Dale Partridge - March 04, 2020


Real Christianity #87： How Christians Should Respond to Coronavirus


Episode Stats


Length

30 minutes

Words per minute

165.53137

Word count

5,087

Sentence count

207

Harmful content

Hate speech

5

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Summary

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Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 welcome to real christianity today we are talking about the coronavirus and god's sovereignty so
00:00:06.200 this is an episode that could apply to many situations but the coronavirus is something
00:00:12.900 that is a global discussion and we're going to have a talk about that today but before we dive
00:00:17.680 in uh welcome to the show if you're new here uh we're excited to have you if you're a regular
00:00:23.100 listener we'd ask that you would leave a review uh on itunes just tap the app that you're listening
00:00:29.360 to the podcast. And leave a review. You just have to tap the stars. You don't even need to write
00:00:34.060 anything. But if you do write something, I will read it. And guys, I think we're over now like
00:00:40.160 5,000 plus reviews, and they're just so encouraging to us. They're actually one of the most central
00:00:46.000 sources of encouragement to our ministry. So thank you guys for leaving those messages there.
00:00:52.200 Also wanted to mention real quick, if you haven't had a chance to look into our Ultimate Marriage
00:00:57.880 program. It's a six-week marriage mentor program. We talk about how to build a biblical marriage.
00:01:05.260 And guys, you want to build a biblical marriage before you are falling apart, meaning that you
00:01:11.540 want to make this something that you're investing in now before you need it. And so we just want
00:01:18.900 to encourage you guys to check that out at ultimatemarriage.com. It's a great program.
00:01:23.220 we've had over a thousand couples go through it and the messages and the testimonies are just
00:01:28.180 fantastic it's a great we talk about kids and sex and money and all things in between um so if you
00:01:34.780 want to check that again that's ultimate marriage.com okay veronica is going to give a little
00:01:40.140 introduction she's mostly going to be asking me a couple questions and then i'm going to be giving
00:01:44.280 the perspective on how we should be thinking about this yeah okay so at the time of this recording
00:01:50.220 as del mentioned uh the coronavirus has become a worldwide discussion um i believe there's over
00:01:56.600 88 000 cases globally and just over 3 000 deaths now uh that might seem scary but in reality it's
00:02:05.020 actually just slightly more uh slightly more deadly than the common flu that goes around every
00:02:10.500 year um that is the death rate is somewhere between one and two percent um now we're not
00:02:17.720 diminishing the severity of this illness and neither are we lacking empathy for those who are
00:02:23.660 being affected by it. Um, we know it's, can be a very scary situation. Um, our son is immune
00:02:29.460 compromised and he cannot get sick. And so, um, we have a small understanding, but you know,
00:02:36.040 we're not being non empathetic to those who are affected by it. Um, two years ago, we actually
00:02:41.100 got the flu in our house. Dale, you had a fever for 11 days, but there was someone sick with the
00:02:46.320 for 21 days in our house um that sent several of us to the re re er to the er dyslexic guys sorry
00:02:54.600 er um several times um and it was terrifying there was a couple of situations where i particular was
00:03:02.140 really struggling breathing they weren't sure if i had pneumonia things like that um and then with
00:03:06.780 our little kids you know i think valor was like six months old he was a brand new it was so scary
00:03:11.420 I called the ambulance on Veronica just to have her oxygen levels taken because she looks so like dilapidated.
00:03:18.980 That's the most sick I've ever been in my life.
00:03:21.040 It was not it was it was kind of a traumatic experience for us.
00:03:24.640 It was.
00:03:25.520 And that same year, one of my cousins, actually, her son ended up passing away from the flu.
00:03:29.940 I think he was 10.
00:03:31.160 He also had some other outside health issues that played into that.
00:03:34.400 But it was it was a scary year for us.
