How to Prepare for the Harvest w/Pastor Joe Kerrigan | Episode 292

[00:00:04] I want you to come down, wherever you are, we're going to be waiting right here. I want you to come and say, Lord, I want to be born again. I want to surrender my life to you. I think the bigger picture of Hope Orleans is God taking charge over a room. And I think Dr. Michael Youssef gave God the room in the convention center. And we got an onslaught of people coming for salvation. Dr. Youssef brought a spark to release a flame.

[00:00:28] Wonderful to watch the people come and give their life to the Lord. And then to see what's happened after that. The people are being drawn to Trinity. Maybe the week after, two weeks later, there was maybe 20, 30 new people in the church. And a lot of them had come from the Hope Conference. And they've just been on fire for Jesus. The team from Dr. Youssef's campaign came and they trained us up for how to engage with people. And they're coming in their droves. I see younger people coming in and it gives me hope for the future.

[00:00:58] My family are amazed to see the work that Jesus has done to me. We've never had so many baptisms actually in our church. And they're still happening. I was an atheist. I had had suicidal ideation for years and years and years. Joe prayed with me and I repented. And I felt like that was the first time I had felt alive in years. I don't recognise myself sometimes because I'm just a totally different person.

[00:01:26] My life has completely changed. I have to give all props to Jesus. My whole life has just changed. I can't even explain it. I felt like I'd found my people. And by the end of the whole service, I felt like I'd found my family. I'm totally different. I have a new life. A real life. I don't know how I lived before. Well, I was very blinded all my life to this. But now I see the work that God does. And I'm free from active addiction.

[00:01:53] To have them bonds broken and them chains broken through the works of Jesus. It's like, wow. Thank you, Lord. Thank you. Thank you. Hello. Welcome back. This is Candid Conversations. And I'm your host, Jonathan Youssef. Today, I'm joined by Pastor Joe Kerrigan from Trinity Church in Dublin, Ireland, where God is moving in incredible ways.

[00:02:19] We're talking about how churches can truly welcome new people, creating spaces of hope and belonging free from judgment. It's a conversation I've been looking forward to. For those of you who may have seen the testimony videos from Dr. Youssef's travels to Belfast and Dublin, Joe is the pastor of Trinity Church.

[00:02:42] And you can't help but be moved by how God is working in Ireland at using men and women like Joe and his wife and his church to bring the masses in and to feed them with spiritual food. And it is such a privilege to have you on Candid Conversations. Joe Kerrigan, thank you for joining us. Oh, listen, it's great to join you. Thank you for having me.

[00:03:09] And it's great to say there's a water between us, but yeah, we're one in spirit. We're kindred spirit. We're united in Christ. And it is such a privilege and a joy to have you. Well, Joe, you know, for those who maybe haven't seen any of the videos or haven't heard about Trinity, tell us a little bit about yourself. Obviously, your accent gives you away. But tell us a little bit about Joe Kerrigan. Yeah, well, I came to faith in Westport down in Mayo.

[00:03:37] As I was replacing a chef, I was a chef by trade. And yet in the trowes of me taking his place, God touched my heart and saved me on a road, a Damascus experience. And I couldn't take another step after hearing the gospel. I just said to God, look, I need to know you. And I don't know you. I was a religious person up to that point. And I was genuine. But I didn't know Jesus.

[00:04:06] And I was really envious of this chef who knew him. And I just thought, wow, this is amazing. And I was listening to his truths. And I really wanted that, but I hadn't got it. And I had to be courageous enough to acknowledge that I didn't know Jesus. I had a tradition, a religion, but it was empty. And then once I repented that day on that road, within 10 minutes, I walked into the kitchen and I shook that chef's hand.

[00:04:37] And he went to Canada now, by the way. His name is Tony Bevan. And my life dramatically changed. And I became an evangelist for Jesus. And that was 44 years ago. And from that day to this day, I've been in and out of so many situations where God would have trained me to reign in his ways.

[00:05:02] And now today we run a church that has been passed on from, like, you know, our senior pastor. I stepped down a couple of years back and then a team of pastors took her over, elders. And now we've rejigged it again. And over the last, yeah, over the last period, it's just been an amazing outpouring of God's spirit. And we run a deliverance ministry.

