're probably expecting some warrior or um, rebel type of

thing. Mark's Gospel has got its own style in how he tries to communicate, um,

to us the story of what is going on. And one word, um, that appears, um, a

number of times, um, in this gospel is immediately or at once. Um, and it's like

the writer is like, we God knows where your heart is, so you can respond to

this, you know. And sometimes we forget that, you know, God goes before us.

Yeah.

And he is speaking to us, he is preparing the way for us. And, um, those two—

it's mainly in two places directly, and it's in verse 18 and verse 20. And it

says, um, that those Men who become the 12, who become part of the disciples, it

says they responded to Jesus immediately. And you know, there's sometimes in our

lives when we hear something and we perceive it that this is true, this is of

God, and we then start thinking, well, maybe I just need to think that through,

otherwise I'm being reckless, And you know, I probably would err towards

probably the reckless side, if you know me.

Mm-hmm.

But for me, when I know the truth, I don't really have to pray about it a whole

lot. I'll pray, "God, strengthen me, give me the grace to do it." But you know,

I want to encourage us to learn to know the voice of God, the prompting of God,

the moving of the Holy Spirit, and act on it. And it says this, "They left their

nets, their boats," Excuse me. And even the security of their family business to

follow him. It meant them leaving something of cost behind. And, um, sometimes,

you know, when I hear the gospel being preached, that is missing. And that

concerns me greatly when I don't hear people talking about the cost of following

Christ, because we can say that Jesus paid it all. He did. But in following,

there's a daily sacrifice of walking after him and walking with him. You know,

so it's not supposed to be dead easy. There is a cost involved, and I think

that's wonderful. The response that you see from these men, it's not impulsive.

It was a recognition that they recognized the authority of Christ Jesus. Amen.

They recognized the authority of the Messiah. In the ancient world, you know,

students would normally choose their rabbi, and like there's 3 stages mainly of

education, but students would mainly choose their own rabbi. Here, something

revolutionary happens.

Hey!

I had to get it in. Jesus rabbi, the rabbi chooses his students, and that's not

just to be different. As you see the story between Jesus and the disciples, it

is significantly different, so you need a significantly different call. What

encourages us about this passage is that Jesus chooses ordinary people. He

didn't begin with religious experts, political leaders, and celebrities. He

chose ordinary people, and, you know, I think if I was at a message, I want to

get into the world, and I had to pick a handful of men, I'm not sure I would

have picked any of these, you know, because they were just ordinary, and they

weren't great men of significance in one sense, But isn't that great for us, you

know, that God still uses ordinary people? We have a God who takes ordinary

people and uses them to do supernatural things, amazing things, extraordinary

things. God always, it seems, to delight in using ordinary people because, you

know, then the focus isn't on what these people can do. The focus is on what God

has done. Paul reminds us in 1 Corinthians 12— I'm sorry, 1 Corinthians 1:27—

1 Corinthians 1:27

how God chose the foolish things, you know, to shame the wise. God chose the

weak things of the world to shame the strong. It's just to keep the emphasis on

God and not on man. Maybe, um, you might this evening, if you don't know the

Lord Jesus, or maybe you're walking with God, but you feel unqualified. You

might even feel overlooked or insignificant. The calling of the disciples

clearly, clearly, clearly reminds us that Jesus sees far more than we see about

ourselves. When we often in church will say, "God has got a plan," He has, and

that plan starts and finishes with relationship, relationship with him. He sees

our potential. I'm not a big lover of the word potential because we just seem to

say the word and get stuck there rather than moving into it. God sees the call

that he has placed on our lives. He sees how he can work in us and through us he

sees his purposes being fulfilled through us. We are invited into, um,

partnership. And these fishermen would have known about partnership because they

would have been part of a larger community of partnership fishermen. Yeah. Um,

Jesus didn't invite these guys just to accompany him. You know, as, um,

somewhere in on the outer echelons. He invites them right into his life and he

says, come, follow me. That meant walking with him, walking closely with him.