00:03:37.060 But all that to say is that we've actually had quite a few people message us or email us asking us for our opinions on how Christians should be thinking about large scale disease and outbreaks and other health related threats.
00:03:50.960 Should we worry? Is it a valid issue to invoke fear? Is this God's judgment on certain people or nations? 0.96
00:03:59.060 Should we stop going to church during times of outbreak? That's a very common one.
00:04:03.360 um should we go buy you know a month's worth of worth of groceries and face masks oh my goodness
00:04:09.340 our costco this last week one of our friends posted a insta story on his instagram and the
00:04:16.220 line was literally to the back of the store yep everybody's doing it was insane and you know
00:04:21.820 because our soon is immune compromise and he can't be out in public right now i go grocery
00:04:26.740 shopping after the kids go to bed so seven o'clock seven thirty last night i go to the grocery store
00:04:31.420 I couldn't buy chicken they're like I went to two different stores three different stores and all
00:04:35.460 three of them had like no chicken um the shelves the produce was completely cleared out and I was
00:04:40.120 like this is insanity it was crazy anyway um but basically people just want to know uh how they
00:04:47.320 should be thinking about moments like this according to the scriptures yeah it's it's a
00:04:53.280 really important um topic because we're not dealing with the coronavirus this could be this
00:04:58.740 kind of fear could be invoked by a variety of things and these are valid questions um and you
00:05:04.400 know this won't be the last time that we have an outbreak of some sort of disease that makes people
00:05:09.660 panic um you know so it's important that we have a biblical perspective so that we can really rest
00:05:15.020 on god's truth in the matters of public panic and so we're not going to spend a lot of time
00:05:21.340 answering all of those questions in detail because there's a bunch of those that veronica mentioned
00:05:24.500 And the central issue I want to tackle right now is worry, fear, anxiety that a lot of Christians are even having over this matter.
00:05:33.860 And it's affecting them in a variety of different ways.
00:05:36.440 They're not showing up to church.
00:05:37.920 They're maybe going out and buying a month's worth of groceries, whatever it might be.
00:05:42.680 In my experience, these concerns are actually driven from one thing.
00:05:47.880 When you have fear, anxiety, worry, panic, it's usually driven at the root level from a fear of death.
00:05:56.900 From either your own fear of death, you don't want to get sick and die, or the fear of someone in your family dying, one of your children dying, your spouse getting sick.
00:06:06.140 So this is, I think, the root issue that we're going to talk about today, the fear of death and how that's related to the coronavirus and why that makes everybody panic.
00:06:13.400 The reason people are panicking because they're afraid to get the coronavirus and die.
00:06:16.600 that that's really the narrative that the media is talking about and again we totally get it as
00:06:22.640 veronica mentioned our son is immune compromised i wouldn't even say he's immune he's respiratory
00:06:27.860 yeah he has a respiratory issue yeah he's respiratory compromised and if he got the
00:06:32.780 coronavirus yeah i mean it would be intense he might not make it he would he's that kind of
00:06:37.600 kid that if he got the flu it would be really really intense he'd definitely be in the hospital
00:06:42.420 for sure and so we understand he was in the hospital last month for a cough yeah for a cold
00:06:48.400 and so we understand the fleshly desire to fear things like this we get that um so first i want
00:06:55.920 to just talk just briefly on the question of preparedness is there anything wrong with being
00:07:01.020 prepared no there's nothing wrong with being prepared um veronica and i we have an emergency
00:07:06.520 kit at our home yeah there's wisdom in having things that you're going to need um in case
00:07:11.100 emergency situations um before you actually need them yeah things like that and we update our little
00:07:17.080 kit that we have every year or so and we didn't do this because of the coronavirus we've had this
00:07:21.800 forever we've been doing it for several years that we do that in case there's an earthquake