[00:05:28] Me and my wife has carried that probably for the last 25 years from our home into the city, from the city into rehabilitation centers where God would train us on the front line, show us what we're dealing with. And, yeah, he trains us to reign in righteousness. And it's very powerful to see what God is doing these days. You were training as a chef. The Lord drew you to himself. A fantastic conversion.

[00:05:55] But then there's the call into ministry, which is, for those of us who have had that, it's a very different experience. Tell us a little bit about what that looked like. Yeah. Well, we ran our own business. We took over. My boss, who I worked for at the time, sort of surrendered his business. And we picked up on it. And we carried it. And then we won this contract for the National Museum restaurant. And we had lots of contracts.

[00:06:24] We were a really good company. We're really good. We were called Taste and See from Psalms 34. Yeah. And it was very apt. And, yeah, we were right beside the doll, which was the government building in Ireland that you'd see on the TV all the time. And I used to get free advertisement outside because my van would always be parked outside. So it was really cool. And, yeah, and we were there for seven years.

[00:06:51] And then on the seventh year, the Lord said to me, come out of it. And he said, stop working for the food that perishes and start working for the food that endures unto eternal life. When God speaks like zeal for his house consumes you. And I knew and my wife knew we were to stop. Now, this sent like an earthquake through the church because a lot of people, especially young men, said, so we're all to give up our work.

[00:07:19] And I said, no, God's calling me. Yeah. He's not calling you. Yeah. He called me to do this. And I obeyed. I was 40 years of age then. And, yeah, God has just been powerfully ministering. And since then, I worked for the kingdom. Basically, there's a big difference. And I was sort of wanting to be about my father's business. And I met the realm of the spirit in a way that I never met it before.

[00:07:50] And God trained me to reign in the spirit and how to deal with the realm of the spirit. And I set captives free now in the name of Jesus, have been doing for a long time. And we minister to broken hearts. And Jeremiah says that God trains you to deal with the deep places of man, the deep wounds, because deep calls on to deep. God doesn't want surface Christianity. He wants to liberate people.

[00:08:19] He wants to set them free. He said truth must be found on the inner parts. Now, sometimes I go into a bit of a preach. So I get caught by that, you know, and that's the passion. It's Christ in us, isn't it? So God gives us gifts. It says this in Proverbs 18 and 16. God gifts people and he makes room for them. And then he brings us before great men, it says, or great people.

[00:08:47] And oftentimes those people are in great positions, just like he gifted Moses. And he said, Moses, now I want you to take me into the Pharaoh. Moses bricked it like. And yet God is saying, I need to be in there so you can be me and I'll be you. How is that? As a deal. And finally, he got Moses in there with all of his excuses. He got Moses to take him in. And he asks us to do the same.

[00:09:13] There are many people in positions today that God wants to speak to and he wants his people to be released so that they can worship him. And I don't know how that looks in your country. I know how it looks over here. And yet God speaks when we open our mouth wide. He fills it and he fills us with passion and he fills us with wisdom. Our tongue becomes his pen. That's what it says in Psalms 45.

[00:09:41] Your tongue will become the pen of a skillful writer. And as you speak, the passion of the father's heart starts spilling it. And you're his conduit. You're the vehicle that he's coming through. Yeah. So that's what we've been sort of moving in. Now, there's loads of stories wrapped around those areas. They're really exciting. Well, we want to hear some of them. But I wonder if you can help us just, you know, again, we are still an ocean apart.

[00:10:09] Give us a picture, a little snapshot of the spiritual condition in Dublin, in Ireland, because we've heard about some little pockets of revival awakenings in parts of the UK and Scotland, Edinburgh, different areas of things coming up. Give us a little snapshot of spiritual life in Ireland. Well, it's been religious for a long time. And then obviously, you know, that went and that broke down.

[00:10:36] And then people, because they're spiritual, they're looking for spiritual identity. And after the collapse of the Catholic Church through the misgivings of that situation, people were looking in and they start looking in the wrong places. And shamanism, Reiki, all of that starts spilling into our country.

[00:10:57] I suppose the gods of the new age came in and also the gods of Hinduism and the gods of all of those sort of scenarios that people get caught up in. And then we deal with all of this, where people go after false gods. And as as one young man who came to faith, actually, down at the convention center that your father was hosting. Yeah.