And I don't really think, you know, in the 21st century we understand walking

anymore. Um, I think I may have said before on Crowd Church, I am— when we were

at Frontline many years ago, there's a picture. I used to see a guy Every week

at a certain time, and we used to walk around the Mystery, which is a large park

in Liverpool. And in this picture, it's snowing, and we didn't know this picture

was being taken of us, but the snow's coming down and you can see this guy's

talking, and I'm walking side on, and I'm just looking at his face, looking at

his lips, you know, um, when people talk, we need to look at them so we've got

their attention. And I was really interested in what he was saying. It wasn't

just about me fixing him, and you get that with walking. You don't get that when

you're just jumping in the car for a few minutes. I think it's just a completely

different thing. Um, I want to— I'd encourage us to find a way of rediscovering

walking with people and talking and sharing and listening 'Cause that's what

Jesus invited those early disciples into. They were some of the key things. He

says, "Come follow me and I will make you." Wasn't just come follow me and we'll

have this great holy uddle. You know what, we can have a small group. It's gonna

be great, Andrew. It's gonna be absolutely fantastic. Gonna get together every

week, we'll do all these great things. We'll read our Bible, we'll eat, we might

break bread together, and we'll sing some songs maybe. Um, but it wasn't just

that. And he said, but I will make you— is the purpose— fishers of men. So he's

talking to fishermen. So his illustration is about fish, which makes sense,

doesn't it? It's not worth him talking about building or farming. He talks, you

know, it's relevant. The illustration is relevant for them. And he's not just

saying we'll go fishing, he's saying I will make you I will make you fishers of

men. And I think, um, we need to understand that, that this gospel that we

receive, and as we receive it, the understanding and part of the cost is that we

will also share it. Excuse me. So whilst these disciples may be ordinary people,

he has a plan for them. I will make you fishers of men. I will make you. It's

not about your efforts, it's not about how how busy you can make yourself, he

says, I will make you. What he's saying, I will empower you, and as I empower

you, you— A disciple is all about modeling what you see in your rabbi as you

walk with him. Transformation is in Christ's hand. He brings about

transformation in us. The disciples didn't need to do it in their own strength.

Their own power or in their own desire. They just needed to surrender their

lives to Christ, to walk with him, to watch, to listen, to do what he did. And

the same is true for us as we become followers of Christ. You know, um, we just

need to walk. It's not about effort. You know, when we just try and make

ourselves busy doing God things, I think if you've done it for any period of

time, we just get tired. And we may think we have all the right motives, but I

want to say to you, walk with him, and as you walk with Christ, you'll want to

share the things of Christ with others in your life. You know, Jesus didn't do a

quick, "Let's just do a quick interview on these guys, and let's see if you're

bright enough, clever enough," Do you speak well enough? Are you going to upset

everybody? Or are you going to woo them? Are you going to kill them? He doesn't.

He calls them, because it's all about Jesus. He sees a hunger in them, and he

calls them to himself. And they follow. They leave behind, and they follow him.

And for some folks, We believe, but we don't leave behind. We have too much of

our past in our presence that is not surrendered to God. Does that make sense?

Mm-hmm. We have too much of our past in our presence. And, you know, um,

obviously we can't just leave everything behind in one sense, you know, we have

responsibilities, you know, but it can be surrendered to Christ. And we can

bring Christ right into the center of it. Um, so, you know, um, it's not merely

about believing in Jesus, it's about following, it's about living a life that

demonstrates him. That's the whole thing about being part of a community. They

contribute, they share, they have something, um, to contribute to a relationship

is made up of, um, different parts, isn't it? Different people playing their

role. And how amazing it is that we've got Peter, you know. I just think having

Peter in any group is going to keep you on your toes. It's going to teach you

grace. Oh, you know, and, and I thank God that Peter is in that group. It

brings— gives me grace, hope, you know, for myself. Um, But he takes them as

they are, and he tells them who they are in him. He says to them, "Come, follow

me, be like me." And Jesus, as a rabbi, inputs them. He shares all that he has.

They see all these different areas of Jesus's life, and they are part of it. And

I love it. I think I've said it before. They see him when he's tired. What is

Jesus' response to tiredness? Sleep. Yeah.

Come and si.

Do you see him when he's stressed? What is his thing? Come aside and pray. All

these different responses they will have seen with Jesus, because Jesus models

it to them, and Jesus' expectation is for them to do the same, to copy him. I

just want to say something about these guys. You know, we People often say about

Christians, 'Well, you were just a loser.' I don't have any problem identifying

with that. Going nowhere, going there fast, you know. But Jesus came for the

lost. Lost. If you can't identify that you were lost, even if you had everything

or if you had nothing, well then it's very hard to encounter Christ. But you

know, let me just tell you something about these guys. James and John, we're

told, left behind a successful fishing business. They were successful in what

they did. Their father had hired servants. They're part of a fishing, like,

cooperative. They had real security. They had something to leave behind that was

going to cost them. And there was no plan. There was no return plan, by the way.

There was no return plan.

No.

You know what they did, and it's true for any of us today, is that they

surrendered themselves. They put their trust in following Jesus. And that is

true of us, whether we have much or whether we have little. The question for us

today is, what are the nets? You know, it says that they put down the nets.

Maybe the question for us today is, what are the nets that Jesus is asking you

and I to leave behind? You know, when we hear the gospel message, lots of

people, they say, "Oh, well, I would do if I was good enough," or whatever, you

know, and they try and make themselves better, or they think about all the

different situations, a marriage, a family, I know, a sickness, a disease, a

whole host of things. I'll just work on those, and when I get them sorted, then

I will follow. Well, you know, it's— we have— you had to hear the call to

follow, and the appropriate response is that they responded immediately. So what

are— maybe what are the nets that we have in our life? Maybe For some of us,

perhaps it's fear.

Yeah.

