So if you have your Bibles, please turn to Mark chapter three. As I mentioned already, we're gonna be looking at verses one through five. Yes, I said that rightly, one through five. We're gonna be looking at those verses. And tonight's message I have entitled, that's a long stretch. That's a long stretch. And hopefully by the end of this evening, you'll know exactly why it was entitled as such. And here's the scene. Jesus, just by way of backdrop, is performing these amazing miracles. People are flocking to him like the swallows to San Juan Capistrana. The people love Jesus. They love hearing him speak. They love being near him. They love watching him. They follow him everywhere. Now the religious leaders, however, weren't too happy with Jesus. They weren't too happy that he was in town because Jesus was leading people away from legalism, which the Pharisees represented, and also he was leading the people away from liberalism, which the Sadducees represented. And for all intents and purposes tonight, we need to understand that legalism adds to God's word. Liberalism takes away from God's word. Both parties here that we're gonna be seeing tonight were not happy with Jesus because he was teaching them about God. He was teaching them how they could have a personal relationship with the almighty God. See, the religious leaders had a problem with Jesus' stance on their rules. As you remember, specifically the Pharisees adding to God's word, and then Jesus would come and say, you don't need to do these extra things. You need to know the Lord and worship him in spirit and in truth. See, these rules that the religious leaders had developed weren't God's rules. They were man's rules. And they had come up with this particular rule that you could not heal on the Sabbath day because that would constitute work, which you were not supposed to be doing on the Sabbath day or the day of rest. In essence, the religious leaders, their aspects of Judaism were weighing down the people. They were weighing down the people. Man's rules were not alleviating people's problems. They were adding to people's problems. And see, that's what happens when you have a works-based religion. You look at every other religion in the world, apart from Christianity, which we say, hey, it's not religion, it's a relationship. Yeah, right on. You guys know all about that. It's not me trying to earn my way to heaven. It's about the Lord saying, hey, you could never make it on your own. And so I'm reaching down to you. This relationship that we have with God is through faith in Jesus. But the religious leaders, and as we see in the world today with works-based religions, you need to earn your way to heaven. Now, this kind of sits well with some of us too, because we like putting our work in. We like being able to earn our way and we feel like we can accomplish something. And if you were to ask anybody out on the street today, how do you get to heaven? What do you think that they would say? Yeah, unanimously it's be a good person. Everybody knows that. But see, the Bible tells us that our good deeds, like filthy rags in the sight of God. And then also, in God's economy, our good deeds don't transfer over to God's righteousness. It would be like, well, how many guys are into sports here? Probably a lot. Baseball, football, basketball, understand. You know, I played basketball growing up in high school and then I got a scholarship and played in college. And let's just say, for instance, I would say, hey, I scored 40 points in this game. How many touchdowns does that equal? You'd be like, I'm sorry, you can't equate how many points you scored in this game to how many touchdowns in a football game. It doesn't work. And so we try, as mankind, to earn our way and say my righteousness will actually earn me some of God's righteousness and it doesn't even compute. It's not even the same league. You can't do that. But see, the religious leaders were saying, hey, do this and do that and do this and do that. And then maybe you'll be good enough to reach heaven. You'll be good enough to get to God. Jesus spoke of this problem in Matthew 23, verses four through seven. He said, the religious leaders, they bind heavy burdens, hard to bear, and they lay them on men's shoulders. But they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers. But all their works, they do to be seen by men. People were having to jump through hoops to get to God. Now I used to live in Hawaii. And in Hawaii, they had these trees called kiavi trees. And if you've ever been there, you may have seen them on the shore. But the kiavi tree, from what I understand from living there as well, was it was planted actually by missionaries. Because the Hawaiians were walking around barefoot and you couldn't go to church barefoot. And so if you planted trees that dropped huge thorns on the ground, they would quickly wear shoes and then be pleasing to God and go to church. If you even hear stories of church history in South America, where you couldn't go to church unless you had a white shirt and a black tie.  But they couldn't do that because they weren't dressed appropriately and the religious leaders would turn them away. Sorry, no white shirt, no black tie, no church, no can do. And you'll see that it's not unique just to the time that we're looking at tonight where men try to add to God's word. We know that this is something that breaks Jesus' heart. And I think we need to be reminded tonight that religion apart from the Holy Spirit pushes people away from other people and from God. See if I'm religious but I'm not filled with the Holy Spirit, then my self-righteousness alienates me from other people. Now please don't raise any hands, especially if you're thinking of the person that's sitting next to you. But have you ever known somebody that was holier than thou?  Well it's called self-righteous. It can be self-righteousness where people think that I've accomplished this and I'm way better than you and I can't believe you would make those mistakes and maybe when you arrive and become a Christian like I'm a Christian, you won't make those kind of problems.  Kind of like, I don't know, I think I'll do something else but more importantly, self-righteousness alienates you from God. I don't need the work of the Lord because I have earned my way. Look how moral I am. I open doors for old ladies and I give money to humanitarian works and we think that somehow in this world that humanitarian relief actually is a replacement for personal salvation through faith in Jesus. In Galatians 2.16 it says, knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law but by faith in Jesus Christ. Even we have believed in Christ Jesus that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law. For by the works of the law, no flesh shall be justified. Now yes, by way of long introduction, we're wrapping this up but when I am self-righteous, I create a nice little spot for myself. The religious leaders created a place of authority for themselves, a place of admiration from man. You know, I become now a role model on how you can too earn your way to heaven. Yet, when someone comes around that has a firm grasp of God's word on what God's word says, me and my self-righteousness can feel threatened because my position is wrapped up in my rules and rituals in addition to God's word. We know this to be true for the Pharisees here with Jesus in John 11.48. They said, if we let Jesus alone like this, everyone will believe in him and the Romans will come and they'll take away both our place and nation. That's the heart. How can Jesus be a threat to religion? Well, religion apart from the Holy Spirit alienates people from God and Jesus came and said, I am the way, the truth and the life and no man gets to the Father but through me. So Jesus is that line of demarcation, so to speak, that separates righteousness through faith in Jesus from self-righteous hypocrisy. It's more than just appearances. It's more than what we look like to other people. However, though that is the background to our passage, our