Secrets for the Seekers

0:00:00 – (Steve Gray): Hey, have you ever heard a sermon and it’s like you’ve heard it and heard it and heard it and there’s nothing new and no, you kind of start dozing off. Well, I’m going to teach you today on today’s podcast, More Faith, More Life. How to dig out the secrets and mysteries that’ll change your life and others forever.

0:00:14 – (Steve Gray): 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. I’ve spent many years as a worship artist, minister, non-profit leader, bold truth speaker, and most importantly, father and spouse.

0:00:39 – (Steve Gray): 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. 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.

0:01:14 – (Steve Gray): So if you’re ready to do more, so subscribe to More Faith, More Life and hear an unfiltered biblical truth every week. It’s time to be and experience more.

0:01:26 – (Steve Gray): Hello everyone, and welcome to another More Faith, More Life podcast. I’m Steve Gray. Here’s Kathy, my wife, and we’re excited to start a new series. Yes, we’ve been doing, we’ve been doing on our podcast, we’ve been doing parables every week and all from Luke. Obviously we didn’t get them all in, but we sort of got parabled out. We got the idea, if you didn’t get those, I hope you hear the value. I did a parable just recently somewhere, one of those parables afterwards, we had people that had been in church for years and years and they said, you said things we’ve never heard before.

0:02:00 – (Steve Gray): Other people can. It’s not hidden information that others can’t have. But it seems like people just stick to their pattern and they’re not furthering their education where they develop a relationship with God that, that God has, he has mysteries. And doesn’t he say, I reveal my mysteries or my secrets? He says to the children, well, if you think everybody’s a child of God, then Everybody’s going to know the secrets. But that’s not right. Children mean the special relationship I have that they treat me like a father.

0:02:32 – (Steve Gray): I tell them like a father tells his children things that he doesn’t tell everybody else.

0:02:36 – (Kathy Gray): That’s right.

0:02:37 – (Steve Gray): The father teaches his children. He doesn’t teach everybody else’s children.

0:02:41 – (Kathy Gray): That’s right.

0:02:42 – (Steve Gray): And that’s what that means. So he unlocks mysteries and secrets. And if you, if you work on your relationship with God enough, intimate enough and, and be decisive and you know, seek the Lord and, and, and those who seek the Lord, please the Lord, you know, and believe that he’s a rewarder of those that diligently seek him and you do that with your life, then these things get open to you.

0:03:10 – (Kathy Gray): That’s right.

0:03:11 – (Steve Gray): Now though, the problem is some people don’t have a schedule like a pastor, like I do have. Of course my schedule’s packed, but still my profession is in the spirit realm, the word of God. Right. Sharing it with others, helping other people understand the kingdom of God. So the people that don’t have the time, maybe in life, maybe they have a bunch of kids now and maybe later in life or their job or their time.

0:03:37 – (Steve Gray): That’s why you need to have a friend in the ministry, so to speak.

0:03:40 – (Kathy Gray): That’s right.

0:03:40 – (Steve Gray): That takes the time to unlock the mysteries for you and share them with you. This book, Kathy, Mighty Like Gideon, I didn’t write the whole thing. I wrote half of it and my son in law, J.D. king, a pastor at Revive Church, wrote the other half. He’s got great insights that are a little bit different than mine. Mine is a lot more unlocking what I talked about secrets, mysteries, Bible passages and ideas and thoughts that you just, it didn’t compute because people are locked into their busy schedules. Pastors kind of preach the same, you know, they preach their denominational boundaries and like that.

0:04:14 – (Steve Gray): And so that’s why that book is so valuable. The other books there are the same, you know, if you get my absurd religion I wrote yes. By which I make my living, you’re going to hear things that, oh, they’re like kind of like secrets that pastors aren’t supposed to tell you. Stuff like that. If you only knew. It’s been translated. We’re thankful. It’s been translated now into the Finnish language. It’ll be translated into Swedish and then later German, that’s, it’s short, five chapters or six. Whichever it is, you can get that and unlock more. So that’s what I’m doing.

