Can Revival Really Happen Again? Why Prayer and God’s Word Still Matter
FULL TRANSCRIPT
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He's just a regular guy with a cool job that God loves for some reason. Welcome to The Steve Marston Show, a daily journey in learning how to live more like Jesus, conversations with those that God is working through, and dad jokes. It's the most unique show you'll hear today. Now, here's Steve. And away we go. Thank you for joining us. Whatever your way of consuming the program is, maybe you're listening live.
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in San Antonio on AM 630 The Word, or maybe you're in central Arkansas listening to 99.5 The Word, or you're online listening on your own time, maybe three weeks from now. Whatever your story, thank you for being a part of today's festivities. And I got to tell you before we get too far deep into the show today about our website. I'm so proud of the way this has turned out because
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I had this goal of making a website that was not just about the radio show slash podcast. I really wanted this to be kind of a library of encouragement. I wanted to be able to cross reference all our different topics and all our different things that we talk about from marriage and family to the death of loved ones to evangelism to missionary work to
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studying the Bible, all of these different topics. I wanted to have a place to be able for you to come and find encouragement, find the different resources that will help you go along your path walking with Jesus. Because that's the whole point of this program is helping you live like Jesus. And I think it's really starting to take shape. I have a...
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really worked hard on this and our team has worked hard on it. And it's really now open for everybody to kind of check out. It's SteveMarsdenShow.com. And again, you can use the search tool. Everything is cross-referenced and it's been just a big time blessing. So I would encourage you, if you get a chance to click around on it, please do so. SteveMarsdenShow.com. While you're there, we've got the free PDF.
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that is called Five Ways for You to Study Your Bible. They're just little strategy tips. You can download that. It'll come right to your inbox. And we would just appreciate you checking out the website because again, we put a lot of time, a lot of effort into it, and it really is turning out better than we ever thought. Okay, let's get started today. And I wanted to start with something that I think is becoming more prevalent in Christian circles than maybe it has been in a while.
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And that is, we'll go around our elbow to get to our wrist in order not to open up the Bible. I think a lot of Christians will buy books on prayer, will listen to podcasts about how to live the Christian life, will download little articles about five ways to study your Bible, and will do everything
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we can to not have to physically open the Scriptures. And I think we psych ourselves out so many times about it because for whatever reason, we think we're never going to understand. We think it's too hard or something. Something's there hanging us up. And maybe we feel like we'll understand more from someone else instead of the God of the universe who calls Himself your Heavenly Father who you have
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placed your trust in. I mean, it just sounds ridiculous, it? And look, I know this is not new. I can remember back, gosh, it's probably been 30 years ago now. mean, just flies, my goodness. But yeah, I used to work at a Christian bookstore. I was in radio part-time and worked at a Christian bookstore during the week. And I had this one lady that attended our church. And she would come in and,
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She would buy every new Max Locato book, and I don't want to just pick on Max Locato, but every author that came out with a new book on prayer, a new book on Christian living, a new book on grace, a new book on this, on that, and she would read it and she would consume it, and she would tell people at church about how great and how helpful it was for her to buy these resources and to use them, but she never...
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put it into practice that same energy towards reading her Bible. She never talked about that. And it was something that she felt like, I guess, was just overwhelming to her. And it always made me sad that she was like that because I thought, she's just missing out. God's Word is not something that is hidden from us or some kind of code or some kind of something that...
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It takes a special degree in to figure out. No, it just takes a little time and a little effort on our parts. Now look, devotionals help. So do workbooks to get us into the Word, to be able to answer questions and be able to see what the text says and use our brains. So, I mean, those things are amazingly helpful. But...
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you can also just open the Word and really figure things out too for your own self. It's not too hard. It's not too difficult. But we do, I think so many times, we allow ourselves for whatever reason to think that we can't do it. Now maybe it's the type of translation of the Bible that you're reading. Maybe you open the Bible and you look and say,
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I just can't understand the words on this page. Well then get another translation. I mean there are so many of them out there now. All kinds of reading levels, even those people who suffer from reading disabilities, there are Bibles written for them too. So there's really no excuse. You can learn God's Word and hiding God's Word in your heart is such a big part of being a Christian. We talk about it a lot.