story isn't gonna be about religious leaders but a man that had a withered hand. I believe that there are many of us here this evening that will be able to relate to this man's situation. I know that there are those of you here today that are struggling. You're having your faith tested. Maybe you're facing impossible odds or insurmountable problems but tonight we're gonna watch and see what Jesus will do. And so if you're taking notes tonight, I just have three points the point number one is this, two people, two people. Just remember that, two people. Verse one, Mark chapter three, it says, and he, referring to Jesus, entered the synagogue again and a man was there who had a withered hand. Now you may have heard this story before but I want you to mark down a couple things. These are the two main characters in our story. Jesus and the man with the withered hand. These are also the two main characters in your story, you and Jesus. See, it doesn't matter who's watching from the outside. It doesn't really matter what other people think because when it comes down to it in real time and in real life, it's you and Jesus. Friends are gone, families are gone, church is gone, whatever it comes down to you and Jesus. And it says that Jesus entered the synagogue again. It was a regular practice of Jesus to enter the house of worship and prayer. It's not like some of us that are at church only on Christmas and Easter only. You know, I actually looked this up in the Urban Dictionary. It says that Christians that go to church only on Easter and on Christmas aren't called Christians. They're called Christers, Christers. And so I thought, wow, this is something different. It's not a Christer, not a Christmas and Easter goer but this is somebody that worshiped every single day. This was Jesus entering the synagogue again and a man was there with a withered hand. Now, were there other people in the synagogue at this time? Yeah, absolutely. Were the Pharisees there? Absolutely. The scribes were there, the Sadducees were there, other worshipers were there as well. Yet sometimes people think that they can get lost in the crowd. Sometimes people think that they can escape the perfect knowledge of God by hiding themselves in a mass of people.  Nice to meet you. But inside, you're dealing with the pain and you're dealing with the stress and you're dealing with whatever it is that you're dealing with and you're having a hard time. You think, well, I'll just get lost in the crowd. God knows exactly what's going on in your life. He knows every detail of who you are. He knows if you're putting on a facade, if you're pretending to be somebody that you're not. Mistakily, people think that God isn't interested in them personally. But there's a couple of things that I like to point out in this first verse. Number one is the Lord works in the place of worship. In the place of worship. There's a dynamic power in the life of the believer who's worshiping God.   But so often, our trials rob us of our joy. We lose it real quick. How quickly we can rejoice when something's going good and how quickly it goes when something's going not so good.  And there's not a better example of worshiping God through devastation than Job and his whole experience is dedicated in that book of his. Being in the place of worship and maybe some of you here tonight didn't feel like coming to church and you're like, I don't really feel like it. I've had a long day. It's been a long week already.  You've drawn near to the Lord. You've given of your time. You were there as we're worshiping the Lord and we're lifting up our voices and we're turning our attention to God and you maybe didn't feel like it when you were coming in here tonight. Maybe you found that your heart softened a little bit after the worship time and you realized that I need to turn my attention to the Lord. I need to be reminded of how great God is. I'm so focused on myself and my own problems but now I'm worshiping the Lord and my focus is off myself and now it's on the Lord. And so I'm not gonna fall into the category of the number one cause of depression which is self-focus because I'm focusing on the Lord. And now I'm worshiping him and being in the place of worship, that place of drawing near to God is the best place for us to be especially when dealing with difficulty and dealing with trials and problems. Because I'm telling you right now if you're going through a hard time the last place that your enemy, Satan would want you would be in the house of worship with other people worshiping the Lord. So we see that the Lord works in the place of worship and secondly, under this first point which is two people, the Lord works in the place of prayer. Prayer is such an underused powerful tool that we have as Christians and unfortunately we only use it as a last resort often. I've tried every single thing under the sun known to man and it's not working. I bet I better start praying now and we wait till the end and we'll get out ahead of the Lord and then we'll say, oh man, I better try to retroactivate this prayer thing and try to work my way back when we should have just taken time to pray in the first place. Now for those of you that may know me a little bit and maybe even from sharing here on a Wednesday night that I have a beautiful little girl named Ava who was born with special needs and she's six years old, beautiful little girl. I was blessed also to have a son who's eight and his name's Hudson and our little daughter Ava and especially with my church family have been pretty transparent with some of the challenges as a family that we've gone through. And recently I had felt that the Lord was calling me to pray and to fast for my daughter Ava. Now Ava, to this day doctors don't know what's the matter with her. Every single scan known to man and tests that could be run shows that on paper she's absolutely normal. If you look at her you would just think, oh that's a pretty little girl and you couldn't tell that she had any special needs but she can't speak and she's just learning to really walk well now and strong. And so we have battled with a lot of things, a lot of things where the doctor said that she was gonna die at one and just the emotional roller coaster of all these different experiences that we had trying to figure out why she was in so much pain all the time and how come she was crying all the time and how come we couldn't help her and how debilitating that can be especially as a father, not being able to help this baby girl and how hard that is and maybe some of you can relate but I felt like the Lord was calling me to pray and to fast for Ava. And fasting as you know, it means to go without food, it means don't eat. It's not like the spiritually inclined child that tells his parents, you know mom and dad, I've decided to give up vegetables and seek the Lord. You know that's not exactly what we're talking about here. We have some examples of fasting in the Bible but just so we're all on the same page we replace our physical meal with a spiritual meal and so instead of eating dinner, you know where you'd feed your body physically you take that time to pray and you take that time to read the word of God and to draw near to the Lord. And so Ruth and I, my wife, we made this list and it was on the back of an old envelope that had been opened and not in order of importance but I'm just gonna share five of these things that we put down, which one was her speech that she would just be able to talk. I mean, could you imagine how frustrating it is to be six years old and not be able to tell people what you're trying to communicate. Like I want this, I don't want that or you know, whatever it may be, I have a sore throat, I have a tummy ache. So we prayed just really simply for her speech. Secondly, we put down interaction with other kids that she'd be able to kind of connect with other children. Thirdly, we put eye contact. Just so, and she'll look you in the eyes but to really like have the good solid eye contact when you're looking at her. Fourthly, we