00:07:26.920 in case whatever it is we live we live in an area with a ton of dormant volcanoes but lots of
00:07:32.220 mountains and hills that are all dormant volcanoes yeah so we think that being prepared is fine be
00:07:38.180 wise and how you do that um we don't think that you need a year supply of food and we don't have
00:07:43.040 some crazy prepper storehouse of all the different stuff that's going on although we've considered it
00:07:47.920 and um um but we what we've learned to do is to just rest in god's sovereignty as he is our
00:07:57.580 ultimate provider and sustainer in these matters and this is something that you you grow into and
00:08:04.020 you lose that fear. So I really want to focus on today's idea of God's sovereignty and how that
00:08:09.480 sovereignty reigns over everything, including the coronavirus and including the timing of your own
00:08:16.180 death. And so it gives you just this peace, hopefully at the end of this episode of going,
00:08:21.120 oh, my death is in the hands of the Lord. And that's what we really want to tackle because I
00:08:26.960 think, again, this is the root issue of today. So I want to start off with a verse that's found
00:08:31.200 within the Great Commission at the end of Matthew 28.
00:08:33.860 We know that's the Great Commission text.
00:08:36.100 And it says, Jesus says to his disciples, he says,
00:08:39.520 All authority, okay, just catch that for a second.
00:08:43.620 All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.
00:08:48.160 All of it.
00:08:49.260 All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.
00:08:52.620 This is a direct reference to Jesus' governing, reigning, ruling power.
00:08:59.380 uh it's it's a it's easy to pass over but jesus the the second person of the of the trinity
00:09:06.720 has become the mediator uh between god and man you know and all authority has been given to him
00:09:13.960 in that those matters he is he is the chief in control and this makes him the lord of heaven
00:09:20.320 he's the lord of earth he's the lord of the church he's the lord of life he's the lord of light he's
00:09:26.280 the Lord of death. He's the Lord of nature, the Lord of the internet. He's the Lord of your health.
00:09:31.120 He's the Lord of disease. He's the Lord of your children. He's the Lord of everything, all things.
00:09:37.220 He's the Lord of those things. And so Jesus, God in the flesh is the Lord of all. Okay. The Lord
00:09:44.200 of all, just let that sink in for a second. The Lord of all in Isaiah 45, seven, God says,
00:09:50.040 I form light and create darkness I make well-being and create calamity I am the Lord who does all
00:09:59.860 these things okay did you catch that I make well-being and create calamity I am the Lord who
00:10:07.860 does all these things Jeremiah 32 27 says behold I am the Lord the God of all flesh is anything too
00:10:16.180 hard for me he asked that question and so too often we have this perspective that uh the enemy
00:10:23.860 or nature has gone rogue and poor god can't gain control over his creation um and he can't rule
00:10:34.060 over it because he doesn't know what's like how could god allow this to happen right no god knows
00:10:40.660 God directs and ordains all things to pass to work together for his purpose to be accomplished
00:10:49.340 in the world and I wish I had the variety of scriptures that talk about that all things are
00:10:54.440 going to come for his purpose they they do exist I just didn't put them in my notes here Ephesians
00:10:59.840 1 11 says in him we have obtained an inheritance having been predestined according to the purpose
00:11:07.600 of him who works all things okay that means all things i'm talking he he works everything like the
00:11:18.140 the the direction of the wind the the amount of movement that are in the leaves of that wind
00:11:25.960 in the trees all things according to the counsel of his will this is actually a sister verse to
00:11:32.180 the romans 8 28 verse that we all know uh and we know that god works all things together for those
00:11:37.800 who love him and are called all things for good for those who love him who are called according
00:11:43.460 to his purpose right um this is an important perspective i think god's sovereignty sometimes
00:11:51.340 gets lost and if you believe wrong about god you'll never be able to live strong with god
