MID WEEK MOTIVATION - March 4, 2026 (Guest: Dustin Tutor)

You're listening to the Midweek Motivation Podcast from DeSoto Hills Baptist Church is David.

Here's your host, Mark Lewis, David Burgess, Laura Lord, and After Grant Eagle.

Hey, welcome to the Midweek Motivation Podcast for March the 4th here at DeSoto Hills Baptist Church.

I'm Mark Lewis.

We hope this programming can encourage folks throughout DeSoto County and beyond.

Be sure to subscribe and share our link on social media.

Today I'm in the studio with special guest, Dustin Tudor.

Now you're gonna have to talk right in the mic.

Oh, I got it.

I got it.

All right.

Now uh you are the BSU director right down the road at Northwest, but I'm curious about your story, like specifically the arc of your ministry, where you started, because this isn't the and and everywhere you served, because this isn't the first time you've been in the Cenatobia area.

No, it's not.

So uh I surrendered to ministry at 19 and I took my first church at 19.

I would also like to say I would not encourage that.

Uh what church was it?

Liverbend Baptist Church in Aberdeen, Mississippi.

Uh I'll never forget.

I went into the interview and Dr.

Roy McHenry um was the pastor there.

And uh he said, uh, you know, we'd really like for you to come and serve.

And I was like, look, I've never done this.

This is gonna be really bad.

And he said, Well, they've never had a youth minister, so they're not gonna know the difference.

And uh where were you living?

Where was your Ponitok?

Okay, so that wasn't far.

No driving.

I was I was uh I was at ICC, so I was in Fulton as a student, and so it was about a 45-minute drive from there, and I enjoyed it.

They had a lot of grace because it was real bad.

Um and and I did that for uh a bit, like less than a year.

And then uh my dream had always been to work at GBA.

Um like I was gonna go work at GBA.

I I went there from seventh grade through twelfth grade.

So your church had always gone to GBA.

Every summer.

And uh I got saved there in 2001 and I was gonna work there.

You know, I I knew that.

And so for listeners who don't know, that's Gulf Shore Baptist Assembly, which the state of Mississippi, the Baptist building, owned a retreat center right on the Gulf.

Right on the beach.

Gulf Port.

32 acres, 32 acres on the beach in in Pass Christian, Mississippi.

Which is sadly no longer there.

It it's well, uh a red while ago.

It is still in the process of trying to get it sold.

The uh people of Henderson Point and Pass Christian are fighting the sale.

So we'll see.

We still own it at the moment.

Um the Baptists do.

They're trying to get rid of it.

But uh but I think anyway, you wanted to go.

I was gonna be a part of GBA.

And I ended up staying there the next three years.

I lived I lived on campus, I stayed year-round.

I was the last staffer ever to leave August 28th before Katrina hit.

I was the last person to ever leave that worked there.

Really?

Yeah.

So you drove off last.

I drove off last.

Um did you have a feeling that uh something was gonna happen?

I was a really stupid college kid, and so I didn't even know a hurricane was coming.

I that Saturday, Mr.

S.

Frank Simmons, who ran it, pulled up and I was on the tractor mowing.

And uh he's like, son, what are we doing?

And uh same thing I do every weekend, you know, it's mowing the yard and he said, We've got a hurricane coming, we gotta move some uh pianos, and so I spent the rest of the day moving pianos, which turned out to be very pointless.

Um a lot of pointless work there.

Um moved him up to the third floor, and I think the water set four foot on the third floor for like six hours.

Really?

Yeah.

So it got that high because GBA's third floor was high.

Oh, it was high, twenty-four feet.

Um and and so it set, like I said, four feet on the you could see the line.

We went back a year to the day, and um the third floor still intact, like everything still looked exact the way it always did.

And I still had closing hanging in my closet um in the in the infirmary, and that's where I stayed, me and a guy named Wood Woodhead, Josh Eaton.

Um but yeah, we went back and you could see the water line where it it it set um on the concrete about four feet high.

And so yeah, I I left uh left the twelve, but I had no clue what was coming.

I mean you could see it, it was weird.

I uh if people weren't down there, you could look out and you could see Katrina coming.

Um and it was massive and big and scary.