put attention just to be able to maintain attention when you're talking or when she's doing something. And then fifth was fine motor skills. And so for a couple of days, I was pouring out my heart before the Lord and it was for my daughter Ava. I told Ruth, I said, Ruth, I really feel like I need to pray and fast for my daughter. And this is something that had been on my heart for some time and I had been putting it off. And then I had people randomly come up to me and just say, hey, I don't know what this means but I felt like the Lord was telling me that I was to tell you that you need to pray and fast for your daughter. And they didn't know that I was thinking about this, praying about this, but I decided we need to do this. And so we started praying and I started praying and fasting for Ava. And the night of the second day, the Holy Spirit completely ministered to me. You know, so I went from those times of just, you know, and I know I'm being very honest with you about these things, but for me, this was very hard. It was hard for my wife. It's been hard for our family of just praying to God, saying, Lord, I'm reading these things in the Bible, how you heal people's children. Lord, you heal gyros, you know, the man that had his son was epileptic and he begs Jesus, will you please heal my son? Will you please touch him and heal him? You know, and then Jesus will say, well, do you believe? And then the father would cry out, Lord, help my unbelief. Like, that's me. Lord, help my unbelief. Help me, Lord. And every meal, just praying, just taking that time just to be spiritually fed and crying out before the Lord. But like I was saying, on the night of the second day, the Holy Spirit ministered to me completely. I can't even adequately describe to you what happened, but I'll try a little bit. And I wrote this down and I'll read it to you because sometimes it's hard for me to talk about this. But it was as if the Lord gave me a measure of faith and that I was praying in such a way that the things I was praying for were based upon the things I was asking for had already happened. Out of nowhere, instead of praying for the surface level, I felt that the Lord took me to a deeper place. Remember, just on that list, on the back of that envelope was just speech. And instead of praying for speech, it was this.  And she can't even speak yet. The interaction, I wrote this down. May Ava interact with others in a loving and kind way that she would be nice to people and befriend everyone. And then for her eye contact, instead of just saying, Lord, please help her eye contact, we were praying for better eye contact, but it was this, that her eye contact would be such that others see the love of Jesus in her eyes as she speaks. For the attention that we prayed for, that she would be amazingly attentive to others' needs and have empathy, and that she would be attentive to the Holy Spirit.  It was like, Lord bless her as she uses her hands to play string instruments in the piano.  It was the Lord changed my life through this entire thing. And I was praying for these certain things that I felt the Lord had given me that were based upon, yeah, she'll already be able to speak, and that's why we're praying that the Lord would fill her mouth with words that praise his name. And that everything that I was praying for, I felt like the Lord was saying these surface level things are already accomplished, and the Lord is gonna do a great work. I can't tell you what exactly happened that night, but it ministered to me and Ruth in such a powerful way that it confirmed all the miraculous things that he has shown us and even the things that we've doubted. I think it was either the last time I was here or a couple of times ago where I told you we went to Ikea and my daughter of all the people that she could have grabbed, hundreds of people walking by and she grabs the leading pediatric physician who was visiting from San Diego and he does a full work up right there in Ikea and asks her all these things and she just grabbed the guy by the shirt and it was worse too because it was tucked in and she just yanked him. And he come to find out he's this leading pediatrician you're thinking how in the world of all the people that my daughter could grab, she grabs the pediatrician. I mean, the Lord had done so many miraculous things and so many things up into this point where you just are going, I don't understand how this is even possible but yet then how quickly after the Lord shows you something miraculous do you begin to doubt because you don't see it yet. You don't see it yet. You don't understand how it can happen.  The Lord has shown you things in his word. He has brought people out of the blue supposedly to encourage you and to give you something that they felt was from the Lord. And obviously you would test that against what God's word says. So there they say, hey, you know, I have a word from the Lord, you know, and it's this passage in the Gospels where Judas went out and hung himself and you're like, I don't think that's from the Lord. But when you pray and the Holy Spirit ministers to you it changes your perspective on everything which leads us to our second point, which is two perspectives. Remember point number one was two people because when it's all said and done, it's you and Jesus. That's it.  It's you and Jesus.  No, it's you and Jesus. It's not you, Jesus and your friends. No, it's you and Jesus. You two are the two main people in your story. So we see now point number two is two perspectives. And so it says in verse two that they watched Jesus closely whether he would heal on the Sabbath so that they might accuse him. They might accuse him. So here are the two perspectives when it comes to God at work. Perspective number one is this, the perspective of failure. This perspective doesn't believe that God can do anything to change the situation of the person or the person in the situation. They don't believe that that can happen. Let me say that again. This perspective of failure comes from a standpoint where someone believes that God cannot change the situation of the person or the person in the situation. They come at the issue from a place of cynicism, criticism and doubt. And they're really looking for God to not come through. The religious leaders were as some are of Jesus today, scrutinizing, critiquing, looking for a way to disqualify Jesus. Yet these men would look and look and look and look and look and never find one. I mean, how often have we prayed for something and we said something along these lines? Maybe somebody's sick. Maybe they're really sick. And you're like, Lord, I know that you can do all things and we know that you can heal this person right now. And in the back of your mind, you're thinking, that's a long shot. Come on, be honest with yourself. I've done that. I'm a pastor. We've all done that. Lord, I know that you can do this, but you know, oh man, that's gonna be a long stretch. That's a long, long shot. See, there are people coming from this perspective of failure that they consciously and even subconsciously are looking to accuse God, looking to accuse God of failure. Aha, another thing that God's let me down in. They hope really and even on the extreme to disprove God's existence. And in the least, they could prove that he's unloving and unconcerned. And a lot of our atheists fall in that category. And if you ever just as a side note, this obviously is not what our message is about tonight, but if you ever come in contact with somebody that says they're an atheist, ask them one simple question and 99.9% of the time, you'll have an open door to share the gospel. You ready for this? When did you stop believing in God? Ask them that question. Every single time I've ever met an atheist and they said, it's, when did you stop believing in God? And they'll go back to some point in their life where they used to believe in God and something didn't turn out the way that they thought it should have turned out. Just file that one away. But there are people that are looking to