00:11:58.460 And so believing incorrectly about God's sovereignty is a big deal because you start to attribute certain activity in the world to the enemy or to nature as if God didn't have control over it.
00:12:16.240 And so do you remember last year's fires?
00:12:18.760 You know, they were down like in Redding area and then there were some down in.
00:12:23.220 They're everywhere, Idaho, Montana.
00:12:24.580 It was like the whole west side. 1.00
00:12:26.580 just on fire and they're the redding ones are really bad yeah and the malibu ones down there 1.00
00:12:30.760 there's many people died in those fires um do you remember the tsunami in 2004 uh 230 000 people 1.00
00:12:39.760 died in that tsunami and it happened actually on a sunday entire churches died as they were
00:12:47.280 meeting in their church building died as they they the the water came through um do you remember
00:12:54.620 Katrina. Katrina had 2,000 people died in Katrina. And so I want you to think about those natural
00:13:02.740 disasters. Last night, tornadoes came through and killed at least nine people. No, now last I heard
00:13:10.560 was like 90 something. I don't know. It's gone way up since nine. When I first woke up, it was nine
00:13:15.500 and then it jumped way up. But I think I've got that number wrong. So we have lots of deaths from
00:13:19.300 the nashville tornado that happened this morning as we're recording this um and i want you to take
00:13:25.760 that moment for a second all those things of nature and then i want you to compare that to
00:13:32.820 the verse that jesus says in matthew 8 27 it says and the men marveled saying what sort of man is
00:13:40.000 this that even the winds and sea obey him okay the wind and the sea obey god
00:13:48.240 they are in his control and authority and so these tornadoes and these tsunamis aren't happening
00:13:58.620 outside of god's purpose and plan for the world it's like he didn't know about it no yeah he
00:14:03.560 absolutely knew about it and he's actually working all things together for his purpose in the world
00:14:10.520 God is sovereign over the world.
00:14:13.600 He's sovereign over hurricanes.
00:14:14.880 He's sovereign over tornadoes.
00:14:16.060 He's sovereign over earthquakes.
00:14:17.340 He's sovereign.
00:14:18.520 He was sovereign over the black plague.
00:14:20.100 He was sovereign over the Ebola breakout that we had, I don't know, a year or two ago.
00:14:25.560 He's sovereign over the coronavirus, and he's sovereign over every other cell and molecule and atom that exists in this world.
00:14:31.780 Imagine if there was just one thing that God wasn't sovereign over.
00:14:36.520 Like, could God actually be God if that was the case?
00:14:39.900 I mean, the reality is that God is sovereign over all these things, and that's an important perspective to have.
00:14:48.000 Yeah, and what I expect a lot of people to be wondering, Dale, is if God is sovereign, is he the cause of all of these terrible things?
00:14:57.480 Where does Satan come into play in disease and natural disasters?
00:15:00.940 Because I think many people fear that Satan is somehow attacking them, and they feel that God just somehow doesn't know about it,
00:15:09.220 or is not intervening for some reason.
00:15:13.620 Can you help us understand the enemy's role within God's sovereignty?
00:15:18.420 Yeah.
00:15:19.480 First off, John Piper is probably one of the best people
00:15:22.340 that explains the roles between God's sovereignty and Satan's role.
00:15:28.900 And so if you want to go and look up some more extensive, deep thought on that,
00:15:34.200 you can do that.
00:15:35.360 I did a little bit of listening when I was preparing for this message.
00:15:38.100 I want to first back your eyes up to and your ears up to this verse Isaiah 45 7 that we just
00:15:45.160 talked about I form light and create darkness I make well-being and create calamity create
00:15:53.060 calamity I am the Lord who does all these things that said God uses the enemy Satan to accomplish
00:16:04.760 his purposes to bring him glory. We see this, and we know that God works together all things for good
00:16:12.180 for those who love him. But let's briefly just use Job as an example. Okay, if you've read chapter
00:16:19.800 one of Job, which is most people end up giving up after chapter one, because it goes into this long
00:16:27.860 30 some chapters 37 chapters of narrative between job and his three friends but chapter one is a