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with the segment we do every day called Faith Between Your Ears, which by the way, we'll have another one of those verses that we're gonna start learning today and take it through the rest of this week. But I just wanna encourage you, if you're one of those people who feel like maybe I'm not smart enough or I'm not bright enough to be able to open up God's Word and understand it for myself, look, you have been deceived. You have been lied to by
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whatever or whomever has said that. It really, it all basically goes back to your enemy, the enemy of your soul who really plants that seed because look, God created His word. He left it for us so that we wouldn't be orphans. You know, I mean just think about it on the opposite end. If God created this whole great universe and created us to have a purpose and a meaning and all of the different things that He has but left us
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without any instruction, left us without his word. Think about where we would be then. We would have to wonder, well, what does God think about this? How should I approach this situation? And on and on, we would just be lost. But God in his sovereignty and in his justice and his mercy and his grace left us a written account of exactly what he thinks about life.
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about how we to live it and how we can have life on a higher plane than anybody else does. Not because we're better than other people, but because we're taking his truths and applying it to his way of doing things. mean, if he's the creator, then he ought to know the exact way the creation can function at the highest levels, right? Well, of course. So it's not...
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A secret, it's not something that you have to have some kind of specialized degree in. All you have to do is have the courage to say, God, I don't know anything about your word, and I want to. I know you have left it for me. I know it's something that's important, so help me to see it. Open my eyes so that I can understand your word, but more than just understanding facts,
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and understanding the scripture itself, I want to be closer to you. I want to know you better than I know you right now. And I promise you on the authority of God's Word, not on my authority, but on His, that if that's your heart and that's the way you come to Him, He's going to answer that prayer 100 % of the time. He loves for us to do that. He's just kind of sitting on the edge of the throne in heaven.
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waiting for you to do that. So take advantage of it. Do it right now. More coming up.
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The Steve Marston Show continues. Thank you for letting us be a part of your routine, whatever that routine looks like, helping you live more like Jesus. That's what we're all about here. And I want to mention something that I talked about just briefly in the first segment, and that is our free PDF. It is at our website, thestevemarstonshow.com. You go there and there at the page about midway down, you'll see
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this free PDF. And it's five strategies for you to be able to open up God's Word and be able to get the most out of it. And again, I just want to get it into your hands. It will help you, I think, in a lot of ways. It's helped me. It's the strategies that I use when I open up the Bible for myself to try to spend quality and quiet time with God. And I would love for you to get a hold of it. We've had people literally all across the country download it.
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From Maine to Texas Arkansas even California. So thank you again everybody that has done that and You are welcome to try it out as well Steve Marston show.com is the website just look for the free PDF It's there in the menu bar, but it's also on the home page as well. Okay on Mondays We like to do Sunday morning takeaways. This is where We go back in time and we Relive what happened yesterday
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to find the nuggets, the truth, the things that we can take out from the sermon we heard and bring it forth through the rest of this week. And for me, my Sunday morning takeaway was a breakdown of a verse that I think gets misused a lot of times. And I don't think it's on purpose. Don't misunderstand me. But I think we read it and we initially have one idea of what it means. But really, that's not.
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what it means. Let me explain what I'm talking about. It's 1 Corinthians chapter 9 verses 19 through 23. Now Paul is writing this to this church and he wants them to understand what his whole idea is about, what his whole authority is and how he reaches people and what he does.
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He starts out in verse 19 by saying, let me pull it up here, it says, even though I am a free man with no master, I have become a slave to all people to bring many to Christ. When I was with the Jews, I lived like a Jew to bring Jews to Christ. When I was with those who followed Jewish law, I too lived under that law. Even though I'm not subjected to the law, I did this so that I could bring
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to Christ those who are under the law. When I'm with the Gentiles who do not follow the Jewish law, I too live apart from that law so that I can bring them to Christ. But I do not ignore the law of God, I obey the law of Christ. And then it winds up in verse 23 by saying, I do everything I do to spread the good news and to share in its blessings. So a lot of times we look at that or can look at that and say, you know,
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I'm supposed to become a chameleon and how I'm supposed to kind of blend in with whatever circumstance that I'm in and that way, you know, make it known how persons can become Christians, right? But I don't really think it's saying that. I don't think that's Paul's heart in that passage. What I think he's saying is wherever a person is in their walk,
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is where he goes so that he can make sure that Christ is known. So if he comes across someone who doesn't have any kind of faith relationship, maybe even questions that there's a God, that's where he starts. Or if he is someone like you talked about that's of a Jewish background that really follows those customs, that's where he starts. And I think we can extrapolate that into our lives as well.
