Build a Life God Can Trust

0:00:00 – (Steve Gray): Well, everybody, what time is it? Is it time for the Rapture? Is it time for the end of the world? Nope. It’s time for you to leave your legacy and make something of your life. And I’m going to tell you how to get it on the next More Faith, More Life podcast. You were made for more than the status quo. I’m Pastor Steve Gray and this is the More Faith, More Life podcast. This podcast is for Christians with an ambitious heart who want to be more for their family, do more with their career, and see more of God’s promises in their life.

0:00:30 – (Steve Gray): I’ve spent many years as a worship artist, minister, nonprofit leader, bold truth speaker, and most importantly, father and spouse. When I was in my early 40s, I was craving more. More from God and more from life. I’d done everything I was supposed to do. My life was good, but it wasn’t good enough. So I spent the following years diving into the word of God and searching for the biblical principles that would bring me closer to God and help my purpose and life flourish.

0:01:00 – (Steve Gray): That’s what I want to share with you. In every episode, you’ll get practical tools based on real life experiences that you can put into action to redefine your faith and ultimately your life. So if you’re ready to do more, subscribe to More Faith, More Life and hear an unfiltered biblical truth every week. It’s time to be and experience more. Hello everyone and welcome to another More Faith More Life podcast. I’m glad to be hosting with Kathy again this week. You were out last week, but you’re back this week and we’re going to continue.

0:01:35 – (Steve Gray): Actually, we’re not going to continue. We’re actually going to finish up what you’ve been working on and try to put a conclusion on it. So why don’t you explain again to those that might not know or those that need to be reminded what we’ve been working on for a number of weeks and then we’re going to switch to some new stuff after next week. But that great stuff. But, but right now, why don’t you explain the project you’ve been working on?

0:01:55 – (Kathy Gray): Well, I’ve been working on capturing your legacy. And the legacy started way back when you just first started with the Lord and kind of going through all the steps, the character growth, the faith adventures, how you learned to hear the voice of the Lord, be led by the Lord, how you became someone that God entrusted to major world touching revivals to what is your story? Because there’s so many people, they don’t really know everything, how you became you.

0:02:28 – (Kathy Gray): And yet there’s a lot of principles and things that can help and something to pass on to the next generations. And so I just. I’ve loved it. I’ve loved doing this and watching and reflecting and reminiscing back. Different adventures and challenges that have made you who you are, but also who you are has made many others who they are. And I want that to continue.

0:02:55 – (Steve Gray): And I often explain this to. You know, it’s like kind of embarrassing for me, like legacy. Like, why would you. Who am I? Am I better than somebody else? Or that. But I think just to re. Explain that is my background. We talked a little bit yesterday. We just had a discussion about things about my early life before I was a Christian that you didn’t even know about. And I just was sharing stuff with you that difficulties and things that are other people didn’t go through.

0:03:25 – (Steve Gray): Let’s just say that. Right. And just normal people. I think the more I talked about my past, the more abnormal you started thinking I was. I saw your face.

0:03:34 – (Kathy Gray): I know.

0:03:35 – (Steve Gray): But anyway. And you know, my dad dies, I just turned 16 and the different things, the different health things even, and just stuff. And yet out of that came a flourishing with the spirit of God that came on me. And so then out of nothing, nothing, God made something to where now I’ve been able to have songs played on the radio, songwriter won awards, I’ve won three Emmys, I’ve got published books. I mean, the list just goes on and on. And today we’re going to talk about something else.

0:04:11 – (Steve Gray): Filmmaker and talk about that legacy. Made a film that did okay. You know, and so there’s a big. It’s not just like, tell your legacy because you want to talk about me. There’s. There’s milestones in it that I came from nothing.

0:04:26 – (Kathy Gray): Right.

0:04:26 – (Steve Gray): I’m very poor. I. I know what it is to beg for food. Before I was a Christian, Obviously, I was 17 years old and I’m begging for food. So to go from there to where God has taken us now to touch the world, it’s worth telling the story. So it has nothing to do with any pride or anything with me. It’s just. It’s worth telling because there’s other people that need to realize that God’s trying to build a legacy for your life.