Perhaps it's pride. Perhaps it's comfort. Perhaps it's self-reliance. Okay, and

those four things, we all encounter them in real life. Perhaps it's a

distraction that has slowly taken place in our lives that hinder us from

following God. Maybe you have encountered God in some measure, But you know,

when we have unsurrendered areas in our lives, I'm telling you, it only goes one

way, and that's not towards God. You know, I am— for the first 2 years I became

a Christian, I have to say I experienced the goodness of God in my life. But

there was one area in my life, um, that I hadn't surrendered to God. I wasn't

struggling with it, but I knew it was there, and, and I knew I hadn't

surrendered it. And after about 18 months or nearly 2 years, one day this thing

just popped its head up and I knew it wasn't surrendered. And I turned my back

on Christ, and for about 18 months I went off and I was in a worse place than

what I was before. The reality is we need to not be perfect. Hear me, it's not

about being perfect, it's about being surrendered. And maybe that's another

talk. Mm. You know, um, don't allow distractions in your life to say, well, you

can't follow Christ because of this, you've got this, you've got that. They

heard the call and they put down their nets. Jesus continues to call people to

radical discipleship. We're talking about this being Jesus the revolutionary.

There's nothing ordinary about being a revolutionary. There's nothing ordinary

about being a Christian. You know, to follow Christ, there is something about

standing up You see it repeatedly in the New Testament, both standing up and

speaking out. And yes, by all means, I totally agree with folks who say we make

our lives count, we're salt and light. Absolutely, totally agree. But you can't

leave out that we have to literally share verbally with people the love of God.

How can we not tell people about if we fall in love, we tell everybody. I

remember when I met Julie, um, Julie was really young when I met her, and, um, I

remember, like, you know, I couldn't shut up. You know, you know when you fall

in love, you just bore the pants off everybody else, don't you? Well, when you

have children, everybody's seen your baby, or 450,000 photographs. They're happy

with the first 5.

Or the first one.

Or the first one. More tolerant than that, but, uh, you know what I mean? Um,

Well, because we're passionate about it, aren't we? You know, and you can't hold

yourself back by saying, 'I've got a new boyfriend or husband,' um, or whatever.

And, and that's how we need to be about Christ, because he's impacted our lives

so wonderfully.

Yes.

You know, and Jesus continuing to radically call men and women to discipleship.

And I don't mean people who are pastors, whatever that means, or missionaries,

or church leaders, or this or that. I'm talking about ordinary men and women who

Jesus loves, and he calls them into a living relationship so that they can be

who God has called them, whether that's in the university or in the factory or

wherever. Let me try and land this by saying all of us need to know what it is

to respond when God speaks to us. Yeah. And if you're not yet a Christian, I

want— I really want to say to you this evening, there's an invitation. Jesus

gave an invitation, okay, to those early disciples, and that same invitation is

true for you and I, and it is real today. And in the same ways that Jesus came

and walked with those disciples. He longs to walk with you.

Yeah.

He longs to draw near to you. It's not known about some distant, far-off God.

The question is not whether Jesus is calling. The question is whether you're

willing to respond. The church is built— is built on an unlikely foundation of

ordinary people. It's about people. It's not about buildings. You know, wherever

we are this evening, whatever you do, whatever your story may be, Jesus sees

you.

Mm.

And he loves you exactly where you are, going through exactly what you're going

through. And he says, come, follow me.

Mm. Wonderful. Thank you, chief.

Pleasure.

I was— the reason I was smiling when you were saying that is someone wrote in

the comments, I'm gonna get straight into it because I was looking at the

comments earlier. Someone wrote in the comments, uh, God hates me, too much bad

luck and too much stress. And so, and obviously you'd not seen these comments.

No.

Um, while she was speaking, uh, too busy looking at your own notes, I feel. Um,

but yeah, it's interesting how, how you sort of finished on that. Um, God hates

me lately, too much bad luck and too much stress. What would you say to that?

First of all, God doesn't hate you, okay? God doesn't hate you. He sent his one

and only Son to die for you, and that wasn't on condition. He came to seek and

save the lost, not for those who he already had or those who already believe.

You know, I want to tell you, when you— if you're thinking God hates you that

has not come from God. You need to know that God loves you. He loves you so

much. The scripture said that he sent his only son, yeah, to die in your place,

in my place, to carry my sin, my brokenness. He loves you. Don't fall for that

lie. That is a lie to keep you separated from God.

So true, isn't it? And again, it comes back to the whole conversation you were

talking about in terms of calling. Like, God chose this sort of ragtag bunch of

people. So it's not based on performance.

No.

It's not based on skill level. It's definitely not based on education level. Um,

but there's still that calling, isn't there? And there's another comment

actually that's come in a couple of times I want to just pick up. This idea that

Jesus was a Greco-Roman myth. Um, and it's an interesting one, isn't it? Because

yes, he was in— he's from ancient times, but I'd say it came more out of Jewish

theology Graeco-Roman mythology. But I can see, um, to totally answer the

question, uh, there was, after the resurrection of Christ, a crossover. So you

could say that some of the Christian art started to use some of the pagan

iconography. But the fascinating thing, the reason why I wanted to bring that up

right at the start, again going back to your point, Dave, was if Jesus was a

myth, which I've I fully don't think that he was. There's way too much evidence.

But if Jesus was a myth, there's no way these guys would have followed him to

their death, right? If it was all based on a lie, if it was all based on a myth,

there's no way that Peter would have gone through and endured, or Paul would

have gone through and endured what they went through. You, you wouldn't do that

for a lie. And the fact that they endured that to me is actually quite a telling

part of this story. And it all kind of kickstarts right here in these fishing

boats. And, uh, and I love this imagery. I'll make you fishers of men.