So where did you go?

Uh I can't so Where did you drive that night?

I drove just to get off topic.

I drove to my house in Hattiesburg because I was going to Wim Carey.

Um so I drove to my house in Hattiesburg and I stayed.

And Hattiesburg was bad.

People were leaving Hattiesburg.

Well, I stayed one night and then drove to Oxford.

Um I was dating a girl in Oxford, so I drove to Oxford and I went to I had some buddies from GBA that lived in Oxford went on Miss and I drove to their house and didn't know how bad it was until like just several weeks later, really.

I went back to my house in Hattiesburg because I was supposed to start school.

Um, you know, I'm supposed to go to William Carrey.

And uh I get down there and we've got a tree through our house, you know.

And I'm like, well, this is not gonna work.

And uh then I was like, well, I'll go down to to GBA and we got calls like there's nothing that can like get you ready for what that really looked like.

Um but they were like, hey guys, it's like a bomb went off.

You can't tell where anything at, like you can't get down here, and they weren't letting anybody down at that point.

And so uh I just drove back.

I I became a what they called a displaced student in 2005, and uh I went to Ole Miss for one semester, and then I got the the inkling of like, hey, I'll go uh get me a landscaping degree because that's basically what I was doing at GBA, and now my plan was to be there.

Like I I was making for you know me at that time great money, and I was like, I'll just go back and work full-time at GBA and landscape and little did you know.

Yep.

So I got a landscape architect degree, and I got called Is that Mississippi State?

Because that's where the everybody goes for that.

Northeast.

Okay, so Northeast had a program.

Yep, Northeast had a program.

I guess they still they were the only junior college that had a program.

They were the only junior college that had a program.

And so I went and I studied that, and uh, I can tell you where to put your shrubs at and how far away from your house and away from each other.

But then I got a call saying, hey, you you you will not be coming back to work.

Um there is no more GBA, it is not gonna be a thing.

And uh heartbreaking.

It was because that was if you've been there three years pretty much full time, that's my man.

It was my baby.

I loved it.

Um I still love it.

I love getting around people who work there and talking about it.

And um, but it was great.

Love love my time there.

I went back to William Carey though, um, and I went to Carterville, and and so I served at Carterville Baptist Church in Peddle.

Great church, by the way.

Great church, great church.

I I have been blessed as far as the churches I've served at and the men I served under um because I had Ben Skipper as a boss and great dude.

And uh I served there with uh guy named Chase Coleman and uh Jeremy Strowe.

Oh yeah.

We were all interns, and Ben was the student pastor.

And um when I left Carterville, I'd I'd actually finished up and um I moved back to North Mississippi to uh Smithville Baptist Church and I served there.

Different worlds, by the way.

Oh, yeah.

South Mississippi and the Hattiesburg area is like a different planet from North Mississippi.

It's a different state.

I always tell people there are three states in Mississippi, we just get them really confused.

There's Hattersburg Hattiesburg Down.

I mean, you can't guess four, like, because once you get to ITN down, you got Coasties.

Um Hattersburg Down, the Fine Belt's very different, the Delta's very different, and then everything else is North Mississippi.

Right.

Everything else is kind of the the same.

But um I went to Smithville and uh I served under a guy named Lee Gardner there and really a great pastor, great church, enjoyed it.

Left there.

Um I served at Longview and Pontiac and uh that I didn't realize that.

I did.

I served at Longview Baptist and Pontiac and How long was that?

Uh two and a half years I was there.

And um then I did five and a half years at ICC as the associate B issue director.

Um part of that time I was also the uh student pastor at First Baptist Oklahoma, and that's when I got married.

Uh married my wife Beth, and uh we came here.

We left Oklahoma, we came to First Baptist Cenatobia.

Um how did that happen?

So the guy who was pastor at First Cenatobia at the time was a guy named Chris Williams.

Um he's the pastor at North Oxford Baptist Church now.

I served as an intern at North Oxford under Johnny Flint and Fish Robinson.

And um Chris had surrendered to ministry at North Oxford during that time, and so we knew each other.

He had also moved to Texas to go to seminary at Southwestern, and he ended up on staff with my sister-in-law and at the same church, so I kept seeing him every time I'd go visit my brother.