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that wherever someone is in a faith journey or like I say, maybe not even walking with God yet, we can take that principle and say wherever they are, that's where we want to meet them. We would take them to Genesis if they've never really thought about God or had too many thoughts about him. Or if they're looking at whether abortion is right or wrong, you could take them to some passage there and on and on.
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You just find out where the person is and meet them there. That was something that I thought, well, that really illuminated that passage for me in 1 Corinthians chapter 9. But what about you? Well, we threw it out on social media and got some very interesting answers of people that are learning their faith and sharing their faith from their sermons. This is Roger. He said,
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Acts chapter 4 is what the sermon was about yesterday, being bold for Christ. And being bold for Christ, I mean, I think when we were younger, it had such one image in our mind, you know, like taking on hell with a water pistol. Yeah, I'm going to stand up and I'm going to be radical for God. But I think as we grow older and maybe more wiser, hopefully, that we realize
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that being bold for God is just being counter-cultural, loving our enemies, praying for those who spitefully use us. That's being bold. That's being something that no one else is doing in society as a whole. So good thing, our good stuff, Roger. Thank you. Lisa checked in. Lisa said the sermon she heard was from Acts chapter one verses four through eight.
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And then in 1 Corinthians 14 verses 1 and 2 was about the baptism of the Holy Spirit and praying in the Spirit. Yeah, and that can be some maybe controversial kind of topic. I don't want to say controversial because nothing in the Bible is controversial. People read it some different ways, but basically being baptized in the Holy Spirit, that means that you have come to know Christ as your Savior. You get all of the Holy Spirit you're ever going to get. And being
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controlled and dominated by the Spirit saying yes to Him and no to ourselves is where the praying in the Spirit and living through the Spirit and all of that comes from. So yeah, thank you Lisa. Also Ricky checks in and he says Jonah chapter 3 verses 1 through 3, how God gave Jonah another chance and a do-over. Boy, aren't you thankful for do-overs? Can I get an amen somebody? Or in the words of his pastor,
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mulligan. Now you may not, if you don't know what a mulligan is, that's a term used in golf when you hit a bad shot. You just pretend like it never happened. Running out of time here, but we get one more. Jonathan said the title was, Aware, but Beware of the Undertow. Don't let what you see on the surface determine what lies below. Even Satan could quote the Bible. Ooh, that's very intriguing. Good stuff. Back for more in minute.
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The Steve Marston Show continues. Thank you for being a part of today's festivities. Check out our YouTube page. It's all new and we would love for you to like and subscribe. Hit that notification bell. I know everybody asks you to do that, but there's a reason for it because it really does help. It does help get the word out and get the show out to more people. So if you would do that for us, that would be awesome because you know you're going to be on YouTube anyway. So please swing on over to the Steve Marston Show.
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page and and click like and subscribe and notify and all that fun stuff It's time to welcome in our special guest for today and he is a good friend Someone that we just love turn it to because he's got great insight great Bible knowledge And he's just an all-around fun guy. He's he sees my friend Joe Manning. He's a pastor. He's an author He's an apologist and we welcome him back to the program. Hey, buddy Hey Steve, welcome
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Appreciate the opportunity to talk with you again, my brother. Yeah, I love being able to have you on because I love to pick your brain about different things that come up not only in the church world, but just in society at large, which is really your podcast, The Apologetic Café, is exactly what you guys have been covering here a lot lately, and that is some of these...
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these things. What are church? What's a pastor? All of these kind of social issues that are kind of popping up that are causing a lot of confusion for believers. Yeah, yeah, it is. And if you're going to pick my brain, it's nothing more than a snack. We'll get started. So, okay, we'll get started with that here in just a second. But first, we got a new little thing we do where we pass along words of wisdom. Our last guest...
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left this for you. He didn't know it was going to be you. And then at the end of the conversation here, I'm going to ask you to do the same thing. the last guest we had said the best piece of advice he could offer was a scripture verse, 1 John 1, 9, which we all are familiar with. Confess your sins. He's faithful and just to forgive us. So there you go. There's your words of wisdom, Rojo. Well, I appreciate that. I mean, I really do.