But I'm sure as you guys have, you know, been, you know, growing up— I know, and

you've grown up in and around church, you know, we, we hear people saying, well,

Jesus is just a myth, he's just this Well, I have spent many hours, because, you

know, I have to teach on some of these things. You know, the evidence for Jesus

is overwhelming. Even people who don't believe in him would say, you know,

there's more documentation that Jesus existed than Napoleon Bonaparte's.

Yeah.

It's, you know, it's huge. But it's easy to get caught up on that, because I

would have to say, if he's a myth, who is this that has totally transformed my

life? Yeah, yeah. Who is this that is now living in my life?

Yeah, you know. No, it's a fair question. It is a fair question. So let's get

into it. Calling thoughts and comments, Miss Anna.

Yeah, I just thought there was like so much in that, um, in that talk tonight,

Dave. Thank you for it. I, I I loved, I love what you had to say about that kind

of sense of urgency, like drop your nets, come and follow me. And it's not like

a, in a couple of weeks when you've sorted a few things out, you've talked to

the wife, you've got all your assets in place, you've kind of, you know, worked

out all the logistics. It's like immediate. It's like just drop everything and

come follow me. And, and they do it. That's the incredible thing. Like I think,

wow, if Jesus was standing in front of some of us, would we just drop everything

and come? Yeah. No, it's challenging, isn't it?

It is.

Just like that, drop everything you're doing. You know, they were fishermen.

They weren't religious leaders, people of their time, were they? They had a

profession. They had, you know, families to feed, you know, money to make on the

fishing boats. And, you know, how— Yeah, how quick would we be to drop

everything? I sometimes think, oh gosh.

It's a really good point, isn't it?

Yeah.

Because I— and I love the imagery of the net, right? So they let go of their

nets. Their nets are symbolic, isn't it? That's their living, that's their

livelihood. It's what they know. It's what they've done day in, day out. It's a

security. It's like, this is how they do life. And so actually the call of

Christ is to not necessarily abandon like you don't have to quit your job or any

of that, but to actually go, no, I'm, I'm gonna follow you. I'm— everything that

I know and think may still be true tomorrow, but I'm going to subject everything

I know and think to your lead. Yeah.

Right? Yeah. So, and can I ask you a question? Yeah, I know you grew up in

church. Like, for everybody, there's a moment, isn't there, when that wherever

you are, you hear something that changes your thinking to bring you to a place

of surrender or committal to Christ.

What was that?

What did— because they hear the call.

Yeah.

What I'm asking is, what was that call like for you?

I suppose for me it was different to that, that moment that the disciples had

because I'd grown up in church culture and going to church with my parents. Um,

so I think for me it was coming of age really because being like a late teenager

and sort of thinking for the first time, do I just go to church because my

parents take me? Yeah. And told me I have to go every week, or do I go because I

want to do it? And am I going to continue to go when I, you know, so when I was

18 and I left home to go to university and came up to Liverpool first time,

suddenly it's like, no one's gonna make me go to church. What do I really think

here? Do I really believe in God? And if so, why? And have I encountered him

personally? And honestly, at that point, I don't know if I had, but certainly in

that first year of going to university, and, you know, I didn't do a physical

Alpha course, but I did read the book because I wanted to answer some of those

questions, like, how can you be sure the, you know, Bible's true? Is Jesus

really real? How can you know? Did the cross really— like, I wanted some of

those answers. And I'd definitely encourage, just going off-piste here, but

anybody who's got questions like that one about, is Jesus really real? And how

can we know? Do the Alpha course. It's a few weeks of your life, and you've

nothing to lose if Jesus isn't real.

Absolutely, yeah.

But actually, it goes through a lot of that evidence in that case for Jesus. And

for me, that was quite life-changing. But I also think, so some of it was that

and getting my own understanding right. But actually, a lot of it was a heart

change as well. And being like, actually, when I put this into practice, Jesus

meeting me there in some, like, really practical, real ways. It's like, oh, and

so I think for me it was a bit more of a process, but it was like choosing to

go, okay, God, I— and I do remember thinking when I, when I first went to uni,

okay, I don't know if this is real, but I'm gonna go all out with it and see.

Yeah.

And if it works, it works, and if not, never mind, I'll, you know, sack it off.

But I'm gonna, like, fully check it out before I've been at it. Yeah. And of

course I never binned it because the more I looked into it, the more I was like

convinced. And also the more I knew of God and tasted of God, the more— yeah, I

couldn't look back. Yeah. And I never have.

Yeah. So yeah, it's great.

This is a really good point. It's a really good point, isn't it? And it's that,

that sense of, um, that sense of call, isn't it? Like what you said about

purpose, the purpose, you know, I'm calling you, you're going to be fishers of

men. So it's like I'm calling you to something. This is not a kind of, you know,

a sort of a— we don't know what's—

It's not self-indulgence.

Yeah, it's not. So that's a good point. It is really not self-indulgence. This

is not about you all of a sudden. No, this is about impact. This is about, um,

and actually being fishers of men. I— the language I would use is this is all

about growing God's kingdom. This is all about the kingdom of heaven versus the

kingdom of Matt. Yeah, right. Um, and so I, I think your purpose then becomes

bigger than you are, and then this is what you end up giving your life to. Yeah,

right. Um, did you— going back to your example, Anna, did you sense that purpose

in those early days when you were doing the Alpha course and stuff? How did that

come about?

