Chrystal and Jonathan talk with their Dad about some of the issues facing families and individuals today. Do you have questions or concerns not covered in today’s video? Post yours in the comments and let us know.
[Chrystal] hey y’all we had an opportunity to air
the message from Sunday what on earth is
going on and I know a lot of you all
have seen that and we’ve been looking at
your comments we see your concerns we
see your responses and we wanted to take
this opportunity just to present some of
your questions and some of the things
that you’ve mentioned to dad we see a lot
of you talking about how you were both
excited to see us still having church on
Sunday in an empty sanctuary but someone
actually said that they were convicted
because it reminded them of the fact
that with Church being empty that
shouldn’t stop their engagement with God
but by themselves kind of what do they
do they’re at a loss without coming to
church and without being led in worship
what they can do with all of this extra
time that they now have to seek God for
themselves so how can somebody who’s at
home spend time in practical ways with
God [Tony] well that’s a great question and
it’s also this crisis that’s created a
great opportunity because you know in
Scripture they not only gather together
you know corporately but they went from
house to house so you got you had you
had a lot of house churches and I think
often collective gathering has sometimes
taken away from personal worship and to
come to God now in a daily surrender one
because you can’t go to church and
number two because we’re in a crisis you
put those two together then you take the
Word of God and since the Bible says the
Holy Spirit is in us we are the temple
and the temple of the place of worship
this is a learning opportunity to enter
into personal church each day doesn’t
have to be long like your regular church
service but now it can be regular
because you have the flexibility and the
freedom to do that how do you do that you can take
a section of scripture you can take a
devotional book you can
go online it’s a technology that’s given us
all kind of things I mean you know our
ministry has devotionals those other
ministries have devotionals so so you can
use the support of others
you know songs that you have sung in
church now’s the time for you to be your
own choir director and your own song leader
and sing it to the Lord not be ashamed
about your voice okay and sing to him
praise him pray to him look at His word
and then use this time to deal with
things in your life with Him that you
know you need to deal with that Church
can cover up but now that you’re in your own
private place you don’t have to hide now
you can be raw with God respectfully raw
[Jonathan] but this kind of shows us too
how much of a dependency we
have on the brick and mortar that we
have this great dependency on well I’m
gonna go to church and when I get inside
the building that’s when I’m gonna have
an opportunity to worship God and so
talk about what we’re going through as a
country right now and how that’s gonna
strip us of that dependency where people
are gonna say well now I can’t just go
to church I have to really learn how to
be the church [Tony] well absolutely I think
one of the benefits of a bad situation
that God allows which Bible calls
trials these trials are designed to
teach and so we’re in a teaching learning
situation since our country for example
since our country is so disunified God
decided to help us get together
that’s what he did was he created a crisis
or He allowed a crisis to force things so
when it comes to now defining church you
know in Acts chapter 8 God let
persecution come in to force the
Christians out of Jerusalem
so they would take the gospel worldwide
so he let a bad situation force
witnessing so he’s let a bad situation
force caring force personal worship force
prayer he is setting the stage for
us to have to do things that we should
have been voluntarily doing on her own
so let’s look for the teaching in the
trial [Jonathan] hmm it’s hard to be a narcissist
in a global problem that’s great
families you know when we did our
service people saw the family together
and for some people that was encouraging
we’ve got messages saying hey we love
you guys y’all are kind of a blueprint
all of those different things as far as
family is concerned even though we’ve
gone through a lot in our family but
then there were some people who were
discouraged because they don’t have the
family support they don’t have the
support in their family they don’t have
the support in their their community so
how does someone out there that’s going
through what we’re going through
globally but they’re feeling it
personally the effect on them how did
they move forward and negotiate these
times with very little support [Tony] well
first of all we have to come up with a
bigger definition of family because
Jesus said the one who is my mother
father brother and sister is the one who
does my will so don’t limit family to
nuclear don’t even limit it to
biologically extended family you want
faith family and when you—that’s why
every Christian should be a vital part
of the local church because if something
like this happens and you don’t have
immediate or extended family but you’re
not connected spiritually then you
know you become a lone ranger and see
people don’t realize that until they get
in this situation but if you have a
church that not only preaches and
teachers that’s foundational but cares
that builds community all the one one-