0:04:54 – (Kathy Gray): And people are your legacy. It’s not what you’ve done. My book, it’s who you are, who you’ve become. And all the people that you have touched, their lives, their souls and inspired them. And I remember before I get you talking here, I remember years ago in our when we were filled with the Holy Spirit and we were trying to move with God and we were so fresh and raw and full of faith and zeal and we wanted someone to guide us.

0:05:21 – (Kathy Gray): We needed a teacher. We needed a godly, more mature, experienced man of God to come alongside and give guidance. And finally we were around one wonderful that Sister Louise Copeland who had really inspired our lives. An old line Pentecostal woman who had been born blind and healed when she was six years old. And you said to her, sister Copeland, I need a Paul in my life. I need someone that I can be a Timothy to and I need someone, I’m a Timothy and I need a Paul.

0:06:00 – (Kathy Gray): And she looked right at you with those bright blazing blue eyes that could see and she said, you’re never going to have one. You need to become one.

0:06:10 – (Steve Gray): Yeah, you’re going to have to become one.

0:06:11 – (Kathy Gray): You’re going to have to become one. And that is why I want to do this. Yeah, you could have done anything, Steve, but who you have become is your legacy. And there’s so many millions of young men, I’m just getting emotional now, but there’s so many looking at our nation nowadays that the young men that need to be raised up and into truth and righteousness and hope and a future and courage and godliness and they need you, they need a Steve Gray, they need a Paul.

0:06:48 – (Kathy Gray): And so I believe capturing these principles and getting these videos out and getting a book going can have a real impact because there’s two young men sitting right here with us, Steve, and they need a Paul.

0:07:02 – (Steve Gray): I think you’re right. It’s easy to get people’s attention by saying I got this award or I won that or I wrote that or whatever. But really what I really do through all that is convince people, people, not just young men, but convince people around the world that commitment, loyalty, sacrifice, generosity, all those words that dying to self that we’ve lost in modern day Christianity is worth it. And it puts you in a different place with God and it’s what he always intended. But we’ve lost it through the way where we’ve got more commercialism.

0:07:38 – (Steve Gray): We have what I’ve called the commercialized Jesus and not the real authentic Jesus because it’s the accepted one, you know, and it’s just, well, you know, makes just. We just want to take care of you and make life easy for you and that’s what, that’s the Jesus people know and yet he didn’t make it easy for himself and others through the ages. And I try to make a different path. That’s really the legacy of it. Yes, well, but we were talking about, let’s pick it up where we left off. Where I left off last week, I got us through the Kansas City Revival of 2008 till 11.

0:08:16 – (Steve Gray): A little past that, three and a half years. Three years being on the television network around the world, live and live, 90 minutes live every Friday night for three years. And that affected millions around the world in 200 countries. You’re just going to affect a lot of people. And so we did our duty with that, and we felt like then, once I did that, I explained last week that I knew it was time to end, the network knew it was time to end, but it was because I felt like I’ve said it, people had a chance to hear it. I’ve made it very plain, if I go past this, it’s going to almost be overkill or begging or pleading.

0:08:56 – (Steve Gray): And I said, now, you know, now it’s time to react, and I’m not going to tell you anymore, you know. So we went off with that. Although revival continued, and our church still has revival roots, you can tell our church still is a fiery church and very enthusiastic. It’s not like. I mean, people still come and say, I’ve never seen anything like this, but it’s not exactly what it was, and we’re heading toward what it should be.

0:09:21 – (Steve Gray): But in the meantime. So the revival days ended and we began to settle into, what do we do now? What you do with our church? What do we do now? And I had Steve’s big idea. I don’t know. I can’t really explain it why, but I decided I’d done all these things, and all of a sudden I decided I wanted to make a movie after we had the Steve and Cathy show that won awards and won the three Emmys. And so, Kathy, when I thought about making a movie, my good friend Brad, who had produced movies with Robert Duvall, 14 movies, as a matter of fact, he came and he was a guest on our Stephen Cathy Show. And that’s how I got to know him and he got to know us.