Right.

Well, when he came back, um they, like a lot of churches, having a hard time finding a student pastor, and my wife and I knew we wanted to move.

We knew we needed to move.

Um, one of one of those just hey, it's it's time.

It's time.

The Lord has has has freed us.

Let's go.

Sure.

Um, and he called and was like, look, I need somebody who's done student ministry for a while.

And I don't because he had never, I mean, the only thing he'd ever did was a first impressions ministry before he was the pastor of first Cyptobian.

So he's like, I don't know what I'm doing.

Just give me somebody who and and he knew me.

Uh he trusted me.

That's that's a key.

Because if you're gonna turn a ministry over to somebody, you better trust that person.

Right.

And um, and so we went in and and to this day, still probably the most fruitful ministry we had.

That that student ministry blew up.

Um, which and it was great.

It was a lot of fun, uh, a good time.

I love that church.

I'm a member of that church today.

Like I love that church.

Um, and then we left there to pastor a church in Tupelo.

Um now, like some ministries, that didn't go great.

Um, it was very good as far as we grew.

The church tripled in size, we baptized 15 people.

Uh they loved every second of that, and and by that I mean they did not.

And so we uh we uh got a phone call.

I I basically got to a point where I told my wife, I said, I can dig ditches and tell people about Jesus.

I don't have to do this.

And um, we were about to just resign and be done.

And um, my best friend's a guy named Josh Dunn.

He's a pastor at First Baptist Richton, and uh he was just going there, and they had told him he could hire whoever he wanted to, um, whoever you want, that just get you a student ministry.

And he called me and said, Hey, would you go back into student ministry?

And I really didn't have the plan to go back into student ministry.

I I like preaching, I like being in the pulpit.

And but I said, Let me talk to my wife, because it you get to work with your best friend.

You know, that's that's a dream for anybody.

Like I get to be on staff with friends and so it doesn't feel like work.

It doesn't, it's different, it just doesn't.

It's a joy to get up every day.

Right.

And um, and so and I had some of that in Tupelo because I hired one of my best friends to be my associate pastor, the guy who married my wife and I.

Um, and uh we loved it.

Man, we shared an office.

You know, my he we didn't have an extra office, tiny little church, so I just like put your desk in here, and we'll we sat across from each other for every day for two and a half years talking.

It was great.

Um, and so Beth was like, Yeah, let's go.

We know we're gonna move to Richton.

She's like, Where's that?

You know, I don't have a clue where that's at.

And I'm like, well, it's like right outside of pedal, which is right outside of Hattiesburg.

Yeah.

Um and so back down south.

Back down south we go.

And I like that didn't bother me.

I genuinely do love South Mississippi, the coast, many of that area.

Like, I really don't I enjoy it.

For listeners who don't know, you don't even need a jacket.

You won't you won't have a coat down there.

And and and for those, I mean, I'm sure this isn't film, so like I'm a big dude.

My thing is food.

Like I like food, and I'm not sure there's a better place in the world to get food than South Mississippi.

Lots of great food.

Lots of food.

It's got that New Orleans vibe, and then but it's good.

There's some really great places to eat and just a cool place to be.

And I was like, Yeah, let's go.

We'll do it.

And then like a week later, he called me and said, Hey, uh, my dad's youth ministry resigned, and he wants to hire you.

And I was like, Well, I'm I've already told you I'd go with you.

I'm not gonna, you know, I'm not backing out.

And he's like, Listen, you need to heal, you need to go somewhere that's gonna love you.

And he said, Well, I know I love you.

I don't know what this church is gonna be like because I haven't searched, but I do know what Bayusera is gonna be like, and they're phenomenal, they're gonna love you, they're gonna love your kids.

And so for the last six and a half years, that's where we've been.

Um we went to Bayusera in Sarah Land, Alabama.

Easily the best church I've ever been in.

Um, best, best pastor people, and um loved me in a way that I hadn't been loved before in a church, and and and so we spent six and a half years there as the family pastor, and we watched that church grow from 225 to about 450, and really, really good time, really like phenomenal time of ministry and got to preach, got to do college ministry, got to do youth.

I was the children's minister.