00:16:34.820 famous chapter and what a lot of people miss in chapter one is how job is attacked by satan
00:16:42.340 not only does god approve and permit satan to go and attack kill his family and his children
00:16:55.860 and inflict illness upon job so god permits his livestock everything takes all of his things
00:17:05.800 permits and approves but what a lot of people miss is that he actually god is the one that
00:17:13.520 actually suggests it in the job story he says the verse have you considered my servant job
00:17:19.640 you know thinking about the council in heaven of going man you definitely don't want the Lord
00:17:26.740 going hey have you considered your servant Veronica or my servant Veronica these this is
00:17:33.240 the example that the scriptures give to us in the book of Job if you haven't studied it it's an
00:17:38.680 extensive book on the search for understanding the meaning of suffering that's what this book
00:17:47.500 is about and if you if you've read the book you know that God doesn't give Job the answer that
00:17:52.940 he wants he doesn't give him why people why he suffers instead he spends basically two full
00:18:00.500 chapters it's chapter 30 or 38 and 39 responding to Job through a series of like never-ending
00:18:08.640 gigantic questions and they're questions like where were you when I laid the foundations of
00:18:16.380 the earth who determined its measurements have the gates of death been revealed to you where is the
00:18:22.700 way to the dwelling of light i'm just huge questions that job obviously has no answer for
00:18:30.920 basically what job or god is doing is he's revealing the the mass magnitude of difference
00:18:39.780 between him and job as high as the heavens are above the earth so are god's ways higher than
00:18:45.560 our ways and his thoughts higher than our thoughts. This is a revelation of that, of
00:18:50.620 you just get to the point where you go, I don't have answers to any of these things.
00:18:56.080 And God finishes in chapter 40 verses one through three. He says,
00:19:00.920 moreover, the Lord answered Job and said, shall the one who contends with the almighty correct
00:19:07.300 him? Capital H basically saying, shall the one who contends with me, correct me? He who rebukes
00:19:14.200 God let him answer it imagine God saying those words to you Job it says in verse 3 then Job
00:19:22.320 answered the Lord and said behold I am vile I'm vile who are you oh man to to stand before the
00:19:31.960 Lord and go why did you do that tornado why did this person die why did you allow 230,000 people
00:19:40.760 to die in this tsunami in 2004 who are we to ask god why we suffer is basically um have have we not
00:19:53.060 put our trust in god is the bigger question uh do we not believe that he is righteous and true
00:20:00.160 do you not believe that god is just and righteous and trustworthy and that he will work all things
00:20:09.860 together for good even if that means you're steven and you get stoned and your life is taken
00:20:17.020 and you didn't get that life into old age can you trust that god will work those things for his
00:20:24.000 purpose and that it'll be good for the saints and for his church i'll tell you what i am blessed by
00:20:32.060 several books written by people who had tragic deaths in the 16s and 1700s i i know veronica
00:20:38.580 has been blessed by women who have had many children die. And so you go, this is an amazing
00:20:45.780 thing that 250 years ago, a woman's trials of death for her children are actually helping
00:20:52.360 another Christian woman centuries later. God works together all things for good for those who love
00:20:58.740 him and who are called according to his purpose. Psalm 145 verse 8 says, the Lord is gracious and
00:21:06.040 merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. Ephesians 2, 4 through 10, but God who is
00:21:13.140 rich in mercy because of his great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our
00:21:18.600 trespasses, made us alive together with Christ. We serve a good God, a good God. Is it easy to see
00:21:26.920 that in the midst of trial and tragedy? No, but our only option is to go, Lord, I trust that you're
00:21:32.980 good and just I trust that you're merciful I trust that you're right I trust that you will do what is
00:21:37.680 right this I will lean on you are trustworthy father I can trust on you and so what's this