0:04:44 – (Steve Gray): That’s what we do now. You’ve been doing some unlocking of mysteries too. Tell us about that.

0:04:49 – (Kathy Gray): Yeah, well, I’ve been thinking and considering how in the world did you get all these mysteries and everything? And you, you were not an overnight sensation with pulling out and gleaning from the Lord and from the Word and the Holy Spirit everything that you now can produce and that you have produced over the years. And you know, Steve, you’re preaching and your teaching has touched not only churches, but nations and many nationalities and you’ve reached in and actually your teaching, your teaching has changed a lot of churches.

0:05:23 – (Kathy Gray): When you would come to town and you would share from the word of God and the light would come on, not just for the pastors and the leaders, but in the lives and hearts of the people. And of course, I’ve been married to you for 50 years now. And it’s just when I’ve been thinking and reflecting back who you have become and how you have done it. And you’ve taken specific steps, maybe not consciously, but you know, been led by the Spirit since the beginning when you were filled with the Holy Spirit and you stood up and you said, I’ve been called to preach.

0:05:59 – (Kathy Gray): And then somehow, instinctively, you knew you had to have something to say beyond yourself, you had to have something to preach. And I’ve watched you over the years just developing and becoming who you are to bring all these up, to unlock Bible mysteries and help people to see the focus of the kingdom, truly the kingdom. And so I was thinking, I would love it if you would kind of share a little bit of your story and so people can understand you’ve paid a price and you’ve gone through experiences and you’ve progressed and progressed for so many years now. But I like to think the first memory I have really of watching you and realizing my husband, he’s studying, he’s got the word of God. And I was teaching. We weren’t in the full time ministry yet and I was teaching first grade 40 miles away.

0:06:57 – (Kathy Gray): And whenever I would get home during that time, I won’t go into the whole story. You worked for the Methodist church in the morning, then they’d send you home and you have plenty of free time in the afternoon. But I would walk in the front door and say, look at you. And you would be on your nose, literally.

0:07:16 – (Steve Gray): I’m telling the story.

0:07:18 – (Kathy Gray): Well, no, but this is my first memory. I know, okay, this is my memory. And you have so many others.

0:07:24 – (Steve Gray): No, I can see that picture. I know. What, you walked in the door and.

0:07:27 – (Kathy Gray): There it was, yeah. And on that ugly red carpet in that rental duplex. But that’s beside the point. But that’s one of my first memories of how you learned and grew in the Lord and the hunger and the sincerity and the humility. And often, you know, you would be crying out to God. But I wonder if you could kind of start there and share with us. How did you. How did you grow in the Lord? What were your early.

0:07:53 – (Kathy Gray): Okay, I think people would love to hear your early experiences.

0:07:56 – (Steve Gray): Okay. So I was blessed in an unusual way. My first job was at a Methodist church. Now that means I’m hearing Methodist sermons. And I grew up on Methodist sermons. I also grew up on some Nazarene sermons, but I dropped out of Church in 8th grade. At this point now, I would have been about. That you’re talking about. I would have been about 25. Let’s just say about 25. And so the church I grew up in needed an assistant to help the pastor. He was having some physical problems, so they asked if they could hire me.

0:08:26 – (Steve Gray): And I think they paid me the same amount of money that I was paid as a music teacher. It wasn’t a lot of money, but they matched it. And I was only there a year. But the pastor, the minister there, you know, he didn’t really want to admit that he needed help. So I’d come in the mornings, I’d do some little stuff, and then I go home for lunch. Then I come back. But they’d usually send me home about 1 or 1:30. I’d come back for 30 minutes or so. They’d say, we don’t have any more work.

0:08:51 – (Steve Gray): We’re done. And so they gave me the opportunity to go home. And when I went home, rather than just relax or go fishing or whatever, I would use that time to seek the Lord. And that’s the time you’re talking about. One of the things that I got jealous about in a not a bad way. I didn’t have bad jealousy, but it seemed like there were so many young men my age whose fathers were in the ministry, who were already pastors or denominational leaders or evangelists. And then there’s their sons who had all those roots.