Um, like they called me family pastor.

Some fantastic people down in Sarlin.

And and I and I feel like the University of Mobile is part of the reason for that.

Like there's it's there's so many just really, really sharp people that live around that area.

Well, we had been a year before that, we went for Joshua's ordination at Bayu Sarah.

Uh-huh.

And I told my wife then, and again, no inkling what was going to happen or we were going to go.

And but we went for that ordination, and I told her, I said, if I had the opportunity, I'd serve at this church.

I was like, these people are and I didn't know that wasn't just the church.

Right.

That is Sarah Land and Satsuma and that area.

They're really good people.

Um and so when we got there, I found out quick, like through the school system and playing ball and our kids and everything.

I was like, oh, oh, it's it's just the area.

Like these people are pretty very family oriented.

It is.

Um and to to that point, I had sixty kids in the student ministry, and hardly any of them came from broken homes.

Any of them came right, you know, their their parents it was just different.

It's a different culture for sure.

It very much is.

And and so we enjoyed it, we loved it.

But our parents are older.

Um and and and you know, we kept getting So she's from this area too.

She's from Oklahoma.

Okay.

So I'm from Pontock, she's from Oklahoma, her parents live in Oklahoma, my parents live in Pontiac, um, Allegoma.

Oh, yeah.

And so we uh we were just like, look, we don't want to leave the church, but we do know we need to go home.

And when I surrendered ministry at 19, I surrendered with the hope.

We'll call it a hope because I also understood getting a job at a Baptist Student Union is incredibly difficult.

Um near impossible.

It is it seems it is very hard to get the job.

Um and so And tell me t read read all of us into that a little bit.

There are just a lot of first of all, there's a lot of requirements.

There's a lot of requirements, there's a lot of steps.

Um, and there's not a lot of jobs.

And we are the last state, and this is a praise to the people of Mississippi Baptist churches, but we're the last state that's fully funded for BSU.

Um, if you go anywhere else, you're gonna have to help raise your own support to pay yourself.

Um Does that include Alabama?

Alabama is as is unwell.

They they they might have a couple, like I think the Tuscaloosa Baptist Association helps cover the Tuscala like the Alabama guy.

Um I know that the Mobile Baptist Association helps cover the guy at USA, but a lot of them do have to help help.

They and and no knock on that.

But like Mississippi cares about college ministry and and so those guys don't give those jobs up.

Um I I I went to my first BSU directors meeting in May of last year in New Orleans for for the state, and there were eight guys there over 30 years in.

Oh.

Which means they're all 50, 60, yeah, 70.

Yeah.

Like they're they're and we're starting to say like some of those guys are retired.

Michael Ball just retired.

Um, but you know, they already announced they they had his replacement ready.

Right.

You know, he was on staff, and and and that's the other part.

There are guys that line up, they want it.

And and I don't blame them.

Again, it is a really one, you're working for the Mississippi Abs Convention Board, and that may not always have been a great thing or whatever, but Sean Parker has made it somewhere you want to be.

Right.

Um, he is great, and he has a great vision for our our convention, and you can get behind him.

But that's that's you know, that's the boss.

That's the guy who's over everybody.

And then um the guy who over collegiate ministries is Sam Ivey, and uh Sam's great.

He's wonderful.

U also just a side note, I was his associate bishop director at ICC.

And so the the process went something like I got a phone call from a buddy of mine knew we wanted to come north and said, Hey, Northeast is open.

Would you be interested?

And I'm like, Yeah, it's one of the you know, 14 colleges I went to in Mississippi.

And I know some people up there, well, you know, and uh and so I put in and uh Sam called me and he's like, Look, toot, everybody calls me toot or whatever, but he's like, Look, toot.

We pretty much know who we're, you know, we went through the process and we'd already he said, I wish I'd known, we'd have talked to you for sure.

Um and he interviewed me then like for a job that he knew I wasn't gonna get, and we talked and had it and we had a great conversation.

He said, I'm gonna keep you in mind, you know, there there's gonna be some others or whatever.

And not too long after that, uh Northwest came open.

Northwest, the if there were two natural fits for me, it was ICC or Northwest.

Um I'm from Pontac, I went to ICC.