00:21:45.300 teaching us about fear and death this isn't a worry and fear how should we be thinking about
00:21:52.020 this so first God is not shocked when the earth quakes okay he's not shocked when diseases and
00:22:01.920 tragedies kill people. He's not shocked by these things. God is sovereign over your life. He is
00:22:07.940 sovereign over your death. And even Job says, you give and you take away after his children died.
00:22:16.740 Blessed be the name of the Lord. You give and you take away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.
00:22:24.180 So let me offer you some more scripture on God's sovereignty over your life
00:22:26.900 and your death. James 4, 13 through 15 says, come now, you who say, today or tomorrow, we will go to
00:22:36.260 such and such a city, spend a year there, buy and sell and make a profit. Verse 14, whereas you do
00:22:41.780 not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a
00:22:48.100 little time and then vanishes away. Verse 15, instead, you ought to say, if the Lord wills,
00:22:54.640 we shall live and do this or that.
00:22:58.000 We shall live.
00:22:58.960 If the Lord wills, we shall live.
00:23:01.980 Okay, catch that.
00:23:03.300 If the Lord wills, you might be alive tomorrow to go even do those things.
00:23:08.140 If the Lord wills that you live.
00:23:12.280 God has appointed every single person a time to live and a time to die.
00:23:18.380 Okay, is there anybody else that you would rather place that decision in the hands of?
00:23:24.640 Is there anybody else that you would rather have the timing and the process of your death rest upon anybody else but your Heavenly Father?
00:23:36.220 No, right?
00:23:37.460 I don't want that resting in my hands.
00:23:40.700 That is for sure.
00:23:42.560 I would do a selfish thing.
00:23:45.020 That's for sure.
00:23:48.660 Genesis 18.25 says,
00:23:50.520 Shall not the judge of all the earth do what is just?
00:23:55.280 Okay, remember this.
00:23:56.580 Shall not the judge of all the earth do what is just?
00:24:00.100 God is a just God.
00:24:01.520 He will do with my life what is just.
00:24:04.320 He will do with my life what is right and trustworthy and good for his purposes and good for his church.
00:24:12.020 That's what he'll do with my life.
00:24:13.580 And I trust that he will do that.
00:24:15.400 Whether that's death today, whether that's death in 40 years from now,
00:24:19.240 I trust that God is the judge of all the earth and that he will do right.
00:24:24.640 And so what I'm telling you is that you're not going to die until the Lord has appointed your death.
00:24:33.460 That's a bold statement.
00:24:35.680 You're not going to die until the Lord has appointed your death.
00:24:40.020 And God knows when you will die and God knows how you will die.
00:24:45.080 And this should give us hope, not fear.
00:24:48.160 It should give us hope and not fear.
00:24:50.300 You're not at the mercy of rampant situations.
00:24:55.800 You're not at the mercy of this disease that could come and get you.
00:25:00.420 You're not at the mercy of natural disaster.
00:25:02.640 You're not at the mercy of murderers and people who are,
00:25:05.460 you're not at the mercy of those things.
00:25:08.300 John Piper, in a podcast titled, How Do I Overcome My Fear of Death?
00:25:12.880 He makes a powerful statement.
00:25:14.700 He says, you are immortal until God's work for you is done on this earth.
00:25:20.060 I'm going to read that again.
00:25:21.400 You are immortal until God's work for you is done on this earth.
00:25:25.280 What does this mean?
00:25:27.200 Stop worrying.
00:25:29.420 Okay, stop worrying.
00:25:32.160 Enjoy your life.
00:25:34.920 Enjoy your life without fear.
00:25:36.400 This constant state of, I used to worry all the time that Veronica would go somewhere and that she would get in a car accident and that she would die.
00:25:45.080 I used to worry about my kids all the time that they were going to die.
00:25:50.060 And that they would get sick and they would die.
00:25:54.280 When the time comes for any of us to die,
00:25:57.080 who is going to thwart the plans of God?
00:26:00.240 Now, are we called to be wise?
00:26:02.940 Yes.
00:26:03.600 Are we called to be faithful?
00:26:06.020 Yes.
00:26:06.460 Are we called to be responsible with our bodies and decisions?
00:26:10.920 Yes.
00:26:12.000 But there's God's sovereignty and there's man's responsibility.