0:09:19 – (Steve Gray): I’m realizing now that wasn’t necessarily good because not of them turned out so good. But at the time, I thought, I wish I had somebody to help me. And I had nobody to help me. I had no father. Of course, my father had been dead for a number of years, and I had nobody. But it was the opportunity for me. Okay, I’M going to have to dig this out for myself. Now the other thing I want to say for other people, especially guys, I was not a particularly outstanding student through high school or college. The being is I made it through. My grades were okay. Especially in high school. I made it okay. And college. Then I got better and better. But there was a reason. Because you got me studying. But I never studied before as you.

0:09:59 – (Steve Gray): I might cram a little bit and we tell the joke like I would go through a whole semester and not even. Never even pick up my books, you know, I didn’t never pick up the books. And then I go take the final. That’s it. And that went on for about three years. Almost three and a half. Three, Two and a half to three years till I met you and I started studying. Then my grade point went up to 4.0, thanks to you probably.

0:10:19 – (Kathy Gray): But well, remember I did offer a promise or a threat. I said, I’m not going to spend any time with you till I go to the library every day and study and dig into my classes. So you wanted to be with me?

0:10:32 – (Steve Gray): Yeah. So I went to the library.

0:10:33 – (Kathy Gray): You went to the library and you learned to study.

0:10:35 – (Steve Gray): But I wasn’t rooted in reading books. Our granddaughter is amazed. She said, how did you make it through high school? She said, what books did you read? Because they have a book. I can’t. That one about the wolf. There was a. I don’t know. I can’t remember. I read part of that book and the Shakespeare ones? Nah.

0:10:52 – (Kathy Gray): Little Red Riding Hood?

0:10:53 – (Steve Gray): No, no. Anyway, they made a movie out of it. But anyway. And she said, how did you make that? I said I didn’t read it. And I would just get other people and girls to write papers for me or go take some. You know, go find some paper somewhere. I don’t know how, but I never wrote a term paper ever. You didn’t even college. Even though you’re. You know this ways. Another secret I can tell people. Do you know you have. What’s that test you have to take in high school before you can go to college? Sat, act, whatever it is.

0:11:26 – (Steve Gray): And you have to take it. I never took mine ever. So I went to college. I was a freshman. I still hadn’t taken it. My sophomore year they came to me and said, look, you have to take this test and stay into college. And I’m a sophomore and never took it. And I still got into college. How do you do that? So one Saturday morning, had to show up like 8 o’ clock at 7:30. 8 o’ clock, and I’m drowsing in. You have to bring your pencils and all that stuff.

0:11:51 – (Steve Gray): Everybody in there is a. Is a senior in high school except me. So I’m walking in there. Don’t worry about it, man. Don’t worry about it. I’m a sophomore. I’ve been here two years, taking the test. Just when it starts, just start. What I did that day, I just. I just wrote in this. I just wrote a song for, like, zero. I’ll mark in one. Here. I’ll mark in two. I didn’t even read the questions. And I graduated.

0:12:15 – (Kathy Gray): Yeah.

0:12:16 – (Steve Gray): Okay. The reason I’m setting that up is that’s who I was. Up to the time when I was saved and filled with the Holy Spirit. I was still involved in drinking and things. I toned it down. I was married five months to you, so I toned it down. Wanted to be a sort of a husband. So I wasn’t working, and I quit the bars and nightclubs. Because I was teaching now, so I didn’t want to do that. But still, the ability to comprehend and read and study and want to know and hold a book and actually read a book was not in my life.

0:12:47 – (Steve Gray): So when I got saved and filled with the Holy Spirit and I stood up and said, I’ve been called to preach, that changed. It wasn’t that I became a great student. I had a great hunger, and hunger will lead you wherever. And I started reading the Bible and I started reading books, books, books, good ones on all kinds of subjects. And I don’t know if I was a fast reader or slow reader, but I tried to absorb and absorb. And you noticed then over time, spiritually, as a person, you felt like I was starting to run a little ahead of you. Cause you’re very studious. And you grew up in a different kind of home than I did.