Um I know everybody.

I served at Cenatobia, you know, I know everybody in town.

Um and so he said, Would you be interested?

Well, yeah, you know, absolutely would be interesting going to Sanatobia.

And so you go through it's like five or six steps that you have to go through, and they're not quick.

Um I mean, we are Baptist.

We are not quick in moving, and that's no different at the convention.

Um and so you take uh your first one is just a phone interview, your second one is I went to I drove to Southern from Mobile, um, went to the BSU there, met with um Sam and a guy named Paul Pence, who's the HR guy for the the convention.

Um really like that guy.

Um again, another one of those guys that real high up, but but just a fantastic human being and lover of Jesus.

And you go through that and you go to what they call Teams interviews, and it's basically just use the Microsoft Teams to interview with uh Barry Shirley and Paul Penson and and John Martin and You've got to get a lot of yeses.

You gotta get a lot of yeses.

Um and and to me, that says once you get to that point, like hey, if if everybody's on board, then this is probably what you need to be doing.

Right.

Um you go from that to Sean Parker, and you get a Sean Parker yes, and then you have to go to the executive committee, which is like 16 men.

Um and you get to stand in front of them and and do the whole thing.

Um and I will say as and it took months.

It wasn't like, hey, we talked to them and we can tell our church like we're gonna be moving in this direction.

Um I think between the first and second interview was like four months.

Um and so it was just a while.

And uh but man, I enjoyed it.

Like I enjoyed getting to know those guys.

Um I had worked like I worked for GBA and then after GBA was destroyed, I'd work with uh Harvey Ellis and Hugh Debon doing the camps afterwards and like so I got to work with the convention and but not like this, not getting to meet the people that you know I I know Rob Futral.

I know um Jim, you know Rob's the son, what's Jim.

Jim.

I met him, you know, he signed my checks, but I didn't know him.

Right.

You know, I I but I got to meet and talk to and and be around these guys, and I found out like Mississippi's in pretty good hands.

Like we have we have a good good convention.

A thousand percent.

Yeah.

And uh and so do they take care of you, they love on you, they they they they get you set up and get you ready to go.

Um we had to move a long way.

It's not the easiest thing.

You know, I got three kids.

I got an eleven-year-old, eight-year-old, and a five-year-old, and we took them from what they knew.

And their friends.

And their friends, and 'cause at that age they had started to make deep relationships with some of those.

Very much so.

Special specifically my old one.

My oldest one was very ingrained in his school and and again, different culture.

Oh my goodness.

Different culture to go from there.

We talked about the three states south or in the state of Mississippi.

Sarilin's a fifth.

Like it's uh totally different from all of those.

It in fact, Sarlin, I would say it feels like uh because I've been in I've done lots of camps and and worked in Saralin for a long, long time now with the state of Alabama.

Feels like stepping into the 1980s, no lie.

It is.

It is it felt like the living in the 80s too.

Well, it's the it's one of the top five school districts in the state.

Um and then you've got and and Sarlin and Satsuma butt up.

They don't like they're right on top of each other.

There's no like if you drive down 43 from one to the other, you don't know where they end.

Satsuma's the safest town in in Alabama, right?

And so like you're in a really great place.

And I'm not saying San Tobia is not, but it's not that.

Right.

And and so we knew like, hey, this is gonna be different.

It's just gonna be different.

We're fine.

Like me and my wife have lived here.

My son was born here, but that was it.

He was born here, and then we moved when he was, you know, a year old.

And so coming back, that was that was the the hardest part of it.

Not the job.

The BSU working, I go into the past the the process.

The job itself is loving and discipling college students, and that's a different world.

If people don't understand that, it's the only ministry I know where they absolutely want to be there.

They show up every week wanting to learn and they're hungry, they're full of life, they're full of path, they want to serve.

What can we do?

Um and that's real different than everything else I've known where you're begging people to be involved and begging people to be and you're recruiting constantly and you're at the schools begging kids to show up, and this is not that.

Um and so it's been it's been really nice.

And and and I serve at Northwest where it's really open.

Um our our president, and I'm first name basis, I go to his office all the time.

He's great.

Um one of the nicest guys I've ever met in my entire life.