[00:11:21] And then he said to me, you know, when I take magic mushrooms, I'm making an illegal entry into the spiritual realm. I was amazed at that. And I'm looking at him. He's only saved like two, three months. And he's in our groundwork course, which is our basic Christianity course. Yeah. And I said, could you say that again? Because it was his tongue speaking life into death. Yeah.

[00:11:48] And he was telling us about John 10, that the sheep and the shepherd. And he said, if anybody comes in the back door, he's not the good shepherd. And he said it again. He's making an illegal entry into the kingdom of God, but taking magic mushrooms or any form of substance abuse. And I just thought that was amazing.

[00:12:15] And I just think, yeah, in these places of revelation, God is going to use us and teach us how to discern spirit. There's three spirits in the world. It's human spirit, evil spirit and Holy Spirit. And we just have to learn how to discern what we're dealing with. And we need to learn how to set captives free.

[00:12:39] And the deep work of the Father is that he wants to reach into man's heart and pull him out of those dark places and liberate him and let him know there's a God who loves him.

[00:12:52] You know, Joe, it's interesting as you say that because I think there's something to when people see the manifestation of demonic possession or people chasing after a lot of these false gods and really getting caught up in that spiritual realm of darkness.

[00:13:36] It's visible. need and desire that's still behind the facade. But it seems like in Ireland, the facade has worn down the sort of collapse, so to speak, as you put it, of the Catholic Church and all that came with that revealed what was actually behind all these things. And these ideologies come in and proliferate themselves.

[00:13:56] And so there's an obvious being called to the task of people like yourself to go in and really be warriors for the truth of the gospel to bring healing. Yeah, I do think that Aikoba had a powerful part to play in it because it brought the realism of our identity and our existence into play. And it was nothing to be feared. It was more something to be found. People started looking for themselves.

[00:14:24] They were looking for something greater than themselves. Yeah. And they reached out. And as I say, it's our time now to answer the call and to be always prepared to give an answer for the hope that lies within you. Maybe could I share one of the most amazing things that happened in the last two months? Yeah, please. And I was just amazed by this. We were setting up for our Tuesday morning ministry, which goes on from eight in the morning till six in the evening.

[00:14:53] And we meet people on the air every hour. And there'd be probably three or four meeting rooms that we would minister out of. And we equip the church to minister to broken hearts and broken lives. And, yeah, demonically infested lives and people who have madness going on, whatever it may be. Just life, I would say, pastoring a world that's broken and bringing them into security.

[00:15:21] Like, you know, the way the Lord says his house is a strong house, strong tower. The righteous run into it and they are safe. But we try and bring people of the world in their wills. And we cast out then the spirits and we keep the people. And that's the plan, isn't it? That's the plan. But as I'm doing a bit of gardening, because I love gardening, being a chef, you always like a bit of gardening. I'm doing gardening in the church and I'm waiting for the ministry to kick off.

[00:15:47] And a few of my people arrive and I'm looking at this man at the end of the gate. He's at the end of the passageway at the gate and he's pacing the gate. And he's like something that is locked up behind the gate. And I'm looking at him and I don't feel anything in my spirit to go down. He was a foreign man. And I thought he was just waiting to be picked up, which he was. But I didn't know how he was going to be picked up.

[00:16:15] And then one of our administrators arrives and she cops that he's crying. And she goes over to him and she talks to him, said, are you OK? And he starts speaking to her in Portuguese. And she has a Portuguese student. So she had on her phone a conversion like that. She could hear, she could speak. Translate, yeah.

[00:16:42] And she was the right person, you see, because I hadn't got that. And she was the right person. Yeah. And she said, what's wrong with you? He says, I don't know. All I know is I was told by God to come down to this street and to stand at this gate and wait. And he would send somebody to tell me about himself. And she didn't know how to handle that.

[00:17:12] What do you mean? And he said, well, I'm from Portugal. And I flew into Dublin on Monday. This was the day before. And I came for an interview for a job. And when I got into the hotel on my first night's sleep, I fell asleep. And I had this vision. And he described meeting Jesus as John on the island of Patmos met him.

[00:17:40] And Jesus revealed himself in that way. And he said, it terrified me because I'm an atheist. I do not believe in God. But he told me that he believed in me. And he told me he wants to know me. And if I wanted to know him, I was to go down to this street, stand at this gate and wait for somebody to come.