accuse Jesus and hope to disprove him and even disqualify him as God. Ironically, the religious leaders knew that Jesus had the power to heal this man because they had seen him do other things before. They even knew that he would heal this man, yet this knowledge didn't bring them to put their faith in him. They would attempt to use this double virtue, if you will, of Jesus being willing and able to bring an accusation against him. So you have the perspective of failure. The second perspective is this, the perspective of faith. This perspective believes that God can do anything to change the situation of the person or the person in the situation. They come at any issue from the place of confidence, optimism and faith. They're looking for God to come through. Oh man, I don't know what God's gonna do, but it's gonna be awesome. This is so exciting. Right now, it's the 11th hour. What is God gonna do? Great things he's gonna do. We know that he's gonna do it. See, this position believes without seeing as if it's already accomplished. This is the perspective of faith. I don't see it, I don't understand it, but I know God is going to do it. See, this faith is a gift of the Holy Spirit to the follower of Jesus. In Hebrews 11 verse one it says, now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. We can even add to this as well, obviously not to the authority of the scriptures just by way of interpretation and by way of application, that faith is the lens through which we see the facts of God's promises before they're yet in existence. So in Hebrews where it says that faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. In the Greek language that word for evidence is proof. I mean, if somebody asks where's the evidence or show me the proof. Faith says it hasn't happened yet, but God promised it and that settled it. That's what faith is. The two people, it's you and Jesus. What about them? They're looking at me. No, it's not about them. It's about you and Jesus. What are you going through in your life tonight where it really, if you get all the way down to the base of all things and it's strip away the blaming, strip away the thoughts that you think that you have to live the rest of your life this way, jaded, scarred, messed up, remove all those things that are causing you to doubt and see that it's you and Jesus. It's you and him. Stop blaming other people. Stop pointing the other finger. Stop over analyzing it. Just say, all right, there's two people in my story. It's me and Jesus. There's two people. The Lord works in the place of worship. The Lord works in the place of prayer. In this group of me and Jesus, there's two perspectives. Do I have the perspective of failure or do I have this perspective of faith? And that leads us actually to point number three in our final point this evening, two faiths. Now, I'm not talking about two separate sets of belief systems. I'm referring to two forms of faith. Which are these? Passive and active faith. Passive and active faith. Let's look at the first one, passive faith. Passive faith accepts the word of God as true, but never moves. Never moves. You may believe that God can do it, but won't do it. And that's what I said. I think a lot of times we see that happen in our prayers. Lord, I know that you can do all things, but man, I don't know about this one. What are the chances of that? Look at verse three. And Jesus said to the man who had a withered hand, step forward. And then he said to them, is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do evil? To save life or to kill, but they kept silent. Now, if you were here, I mean, as this whole drama is unfolding between the religious leaders and Jesus, I had to ask myself this question when I was reading this. What must have been going through the mind of the man with the withered hand? He knows the religious leaders are trying to trap him. He's like the bait, if you will, for Jesus to do something good for they can find something to accuse him by. Maybe we'd ask the question, well, what did Jesus want to do? What did the man with the withered hand want to happen? Many years ago, my wife Ruth, and I actually had my father-in-law visiting from Cardiff, Wales tonight, and he's the founding pastor of Calvary Chapel Cardiff in the UK. And his daughter is my wife and married into a great family. I got another brother who's actually watching online right now who's the pastor of Calvary Chapel Oxford in England, and he's visiting with some of his family. But their baby little sister, Ruth, had an episode where her hand retracted as if it were withered. Now, she used to be a barista at Starbucks and worked, you know, you need your hands in order to make those lattes and all those things that we love so much, and no doctor could figure out why she was having these issues, and she was very, very concerned, like I think any of us would be, if one day we woke up and our hand was shrunken up like this and we didn't know why. And she grabbed a devotional called Streams in the Desert, which maybe some of you have heard, and it was the story of the man with the withered hand. And the Lord encouraged her through that story that she needed to trust in God and to believe. And very short thereafter, the Lord healed her hand and she hasn't had a problem with it ever since. That's called active faith, active faith. Passive faith believes that God can do it, but won't do it. Passive faith believes in God's word, but never acts on it, never moves. Active faith accepts the word of God as true and moves on it. I know this is what God's word says, and I'm gonna do it. You believe that God can do it and will do it. And in our prayers, God, I believe that you can do even this. And the great commentator, by the name of Matthew Henry, said and I quote, active faith gives thanks for a promise, even though it is not yet performed, knowing that God's contracts are as good as cash. End of quote. I'm praising the Lord and saying thank you for something that I believe God has promised me before it's even happened yet, active faith. And in verse five, it says, and when he had looked around, Jesus looked around at them with anger, being grieved by the hardness of their hearts, he said to the man, stretch out your hand. Man, that's a long stretch. The man with the withered hand must have thought. That's a long stretch. Jesus just said, stretch out your hand. So might I ask you tonight for you to think about this question. What is it in your life that seems like a long stretch for God with you? I feel like I just saw a whole bunch of little light bulbs turn on. I'm like, the Holy Spirit moves through His word. Is it your marriage? Is it your finances? Is it your health? Is it your job? Is it your addiction? What is it? What is it?  What's the thing in your life that you're thinking, oh man, that's a long shot? That's a long stretch. Whoa. And when he had looked around at them with anger, being grieved by the hardness of their hearts, he said to the man, stretch out your hand. And he stretched it out and his hand was restored as whole as the other. So often we're paralyzed by our paralysis, so to speak, our issue, our thing that we're like, no, no, no, no, no, no. I don't let anybody see that. I don't even think about that. I don't even wanna acknowledge that that even exists. I'm in denial actually right now. I don't wanna talk about it. No, no, no, no, no. What's the very thing that the Lord would even be saying to you tonight? Stretch this out to me. Lord, I can't stretch my hand out. It's impossible. Lord, why are you asking me to do something that's impossible for me to do? Well, have you ever noticed that God does ask you to do things that are impossible for you to do? We see it in the scriptures all the time. You might think, well, where?  