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Any kind of words of wisdom that I can get I am greatly appreciative of. Okay, so let's get started with some of the things you guys have been covering on the Apologetic Cafe here lately. I mean you've been in the book of Luke, but you kind of stopped for a little bit going through the different things with some of the issues and cultural stuff that's been going on that's kind of infiltrating the church. Yeah, and you know it's...
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A lot of folks send me videos of sermons that they've seen online and ask me what I think about it. What I'm seeing a lot of is so many taking and distorting the Scriptures to fit their particular ideology or their particular view of sexuality, and it has nothing really to do with what the Scriptures are talking about.
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It is really a distorting of the Word of God and twisting it and leading so many people astray with that. It really is, and it's something that seems like, guess, because we're in such the information age and everything is on video, everything is right there at our fingertips all the time, maybe it's more prevalent than it used to be or just seems that way. But you're right. And let me ask you this.
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Because, you know, obviously sexual perversion, sexual immorality, all of that stuff, that always follows on the heels of idolatry, doesn't it? It does. Absolutely. Because sexual perversion is an idol. Right. You've made an idol out of your lust, your flesh, and your desire for it. And so it actually is an idol. And, you know, we are told that idol worship
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is not something that we need to be involved in, and that it will really twist your thinking. And that's what we see happening in our culture today. And Joe Manning is our guest here on the Steve Marston show. And I just wanted to kind of dive into that a little bit, that whole, it's almost like a slippery slope. Once we start getting away and getting idols in between us and God, it seems like that's the next step. And it's crazy to think that goes from that one...
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thing to the extreme of sexual perversion, but it really does, doesn't it? It does. And it all, I'm telling you, it all goes back to the Garden of Eden with the very first encounter with it, well, I should say the encounter that Eve had with the serpent and getting her to begin to doubt God's Word and begin to think more about what her wants and desires are rather than what
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God had commanded. So everything that we see and hear is really the lie of the serpent from the Garden of Eden. It really is. And when you stop and you think about that, because Adam and Eve were in such a perfect paradise that they were created in the image of God and their thoughts were only for God and about God, meaning, you know, what would God think about this? And just kind of God-centered. But once this
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the serpent appears and they fall, now all of a sudden that's broken and it's all about me first. Yeah, and really that lie has always been there to doubt God's Word. And this is what we see happening and sadly among many church denominations, many pastors today, where they're casting doubt upon the Word of God. And when you began to cast
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doubt on the Word of God, whether it is really true, whether it is really inspired and infallible. That's when you begin, as you said earlier, to get on that slippery slope and say, okay, well, if this isn't true, what else is it true in the Word? Exactly. you begin to question the whole thing. And here's the thing, too, that those questions aren't necessarily wrong or bad because there are answers to them. There are...
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answers, well, is God's Word infallible? Is God's Word truly inspired? There are good, solid answers for those. Yes, there are. And, you know, that has led me to go, in our church now, starting this coming Wednesday night, we're going to be diverting away from our usual study of the book, of a particular book, like we've been studying the book of Deuteronomy. But I'm going to go back and teach what I did about five years ago. It actually before COVID.
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You know the the course I don't have enough faith to be an atheist and I'm gonna go through that again with our church and with Anybody they also wants to come and join in because we have to be ready to give an answer for the hope that is within us You know, that's what Peter said, you know in first Peter 3, you know He said that we we need to be ready at all times to give an answer for the hope that we have within us and that that is being able to defend the
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the faith and when it is especially challenged about the Word of God, that we need to be able to have an answer ready and be able to show people that the Word of God is in fact true and infallible, that you can rely upon it, and that it has the answers for every aspect of life today. We're visiting with Joe Manning here on the Steve Marston show. He's an apologist, he's a pastor, he's an author, and he joins us from time to time to break down some of the
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things going on in society, but also just to kind of give, like you just were talking about, a reason and a hope for the...or the reason that we have for the hope that we have in our walk with Christ. And I wanted to kind of switch gears a little bit here with you and talk a little bit more about revival, because that's always been something that we've prayed for, that we have longed for a lot of us, but we haven't seen it.