[00:18:08] And they would come and tell him about God. So our administrator said, come on up into the church. And for two hours, she sat and she conversed with him. And it was amazing. And his wife rang in the middle of it. And she said, did you get the job? And he wasn't getting the job, but he was getting the interview because God was interviewing him. And that was a powerful engagement.

[00:18:39] And he got powerfully saved. He got powerfully saved. And he went there. One of our lads plays the mouth organ. And he was out playing this mouth organ. And for some reason, this man played the mouth organ, too. So he knew the song. And he went there and they were playing it in the reception area. And there they were worshipping. And he was worshipping for the first time. And he just got powerfully saved. And he walked out of our church two hours later.

[00:19:09] He went by the window. And he was just jumping in the air, punching it. And how would you make that up? Right, right. How could you make it up? We just seen God at work. And God knew we were opened on Tuesday. And he sent him down to us. He didn't send him down Monday. And he didn't send him down Wednesday because we wouldn't have been there. Always be prepared to give an answer for the hope that lies within you.

[00:19:38] Joe, in the video, I think, of the Leading the Way stories, at one point you talk about how the church was just 20, 30 people. It was a smaller group gathering. And then it's as if the floodgates opened. And, you know, some of that could have been from Dad's visit to Dublin. But I'm sure it's a lot of this type of ministry as well. What was it that you saw that really kind of, of course, it's the Spirit of God. But what were the things that you saw that were really just starting to bring the people in?

[00:20:06] Was it just the willingness of the church to open the doors and be available? I think maybe the crossover of that, it started as a small gathering. But that was years back. But our church has a lot of history. And we're probably the only people group in our city that owns a building. It's owned by the people. And it's a huge building. But evangelism and reaching out has always been part of our journey.

[00:20:35] We've always been there for that. But we were in a real lull. And we lost half of our members. And that just goes on in every church. It can be a little bit of apathy. Or it can be a bit of slouch. You know, or a bit of, you know, just taking your eye off the ball. And the passion is not there anymore. And maybe it's become a little bit religious, a little bit formated. You know how it happens. It happens everywhere. And yet, as I say, zeal for the Lord's house has to consume.

[00:21:04] And, you know, we have to keep our eye on Jesus. So as we're journeying, we're sort of noticing God moving. And then your dad comes to the city. And we were asked to be involved. And I said, yeah, that'd be fantastic to be involved. Now, as I say, our ministry is moving. And what the growth is happening, but not as much as what happened when the convention center. Yeah, yeah. Hope for Ireland, yeah.

[00:21:34] And Dr. Yousef brought that spark that created the flame. And a lot of people, as I say, down there generated life. And you could see it. Like, you know, you could see it, you could hear it. But, like, there was a particular couple that I met down at the convention center. He was a rapper. And he was just an electric lad, like a lad which had a lot of attraction. I married them eventually in the church.

[00:22:03] And both of them are just such magnets. I met them down at the convention center. And they were jumping around. It's infectious, isn't it? The Holy Spirit is infectious. So I was jumping with them, like, I said, this is great, you know. And they just kept saying, we're coming to your church. We're coming to your church. And they came to our church. And they have just been a breath of fresh air to us. And they brought so much life. And even up to last night, I was with them.

[00:22:33] And they brought a new lad in with them. And every week, they're bringing people. And, you know, Kim's mother got saved. And Casey's aunt got saved. And then all other people got saved. It's just a constant flow. It just had ripple effects. It's like a fire. Absolutely. All these young people became our greatest evangelists. And yet they were like lambs among wolves. And we knew that.

[00:23:01] We knew that they were out in the city. Because, like, the city is full of wolf mentality. Like, I mean, the city is owned by the enemy of our soul. And God says he's the God of this world. And he binds and blinds people. But we were seeing our church becoming a light on a hill. And it was radiant. And all of a sudden, people had a place to come to. And the local people were coming in now in ways that we never saw before.

[00:23:30] And something broke. Something broke after the convention center. Now, I can't put my finger on all of this. Only that I know that what we're doing in a ministry level, what we've been doing all over the years, it all just amalgolated into this amazing sort of Niagara Falls. And it just broke in the spirit.