00:26:16.740 Ecclesiastes 3.1 says,
00:26:17.920 For everything, there is a season and a time for every matter under heaven, a time to be born and a time to die.
00:26:26.900 Job 14.5 says,
00:26:30.580 Since man's days are determined, and the number of his months is with you, and you have appointed his limits that he cannot pass.
00:26:40.420 Think about that.
00:26:41.480 You have a limit, a timeline on your life, and it's been appointed to you, and you cannot pass it.
00:26:50.860 Again, we're all called to be wise and faithful in this time, but God has set an appointed time
00:26:55.640 for all of us to die, and we get to rest in that. We get to rest in that. Matthew 10, 28-31.
00:27:04.100 We're almost wrapping it up here. It says, and do not fear those who can kill the body,
00:27:07.520 but cannot kill the soul. Rather, fear him who can destroy both the soul and body in hell.
00:27:12.740 And he goes on and explains here, verse 29, and are not two sparrows sold for a penny?
00:27:19.040 And not one of them will fall to the ground, die apart from your father. Not one of a sparrow
00:27:27.000 who has the value of a penny, none of them will fall to the ground apart from your father.
00:27:34.820 Verse 30, but even the hairs of your head are all numbered.
00:27:40.220 Fear not, therefore.
00:27:42.060 See, this is encouragement he's giving you.
00:27:45.560 Rest, child.
00:27:47.000 Fear not, therefore.
00:27:48.200 You are more valuable than many sparrows.
00:27:51.700 He's saying, if this is what God does for these things that are worth nothing, pennies,
00:27:59.280 then so much more his care is for you and his sovereignty over you and so we're not to fear
00:28:09.160 death our death in God's timing will be good and just and according to God's perfect will
00:28:14.280 you're not the keeper of your life isn't that a beautiful thing you're not the keeper of your life
00:28:18.900 that's a beautiful thing and this is the truth that's given so many Christians courage in the
00:28:25.180 face of the most extreme situations. You can go and take that trip and do that missionary work in
00:28:31.380 India. And you can fear that the only thing that's going to take your life is God's plan for your
00:28:37.740 death. You can rest in the fact of I'm going to go and I'm going to be wise. I'm going to make
00:28:43.680 faithful decisions. But at the end of the day, God is sovereign over all these things. He who is in
00:28:49.260 us is greater than he who is in the world. He's greater. He has power over the enemy. He has power
00:28:56.760 over our lives and our sovereignty. We're not going to shock God with our death. Oh, I didn't
00:29:03.960 expect that to happen. That's not what God's going to say. Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5, 8,
00:29:09.780 yes, we are of good courage, good courage, and we would rather be away from the body and at home
00:29:16.880 with the Lord. He would rather
00:29:18.740 be away from the body and home of the Lord.
00:29:20.780 And that gives him courage because he doesn't fear
00:29:22.880 death. He says, and to live is Christ
00:29:25.040 and to die is gain. 1.00
00:29:28.480 So Christian,
00:29:29.240 we have to remember that we have the hope of eternal
00:29:30.900 life. We
00:29:32.800 shouldn't be fearing death. We have the hope
00:29:34.860 of eternal life. You can rest
00:29:36.860 in eternal life.
00:29:39.040 If you live
00:29:40.000 tomorrow,
00:29:42.160 live for Christ. If you
00:29:44.780 die, go be with Christ.
00:29:46.880 It's a win-win situation.
00:29:49.080 So don't let the coronavirus or whatever it may be,
00:29:55.660 your fear of flying,
00:29:57.640 your fear of going to do that missionary project,
00:30:01.800 the fear of persecution,
00:30:02.760 don't let those fears take over you.
00:30:07.080 In respect of the disease stuff,
00:30:09.720 wash your hands and move on.
00:30:12.000 Okay?
00:30:12.460 Wash your hands, be wise, and move on.
00:30:15.880 Amen.
00:30:16.580 Amen.
00:30:16.880 so hopefully that episode was helpful for you i know it was a lot of dale talking but
00:30:21.160 i was the one i don't mind i was the one that did most of the studying on that today
00:30:25.580 um so thank you guys for listening i hope that's edifying for you guys and um
00:30:31.360 on that note we will see you guys next wednesday and we're gonna have a great show
00:30:39.040 get ready for it on prayer all right take care see ya