0:13:25 – (Steve Gray): And I think you felt like, he’s kind. He’s moving on here. He’s moving on. And so, yes, so those days, the Methodist would send me home. I would lay on the floor. You’re right. It was a big, thick, ugly red carpet that you didn’t like. But we had a home. We didn’t have a home before that. We were homeless for about three months. But anyway. And I laid on the floor. I would play some Christian music. We bought a cheap stereo, you know, and cheap speakers. I’d set it there, and I would get a gospel record. I don’t know what I did. And play music, lay on the floor, read my Bible.

0:14:03 – (Steve Gray): I try to. Sometimes I try to write some lyrics or scripture or something, you know, because I had a music background. But I would lay on the floor and I read it and I cry out and try to understand it, and I’d read it and try to understand it. Now what changed my life that will maybe change their lives? There’s a difference. I was a teacher in high school and I taught kids and a lot of them got saved and filled with the spirit and all that while I was still a teacher. And now when I’m not a teacher, I’m searching, trying to find my way in the ministry. And I work at a church.

0:14:31 – (Steve Gray): And so I don’t really have anybody during the week to talk to, to teach, just on Sunday. And it was a Methodist church, so it was a little limited, you know, but I got, I started thinking like, well, I’ll read this, but how can I read this to help somebody else understand something? So I really wasn’t reading it. Like, oh, God, I’m such a mess. And we don’t know how much, we don’t know how much money we’re going to make. And, you know, you just had a new job as a first grade teacher and I’m working at this church and we don’t own this house and Kathy doesn’t like it that well anyway.

0:15:02 – (Steve Gray): And, you know, are we going to pay our bills? Are we going to do the, you know, all about me? All about me, all about me. Now what I did is I switched my preaching to make it all about you. But I didn’t make it all. Or somebody, another person. So I’m going to start searching the Bible for other people. And what I don’t want to do is so they don’t have to make it all about themselves, they can make it all about Jesus, they can serve. And then, and I’ll dig this out for you. I’ll try to find things to help you.

0:15:31 – (Steve Gray): So when you are, you are struggling financially or emotionally or your past or abuse or whatever, whatever, whatever, then I’m going to learn how to come and say, listen, I found a clue that might help you in your finances or whatever, right? Or just be closer to the Lord. So I started read. I don’t, I didn’t do it as consciously, but I just did it. And I didn’t say, this is what I’m going to do. I know now looking back my mind, maybe it was the teacher in me. I’m reading the Bible for somebody else to help somebody else.

0:16:03 – (Steve Gray): And of course it helped me because I got to get it too, but I just wasn’t Trying to look for something to help me. And so those few times, then the first time I got. I think we. I spoke. You remember they had women’s aglow meetings back then?

0:16:19 – (Kathy Gray): Yes.

0:16:20 – (Steve Gray): And we would always go to what was the men’s full gospel. Gospel businessmen, we’d go to those and we would sing. They wouldn’t let me speak because I too fresh. But we would sing. They’d let us sing because we were musical. But a women’s AGLOW meeting that met down at a little bookstore. Maybe there would be 10 ladies there. And one day they asked me to speak and come and I’m telling you, I probably spoke an hour and a half, green as could be.

0:16:47 – (Steve Gray): But I had spent time. I read and read. I read. I can’t remember exactly who I was reading. I’ll remember in a minute. But the Bible and books and glean and glean. And then I just took it and went and poured it out. And they were like, amazed. How do you know all this stuff? Well, I. I studied it. I. I got in me. But I did it to come and speak to you. I didn’t come to help my own life. I knew I would benefit. But I’m doing it for you, for somebody else and to glorify the Lord, to help you understand. And I knew nothing. I had no teachers. I knew nothing. I had no Bible.