[00:23:54] And now we're sort of trying to handle all the people that are coming in the doors and pastoring them and getting them into groundwork. And that's an open sort of, as I say, basic Christianity course. And people are coming every week into that. And then we upgrade them then to what we call year of equipping. And we just set them on the discipleship track. And, yeah, people are just getting educated, training terrain in righteousness,

[00:24:24] naturally supernaturalizing them and getting them to understand that they're home. They're home. They've found the home. They've found a place of rest. And now they can convert and they can change and they can rest. And they can bring their families. And they are. They're bringing their mothers. They're bringing their fathers. They're bringing their brothers, their colleagues. They're bringing them. And it's a wonderful thing to see.

[00:24:53] I do believe with all my heart that we co-are and co-reign with the Holy Spirit. And we have to really realize that that's where the life is. That's where the power of it is. And God is saying, are you ready? Because this garden is going to grow. Be ready for the garden to grow. Because my father is a gardener. And if you're caught up in the sap and I am the vine, you are the branches. I'm ready to release fruit now.

[00:25:23] And I know that's metaphorical language, but we all know it as Christians. And we know what that means. And it's fruit that lasts. And God said this as well. He said, now listen, in this place. And it is growth. And oftentimes people would say, is the summer here or is the summer coming? Or will the summer be late? And the summer is here. And God is saying, enjoy what's in front of you now. Enjoy it and get stuck in.

[00:25:50] And I just think that, yeah, we have to be ready for what God is doing. And it needs to be sustainable. And you need to be not worn out by it, but understand the parable of the sower. He says, if you don't understand the parable of the sower, how will you understand any of the rest of the parables? So you need to know that the parable of the sower is very real. And you will have people that will shoot up.

[00:26:18] You'll have people who will be choked out. And you'll have people that will go into 30, 60 and 100 fold. And that's just the way it works. So God is in charge and God is leading. And he's very victorious. Amen.

[00:26:33] Joe, what do you say to the person who's maybe where Trinity was a few years back, where there's maybe some staleness and they're hearing you, they're hearing the story, they're seeing people coming in droves, and they're just saying, we want that. We want to have that, but we feel stuck. What do you say to them? Be very courageous and passionate about your zeal for the Lord's house.

[00:27:03] And ask the Father through the Son, by the Spirit. What do you want of me, Lord? Because God has not done with us yet. And this is not me. And I'll be honest, I'll be honest, I'll be honest. I'll be honest. I'll be honest. But I've been battling cancer for the last six years. This week, something has broke. This week, God has sent me a word and powerful.

[00:27:32] And sometimes in your weakest state, he's perfectly strong. And no matter what you're battling, no matter what you're affected by, let the zeal of the Lord's house consume you. And stay passionate for the Lord's ways. And ask Jesus, use me. Here I am, Lord. Use me. I'm willing. I'm on. I want to be on today. I want to be ready to do the master's work.

[00:28:02] And I think that's it. I think God is always looking for a heart that's completely his. It says that in Chronicles. It says the Lord is looking to and for all throughout the earth, seeking hearts that are completely his. Well, that's the Old Testament. But God is the same yesterday, today and forever. He's still seeking those hearts. Yeah. And if you're saying yes, it doesn't matter how stale you are. The reality is he bakes bread every day. It's a bread of deliverance.

[00:28:28] He delivers us every day from forma and staleness. And it's God who brings the life. He's the one that produces the sap. You just bear the fruit. You don't produce it. He has to have your heart. And he doesn't want your religion. He doesn't want your staleness. He doesn't want even your legalism. It kills. It's the spirit.

[00:28:55] And it's the word and the spirit, isn't it? Spirit, truth. And that's what brought people to life. And we need to rely strongly on his leading. He's the real leader of our church. And as I say, if you have Joe on the throne, well, you've got the wrong J on the throne. It's Jesus and Jesus only. And the centrality of Jesus is the centrality of our message.

[00:29:25] And that's our ethos and that's our values. We are a Christocentric church. And Christ is the center of our lives and our church. And he meets all the needs. We just let him be God. And we have a Savior who saves us every day. And he'll save you. And he'll deliver you. And he'll put you to work. That's passion. I love it. It would be very difficult to listen to you sharing that and still feel cold.