0:10:04 – (Steve Gray): And it really influenced his life and decisions that he made in his life. And then he began to influence me and saying, you know, I’ve made a lot of films. You ought to consider trying to write a screenplay. So I had hit or miss. I had to learn. I had to grow, you know, rewrite and write and rewrite. And then finally it got down to I finished. But you can always make it better. And you can always make it better. And finally he said, well, if we’re going to do this, we need to make a decision. We’re going to do it. So I said, okay, let’ do it.

0:10:30 – (Steve Gray): And so we rushed and we got. And I made a decision that, well, if we’re going to make a film, and it was called Three Blind Saints, and I thought I’m going to try because the Stephen Cathy show had a lot of humor in it. So I’m going to try to put Christian humor or satire or whatever in it and still have a message. So, as you know, I picked three guys and they get themselves in trouble and the law makes them go work in a church and they don’t have a pastor, so they make him the pastor and the youth leader and the choir director.

0:11:00 – (Steve Gray): And it’s all a spoof, you know, it’s not really true, obviously, but. And how they get converted and change their mind about God. Especially the, the pastor guy, he doesn’t even sure he believes in God. The guy that they made, the pastor, and then he has an experience and he believes in God and it turns and the whole thing. But anyway, it did pretty well, called Three Blind Saints. People can still find it on Amazon or someplace. It’s probably free now. You know, obviously they, if you get another movie, they’ll tag that one on or whatever you can find it.

0:11:31 – (Steve Gray): But it did well, I think it did get 86 on rotten tomatoes or something like that, which was not too bad. And. But it was really the first film of its kind that brought humor. Now they have lots of humor, you know, in religious movies and stuff. But in 2011 and 12, when I was doing it and, and out after that, you know, there wasn’t, it was all pretty serious movies. And another thing I, the, the Christian movies, though, the one thing I noticed in every time I watched a Christian music movie, I didn’t recognize anybody. I didn’t, you know, anybody. So I thought if we’re going to do it, I want to tap into Hollywood for two reasons. I want to bring some recognizable people in, but I want to, I want to influence them and see can I influence them with my life and our church, because they did attend our church while they were here. So we, we shot it here in Kansas City, Lee Summit, but we brought in the actors almost all. There was some local, but the main actors all came. And Barry Corbin, who you can see on TV now, he’s still on TV if you look up Barry Corbin, he’s in it.

0:12:33 – (Steve Gray): And Richard Speight Jr. People recognize and he’s big in other things and others I could name, but any. Anyway, and I brought in, so I brought in Hollywood actors that you recognize, experienced, but the team that put the film together, where a lot of volunteers had never done a film before like myself, or directed a film as we did. And so it did really, really well. But then we would go afterwards, we’d go out to Hollywood and meet with people before and afterwards. And can we influence Hollywood people with what God’s doing in our lives? So Kathy, I learned that you can reach people in Hollywood, but they, you, you can’t do it through traditional way because they expect you to start talking about heaven and hell and do you know you’re a sinner and all that. And I did none of that.

0:13:21 – (Steve Gray): I just talked about the presence of God and what God will do in their life now. What’s the now God? And a lot of them never believed in the now God. It was all that other stuff. And they began to respond and even when we were there and they showed clips of the movie and they’d show clips of even the Steve and Cathy show and we were able to reach the unreachable, the people that you wouldn’t think that alternate lifestyles that are really different lifestyles than us, but they listened and they appreciated it and they said we’d never heard anything like this before.