Man, must their eyes have bugged out. How in the world were they gonna feed thousands of people? Why would Jesus furthermore ask his disciples to do something that was impossible? What I think we need to understand tonight is the church is this, is that God does call us to do things that are absolutely impossible. They're impossible to do without him. That's it. It's not complicated. It is impossible for you to do. It is impossible for you to fix it. It is impossible for you to stretch out your hand. That's where faith comes in. Passive faith would be like, oh, like the man by the pool. Ah, man, I wish that somebody could put me in the pool that I could be healed. Jesus just asked him, do you wanna be healed? Oh, these start rattling off excuses. I have no one to lift me up and put me in the pool so that I can be healed. No, Jesus just asked you, do you want to be healed? And so often we're like, these are all the reasons why God can't heal me. These are all the reasons why God can't help me. These are all of the reasons. And then what we end up doing is we project our limitations upon God. And we think that God is confined by our sense of a big problem or a little problem, as if it's more difficult for God to heal cancer than to heal the little cold. God's not in our bubble. He's not. He commands the weak to be strong, the inactive to become active, the sinful to become pure, the weak to put forth power. See, every command that God gives, he gives equal power to accomplish the command.   Some of you here tonight are like the man with a withered hand and you need to present your area of need to Jesus. You need to let him cleanse you and heal you and restore you and strengthen you.  And as the father cried out for his son, Lord increase my faith. You know, it's been said that you never pray for the Lord to increase your faith. That is a rookie move. Why? Because the Lord's gonna allow you to go through things that make you trust in him. That's why you never pray that. And if you were a veteran Christian, you would know, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, don't pray for faith, brother, don't do it. We need to have active faith, not passive faith. I think most of us actually scratch most, all of us in some ways are in passive faith. Myself included. I'm not exempt from what God's word says. I can sit right next to you right now and be like, that's right, that's what God's word says. Some people think that pastors have perfect lives and never have problems and don't know how to relate to people, but let me tell you, it's not the truth at all. They're just normal people. They're normal people. Pastors need the truth of God's word, just as the people that come to the church need God's word. Like to close with this poem tonight, it says this. Passive faith, but praises in the light when the sun does shine. Active faith will praise in the darkest night, which faith is thine? Where are you at? Hey man, I don't like you talking to me personally like that. Oh, generally, where are you at? And if you feel like it's personal, that's because the Holy Spirit's speaking to you right now. This is for you. Like the Holy Spirit just pointed right at you and you're like, that's for that guy, back there. So remember, in your story, there's two people. There might be a lot of people around, but it's you and Jesus. And then there's what? Two perspectives, right? The perspective of failure or the perspective of faith. And remember, finally, there's two faiths. Passive faith and active faith. Which one's yours?


TLO what's pop? We are on twitch. We are not live But you can leave a like comment subscribe Turn on the post notification bells me. Let's continue to grow the family from Chicago to the UK Don't forget. We are partnered with the blueprint mastermind. This is one of the recent episodes not one of the recent But you know one of the episodes with all of us as the team There should be another one dropping soon. So if you could just go over there, you know leave a like comment on this one Let us know that you like it Don't forget ma'am. All my old videos are over here on Facebook And I do got a patreon where we're about to start a new show. This is England I think and then we're starting another one next week So tool in man link down in the description, man Got real heat over on patreon Let me put this man.  You never know. Let's get into it, man. They could have put an X I had a great childhood Everything I got asked for really you know growing up on a On the outskirts of Cardiff, you know, and my friends who probably didn't have their mother around or their father around, you know single parents But my family great household. They're still together till this day and we had everything we wanted really In the summer we play sports They made sure I was involved in every activity Anything I asked for if they couldn't get it they'd get the next best thing and Yeah, I got fun memories as a child When did you start going down direction? When did you start taking drugs? I started taking Drugs at like the age of 16 17. I remember in high school. I was really against drugs I was anti-drug my uncle was a heroin addict. He was in prison for a long time and I Remember my father my mother My grandma drug drugs at like the age of 16 17. I remember in high school. I was really against drugs I was anti-drug my uncle was a heroin addict. He was in prison for a long time So you have seen it a lot. So you have seen it. So you were directly against it because of what you have seen Okay Don't forget man. Shout out to the first responders man. Y'all really make these videos what they are So continue to hit that like button man. I can't ask for no more man And I remember my father my mother My grandmother I used to see him go through a lot of stress used to go prison visits and stuff So I always kind of was drummed into me the drugs were bad My dad was anti-drug never smoked the fire. I never you know would drink on the weekends, but you know non-merch and I don't know it. It kind of had My dad was anti-drug never smoked the fire. I never you know would drink on the weekends But you know non-merch and I don't know it it kind of I was in coming into my last years of high school really where I Started to venture out on taking drugs started with cannabis and a lot of people would say this isn't true But it was a gateway drug for me. I had a few problem Like a lot of y'all think I do but I don't I just don't like it I don't like how it made me feel and keep in mind where I am in America. It is legal so medically medical where one is legal in Florida, but I'm from Chicago and medicinal and With myself I had my mental I had a severe mental health issues and I put my pathway to drug addiction into into three ways and that was bad timing the people I hung around with and my mental health I was diagnosed with severe OCD and ADHD, but what people Think when you say OCD is you know, you're the clean freak, you know, and that's clearly not the case for me If you went to my bedroom where in my house You wouldn't think I had OCD, but it's more of a rich ritualistic thing And I used to get obsessed with certain things and I always used to have like these anxious paranoid thoughts and If I'd have to do these certain rituals and these rituals could you know differentiate day-to-day And if I didn't do these rituals then I Automatically think something bad would happen either to myself or to a loved one, you know when we're all young like we we The pressure of of growing up being in the crowd and stuff. We don't want to admit we've got problems We don't want to open up that we've got problems. So instead of saying I've got problems, you know, I would try and find Give the youth one thing the youth has been letting people know when there's something wrong So salute to that keep that going on the next step is actually getting the help ways to masquer and and drug use is That was what the drug use was for and how old were you when you first hit heroin? I was seven just turning 18 when I first tried heroin and I was 19 That's not funny. Wait, you were from not doing anything jump dead in the weed in age I'm full on Quote-unquote smack head Can you talk through the sort of the hold it can have on you? It just just just runs your life.  