[00:29:56] Right? There's just a great spiritual fervor that's in you. And I can see why the people in your church love you dearly. The people who wait in line for hours, it sounds like, to speak with you are blessed by that. Joe, my prayer is that God would replicate and create more like you who are looking for that zeal to consume them. Not just in Ireland, but around the world.

[00:30:24] That God would raise up individuals, families who would have that passion and that desire and that zeal to see lost ones come to the saving knowledge of Christ. And as you said, be put to work. You know, a lot of the people I've noticed that were coming into your church, they didn't look like ordinary people. They came from all different walks of life.

[00:30:46] And I think the church mentality can be, you need to get cleaned up first, and then you can come in and be part of us. But that's not what's happening at your church, and that's not what the Lord calls us to. How do you prepare your people, your congregation, for having a heart of anticipatory joy, of welcoming in people who have tried everything under the sun and have failed and may look very different from them?

[00:31:13] We have an amazing church, and we have an amazing group of people who are teams, and they're all gifted in so many ways. When the gifts are dispensing, then God is being glorified. And it's getting people just to dispense that gift. And as I say, we've rejigged and rejigged until we got it right. And now I believe, I believe we've got it right. And I believe that what God is doing now is Christ is turning up through the giftedness.

[00:31:43] And that is what the gift is. It's Christ in us, the hope of glory. It's the mystery of revelation. It's a mystery that God is revealing to others through you. And they're looking at you and saying, wow. And that's what I'm saying. There's this whole misconception of, is it you? Is it me? It's Jesus. It's not you at all. You have to get out of the way and let God be God. And God then has you, has your heart. You're his vehicle. You're carrying him.

[00:32:12] Well, that's what our guys do. They all are on board. And that's what the gifts are about. It's the leaders are to release the body into greater work and greater ministry. And our people are great ministers and they all have great passion for Jesus in diverse ways. And look, we have amazing people. And we've had a lot of baptisms. Obviously, we have a lot of baptisms when you see salvation breaking out.

[00:32:40] And we've been down to the beach there just last season. We're going down to the beach again now and now in August with a whole massive group of people to baptize them. So it's quite an incredible thing to watch people take in that position and to want to stand for Jesus publicly. But I would present them as beautiful people. And I said, these are beautiful people being rescued from the dominion of darkness.

[00:33:10] These are the strangers in the world that have been isolated and abandoned and rejected, lost because somebody took some kind of advantage over them or spoke a lie into them and robbed them of their beauty. And God is want to restore them. Don't judge people. Don't judge the stranger. Love them. Don't judge people.

[00:33:36] Because they're carrying a story that needs restoration. They're carrying a story that needs power. So God doesn't give us a spirit of fear, but he gives us one of power to overcome the enemy. Love to embrace the person and a sound mind to discern the spirit in which you're dealing with. May it be human or may it be evil. May it be holy.

[00:34:02] And God just wants you to move with him in the power of resurrection. We see many people raised from the dead. And they're alive today. And I think sometimes we're waiting too much for that sensational God that is amongst us. And God said, I'm raising people from the dead all the time. That's right. And you're waiting for somebody that died naturally. And I said, but he's only going to die again.

[00:34:32] It's the spiritual dead I'm after. Yeah. And we go after them. Well, we're calling the Marys and the Joes and the Johns and the Olives and all those beautiful people back to life. In Jesus name. Amen. And that's what the spirit is after. And the Holy Spirit energizes you and works with you and gives you this. The understanding of the traps where they are.

[00:35:01] Like, I mean, people go to psychoanalysis for psychoanalysis and to go to, you know, not that there's anything wrong with people getting counseling and all that. But I don't want to be sitting with somebody and in 10 minutes, their whole life is spilled out on the table. And they'd be shocked. I would be shocked. But then the Holy Spirit was saying, now, come on, let's put this back together again. This is a jigsaw that needs to be fixed. And that jigsaw is put together again by Jesus.

[00:35:30] And he puts it back correctly. And he restores their life. And he gives them beauty for ashes. The oil of joy for mourning. Garments of praise instead of spirits of despair. They're now wokes of righteousness, a planting of the Lord. And they will bear fruit. Amen. It's a powerful, powerful, passionate ministry to be involved in. Serving God and serving the kingdom.