0:17:20 – (Steve Gray): Like, I didn’t even know when God spoke to me once about a scripture that said. I saw this thing and it said, look at Second Kings. It said, two Kings six. Two Kings six. I kept seeing. I didn’t know, what does this mean? I called a lady, she says, well, don’t you know there’s a second Kings in the Bible? Book 6. Go read it. I didn’t even know there was second Kings in the Bible. That’s how raw I was, Right. But I studied and studied.

0:17:44 – (Steve Gray): Then a Methodist church, because I’m at a Methodist church. The pastor, leader, minister went on vacation and they used to have a. They called it a lay. Lay pastor day or whatever. Well, so I was lay preacher. Yeah. And so I was about 25, right? It was Epworth, Methodist. I’ll just say that. And I never. I knew about them, but I’d never preached or attended. They asked me to come and preach one Sunday morning.

0:18:11 – (Kathy Gray): Yeah.

0:18:11 – (Steve Gray): I put it together. Same way, boy, I put it together. I probably went longer than they were used to, but it was an older congregation too, and they were absolutely amazed. They told me, since I’m supposed to be the. They said, well, when you’re done preaching, you go to the front door and you shake hands. I didn’t know. I’m only 25. Come on. So I did that. But they. They just. They were, like, amazed.

0:18:35 – (Steve Gray): They didn’t.

0:18:35 – (Kathy Gray): You were 25 years old and amazed and the depth. But also there was a zeal, and you understood and you. And you cared about it. Wait, I have to . Do you remember also, that’s the first time that you and I actually sang publicly alone. Not as. Not as our family music group, but we sang a duet there. Do you remember the song, There’s a.

0:19:01 – (Steve Gray): Sweet, Sweet Spirit in this Place?

0:19:02 – (Kathy Gray): Yes.

0:19:02 – (Steve Gray): And we did it a cappella.

0:19:04 – (Kathy Gray): Yeah. And I remember something was just coming over me and changing me and kind of solidifying.

0:19:10 – (Steve Gray): Yeah, it was good.

0:19:12 – (Kathy Gray): Yeah. So anyway, I still think of that once in a while, a few things.

0:19:16 – (Steve Gray): But then the church where I was working at, same thing. Either the pastor got sick, or I think he went out of town. And so they asked me on Sunday would I preach.

0:19:27 – (Kathy Gray): Right.

0:19:28 – (Steve Gray): Well, this was a formal Methodist church, kind of. I would say, so Formal, kind of. Wasn’t that more. They were getting more loose, you know. Hey, come on. It was more. The pastor wore a robe every Sunday, a black robe. And he had colors that they would change, and they had colors that they would lay over the pulpits. And they had a little pulpit, and they had a big pulpit. And the little pulpit was the lectern where you could read today’s scripture and pray for the service. And then after his choir would sing and everybody knew when to stand up, whatever the organist played, you knew what to do.

0:20:00 – (Steve Gray): And then the pastor, he had his big robe on, and he would preach.

0:20:03 – (Kathy Gray): Yeah. And he was the only one to preach from that lectern.

0:20:06 – (Steve Gray): The pulpit, not the lectern. And it was big and high.

0:20:10 – (Kathy Gray): It was very big.

0:20:10 – (Steve Gray): Yeah. Well, I didn’t know. I just. I wore a suit and tie and was ready to do it. I put my sermon together. Well, the leaders of the board members, they said, well, in order to preach at the pulpit, you have to put on a robe. There’s only one guy’s robe in the closet, and that was the old guy’s robe. They put it on me and I preached. Oh, gosh. When he came back, it was a riot. He was furious. You don’t. You are not ordained here. You are not.

0:20:37 – (Steve Gray): That is my robe. And you. And, you know, that was quite a heresy. It didn’t go well, but I still remember what I preached. So I put together the sermon the first time I Preached. And I still preach it. It’s still a great sermon idea. But I put together the best of my ability, the sermon today I lay before you life and death, blessing and cursing. Choose life. And so I preach. I can remember even looking up in the balcony over there and just saying to him, you know, we have a choice. We get to choose life. Life doesn’t just happen.