Yeah, I think I did. Um, I think I sensed God's call. Um, I think even coming to

Liverpool, it was quite— it's quite a long story, but just the way everything

fell into place.

Yeah.

And it wasn't really another option of university courses I could do, and it was

just very clearly God. In the months that kind of preceded me going to

university, like, all the— yeah, all the routes just led to one place very

clearly. And so I did really feel God's hand in sort of, and his direction and

his kind of leading to that, to that place. Um, I don't know if that answers the

question, but I— yeah, I think it, it is a process. But it— yeah, there was

definitely, there was a sense of call and God calling me to a certain place. And

then I think once I was starting to experience God for myself and spend time in

church and read my Bible more, and it became more personal and real to me. The

overflowing is interesting that he talks about. I'll make you fishers of men,

because responding to that call, it changed the way I saw the people around me.

Like, I would look at the friends in my—

Yeah.

And just, yeah, other friends who were like students at the time, and they're

very broken and very— yeah, just, I don't know. And my heart really broke for

some of them because I, I was like Yeah, and it was like— and I— there was a

sense of urgency, like, suddenly about this thing that God is doing in your

life. You, you need to share this with other people. They need it too. They're

broken. And, yeah, you know, I— yeah, it, it was, it was, um, yeah, it was very

real at that time, I think. And it's been real other times as well. But I think

there was that real sense of that calling. But there was also, you know, there

is also a cost, isn't there? It's like you've— there's— and I love that you said

that as well, Dave, because there is a cost. And I think often in Christianity

we can, you know, we can be, we can be guilty in church, can't we, of absolutely

preaching a weak gospel that's like, come to Jesus and he'll make you happier

and yeah, give— prosper you. And there's a lot of prosperity gospel that's been

out there. Absolutely. And, um, it's not the full story, and there's cost as

well. And so I really love that you said that because it's a cost, but I've

never found that it's not worth it.

That's right.

And that's the thing.

Well, and it's like, we're happy to pay a cost for something we feel is valuable

or of value, you know. And, um, you know, what— what reason why I was asking you

that, Anne, was that, you know, I was just thinking about, you know, when he's

saying about, I'll make you fishes of men, um, you know, he's actually speaking

to them in a language that they understood. And what he's doing, he's saying, so

I am going to repurpose all the skills you have, all the things you have. I am

going to use them, and I'm going to use them in— and I'm going to use a language

so you understand. So we're not going to be— we're not going to go fishing for

fish anymore.

Yeah.

But we are going to go and fish. We are going to go and gather souls, lost

souls, and you know, and you understand something about the toil that— I love

this fisherman, the toil that's involved. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, it's not

going up like with your rod. These nets are throwing, there's patience. They

know, they, you know, they know the skills of fishing that are required. But

although that the language he's talking to them, he's trying to reach them not

because they are simple, but to speak a language that they understand.

Yeah.

So He takes their skills and their time, and he completely repurposes them. And

I think for us, you know, that just says, you know, wherever I am, with whoever

I'm with, you know, whatever skills and talents I have, God will use that to

draw people to him, if I am surrendered, if I have answered that call, as Anita

was saying.

That's a really important point, isn't it? It's like, Um, like when COVID hit,

it was in my wheelhouse to go, well, let's just livestream the service. And this

is, you know, the start of Crowd Church in many ways, wasn't it? It was just

like it just all began. It's like God takes your talents and understandings and

he uses them for his purposes and for his kingdom. And that's in effect what the

calling is. You don't have to go out and learn a whole new skill set.

Absolutely right.

It's not like you've got to go to a specific school to learn a specific thing.

Maybe, I don't know, unless God leads you that way. But I think on the whole,

um, I'm reminded of the parable of the talents where the, you know, the sort of

the guys have 5 and 10 and 1, and it's like that it's all what you do with what

you've been given, isn't it?

And how you do it. I love that bit that Dave talked about, um, I will make you.

Yeah.

So I will make you fishers of men.

Yeah.

And it's the God will do the work. God will make you. It's not, yeah, it's not a

striving, it's a surrender. And I, I love that, and I thought it was such an

important point because we can think, oh, I'm, you know, I so often hear people

say, and we hear it a lot in Crowd Church, don't we, like, oh, I don't know if

I'm ready to become a Christian yet, I'm not good enough, or I don't know if I

can do it. And it's like, it's not you doing it. Yeah, it's God doing it in you.

And that's the thing, like, we're never ready, aren't we?

Absolutely.

You know, we've all being Christians around the table for a long, long time.

Yeah.

And we're still not good enough, and we're still not ready in many ways, but God

takes us anyway, and he, he makes us, and he transforms us, and he does it. And

it's so—

it's not—

it's that surrender posture, not striving and effort and self-effort.

And it's important.

Yeah.

You find that the longer you're walking in your Christian faith, the more

reliant on God's grace you become. It's an interesting question because I think

you go one of two ways, don't you? Maybe every day it's different. Yeah. Um, one

day you're kind of like, yeah, I really know, I'm, you know, it's God's grace,

God's making me, God's doing it in me. But the next day it's like, right, let's

go! I mean, it's all about sort of self—

yeah, I know what the right answer is.