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in the way I think everybody wants to see it. Yeah, there's been pockets of it at different college campuses, especially lately we see some of that happening, but the big, you know, kind of great awakening kind of Jesus revolution kind of thing we saw in the past, that's what everybody seems to want, but for some reason it just isn't happening. Any idea why? Well, Steve, all of those revivals, if you go back and look at them, they began with the time of
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prayer, and I think that that's what's missing from the church today. We have given up that idea of praying for revival, dedicating ourselves to time of prayer. You know, there was a time when Wednesday nights were dedicated for prayer service at churches. Well, today, very few churches have a Wednesday night service. And then when we have times of prayer on our Sunday morning service,
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It's usually at the start where we'll say, you know, Lord God bless the service today. And then we have a prayer over the offering. And then we have a prayer at the end of the service as we dismiss everybody. But we've taken prayer away from the main aspect of the worship service. And this is what we need to get back to. Prayer needs to become more a greater part of our worship services.
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than where we have it today. Oh, agreed. But do you think a lot of people, because I'll be honest, I'll just be transparent with this. I look at our culture and our society and I'll pray for revival for a few weeks, a few months, whatever, and then I just feel like, it's never going to change. And I get discouraged on it. And then I give up praying for revival. then I get convicted over it. And it becomes this cycle. Do you think other people?
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are like that as well, that they just don't see any way that God is going to be recognized in this culture. So you just get so discouraged that you give up. Yeah, I think that happens to a lot of folks is that they say, well, look, I've prayed for this for so long and I have never seen an answer. And so I just quit praying for it. But, you know, we prayed, my wife and I prayed for my parents for
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over 35 years for them to get saved. And we continued to pray for them. And then finally, just a few years before they passed away, they gave their lives to the Lord. So you don't give up on prayer. You keep at it. know, we're told in the Bible to keep asking, to keep seeking, to keep knocking. Are we truly seeking after the Bible? Or are we just praying it?
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because we think it's the right thing to do. If our heart is truly set, I believe, on seeking revival, and we're going to get down on our knees and we're going to pray for it, and we're going to keep knocking on that door asking God to bring revival to us, because this is what our heart truly wants to see. The other thing is, are we asking out of selfish motives? Is it because we want to see our church grow, or is it really because...
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we want to see the kingdom grow. So as we pray, we're praying back the very promises of God. We're praying back to Him, His Word, and we're saying, God, I'm praying for revival because I want to see you glorified. I want to see you glorified by the expansion of your kingdom into this world. And I think when we get fervent about that and praying that prayer for God's glory, not for ours, not for our church growth, but
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praying for His glory that we're going to begin to see the revival take place. Well, you know, the one passage that everybody goes to when you're talking about revival is 2 Corinthians 7, 14. And when you look at that closely, it says that when my people who are called by my name turn from their wicked ways, I think a lot of times, and again, I fall into this sometimes, I don't look at my ways as being wicked, you know?
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I think, and isn't that the first part of that prayer before revival can come? We've got to get our own house clean? Absolutely. And one of the things that I've talked to our church about is when we got into the area of the Lord's Prayer in the Gospel of Luke, and the first part of that prayer, Jesus and his disciples, they asked him, Lord, teach us to pray.
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They didn't ask him, teach us how to pray. They said, teach us to pray. And he said, okay. And he said, you know, our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. In other words, are we really coming to that time of prayer to glorify God? Do we really see Him sitting on the throne in His glorified state? Do we visualize that? Or do we approach the
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the altar by saying, yo, God, know, hey, bud, you know, got this prayer offered to you. You know, are we really honoring Him? And then, you know, the next part of that, you know, when talks about our Father who art in heaven, how would be thy name, thy kingdom come? God, I want to see your kingdom come into this world, not just into this world, but into my life. And you have to ask yourself, am I allowing God's kingdom to be seen in my heart?
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and in my life. You know, and that's what we take out into the world. When we walk out into the world, the people that see us, they want to see God's kingdom being worked through us. And then when you get to that next part of the prayer, what it talks about, forgive us of our sins. God, wherever I'm falling short and being a representative of your kingdom, let that be displayed in my life right now so that I can confess it and I can get rid of it and I can...
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I can focus purely upon praying for the revival that needs to be taking place in this country of ours. Joe Manning is our guest here on the Steve Marston show. Just before we wrap up here, like I say, we have this little segment where we like to ask each guest to leave some advice or words of wisdom for the next guest coming up. So what do you got for us? Well, I think one of the things that I cling to and I think that the
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is so important for pastors today is if we go to 2 Timothy chapter 2 verse 15 where the Paul says, study to show thyself approved. I think that that's where we have left off so many times as pastors. get so we get so engulfed into being the CEO of the church, which I could talk forever about that. We're not CEOs.