0:21:09 – (Steve Gray): It’s a choice. He lays it before us. And so it was a little bit word of faithy, you know, it was word of faith. Choose life. We had our friend, I don’t remember his name, that used to come and preach and teach us, actually. Do you remember him? And he got an airplane. He got hit by an airplane propeller and injured. But he was kind of a follower of the. Not really prosperity, but word of faith. And he would come and personally minister to us and our family. Remember him?

0:21:35 – (Steve Gray): And so I picked up a lot from him and I went and preached that sermon, choose life. I still remember it, but it kind of got ruined then when the lead minister guide, you know, went crazy at me. He. He didn’t like me at all after that.

0:21:49 – (Kathy Gray): But I’m so sorry. But so how do you. How did you get that thought, choose life? And how did you get the sermon topic, let’s say, And. And then how did it come to you? And then how did you prepare?

0:22:04 – (Steve Gray): Well, that. That year, then we were at that house and that you didn’t care for. We thought so. Blessed to get a house because we didn’t have a house. And then you turned around and didn’t like it.

0:22:12 – (Kathy Gray): I was really. I wanted a place to live. And then I.

0:22:17 – (Steve Gray): So she got her way.

0:22:18 – (Kathy Gray): Don’t ever let me have red carpet.

0:22:20 – (Steve Gray): Well, she got her way. Our house was hit by a F4 tornado and it was condemned. Now we can’t live in it. Now we have no place to live because 500 other houses were destroyed. I mean, flattened out, nothing left. And ours stayed because it was brick. But we lost all our furniture and both our cars got hit, which we were able to salvage them, though.

0:22:39 – (Kathy Gray): That’s right.

0:22:40 – (Steve Gray): But anyway, we.

0:22:42 – (Kathy Gray): You don’t think I caused that tornado to hit that duplex and shift it off its foundation?

0:22:48 – (Steve Gray): No, but I’m not putting it past you either. But anyway, so the director of the civil Defense. Director knew, because you were teaching with his daughter, knew that we didn’t have a place to live. And he was wanting to sell a house that his mother owned. Just a little house right behind where I used to live. The yards even connect where I used to live. And so he said listen, I won’t sell it. I’ll let you live there until you get it. So we moved in there.

0:23:13 – (Steve Gray): Well that’s when then I went and got out an old reel to reel tape recorder and I went and searched and found in somebody’s garage. Real to real teachings. They weren’t sermons, they were more like teachings. Kenneth Copeland, other people, Oral Roberts, just teachers. I can’t even think of all of them. But so I would put. And they were big tapes. So they were, they lasted a long time. So that afternoon we moved in that house. You still were teaching until in the summer. But even that summer then they, I, I worked at the church that summer. Even though you were off until the fall. I only was there one year. But those afternoons I would have free and I would run those tapes over and I would again lay on the floor. It was a big box full of tapes. I didn’t know who the people were even. But I was learning. And that reel would go round and round and round.

0:23:59 – (Steve Gray): Faith was being after hour after hour.

0:24:02 – (Kathy Gray): Yeah.

0:24:03 – (Steve Gray): One of the things, I don’t want to take too long on this, that helps people. One of the things though that was life changing for me and I still kind of have that idea today that I think would be good for young. Young and old. Okay. So I was used to when we taught school, you know, we went at 8:30, 8, 8 quarter late in the morning, 8 o’ clock in the morning, whatever. And then we’d get out at 3:34. And then being a music teacher you almost had to stay after school and many times you had to come back and play at the basketball games and stuff. So you know, you put in a pretty long day.

0:24:36 – (Steve Gray): And when I went in the ministry then and the church was sending me home or when we went into the full-time ministry then that I taught at the Methodist church one year then we went and we were in full time ministry. That was only one year. So we was quick. Now we’re in full time making our living by the gospel. And she didn’t teach and I didn’t teach and I wasn’t at the church and she went. We had zero income and we, and now we’re starting to in the full-time ministry.