0:13:54 – (Steve Gray): And so I began to think, well, we can really influence the people that were in the movie, that were from Hollywood. Attended our church a couple of times and it was great. You know, we didn’t have any opposition and they appreciated us and I appreciated them and I wasn’t trying to turn them into me. I just wanted them to reach out and experience the living God, you know, in their own personal lives. And that God still comes down and helps us. And that’s the real gospel as you know, it’s not us going somewhere else.

0:14:27 – (Steve Gray): If you start from the Bible all the way through, it’s God comes down to help people and to help his creation. And so I, you know, once they heard that I started talking and they began to get hungry for God to come down like everybody does. And I remember being in Hollywood and talking to people and actors and non-actors like that and I would start sometimes asking like, have you ever wondered if maybe God would talk to you?

0:14:54 – (Steve Gray): If you knew it was God talking to you, would you want him to talk to you? Would you want to hear from God? And I think everybody I Met said, yeah, I wouldn’t mind hearing from God if I could. Knew it was God, you know. And so they weren’t anti God, but they were anti religion that was trying to mold them and let them know how bad they were first. And the reason you want to become a Christian is cause you’re so bad.

0:15:17 – (Steve Gray): And that’s not the way it is in the Bible. So you want to become a Christian because you want to meet God and you want God to come down through Jesus Christ and you want to live a life through somebody else. So anyway, it really worked for us. And from there then, now we’re at a point where the movie came out and it did well. And we forgot all about that then and continued on to develop the legacy. And now we’re looking forward.

0:15:45 – (Steve Gray): We were looking forward. And then, as you know, then the pandemic hit and everything shut down. And I can’t even hardly believe we even went through that where we’re standing in church when we could come together. And weren’t we all. We had to wear masks and stand six feet apart and try to worship, mumbling through those masks. And then we had people in our church that cheated, of course, or they didn’t want to wear a mask. And that was, you know, whatever.

0:16:12 – (Steve Gray): And then we got a break from the city where the city told us we were doing our rules so well that we didn’t have to wear masks. And so we started worshiping. So we worked our way through it. And then, you know, people had to stay home. And we lost people to staying home. We. They never came back. And that’s not our church. I mean, everybody lost people because they liked. They found out how to do church in their pajamas and can’t get them to put. Put their Sunday clothes on anymore. So.

0:16:41 – (Steve Gray): So we go through those years, but we survived. And we’re still surviving. We’re still recuperating. Other churches are too, of a new day, post pandemic day, when now we’re seeing rumblings of revival again because people are desiring to get rid of the show showmanship and all the entertainment that we’re trying to do in church to try to get people to come or all the programs that we want. And now we need, instead of programs, like I said, we need the presence of God.

0:17:10 – (Steve Gray): We need people to experience God. We need to go to a church that God attends, you know, and we experience the real living God, not just say, God’s in the house and everybody leaves unchanged. So that’s kind of where we are in history. We’re starting A new legacy. And people need to realize that God would like to do a legacy through them, too. And I’m continuing on. We have a new book we’re working on right now just on revival.

0:17:37 – (Steve Gray): We have Mighty Like Gideon. They should get that because there’s a whole lot of teachings in that that you’re not going to get anyplace else from my legacy. But this new one, I’m really excited about too, because it really hones down.

0:17:51 – (Kathy Gray): It’ll be very impactful.

0:17:52 – (Steve Gray): Yeah, we need revival.

0:17:54 – (Kathy Gray): Why revival matters.

0:17:55 – (Steve Gray): Why revival matters. And we’re getting to the point where people are wanting something fresh, whether they know, whether they call it revival, renewal, awakening, whatever they title it. It’s. It’s people wanting more than what they have and either get it or give up. You know, they’re kind of, I either want to get it or I want to give up. I want to go or I want to quit one or the other with God. And so that’s where this book is in our lives.

0:18:22 – (Steve Gray): And even this podcast, More Faith More Life is telling. Get more faith. Get your faith going. Faith comes by hearing the word of God. And it’s the living word of God. Not just somebody talking, but the real word of God, that somebody knows how to present it to you, that it’s real life and motivation and encouragement and understanding. Get wisdom, get understanding, the Bible says, and you get understanding about life and what life’s about.