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We should study to show ourselves a workman that needs not to be ashamed, but we are rightly dividing the Word of Truth and proclaiming it rightly so that by that those people God has entrusted into our care can grow in their relationship and their walk with the Lord. Absolutely. I think that's so key to study.
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and to know the Word, because you think pastors just automatically have some kind of special access to God that the rest of us don't, but really, no. You guys have to work at it just like everyone else does. So yeah, I think that's such good words of advice, especially to young pastors, and especially bivocational pastors I know that are listening, because we get the research all the time, and we hear from those men that are trying to keep it going.
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and keep all the plates spinning. it's good stuff. Good words there from Joe Manning. Thanks so much for joining us today. We really appreciate you as always, my friend. Well, thanks, Steve, for asking me. I appreciate the opportunity to be on the air with you.
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The Steve Marston Show continues where we take faith and fun seriously. The ministry of the month is Dr. Michael Youssef and Leading the Way. Really proud to be partnered with him. And we're offering you this book, Winning the Invisible War. Dr. Youssef has gotten this book called Your Biblical Guide to Spiritual Victory. And it really takes you through
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the war that we're in as Christians and you think I'm not in a war? Oh, yes you are. That is such a lie from the enemy that he has deceived us to the point that we're not, because we are. And this book will help you recognize the seductive, destructive philosophies that have infiltrated our culture to be able to identify and defend against the devil's strategy and schemes. Apply the power of God's word to your everyday battles.
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Utilize the full armor of God as provided in scripture. That's Ephesians chapter 6. Such a good book. Again, it's called Winning the Invisible War. How to recognize lies, resist temptations, and be victorious in spiritual warfare. Dr. Youssef's program, Leading the Way, is heard on our San Antonio affiliate every morning at 830. So you don't want to miss that. And then, of course, you don't want to miss September 19th. We're getting really close to that date.
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He and Chris Tomlin are going to be in Houston for the Awake Houston event. It's a revival night, a night where they hope will spurn more of these kind of nights, where we're just going to call out to God and ask him to be gracious and forgive us and help ignite another round of revival in our nation where we can see him work and move in the lives of
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our families and our coworkers and it all starts with us and it all starts with prayer and you can be a part of this service. September 19th at wake Houston dot com is where you get your tickets or you could go to one of the radio station's website that's am630theword.com if you're listening in central Texas or faithtalk995.com if you're listening in central Arkansas. All right.
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So now let's move on to what else is happening around the world and check out some of the headlines that are making news. This was something that I guess completely missed my radar. I don't know if you've heard this story or not, but it brought kind of tears to my eyes when I started to read about it. But there's an American missionary named Kevin Rideout. He was freed after more than nine months of captivity. Here's what happened.
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He was an American missionary pilot and he was kidnapped outside of his home in Niger last October. He serves as a pilot with this group called Serving in Mission. It's a US-based organization to be a catalyst for cross-cultural mission work for 130 years. Anyway, they reported that Rideout was in good health and is in care of the United States officials finally now. And he's being in route to
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being reunited to his family. We are so grateful to confirm that our good friend and brother in Christ, Kevin Rideout, has been released after over nine months of captivity. They said in a statement, he was kidnapped outside his home on the 21st of October, 2025. Kevin is in good health and he will soon be reunited with Krista, his children and extended families. Can you imagine? My goodness, and I had no idea about this, but look, this kind of stuff happens
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all the time, especially when you're in a part of the world where it's really hard to be a Christian. We think we have it hard in America, my gosh. Nothing compared to what some of these families are going through. And that's the thing is, most of us don't know their names, but we need to continue to pray and pray earnestly for our brothers and sisters in Christ who are persecuted on the daily.
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All right, let's see what else is happening here. Oh, there's a new Netflix docu-series that's coming out. Now this story made a lot of headlines a couple of years ago, maybe. It was this pastor and his estranged wife, and then all of a sudden she ended up dead. Well, it's the case of John Paul Miller, and he was granted another continuance in his federal cyber-stalking case.
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and Netflix has released a trailer about its upcoming documentary called The Death of the Pastor's Wife. It's a three-part series that will start August 26th and explores Miller's relationship with his estranged wife, Mika, and her death back, I guess it was in 2024, was ruled as a suicide. according to the...