0:24:59 – (Steve Gray): And so one of the things that I learned, I thought, you know what the people out there that I want to help and that are supporting us or tithing to the church or whatever, they work probably eight hours a day. They have half hour or an hour for lunch and they work eight hours a day. And then all these people in the ministry that I know, they, they study even, I mean even at the church I was at, you know that we showed up at 9:39 or 9:30 and we had snacks at 10:30, oh my, I mean a good half hour or more.

0:25:31 – (Steve Gray): And then at noon we broke for lunch. Then I come back at one and they’d send me home 1:30 or 2:00 clock. And he went and visited a few people just they muttered around and I thought this is not going to get it. So I thought if I’m going to really succeed at this, I need to try to try to put in an eight hour day when I don’t have to. Because I mean we didn’t have any place to minister every day we were new.

0:25:52 – (Steve Gray): So we’re scrambling, learning, growing. So most days we might have, we might minister on the weekends, but most days during the week we had nothing to do. Yeah, I could have just done whatever I wanted to do.

0:26:02 – (Kathy Gray): Right.

0:26:02 – (Steve Gray): But I decided I should try to put in a six to eight hour day for God. And so that’s why I would read and study and you know, pray and put in those hours. And that is another thing is when you are self-employed with God you don’t have to do that because God’s so kind. Okay, if you want to waste it away, you can. But I didn’t want to waste any time. I was very diligent that and, and I was learning to be a student. So I would read, I’d study the Bible, I’d listen to tapes, I’d worship, I’d pray, I’d ask for things for me so I can help other people.

0:26:40 – (Steve Gray): So somehow I got it in me. It was a vessel, like a funnel, a vessel. And that’s how I grew and that’s how I grew so rapidly. Because when I go into a place then to preach, I’m thinking what do these people need? And most of the time you know what it was. And we’ll kind of conclude with this because next week you can ask me some more questions in the next level. But most of the churches, so I was young, 25, 26, 27, I’m going into established churches that don’t know me.

0:27:08 – (Steve Gray): We would sing because music was our open door. They’d let us come because we had good music group, but they wouldn’t, I would always tag a sermon on. I got longer and longer sermons and I would think what do they need? And it was almost 100% the same thing. They were locked into what I would call just almost, almost just dead. Mediocre. Nominal religion. They didn’t have a fire, they didn’t have a flame.

0:27:33 – (Steve Gray): There was usually a few people that did, but they were a mixed group. There was a few flames. There was then the backsliders, the people. I don’t care. The teenagers giggling and playing around, writing notes and punching each other, not paying attention, you know, and they were these. All these groups. And the pastor was just maintaining a congregation by pleasing everybody, a people pleaser. Okay. So he had the dummies, the teenagers. And you remember I would go into a place and I’d shut the service down, say, hold it, hold it. I want all the teenagers to come up here. I’m going to pray for all of you.

0:28:07 – (Kathy Gray): That’s right.

0:28:08 – (Steve Gray): You were that. And they’re like, what? And the parents would look like, can you do this? Well, I’m going to do it. You know, so it was always the same thing. They needed to return to the Lord with all their heart and God will return to them and do great things as we know. Consecrate yourself, set yourself apart. It’s time to get serious about words that we’ve lost. Dedication, sacrifice, loyalty. Serving the Lord. Seek the kingdom of God first. I would hit that everywhere I went. Right. Just seek it first. First means first.

0:28:40 – (Kathy Gray): Yes.

0:28:41 – (Steve Gray): And this young guy just stood up to him in a good way. They liked us.

0:28:47 – (Kathy Gray): You were the young guy.

0:28:48 – (Steve Gray): Yeah, but I would stand up to those spirits and those attitudes.

0:28:51 – (Kathy Gray): You would.

0:28:52 – (Steve Gray): And say, no, no, this is not right. And it’s not. If it’s not right, then it’s not right. We need to do what’s right. And then we’d get asked back. Because the church would get better.

0:29:01 – (Kathy Gray): Yes.