You you can't do nothing You know all I you know and for the first couple of years I tried to blend in tried to cover it, but you might think you've got it under control But you just clearly haven't and you know, you can't go down the pub You can't go out in the weekend with the boys because you have to slide off because you need to use or you know It just takes all your normal social events away from you and That's just a little that's you know, that's just talking about the effect of what it has doing normal things The abnormal things I were doing to get the drug was was horrific Is he gonna tell us the abnormal things he was going to get that to get it That's gonna be crazy And the first five years of addiction I used to go around like universities and stuff and pretend I was a lot of students and Black people for many Yeah, I used to make quite a lot of money doing that And then it was only towards the second half my addiction when I started to become a Sharplifter and again up and down the country sharp lifting But it was just pure desperation the whole time she had desperation and How many times are you in prison? Ten eleven times ten. I know I've been Every time I went to prison. I did try to change my way It was it was a time for me where I thought I needed to change and every time I was in prison I always looked at like, you know, I'm gonna get out this time and sort my life out every single time There was a few times I'd have to go in there and do a detox do a clock off the heroin But there was times as well that I was on a methadone script was in there But sometimes you can get addicted to methadone too as well if they want you back on the street You want the harder effect and back slide back into the age and that don't help anywhere in a methadone script to me is It's kind of just dumbing you down as a person. I would say I've been on probably 1520 methadone scripts kicked off started again, where it's just a Vicious circle type of thing. So, um, yeah Y'all telling me this look like this. This is not there is no way that this is the same person Where's the middle of your beard? No, no, I'm not being funny. I'm asking a real question This is the same person. Hey, y'all need to stay drug-free man. Hey, listen Don't do that stuff Stay off of it, man.  Let this right here motivate you. This is why I'm impressed that he's off of it and looking much healthier Every time I come out of prison. I was you know back to using How did you stop and so obviously lockdown was Different it was it was new for all of us But especially for someone like myself who's a shoplifter a lot of the retail stores were shut. So we were traveling around to hit like at small cooperative shops and It was just getting on top. It was really I was really manic at the time This was like probably the worst I was Was a different person And I knew my body was was deteriorating at the time I was on a not email methadone script and I was using To two to three hundred pounds worth of how to win and crack a day. I never injected using to In at the time I was on a not email methadone script and I was using To two to three hundred pounds worth of how to win and crack a day Oh to the three hundred pounds like dollars like money. I thought he meant like LBS like what? I never injected heroin I always smoked it so I always had a problem in my lungs where I was smoking so much and One day in it was September the end of September come up to August. We're just past two years and Basically a friend of mine passed away who was my co-defendant we he used to drive me around everywhere He passed away and the same day he passed away. I got rushed to hospital And when I when I went into hospital I I come around a day later With all needles in me and stuff. So, you know drips and stuff in both arms and they said I had a sepsis and pneumonia And I thought I was gonna die like you know, I've many many times before like I've I've been in bad situations where I've had to do detoxes and you know I've been in hospital beds prison beds done all the stuff what I thought with you know This is the last time but I genuinely knew this was the last time So whatever My friend and I were using it it obviously had an effect on us when I was in hospital I kind of had this like awakening sounds cheesy. I know and But I had this type of awakening and I knew this would have to be the time I had to change I couldn't go through another another another detox and so what was different about either Your treatment or your mindset for the time that you do you got clean last his boy passed away And he was almost gone too. That's difference right gotta be right This is probably the the best thing that's ever happened to me and I think it's an amazing thing is something called boovah doll. It's a new drug Basically, that's been tested here in the UK, especially in Wales And I actually it's funny. I actually heard about the drug whilst I was still Coming up to where I almost went into hospital I heard about this drug that was going to be getting rolled out during lockdown for chaotic users like myself, but then when I went to hospital and And I was you know really ill in hospital the nearest come to me and he said look We'll keep you on your methadone script, but you're gonna have to go every single day now Include including weekends and or go try this boovah doll and It was the best thing that ever happened to me, you know, I'm two years clean now the first time in my adult life I'm free of drugs So how does boovah doll work? So it's it's an injection in into the muscle and you can have them in your buttocks your arm I has it in my stomach because I've got a bit of a belly there. So and What it does is it basically Releases a blocker into your system which lasts for 30 days So with methadone and with subutex and other opiate substitutes They last 24 hours. You need a new dose and there's a lot of bad effects with these these drugs as well with methadone You can still use on top because it's an opiate also with methadone It ruins your body.   This one has been out for one day 103,000 people you don't know what 100 who the 103,000 people are that seen this but I guarantee 103,000 people that sink this They wouldn't got tried some of that boovah don't This video alone might occur somebody's life expectancy. I remember my father my mother My grandmother used to see him go through and I'm what What is the absolute number one easiest way to make money online in 2023? Well Is it basically Releases a blocker into your own you can still use on top body using drugs because it gives it's very strong So if you are trying to get clean and they can put you on a methadone script You're just gonna feel like you're a headache still there's that that famous word for methadone They call it the liquid handcuffs where And you know you're a prisoner to it this boovah doll and straight away it helps a lot of people In the sense of getting their life back. I've never heard of this at all This is needed in Florida right now. I can go to the park It's a park maybe two three blocks away from me on the hood side of that So I live right in between the hood and the rich people so I don't know why but like I always find a spot That's like that. I'm just comfortable But like if I go to a park like down the street It's like heroin park. That's what I call it.  A high percentage of them don't really want to come off drugs They're using methadone as another way of a high so My dad used to say is these places where you pick up your methadone. It's like going to a gambler's anonymous in the in the coral or an AA meeting within the weather Coral a bedding top chain, a weather spoon, a pub chain Spoons For those that are on let yourself boovah doll if you did decide to go up go out and Get heroin again. Would it what effect would it have? Yeah, it would do nothing like You might as well You might as well just got a lighter than just being your money literally like it's it does nothing the difference with boovah doll other than methadone and sobiotex you don't get a buzz on it. It's not like Method don't where you kind of feel a bit this this is a total block it like you feel totally normal again And that can be tough for people who have suppressed their mind with such a strong painkiller for so long a lot of people in addiction Are hiding from trauma or they're hiding from things they've done whilst on drugs So it's masking problems and when and when you know you take that that blanket off people struggle What was that first month on it like for you? Yeah, it wasn't easy. I'm gonna be fair.  