another’s of Scripture love one another
care for one another share with one
another help with one another connect
one another pray for one another all those
one another’s in scriptures is we
supposed to live it out right now
so let this be a teaching lesson if you
are disconnected spiritually to as soon
as you can get connected spiritually now
again technology provides the
opportunity for online connectivity so
you can get connected with us and you
can get connected with each other
because even without—so you can be
like I know the government wants us
like you know six feet apart you can be
a hundred thousand miles apart and still
get connected so technology is
addressing this quite crisis through
some form of connectivity [Jonathan] Those
one-another sound familiar you did a
series on them? [Tony] I did a whole series on them
because that’s what the church is supposed to be
about it’s not just coming sitting
soaking and souring it is being
involved in the lives of one another in
a responsible biblio centric
God centered Christ honoring Holy Spirit
in that way [Chrystal] just to piggyback on that
though this is also a great time for
your literal nuclear one-anothers and
for the person who not only doesn’t have
support but maybe hasn’t really
connected with their family in a long
time or now we got a bunch of parents
who are thrust with their kids being
home all the time I think a lot of our
togetherness as a family is because we
bonded together as a family doing things
that a lot of families have the time to
do right now so what are some of the
intentional things that you feel like we
did as a family to build our family bond
so that maybe people who are watching
can get ideas for what to do with this
extra time that they have on their hands
with the people that are in their homes
[Tony] this is a great opportunity this is so
great in a bad season this is a great
opportunity because let’s take something
as simple as eating meals together
that’s what we did we ate meals together
so now you have the time to not rush
there no baseball games to go to there’s no
basketball games to go to you don’t
have to rush out and do this and do that
so just sit down and relax and talk
about each other’s lives talk
about each other’s needs pray for one
another around the table have family
devotions that you weren’t having before
then play some games together now that’s
one of the things we did was play
monopoly that’s my favorite game cuz I got to
do my real estate business you know when I play
monopoly but yeah play games
together laugh together watch family
shows together you know they
got a Netflix and all these flicks that
you can do together in the
safety of your home get to know parents
get to know your kids again get to know
your kids you know you’re rushing they’re
rushing get to know them and talk to
them about life this is great time to talk
about life because life is hitting them
and everybody and they need to
understand what’s going on and I got a
call from my grandkids on my way to do
this and they had some biblical
questions because the family was around
together just talking and they have
biblical questions so they called me it
was just a great time to answer some
spiritual questions
don’t waste Corona don’t waste Corona
Corona is a virus that has created an
opportunity [Jonathan] what’s amazing to especially
millennial parents is that the easiest
thing for us to do is I have five kids
eleven nine six four and one
[Tony] that’s too many kids [Jonathan] I’m in the middle of the woods
with no navigation like we’re just in
there and our temptation is just to
give them a gadget our temptation is
just give them a phone so they can have
their time we can have our time and then
the day is gone and everybody’s just
been staring at screens and it’s almost
like you know like you always say to me
boy why you always looking for the easy
way out you’re always looking for the
easy way but a lot of times
we’ll take the easy way out and not
realize that it’s detrimental for that
family camaraderie and for the
teaching times that we have and so it’s
really making the hardship that we’re
going through
another what we would say hardship with
actually spending the time with your
kids and not handing them off to
something else
but that’s what I’m doing as I took
it from you I don’t know how you did it
because they told me I was crawling under
the tables [Tony] you all over the place
[Jonathan] exactly but there’s a lot of parents out
there who are experiencing that so what
would you say take us back to your 38
year old self when you had a bunch of
young children in the house and how you
still spent time with us I know
there wasn’t that much technology then
so we have a higher temptation to do
that but just those times of spending
time together [Chrystal] talent shows
[Jonathan] yeah talent shows charades
yeah we played charades we did talent
shows we had flannel boards back then
teach the Bible lessons with the
flannel board and sometimes one of the
kids we’d ask them to teach the lesson
or do the devotion or read the Scripture
Ask one of the kids to read the
scripture play hide-and-go-seek
that’s right and that’s
a fun thing to do and what it says is
family is important family matters it is
that’s the foundation of the
kingdom it was all built on the family
so reconnecting with family at whatever
level you can do is the most important
thing you can do right now and the
greatest opportunity that has been
granted to us by God through a virus