0:29:02 – (Steve Gray): And the attendance would grow and the finance would grow. Because now people are saying, I need to do what I’ve been called to do and get out of this nominal. Because this young guy has got. I’ve been in this years, and he has just started and he’s got a flame that I don’t have. So that’s what it was. It was study. But make yourself work when you don’t have to put. Put your time in with God. Everybody else is putting their time in. And then you want him to give you an offering, or you want them to support you, or you want them to die or whatever. Put your time in with God.

0:29:32 – (Steve Gray): Study, learn, read, ask for wisdom. And for me, all of a sudden I’m saying things and people going like, I never heard that before. But you know why they didn’t hear that before because the leaders were trying to be people pleasers, rather man pleasers, rather than God pleasers. All those secret things that help people are there, but we’re afraid that it’s going to upset them. So we. We keep the status quo.

0:29:56 – (Steve Gray): You know, I’m doing okay. The church is doing okay, so let’s just stay. Okay. I’m okay, you’re okay. And that’s what they would do.

0:30:02 – (Kathy Gray): Yeah.

0:30:02 – (Steve Gray): And I would come in and be maybe the first one that says, you’re not. Okay, you’re not. I’m going to end on one. I’m over usually in one story. So I’m still young. We’re traveling. I might have been. I don’t even think I was 30. I was probably 28, maybe 27. 28. And I know where the church is. It’s no longer there. Another church is in that building now. And they ask us to come and sing and bring in the New year.

0:30:28 – (Steve Gray): Okay? And so we did, and it was fun. And we sang. And the New Year’s coming, you know, they’re going to have the 12 o’ clock countdown. But before about 11:30, I decided I’m going to preach a sermon to the New year, bring them into the New year with a sermon. And I. And it happened to be a Baptist church. And so I went in and I’m hitting nominalism. And I didn’t hit Baptist, I hit nominal, lukewarm, all the things I said, you know, and I just hit it and I said, this is not right, this. And we’re called to be this. And we need to be more like the people in the Bible, you know, we’re not like those people. If you want to see the things of the Bible, be like the people in the Bible who are willing to get, you know, give their lives for it, all that. So I go on and on and on like it. Then it’s going to be 12 o’. Clock. So now we’re supposed to turn it over to the pastor and he’s going to bring in the New Year. He gets up and he says, well, you know, that was good. But I just want to tell you, no matter what he said, you’re still the best Baptist in town.

0:31:22 – (Steve Gray): Remember that. You’re still the best Baptist.

0:31:24 – (Kathy Gray): Yes.

0:31:26 – (Steve Gray): Okay. Out the window that went. And then they brought in the New Year and we left. And they never asked us, and they never asked, Never asked me back again.

0:31:33 – (Kathy Gray): Yes, yes.

0:31:35 – (Steve Gray): So we had our joke, right? We would say we go through the country and we go and somebody mentioned a church or a town, I’d say I preached in that church once. So there’s a new attitude. You know, we need to let Jesus be the king and the Lord, and just say, there’s a new sheriff in town. His name is Jesus. We need to dedicate our lives, get on board, and start giving him the time he deserves. And he will unlock secrets and mysteries of the kingdom to his children that really desire it. And that’s what we’re going to talk about. We’ll continue to talk about those secrets, but that’s how I started.

0:32:11 – (Steve Gray): And somehow I got it into me. I’m going to read this book and read other books, and I’m going to pray, and I’m going to study and I’m going to do it. And so I can bring truth to other people. And I get it, too. But I’m doing great. I want to help the people that ain’t doing so great. And that’s how I started.

0:32:27 – (Kathy Gray): Yes.

0:32:27 – (Steve Gray): Is that good?

0:32:28 – (Kathy Gray): I love.

0:32:29 – (Steve Gray): I hope that helps. Be sure and tell your friends. Subscribe and join us. Be our friends. Get these books. Because I want to turn you into somebody that you didn’t believe you could be. And you can. All right. So till next time. Bye. Bye.