Challenge accepted.

Give us both.

I feel like, um, I feel like I am a natural lead. Like, I'm quite a doer. My

natural lean is into self-effort and striving, and like, I can make stuff

happen. I'm capable, I've got competencies, I lean into them. Yeah, I'll make

this happen. Yeah. Um, but I think when I don't lean on God, I'm— I think what's

happened over time is I've become much quicker at recognizing when I'm not.

Yeah, when I'm not depending on God. Like, I used to let it not realized for a

long time. And now I think the length of time, yeah, is shorter, and I think

that's great. Yeah, yeah.

And God knows, yeah, doesn't he? You know, I mean, you're a very resourceful

lady, and I think it's as we learn to be in— I love that word, love the word

posture— in a place where we are daily, um, just position ourselves where our

gifts and our talents are surrendered for him to use in whatever way he wants

to. And, um, and I think it's learning. I said, we've been Christians a while,

and I think we would all say, you know what it is to be busy, you know, and to

try harder. All you get is tired.

Yeah.

You know, that doesn't mean that you don't engage, please hear me, you know,

because God wants to use us in the right sense. He doesn't want to misuse us.

And Like when Anne was telling, um, doing a story about that, you know, she

said, um, in a process that she was reading, you know, and that she was reading

around the Alpha Course, but she was also reading scripture. Yeah. And, you

know, somebody said to me, um, numerous times in the last couple of years, um,

I've got some people say, what, how, you know, what, you know, what do we do?

And, um, and I said to them this, and I don't think it's I don't think this is

mine. I probably stole this from somebody else, but I believe it's true. And

that is, I'd say stay in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, the Gospels, for 2

years. Just read them and you'll get to know the character of Jesus. And that's

the character he's trying to work into you and I.

Yeah.

And the attitudes that go with that, you know, that takes great discipline.

And we get disciple and discipline But it's interesting again, because coming

back to this concept of grace, isn't it, that, you know, God makes me a

fisherman and man, but at the same time there needs to be discipline. And it's

not like I can just— it doesn't just come down and go, you know, easy whizzy,

let's get busy. It's like there has— there's this partnership, isn't there?

Yeah. Where it's, it's not, um, laziness on my part, but it's not self-effort.

And that's a real interesting tightrope to walk.

But I loved what Dave said about, um, that, that with the disciples, it was

walking and talking and eating and breaking bread with Jesus day by day by day.

Totally.

And that is what was transformational. And I think it's the same for us.

Yes.

Like, we, we walk with God, we talk to God, we break bread with God, we read the

Bible. We do, we do these practices not out of obligation or because anyone says

we have to.

Yeah.

But because it's just part of that walking with Jesus day by day. And, you know,

I love what you said about how it's like walking with him that was

transformational. It wasn't, you know, there's something about it that's like

that day by day. Yeah, kind of seeing how he does it, watching how he does it.

And there's that, there's that verse, isn't there, about like learning and force

rhythms of grace? I can't remember where it's from now, but—

Oh, that's about Message translation.

Yeah, it is. But it talks about like like, look, watch me, learn from me, see

how I do it, and you'll learn the unforced rhythms of grace. And I think, yeah,

that, that is one of my favorite verses really, because I think you could spend

your whole life, yeah, like, just learning more of that, like, watching how

Jesus does it, learning from him, and learning those unforced rhythms of grace,

which are the antidote to striving and self-effort and trying to do it for

yourself.

And he never kicked anybody else for failing. No, you know, for me it wasn't. He

saw them as they were. And I know somebody's probably thinking, oh, you know,

I'm sure that's not right. It is right, because, you know, grace— there's

sufficient grace for us to fail. Yeah. And he still loves us in our following.

You know, when he said something about being fishers of men, just harken back to

that a little bit. You know, he spoke to him about something dang new. He's a

carpenter, so he ain't going to teach them a whole lot about being fishermen,

you know. So when he's talking to them about fishing, they're like, we're

talking about hard work here, we're talking about toil and sweat, and then we're

talking about the fellowship.

We—

yeah, of going out together even when we don't want to. Yeah, and toiling

together and seeing us on our best days, on our worst days. And that's why, you

know, Family is important, you know, church family, you know, that is part of

the discipleship model as well, that we, we are not in competition with each

other. So true, you know, that we walk together and we celebrate. Because those

first people Jesus called, I'm like, man, I would have loved to have been there

to see how they worked that out. Yeah, they work out several times. You said

grace, it's unmerited, you know, it can't be earned, it's just there for us to

draw on.

Yeah, that's so true.

I just found that— I just found that verse because I love it. So, um, it's like,

are you tired? Yeah. Worn out? Burnt out on religion? Come to me, get away with

me, and you'll recover your life. I'll show you how to take rest. Walk with me

and work with me. Watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I

won't lay anything heavy or unfitting on you. Keep company with me and you'll

learn to live freely and lightly.

Yeah. Where's that? And That's—

oh, I've just closed it.

Sorry.

It's on a phone.

It's in a message.