He's fantastic, and he's made it very clear he wants us on campus, he wants us involved, he wants us at events, he wants us whatever he can do to make that accessible, and and so I know guys that are on campuses where you know they don't they don't get to talk to those guys and they don't get to spend time with them and they don't get involved in anything, but uh I get to, and and so it's been really really good.

Um we have grown a lot, our BSU.

We we we averaged 2530 last year, we'll we'll hit 90.

Well the college is growing.

I have set foot on five junior colleges in the state of Mississippi.

None of them come close to Northwest.

It is the closest thing to a university of any of the junior colleges that I have been to.

They did, I got there in June.

They did$25 million worth of renovations and upgrades in June.

And Dr.

Heinle's not done.

He is He is Ford, Ford, Ford.

He's got he's probably got I would say five or six more phases in mind already.

Oh yeah.

And it looks man, it looks good.

Oh.

It looks good.

Everywhere you look, everything looks good.

And they're man, they're and I don't want to knock any of the other junior colleges, but I attended most of those other junior colleges.

They're very tired buildings and old and they don't have a whole lot of funding to really do much other than maybe fix one every two years or something.

And so it's a lot of them look like they're crumbling, and Northwest looks shiny.

Boy.

It's uh so I got two, I got a niece and nephew both graduating this year, and I'm I'm trying their my best.

Like, yeah, I should probably give them you need to give Northwest a look.

Like it's and it's it's it's an My wife works on campus, she does the academic advisor.

Like we're we're very ingrained in that school now, but it's a really nice place.

What have you loved the most that maybe you didn't even think about as far as coming into college ministry?

Probably the connection with collegiate staff, like getting involved.

I didn't realize how hungry the people that worked on that campus were for ministries to come in and get involved.

Like I was at ICC for five and a half years.

I didn't spend a lot, I never there were a couple of professors that might would show up.

I have met literally almost every dean, um, you know, president, vice president.

It didn't matter.

They have loved on us.

They have I was sitting there one day, there's a guy on campus at at Northwest names Andrew Dale.

Um he's six foot eight, giant of a man.

Oh yeah.

He's did you you know Andrew?

Oh yeah, he was uh I went through school with him.

Yeah, William Carey.

Yeah, he went to William Carey, and so that's that's where I'm getting at.

He come, put a big old bear hug on me.

You know, I'm in his pit because he's a giant.

Yeah.

And uh he said, Man, I'm so thankful that you're here and you're you're involved and you're active.

He said, I love to be a shoe.

He said, I went to William Carey.

I was like, me too, man, you know, and and you know, he said, love to be a shoe, very important to me, and it's very important that we see it active on campus.

And so just that kind of stuff, Dr.

Rush, who who's basically over all the activities and uh student life, that kind of stuff, Michaela, that that's over, they have been hey, whatever you want to do, man.

We want you, we want you here, we want you involved.

And I came from a place where that would just like it just wasn't the case.

Like we could do some things, but it was limited, you know.

Right.

And here they were like, that means I got a handle center over there.

And he's like, Look, if you need to use the handle center for something, it's yours.

Like, yeah, whatever we can do.

It's just no small thing.

No, not at all.

I wanted to do a car show.

Like, and and he was like, Look, have the Coliseum, have the facilities, you need a sound booth, we're gonna put out tents for it.

And I'm like, Yeah, thanks.

I just needed the concrete.

But but yeah, you know, they're they're very excited about the ministry of and they promote it.

So when students come for visits and stuff, they send their delegation to the BSU.

They want them to meet me, they want them, and so again, just that part of being so open and so welcoming and and allowing us to be, we're not a just as a campus ministry, we're part of the campus.

Like we're we're part of the culture of that campus.

And and I it's not just for me.

They're like that with FCA, they're like that with Rangers for Cry for Chi Alpha.

Um, they want ministries on campus, they want students to be involved, they promote it, they talk, um, and and they kind of get us front and center and all like that.

Like football games, I can go on the field and hang out.

I can I can be where, you know, they want us around students.

They gave my whole family passes to if you've ever been to Northwest, the only junior college I know that has like this building at the end that's all you can eat food and it's enclosed and it's really nice.