I'm thinking about everyone I've robbed I'm thinking about everyone I've hit in my life I'm thinking about my make passing trying to put blame on myself like it when it went It wasn't comfortable for me. So I can imagine Other people who go on it. It might not be The most comfortable but when you get past our first month, it's amazing. It's literally I I live a normal life now How long did you use for in total? When it was coming up to say in years 12 years and if you include this one I first tried it at 17. Do you ever think what what it was about you that put you down that path? Yeah, like this You know, I'm I always say like I've been I said something recently About how like we try and dig for trauma like when when you go to see like a doctor or something They'll tell you to like Tackle the root problem and because like I was never a you know, I had a good child that I was never abused as a kid It's not like, you know Someone in my family, you know, it was like a tragic death and I could never find out what the problem was And and that's kind of why I carried on using because I didn't really find out until Towards the end when I started I'm listening to your story and I don't see the problem still coming off the drugs that I realized that like it could be the littlest of things that that make you Take drugs and and have mental health issues and stuff So when I look back, it was definitely my mental health and the decisions I made as a young child Where that whether it was a small thing or a big thing. I now work for a company called Kaleidoscope Who are based in Newport? I'm now employed within my city of Cardiff with a project called voices action change And it's all about co-production Service use and involvement, you know, it was only two years ago. I was actually on them streets Running ragged. So a lot of them know who I am. They've seen me at my Honestly, well, he just said that two years ago. I was on those streets running ragged Believe him y'all. Let's let me remind y'all This is not cap anybody can change See me at my worst. They know And you know, it was only two years ago. I was actually on them streets Running ragged. So a lot of them know who I am. They've seen me at my worst. They know I'm trustworthy and We're just trying to change The way we run services and have more of an involvement from people within services There's just a massive stigma around Drug users drug addiction junkies That's what needs to change


Can you write a book in just 72 hours? It sounds impossible, but welcome to a Book Sprint. Hosted by the Center for Science in the Imagination at Arizona State University, a Book Sprint isn't like writing a regular book, with one author painstakingly considering each word for months. Instead, it's a collaborative work written in just a few days by a diverse group of writers. Exploratory and improvisational, Book Sprints offer scholars a new way to communicate and share their research. Think about the great conversations that happen at academic conferences. Once the meeting is over, people pack up and leave, and many of the important discussions are forgotten or lost. With a Book Sprint, though, participants can come together and create a tangible record of those exchanges. Take, for example, the Society for Scholarly Publishings 2016 annual meeting. Groups of four to six people discuss topics as varied as the future of the scholarly book and whether algorithms and machines deserve authorship credit, and then took 25 to 45 minutes to write something up. The result was an e-book that contained strikingly original pieces that would never grace the pages of standard academic journals. Haikus documenting the struggle of getting a paper published, a fictional letter written to taxpayers humorously highlighting the absurdity of the academic journal system, even a collection of internet memes. Alongside the essays, the pages include photos of the whiteboards used to brainstorm at the meeting, snapshots that put participants back in their seats and help them recall those conversations and allow people who weren't in attendance to imagine themselves there. We don't have to be limited by conventional modes of communication. With the Book Sprint, researchers can share their results in more creative ways and reach new audiences. It's a new kind of scholarly publication that serves as a useful record of conferences and highlights the fundamentally collaborative nature of academic work, all in just 72 hours.


We already did a couple of our post-transcriptional modifications because we had to dress up our messenger RNA before it headed outed to the party in the cytoplasm. I guess that's where I should head it outed too. So adding the five prime cap and the poly A tail, that's one set of modifications. And that just increases stability of the molecule. It also allows the ribosome to know where do I start?  Don't get too close to reality, but every now and then come back and be like, this is chemistry. This happens because molecules interact with each other. They stick together, they form chemical bonds, they release some energy, they break chemical bonds, which reuses up some energy, and they reform new chemical bonds. And somebody, some little protein machine is making all that happen. I've been doing this a long time, and yet my mind is blown on a periodic basis that this is that we are walking chemical reactions. So it's no wonder that chemistry is a required subject before.  In addition to your hat and your tail, before you go to the party, you need to have... One more thing happens. My little messenger RNA molecule was what? Three, seven nucleotides long. Yeah, that is not realistic. The number of nucleotides in a messenger RNA molecule, of course, is going to vary based on how many amino acids we need in our protein. And so that makes perfect sense. But in eukaryotes, what's actually transcribed can be thousands and thousands and thousands of nucleotides long. So this pre-messenger RNA can be huge. And then this is crazy.  And look at this. Exons are the pieces of the RNA that you keep. And I... That's a little bit counterintuitive to me until I think exons exit the nucleus. Introns stay in the nucleus and they're garbage. And we're going to recycle them and make new messenger RNA with the products. But the exons that exit the nucleus, basically we're going to splice them together. We're going to cut out all these introns and then splice together the exons and then take a moment to think about all the possible ways we could splice one piece of RNA that came from the DNA molecule. So one gene, here's a piece of DNA, this is a gene. And then we could splice together. We could get rid of that green piece and we have a whole new protein. We could get rid of the red piece and have a whole new protein. We could get rid of the green and the red piece and have a whole new protein. Splicing the exons together gives you a massive amount of diversity in what the number of proteins, the diversity of proteins you can produce from just one gene or from one piece of DNA. It's so cool. All right, you have transcribed messenger RNA. It's doodly-dooding, can't remember the sound that I made in the last one, on its way to the cytoplasm to be dealt with in the ribosome. And I actually think I'm going to bust a move and record the lecture on translation right now because translation is like fresh in my brain. And that's what's happening next. Let's talk about how that works. Okay, so I will be back. I don't know if you'll be back because this is actually one separate lecture and I'm going to stop talking once again. Goodbye.