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Netflix trailer. There's never before seen footage and firsthand accounts from friends and family speaking out for the first time. John Paul has not been charged in connection with her death, but in 2025 a grand jury did indict him for cyber stalking and making false statements to federal investigators. He has pled not guilty and has been granted another continuance in his case until October. So yeah, what a strange story that was and to
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see it played out, you know, into the headlines and now it's going to be a Netflix docu-series that's going to be hitting, you know, just in the next couple of days. Let's see, what else is going on here around the world? Oh, this one is pretty interesting. It's a piece by Jessica Mauser over at churchleaders.com and it's about how pastors can help protect
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kids from pornography. A lady is named Kristin Jensen. She's the author of a book called Good Pictures, Bad Pictures and the founder of an organization called Defend Young Minds. She says pastors are a supportive role, but they are and can be a very powerful supportive role. And she says she thinks parents can need all the help they can get in helping their kids steer clear of pornography. She says sometimes
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I think pastors feel a little hesitant because the topic is such a heavy and sensitive one. She says, you know, there may be some parents too that are like, stay in your own lane. This is something that I don't want talked about. But the dangers of pornography poses to boys and girls, even at preschool ages, is so great that Jensen believes it's crucial for parents to prepare their children for when, not if, they see porn for the first time. And pastors...
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can be strategic in how they support that battle. That's pretty good stuff. We'll link to that article on churchleaders.com for you and let you see the whole thing for yourself. But Kristin Jensen is a mother and a grandmother, and again, the name of the book is Good Pictures, Bad Pictures, and she's got a brand new title that goes along kind of similar with it called Good Pictures, Bad Pictures, Guide for Girls, How I Stay Smart, Safe, and Confident.
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It just shows how crazy sinful this world is that we have to talk about pornography with kids that young, isn't it? Man, it just breaks your heart. But it's something that needs to be done.
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Here at the Steve Marston Show, we are serious about faith.
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Today's dad joke comes to us from the home office in Alamo City, Texas. And this is one of those kind of time release jokes that maybe not everyone will get immediately as soon as I say the punchline. You have to think about it for a second, but I think it's pretty funny. Says, bought a ceiling fan the other day. Complete waste of money. He just stands there applauding and saying how smooth that ceiling is.
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See, I told you it might take you a second to get that one. But now that you got it, you're like, hey, that's pretty good. Steve Marston Show continues the only podcast that really matters as we help you live like Jesus. Thanks for being a part of it today. Now on Mondays, we choose out, I choose out? I don't think that's the best grammar to use, is it? No. How about we choose a Bible verse for us to learn together?
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as a radio slash podcast family because I'm truly convinced that in order for us to go deeper in our relationship with God, to know Him better, which is the whole foundation of why we do this, and I hope the whole reason why you're listening is to know His Word, is to get it in between our ears. And the Bible says there's a lot of promises that come along with knowing His Word, including one that
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We won't sin against him. We'll know what his word says so we can avoid things that put barriers and obstacles between he and I. But also, when we have it between our ears, it helps us counterbalance and counteract all the negative stuff that comes our way. Right? I mean, think about all the situations you have with people and with circumstances, and then even those voices in your head that sometimes
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start eating at you and start telling you all the negative things. Well, how are you going to react? How are you going to fight that? With God's Word. That's the key. That's how you do it. That's the way Jesus modeled us for us to do. So, let's learn His Word together. Here's the verse for this week. It comes from 1 Corinthians chapter 2 and it is one of the best verses in the whole scripture as far as I'm concerned. Listen to what it says.
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No eye has seen, no ear has heard, and no mind has imagined what God has prepared for those who love Him. That's 1 Corinthians chapter 2 verse 9. But actually, Paul wrote that in that scripture, but he's actually doing a callback for the Old Testament, because that's originally found in Isaiah 64. So you find it both in the Old and the New Testament.
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Just think what that means when you really stop to analyze and kind of meditate on and break down what that means. Wow, that'll bless your bluster, won't it? I'm telling you the truth. That's really, really powerful stuff. We end every program with a call to action for you, your next step, and I think after today's program, it's the old Nike principle that Michael Jordan taught us years ago. Just do it. When it comes to Bible study,
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when it comes to reading God's word, memorizing His word. You don't know where to start. You don't know how to do it. Just do it, just start. And God will bless. You just gotta put the effort into it. Okay, that does it for today. Back on the radio at three o'clock tomorrow, online, anytime and anything you missed at SteveMarsdenShow.com. Adios.