And oh, it's the nicest um VIP box you've ever seen in your life.

Yeah, it's really nice.

On a football field.

And we get passes to that.

They want us in there, they want us talking to like I mean, it's like they're honored guests for the games.

And here comes, you know, the BSU director in his shorts and his, you know, his big hat and dragging his three kids and his wife, and they're like, Hey, this brother too.

We want you to meet brother.

And I'm like, Yeah, I wouldn't introduce me.

Oh, y'all are way above the pay grade of the BSU director.

I appreciate it though.

You know, like there's senators in there, and there's you know, it's really neat.

But they are like they they made it like that, and I didn't expect any of that.

I didn't expect to be treated the way that I'm treated.

Now, we have an unfair advantage.

The the lady who is Dr.

Hundel's like right-hand woman who does office planning and does the food for that event, and like is his administrative assistant.

Her daughter was in my youth group for three years.

We used to have dinner at her house all the time.

We're very close to them, and she has been exceptionally sweet to me.

Um and she makes sure, hey, if there's something going on, she lets me know and she sends me mess and like invites me, and and so but that goes back to we serve there, we know the people.

Dude, that's that's a God thing.

It is.

He knew he placed you in Centopia knowing you were coming back one day.

Or orchestrating things that we never like again, right, dreamed of.

Never really thought, hey, I'm gonna, you know, I'm gonna get to go be a bit shoe director.

And right.

The guys I work with don't I mean they probably don't even realize like they are legends, and and I like I love them.

I love like we went to fall or spring conference last week at Starville, and just being in the room with them, you for me, because it's all I ever want to do, is like you feel unworthy.

Like you just feel like like you're not supposed to be there.

Right.

They're gonna catch up one day, you know, like they're gonna catch up and realize, like, why is that dude here?

But it's uh it's great.

I love it, man.

All right, we're gonna move on to the calendar real quick.

So we have uh spring forward coming up March 8th.

We want everybody to be uh certainly aware of that.

We're not gonna have church activities on March 11th due to spring break.

March 22nd, we're gonna have a night of worship and business meeting.

We then have the Easter egg hunt that's coming up on March 29th at 5 p.m.

We will have separate areas for the different age groups, so don't worry about that.

And then Easter is right around the corner on April 5th.

We'll be having three services that morning: 8 a.m., 9 a.m., and 10 30 a.m.

We're now going to shift to our devotion portion of the podcast that we call the midweek moment.

So our devotion today is going to be coming out of Isaiah chapter 1.

Isaiah 1 · chapter mention

And uh and I don't know if you've ever spent much time in Isaiah, but it does not start off as the most encouraging book in the Bible.

Uh we basically have this moment where Isaiah grabs all of Israel's attention to let them know that they have royally messed this up.

Um he he literally says that you are sick from the bottom of your feet to the top of your head, that there's blood on your hands.

And he even tells them, and I guess modern day translation for us is your church services are about worthless.

Your worship service has nothing to do with worship, uh, and and you're making God sick.

Like you're you're you're you're giving him headaches, you're you're you know, like it's pointless and worthless.

And so we get to kind of the pinnacle of this in Isaiah 118, where it kind of shifts.

We're we're getting away from, hey, this this it's not very uplifting, not very gracious, like uh this we're beating down, we would call it stepping on toes, he's stomping on feet.

And then he says this, come now, let us reason together, says the Lord.

Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be white as snow.

Though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.

I I read that, I get to thinking about when my wife and I, our middle child Blaze, loves baseball, loves to play baseball.

And like every kid that has ever played baseball, if you put a pair of white pants on that dude, the first thing he's gonna do is find the most red mud and dirt he can and get it on it.

And we've tried literally everything to clean those pants.

And then one day someone said, Hey, take it to the car wash and blast it with the car wash.

And we were like, Hey, are you serious?

Oh, I'm dead serious, man.

I'm dead serious.

This is the best thing I've ever seen.

Um, and so here's me and my wife at the car wash.

I'm holding the pants, she's busting the pants, trying to get them clean.

And those pants start changing colors.

But it doesn't matter what we do, doesn't matter how much we spray, we can get most of it out.

There's still the stains from where that red dirt was.