Apple's WWDC has been announced it will run the week of June 6th, and it will be online as we have seen in the last two years except The first day there will be some amount of seats available for humans at Apple Park in Cupertino to gather together and watch the pre-recorded live streams of the keynote and The State of the Union, which I always call keynote part two, so I'm not sure how one will procure a ticket for this. I don't know how in demand they will be There is value in being together with other humans for sure You know, especially I can I've always maintained that I can Say it Experientially now having been able to go to South by Southwest in person last month to go to podcast movement Evolutions in person last month it There is so much more to a conference than just watching the speakers speak, right? It's the the hallway the hallway track is what we always call it at the conference the people, you know We we were both interested in that session and now let's let's communicate with each other and meet each other and and you know form relationships, but also Just learn together so I'm curious to see how that will evolve But it it's interesting that they will not be at least for this year returning to a live Presentation it will be people in gathering in a room to watch the pre-recorded Presentation now will Tim cook come on the stage before the thing and welcome the people that are in the room I'm sure like I would be surprised if that kind of thing didn't happen But it sounds like the meat of the presentation will no longer be a live thing and I I'm not I don't think that's bad like they're they're They're can't they're pre-recorded Productions for these presentations over the last two years have been so much better than the live ones Although the energy of a live Demonstration and and all of that There's some value to it, but in terms of being able to efficiently communicate this stuff nothing beats the Pre-produced things that Apple has been doing so I don't know just the Something I wanted to share. Yeah, I don't know if either of you guys have thoughts about any of that I've never been to one. I would like to go but not this year not this year. That's right You walked me to that's right. I remember that San Jose right a Steve Jobs event in San Jose. Yeah, we couldn't we tried to weasel you in I'm like I have one of my other Mackie cub colos with me. Can we they're like the name on the list? I'm like you could put it on the list. They're like, yeah


What's going on everybody got Kyle and Shawn here relating sports cards. We're doing a personal for 2022 2023 Top scrim ua for club competitions. This one's for Jacob. W. Good luck Jacob. Let's see. We got some soccer Some soccer. All right guys after this we'll have Kyle with two um Star Wars boxes and we will be done Get on out of here Yeet yeet be on fortnight We're ripping some fort. It's a stuff out of the wall while you snack first. Oh, no, no Absolutely Good luck here Mr. Jacob Jake Club competitions chrome Say Pepe Fracture throwback rookie Otto is my tea Suley on the aqua lava that one is numbered to Not numbered I guess Not numbered there on the rookie for you ventus aqua lava It's a sick-looking design nice one there Matisse Suley rookie Otto No number on that round See and surprise. There's not there's a refractor Francisco can say sell I'll be the 199 but There's a Mahalo Moudrich rookie. What's a good late-night spot? Nothing crazy Eddie usually like the wawa or McDonald's is still open Galazzo Jamie Gittens. Um, there's a pretty good taco place by me like downtown Orlando. It's up It's open pretty late Green Ghost Locos is the name of it Pretty solid Yeah, for the most part Taco Bell McDonald's only stuff kind of open when we get out of here pretty late There's a Darwin union specimen and pulsars a meal Smith rope for Arsenal yeah, nothing nothing crazy though nothing nothing crazy open at this time this hour There's a a sugo Dario a sugo rookie refractor. Um, it's just a gas station. Yeah, you know it serves subs and They're really nice. They're really solid the Jude Bellingham There's a Vinnie junior on the purple shimmer to 250. Yeah, they have little like touch screens You can order food like behind the counter. They'll make like fresh food sandwiches pizza and at the rate They're going to lay before you know it. Yeah. Yeah, they're like a huge man. Yeah, they're like a big a Big gas station get all kinds of food going on. There's a noir Yeah, it's solid open 24 hours. So not bad. Yee Mama Drami, there's a Roco Simmich rookie refractor. I think it started in like up in the Northeast like Philly Wonder Kids Gavi They have a they've expanded down here and they are everywhere here now I remember like high school. They started coming down here and then now they are literally everywhere We were just out in Cali of what six months ago. This is a gold beret to 50 gold lava This one there to 50. It's not number either Unless I miss some numbering or something Well lava there to 50 not to 50. I guess no number on that Interesting Yeah, I'll grab it the Darwin unions refractor I'll send a boxing rapper. I'm not pretty sure that's supposed to be number to 50 Yeah, the other one too. I thought Yeah, so we'll send a box with that one Jacob Couple of those number or a couple of those color cards that weren't numbered surprising Look at Modric There's a Fabio Moretti refractor. Yeah, there's nothing out there like that. Uh, nothing out like they're Eddie Not it's wallows are nice, man If I go anywhere, I get get everything is that walla Shinji Kagawa refractor and that one's gonna be a night vision Chukwameika for Chelsea like those night visions to 225 Chukwameika I'm gotten gassed rookie Nobody's not much better. I saw a guy clean his gun there one time really he's just sitting on the bench clean He's gone dude. I was like, I'm gonna go the other 711 I think tonight Adam Hasek there. Uh, lever Cousin refractor. Yeah, a little turn right around 711 tonight. I was there like a couple weeks ago. I see a guy clean is going dude and just ram the The whole pole everything. Yeah So there looked at him. He looked at me put in reverse and he left green shimmer answering at 399. Oh, yeah, he was drunk Yeah, you're on answering. All right later, dude. See you Nice seeing you again. See you man Say 11 Dawski And refractor and kunku closest thing we have is arco guys Oh, yeah, yeah the food warmer kind of stuff and plenty of those around here for sure too Say rookie wonder kids ollie choke Yeah, the thing about that's nice about wallows. They actually have people making food behind the counter So you can go up and like order at a touch screen. They have a bunch of different stuff Um, it's not like the not like the rollers at 711 and everything. Alrighty there. I'll get those right out to you Jacob. Thank you