On my phone, yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

No, it's the message version, but it's Matthew 11.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I'm sure somebody else needs to hear that again. Can you say it again?

Matthew 11:28-30 is, "Are you tired, worn out, burnt out on religion? Come to

Matthew 11:28–30

me, get away with me, and you'll recover your life. I'll show you how to take a

real rest. Walk with me and work with me." Watch how I do it. Learn the enforced

rhythms of grace. I won't lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company

with me and you'll learn to live free and light.

Why would we not wanna walk with him? Why would we not? Why would we not, hey?

Yeah, yeah.

That's it.

Hear that.

That is just wonderful. Wonderful.

But I think it's important to understand, again, going back to the point you

mentioned earlier, my yoke is easy. That means you have to take the yoke still.

Yeah.

Right?

My burden is light, but there is a burden. Yeah, absolutely. This is not like

problem-free life. There's a fight, there's a, you know, you can't let things

rob you, um, of those things. Like a yoke, we don't use this language anymore,

but that's what you pull around a cattle as it walks down the field and pulls it

out, right? That's what it is. And so we've got a, you know, there's some

tension there, there's some resistance that we have to push against.

But it's only a rope if you start pulling in the wrong direction. Walk against

it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You know, pull against it. You know, pull against the older, wiser, bigger ox.

I just think it's such good, good imagery. You know, this sort of my yoke is

easy, my burden is light.

Yeah.

It's just such a good imagery of the call of God, isn't it?

It's true.

Yes, we're gonna walk. Yes, we're gonna plow. Yes, there's gonna be some

resistance, but try a different way, you've still got resistance, you've still

got a problem. And guess what? That's going to be a lot harder. Yeah, right. And

so, and I think the amount of times I hear people— I think I've heard you say,

and actually, you know, some of the stuff that you guys have gone through, or

going through that without God.

Yeah. Yeah, it'll be harder than with God. Yeah, exactly. And I think you can

say that about most difficult things in life. Like, yeah, life, life can be

really hard and really unfair at times. But it's rare that it's going to be any

easier without God. Like, I can't think of an example in my life where I think,

'If only I'd gone through that without God, it would have been so much easier.'

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Not one.

One of the interesting things, coming back to this then, is with the disciples.

So they drop their nets, they become fishers of men, but when they are unsure

about Jesus You know, he's been arrested, he's been crucified, when the whole

world has gone into meltdown. That's what they return back to, and that's what

intrigues me. And in fact, um, that's what he knew they were.

Yeah, yeah, sorry, it is, it is, it is. That's what he knew they would go back

to, the old— yeah, source.

Yeah, there is that temp— there is that pull, isn't there? I think when, when

life is not clear, when you're not really understanding what's going on, there's

that pull to go back to how things were, um, especially, you know, if you, if

you weren't always a Christian, to be pulled back into— like, for me, I suppose,

for example, I've, I pulled back into maybe the way that I would talk, the way

that I would think, the way that I would react to things. There is that

temptation to go back to saying— you have to remind yourself, that's what I let

go of.

Yes.

Yeah, I think the, you know, you, you bring that point up, it's really

interesting because, like, Jesus, like, yeah, he knows where they're going to go

back to.

Mm-hmm.

You know, but they had to come, what Jesus said happened, and they had to come

back to what Jesus has said. The plan wasn't changing, and it was good for them,

but they were dealing with very human things, a sense of loss, that they thought

they'd lost the one they loved so much, the one they'd given everything up for.

And this is where the grace again comes in. So he doesn't come with a rebuke,

you know, comes back to them and loves on them and says, okay, we're going back

again. Yeah, you know.

Yeah. And I also loved, um, what you said, Dave, about, um, how they all had

their parts to play. So like, it's interesting, isn't it, that Jesus calls 12,

12 blokes, not just like 1 or 2 or 3. He didn't need 12, but it's like, it's

almost like right from the start it's baked in there.

Yeah, yeah.

That this, this walking with Jesus is not a solo sport. You do it in group and

in relationship with others, and that like one of you might be good at one thing

and, you know, someone else around the table, metaphorically speaking or

physically, yeah, yeah, yeah, you know, it's going to be good at something else.

And it's like you all bring your different bits and you don't have to have it

all perfect or be good at everything. You just bring, you bring what you've got

to that community. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I think it's, um, I think sometimes we think everything's got to be perfect and

God isn't in it if there's any um, difficulty, any measure of difficulty. Well,

you know, God can't be in this thing. Like, this is, this is our learning

moment. This is our trust moment, you know. And, um, I think we use the word

disciple so much, and yet we think if we're going to be a disciple, certain

discipleship things are required.

Yeah.

And that is, you know, a trust in God, a trust in God's word. When all these

different things are happening in our lives— but not to live in the now. We

don't need to live in the now. We just need to submit them to Christ. And they

are horrendous. We've all been through horrendous things, very different things.

And like, you know, when I was nursing, you know, part of my job was to talk to

families and say like, you know, your baby isn't gonna make this. And I don't

know, I've said it far too many times. And, you know, and end-of-life care for

children. —and I'm like, you know, I felt it was a privilege to be able, you

know, to be there. I felt God had put me there. And I'm like, I don't know how

you walk through—

That. Yeah.