That's basically what we have here.

Sin has stained us.

Um doesn't matter how hard we try, how hard we scrub, doesn't matter what products we use, doesn't matter how good we try to be.

Spiritually, many of us live this way.

We carry guilt, we carry regret, we carry mistakes, struggles that feel permanent.

Um we try to fix ourselves.

We are the best self-help, self-fix it people that you can find.

But I'm telling you, there's nothing that we can do to make ourselves clean.

And so we get to Isaiah 118 and we find the hope that is the gospel.

We find the hope that is Christ.

The hope that the invitation in all of Scripture is found in this.

And it's God speaking to us, and he says, Come, let us reason.

Let us reason together.

He doesn't begin with condemnation, it's an invitation.

Come now, let us reason together.

Uh it's remarkable.

God is speaking to Israel, who is spiritually unhealthy as you can get.

Again, he says, from the top of your feet to the bottom, or from the bottom of your feet to the top of your head, you are sick.

You are, you are, you're in the worst shape that you possibly can be.

He describes their worship as empty.

He tells them that their lives are full of injustice.

They were religious, um, but they were inwardly broken.

And he says, look, fixing yourselves, not gonna happen.

He doesn't tell us, hey, get it all together, come to him.

He says, just come now.

I mean, God invites us before we clean ourselves up.

He invites us before everything gets right.

We often think we must become better before approaching God.

We've got to pray more, we've got to sin less, we've got to feel more spiritual.

But scripture reverses that idea, and God invites us as we are, not as we pretend to be.

So notice the phrase, let us reason together.

I'd start with just saying that that's not how we would think reason.

That's not me and you bantering back and forth.

God is basically saying, hey, come and listen.

I've got something for you.

And it is good.

God is not afraid of honest conversation.

He welcomes repentance, he welcomes questions, he welcomes confession, honesty.

Uh, real relationship with God begins when we stop performing and we start coming honestly before Him.

And the problem we have is something we can't fix.

God describes sin as scarlet and crimson, deeply, deeply dyed colors.

Colors you're not going to just get out.

Uh, in ancient times, these dyes soaked permanently into fabric.

They didn't wash out.

You weren't getting rid of it.

Everyone listening would have understood that this stain is irreversible.

So when he said, look, your sins are like scarlet, he meant like they're not going away.

You're not getting rid of them.

And that's kind of the point.

Sin isn't just a mistake.

We outgrow, it's a condition we can't remove ourselves from.

So no amount of good deeds, no amount of success, no amount of effort is going to erase the guilt before a holy God.

But then comes the miracle of grace.

Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be white as snow.

God doesn't lighten the stain, he removes it.

Christianity is not self-improvement, it is divine cleansing.

So the grace God provides is the promise ultimately points to Jesus.

At the cross, Christ takes our scarlet sin upon himself so that we receive his righteousness.

The cleansing that Isaiah promises becomes reality through the sacrifice of Jesus.

And here's the beauty: God doesn't just forgive reluctantly, he restores completely.

You will be white as snow.

You will be like wool.

Not covered, cleansed, not hidden, but transformed.

Many believers still live as if forgiveness is partial, as if God keeps a record ready to bring up later, but he tells us that our sins are cast as far as the east is from the west.

Scripture says that when God forgives, he makes us new.

You're not defined by your worst moment, you're not defined, but you are defined by God's grace.

So today the question is, what stain are you still trying to scrub away yourself?

A past failure, a hidden struggle, shame you carry quietly, a belief that you're not good enough for God's love or his grace, God's invitation still stands.

Come now, not later, not when you feel worthy, not when life is perfect, but come as you are and come now.

Bring the stain to the one who can wash it and make it clean.

We appreciate you coming today.

I've enjoyed it.

Thanks to all of you guys for listening.

If you don't have a church home, we'd love to see you here on Sunday mornings.

You can catch our services online at Destotahills.com, our YouTube channel at Destota Hills Baptist Church for all of our church family.

We love you.

We'll see you back here in two weeks.

Next week is spring break.

God bless.

This has been your midweek motivation.

We'd love to have you join us in person on Sunday mornings.

Our services are at 9 and 10 30 a.m.