0:18:49 – (Steve Gray): That’s where we’re going. And people are wanting it. College kids are wanting it, but not just them. Retirement people are like, what now? I’m an empty nester? What do I do now? And some of the empty nesters, their kids are wanting more of God and they didn’t even grow up in church. So it’s a new day. And it’s a day to start their legacy and start believing that they need to hone in. Hone in. Narrow your life, narrow it. You’ll be so much happier.

0:19:16 – (Steve Gray): This wide way is. It’s not only dangerous, it just gets you wandering. And then your kids are wandering and you don’t have the relationship. So narrow it down. Stop being afraid that if you love God with all your heart, that you’re going to lose your kids. You love God. That’s going to make you a lover of people. A lover of God is a lover of people. It makes you a better parent. It makes you a better person. It makes you a better husband and better wife. Instead of going to say a marriage seminar, just get more of God.

0:19:48 – (Kathy Gray): Amen.

0:19:48 – (Steve Gray): More faith brings more Life. Jesus came to give us life to the fullest measure. And, and then marriages work, you know, so, so I’m trying to bring people to that point. That’s where we are now is we’re talking about the reviving power of God where revival and it’s. And it. Revival is such a big subject that people think they know it and they don’t know it. But it’s really, it’s a revival of God himself.

0:20:16 – (Steve Gray): It’s reviving God himself in us. Right, because we, we get involved in life, we lose our way, we get beat up by life, we compromise and all that. And all that just hardens us and deadens us to where, ah, now we’re going to church or not going to church anymore and we’re just not getting it. And so more faith, more life is to encourage you to narrow your life down. You know, narrow it down, get. You don’t have to have all, all the entertainment you have and every hour, entertaining yourself, eating and entertaining, eating and entertaining, you know, and entertainment. But narrow it down. Take some time for prayer.

0:20:56 – (Steve Gray): Try to start talking to your kids. And it’s not going to be easy if all they’ve been on their phone and all they’ve been playing games and video games and playing on their phone, their hearts get hardened to God and it’s hard to start. But start with, start with the blessings. Our lives are going to be blessed if we’ll start giving some God attention. God’s going to give us attention and it’s going to make us feel better. We’re going to be blessed.

0:21:21 – (Steve Gray): We’ll prosper in our relationships. We’ll prosper financially. We’ll prosper, prosper, prosper in every area of our life. And you need to be convinced of that. And when you get convinced of it, you can convince other people. I’m convinced of it. You know, I’m absolutely sure it works to narrow. The narrow way works and it’s not horrible. It’s a joyful way because the joy of the Lord becomes your strength.

0:21:45 – (Steve Gray): All the voices that you hear and all the tormentors that try to get in us and all the fears that try to get the narrow way knocks all that out. The road is too narrow for fear. The road is too narrow to be so selfish. The world is too narrow to be worried and anxious all the time or fighting for your rights and fighting. It’s too narrow, it’s narrowing it down and closing the gap on all these things are trying to get our attention and distort life and ruin our relationships and harm us goes away.

0:22:18 – (Steve Gray): In that same passage where he says, I’ve come to give you more life, it says, but there’s another one that comes to kill and steal and destroy. And that’s what he wants to stop in your life. He wants to stop it. So get your faith going, read your Bible, talk to your kids, talk to your wife, talk to your friends. And you don’t have to be over religious. Remember, don’t start talking about heaven and hell.

0:22:41 – (Steve Gray): Talk about life. He came to give you a better life, more life, to the fullest measure. And you can start winning people that really want to serve the Lord. A lot of people, Kathy, will do it just because they don’t want to go to hell. And that doesn’t make a good convert because they’re just doing it for themselves. But the real person who says, I want to live for somebody else, I want to let Jesus live through me and I want to live for him, then you’ve got a real convert and someone who can change the world and leave a legacy for somebody else. Till next time. Bye-bye.