[00:36:00] And Jesus is Lord. Jesus is Lord. He reigns. Oh, does he reign. Well, Joe, I know you've got a lot of stories. Is there one in particular you want to send us out on? Wow. Is there one? Or a couple. Yeah, yeah. You know, I suppose like in a lot of ways, like, you know, there's so many stories of what God is doing in our world.

[00:36:30] And through each individual. Just watching. I suppose just watching Jesus moving in the rooms. Watching Jesus deliver people from enemies that you're afraid of. And when, like, you know, one man from a foreign country who believed in the gospel that wasn't the gospel of Jesus Christ. But it was another Jesus that came in his name.

[00:36:57] And it was a gospel that was sort of performance based. And he kept on saying, I don't know why God doesn't bless me. I deserve to be blessed. Wow. And I'm looking at him. I said, wow. And I said, and I asked him what he believed. I can't go into all of it because I have to protect him and protect myself. And I just looked at him and I says, you're believing in a gospel of works.

[00:37:25] I said, you don't know the Jesus of the Bible. I says, we're not actually a Christian. And he's 20 years pursuing this life. I says, you don't know Jesus. I says, but you can know. And the minute I said this, immediately, his whole body contorted, his face burst. He would nearly turn into the incredible holy. And he said this to me.

[00:37:54] He says, you are changing his mind. And I says, you be silent. I'll be dealing with you in a minute. As you've thwarted this man for long enough. Be silent in the name of Jesus. And you see, immediately, truth exposed the lie and the deceiver. And he broke into our conversation trying to generate fear.

[00:38:23] And I just silenced him with the authority of the kingdom. You never know when to expect the intrusion of the demonic world. But the truths of the kingdom was liberating this man. As Jesus did. A conversation with Jesus changed the life. And they ran running, just like the woman at the well. Come see a man that told me everything I ever did.

[00:38:51] And she became his greatest evangelist. She was just born again. Saved by the grace of God. And all of a sudden, wow, she brought the whole village. A woman brought the whole village out to Jesus. And he hung around with him for a couple of days. That's right. And that's what it's like when you're caught in the spirit. And God says, come on into the fire. Don't be afraid of the fire. I'm going to just burn off all the stuff that's not of me. And he said, kick off your shoes and stay a while. That's what he said to Moses. That's what he said to Joshua.

[00:39:22] Look, come on into the fire. Don't be afraid of the fire. It's zeal now. And it's got to be consuming. And yet you're going to walk with you and bring you through these fires for my sake. My father sent me Jesus. And I'm sending you. And all I need you to say is yes. Say yes to the dress of righteousness. And watch what God will do through you.

[00:39:50] And it's not a performance. It's a love. It's a passion. It's a zeal. And no matter what enemy says that to you, you can bind him and silence him. But you will change many hurts. So, yeah, that's one. Well, Joe, this has been such a fruitful conversation even for me as I think about the different obstacles that we feel like we face. And just the reminder to keep our eyes fixed on Christ.

[00:40:21] He wants to draw people to himself. It's not something he doesn't want to do. And so we can look forward with great anticipation that knowing that the fields are ready for harvest. And he's drawing people in. And so, you know, as I said earlier, I pray that the Lord would raise more men and women like you up in Ireland, in the U.K., in America, Africa, Asia, Australia, all of it, South America, that the harvest would come in and that the workers would be faithful.

[00:40:50] And I thank you so much. I know we're time zones apart, but we are united in the spirit. And I thank God for you, brother. Yeah, thank you. It's great being on your show with you. And again, just in closing, I don't think there's any recipe for this except that you're a son. Own your identity. Know that you've been called and know that you were once not a people of God, but now you are a people of God.

[00:41:19] God has work for us to do. And that's, yeah, what we're called to do. So enjoy it and be blessed in it. And thanks for having me on here. And I'm really delighted to be able to share God's love with you. Thanks, Joe. God bless, brother. You too. The Lord bless you. Thank you for joining us. Before we close, I want to share that Candid Conversations is taking a summer break.

[00:41:43] We're pausing in July and August to rest, to reflect, to gear up for a powerful new season starting August 19th. Now's your chance to catch up on any episodes that you may have missed, raw, honest, and hope-filled stories that meet you right where you are. Stay connected on social. We'll be sharing favorite clips and sneak peeks of what's coming up ahead. As always, thank you for listening to and sharing this episode. Thank you.