—loss and grief without Christ. I know lots of people do, hear me. You know, I'm

just saying, for me, I don't know how people do, because he's there. And he's

left us the Holy Spirit, whose name—one of his names is the Comforter. Yeah, and

we, you know, so I, I don't— I really don't know how people get by. I'm just

feeling so thankful that we have Christ with us.

Yeah, totally, totally. And I think just to sort of square the circle or circle

the square, whatever the phrase is, um, to bring that full round, I think what

are the talents that you have that God's calling you to use on his behalf?

What's the language that God's using I love in the comments, Alicia put that

Jesus is a carpenter. He's used to taking big clumps of wood and turning them

into something quite useful.

I love your comments. Your comments are absolutely fantastic.

So true.

I love them.

It's true.

Yeah, I'm a big clump of wood. Anyway, it was interesting, again, going back to

the story. They were fishermen. They returned to fishing when they didn't

understand things. But the redemption in that story is Jesus barbecued fish with

them on the beach. And I'm like, I would love to have some of that fish, right?

One day.

I'm happy to be on the beach. I'll be on the beach with you, Jesus.

Let me just also give a shout out. So I'm just going through the comments here.

I'm sorry if I butcher your name, Bukirwa from, where did you say you were from?

From Uganda. Uh, so welcome to the live stream, man. Good to have you. Good to

be here. Um, and yeah, he's put in the comments, Matthew 11:28 is indeed the

Matthew 11:28

verse, so comforting. She— sorry, she— uh, thank you for correcting me, Daniel.

Uh, that is the verse, so comforting.

Yeah.

Um, and so yeah, some great comments tonight. Um, Alice put in the comments, uh,

she's thinking of Elisha immediately stopping what he was doing, offering a

sacrifice and saying goodbye to his family to follow Elijah. Yeah, it's really—

that's another great story. It is. If you're not familiar with it, it's

definitely in the— go check it out in the Old Testament about what happens when

Elijah calls Elisha to walk with him in this sort of discipleship, uh, culture

type thing. Um, but yeah, great conversation. Thank you so much for your

comments. Thanks, guys. Love that. Time has just flown by.

It has?

It just felt like we started and now we're finishing. So thank you for joining

us. We are gonna go over to Live Lounge. If you don't know what Live Lounge is,

this is where we go onto Google Meet. So if you're online and you want to come

and chat with us, Dave will be in there, I'll be in there, Anna will be in

there. Come chat with us in the Google Meet. The link is in the comments,

Daniel, is it not? It is. He's giving me a thumbs up. Obviously, God wants to

talk to me. Just get on with it. So yeah, just follow that link,

go.crowd.church/meet. And you can come say how's it to us. We'll only be in

there like 5 or 10 minutes. It's not a big long thing. But it's just always nice

to meet people after the service. Next week. I think it's me. It's me, isn't it?

Speaking next week and baby, you're hosting, right? And Will's hosting. So

talking about what it means to be the salt of the earth. So, uh, yeah, when I

figured that out, I'll let you know. Um, so we're going to be talking about that

next week. Um, but yeah, anything else, uh, from you guys in closing? I'll start

with you.

Um, no, I just want to give another plug to the Alpha Course. So, you know, if

anything that we've said tonight connects, you know, go check it out. There's,

you know, we do them through Crowd Church, or if you can't wait for that one,

there's hundreds of other ones across the country.

Yeah.

Both in local churches and online, or just grab the book like I did. Just start

digging deeper.

Yep, and if you want to know more about that, go to crowd.church/alpha. You'll

find a whole bunch of stuff there. So yeah, that's there. Anything else from

you, G?

If you don't know Jesus today, if you haven't come to a place where you've never

surrendered your life to him, forget the terminology. You know whether you have

or not. I want to ask you this question. What is it that hinders you from being

able to say, Jesus, if you're real, reveal yourself to me in whatever way—

you're God, you can do anything— reveal yourself to me. And just open up your

heart and your mind.

Yep.

And he will speak, because the invitation today to you is as real as what it was

to those disciples.

Yeah. Very good. Come follow me. It's a worthwhile thing to do. It really is.

Yeah.

And my plea will be, give it as much gusto as you can when you follow him. Don't

be that complaining kid in the back.

Hmm.

Right? Don't be that person. Follow him with everything you've got, because it's

very much a worthwhile journey.

Yes.

And a great calling. So yeah, hopefully you got something out of this tonight as

well. If you're a Christ follower already, just like God, What is it you want me

to do? Where do you want me to go? What's the plan? Who are the fishes of men

that you want me to think about here? What talents has he given you that you

could use for the kingdom of God? All those kind of things, always good to think

about. Maybe there's a course correction. Maybe you are on the course already

and God's just going to reaffirm that to you. Whatever it is, it's always good

to know you're in the will of God doing what God wants you to do. Um, and so I

encourage you to spend that time. But thank you so much for joining us this

week. We will see you next week. If we don't see you Live Lounge, which we're

going to in about 30 seconds' time. Um, we will see you next week. But that's it

from Anna, that's it from Dave, and from myself. Thank you so much for joining

us. Have a phenomenal week wherever you are in the world. God bless you. We'll

see you next time. Bye for now. Bye.