Rick Warren (The Purpose Driven Life): Understand & Accept God's Love | FULL EPISODE | Praise on TBN

the purpose of your life is not your career the purpose of your life is not your family the purpose of your life is not your hobbies those are all good things they're all gifts of god but what the purpose of your life is is to let god love you and to learn to love him back praise comes to you from southern california one of southern california's fixtures rick warren you are a fixture my favorite recommendation is uh now here's rick warren of whom billy graham said who yeah years ago for those that might be living on an island group somewhere uh with no internet connection or television uh we're gonna be talking and unpacking uh what what what one of the most it's a phenomenon rig that's all there is to it's purpose-driven life 50 million uh copies published and first of all i want your opening comments about this book and the phenomenon that you have lived over the last 20 years and then we're going to unpack this for a while um well you know first matt and lori it's good to be with you guys thank you love you a lot thank you and you know when i wrote the first four words it's not about you honestly you guys i had no idea how many times i was going to be tested on that oh for the rest of my life wow i sometimes i think i'm tested 50 times a day with that sentence it's not about you and if i hear a compliment or a praise oh god it's not about you and if i hear criticism or an unfavorable attack i go it's not about you okay this really is i didn't have any idea i almost sometimes wish i hadn't put that sentence in because i didn't know i was going to be tested on it the rest of my life it really is not about me it's it's all about god and i think the rest of my life i'm going to be working out the implications of that you know and just because you write a book doesn't mean you know it all i have to learn stuff that is still and i you know even authors forget what they wrote and when i wrote this book 20 years ago and interesting the the how it started is it took me seven months to write this book 12 hours a day when i was typing this book i had no idea that god was going to use it like this i knew it was anointed but i didn't know it was going to be a bestseller i knew i was anointed because a lot of times i'd be typing and tears would be flowing down my face and going i am not this good i i i can't say this on my own this is the holy spirit here talking through me and i knew i was being used different than any other book i've ever written or read and when i before i wrote purpose-driven life i actually asked how do you get a book to last 500 years and i went back and i read stuff like imitation of christ which had been around 500 years and the desert fathers which had been around 500 years i thought how do you do that and it was to not be uh try not try to be contemporary there are almost no stories in this book which is the exact opposite what anybody will tell you in writing a book you got to tell a lot of good stories the only stories in it are pretty much biblical stories moses did this or because those are timeless and when it came out i had no idea how god was going to use it but you know 20 20 uh years later it's it's still still helping people at 16 rick warren was an aspiring evangelist with absolutely zero intention of becoming an author by 20 he had led over 120 crusades and was well on his way to becoming like his hero billy graham then his hero became his mentor and through that friendship rick realized his god-given purpose he never planned to become a writer let alone make the list of times 100 most influential people or times 25 most influential evangelicals in america but when he penned a purpose-driven life he did more than accept god's calling he woke the world the wall street journal publisher weekly the new york times kim kardashian ray lewis manny pacquiao all agreed it was and is a bestseller it's even saved lives literally through this book olympic gold medalist michael phelps overcame his thoughts of suicide it's turned me into believing that there is a power greater than myself it helped me when i was in a place where i needed the most help ashley smith a single mother who was held hostage by a rapist and murderer was miraculously released by her captor after reading aloud from one of the chapters it's not about you the purpose of your life is far greater than your own personal fulfillment with the proceeds rick and his wife kay launched the hiv aids initiative a global ministry that provides care and support to the 38 million men women and children suffering from this deadly disease an evangelist turned writer turned world changer speaking into the futures of millions receiving the honor of the international medal of peace and bringing politicians like barack obama and john mccain together for rick it has nothing to do with him all he did was accept god's purpose for his life it just so happens god had pretty big plans [Music] rick warren's broadcast if you haven't seen it on tbn it airs wednesdays at 4 30 p.m eastern and sunday at 11 30 a.m lori and i are getting to see you on sundays i really hope we're going to church with you we would have gone to church at saddleback yesterday but we're still in the coven thing and so uh we we tried but um ultimately this book has to be re-imagined almost every generation yeah you were pointing out that this month's vogue magazine selena gomez is on the cover of vogue and and in in the interview in the long cover article on vogue magazine said she walked down the stairs with a copy of purpose-driven life in her hands and uh and her pdl journal and said i've read through this book three times and and it's influenced her life well and think about it it it had just been written when she was born yeah exactly yeah uh so a person who was two years old when the book came out it's 22 now yeah so they they probably want to read the book yeah what a sacrifice what is what a seed zone yeah you know all those days all that time it really was putting your head down and focusing and some of the sweetest days of my communion with the lord i've walked to the lord now for over 50 years and uh i can hear his voice you know and i want to just say this to people who i have a hard time hearing from god it'll get better yeah okay it it will get better you know when my wife calls we've been married 45 years she doesn't have to say this is kay your wife okay she can breathe she can breathe and i know it's her okay she doesn't never have to my kids my grandkids don't have to say daddy this is josh yeah okay why i've walked with them so long i know their tone okay and if you have a hard time hearing from god it will get better the longer you walk with the lord and now there's no doubt in my mind i i know now and this is me talking to myself yeah this is the devil putting an idea in my mind this is the holy spirit you you know that dig into that just a touch because um you know you you you don't realize you've already started preaching and teaching here and i love that but uh what what i what i like about that is are you talking about the dedication of the time you put into this was that what triggered this help people understand that this is a phenomenon so you're kind of telling us how this phenomenon happened there's no more fundamental question than why am i alive yeah okay what am i here for okay there's the question of existence why am i live there's the question of significance does my life matter there's a question of purpose what am i here for you don't get any more basic than that and that itself is a timeless question that they're exactly right and and their time my life verses david served god's purpose in his generation then he died now i like that verse i'd like it on my tombstone he served god's purpose in his generation then he died okay i don't want to be around here any longer than i have to i want to be in heaven okay and the more friends and family i have in heaven the more i i long for that but he david served god's purpose that's eternal it never changes but he did it in his generation he did it in a contemporary way it's what you guys are trying to do with tbn sure yeah you're trying to do that which never changes in a world that's constantly changing that which is eternal in a timeless way that is which is always relevant but you do it in a relevant way serve god's purpose in your generation now we can't serve god's purpose in any other generation okay there's some people who think the 1950s was the best right year of christianity and there are people who think the reformation was the best time of christianity but actually it's when the bible says in acts god chose the times of seasons that we would be born so you and i were meant to live in this generation the purposes never change the generation changes all the time and so it's that tension between the ideal and the real that we have to have to live with all the time and when i actually wrote pdl uh the first thing i was asking was how do i say it in the simplest way okay i wasn't trying to be profound i was trying to be simple jesus said profound thoughts in simple ways consider the lilies okay okay you know look at this over here very simple we say simple things in profound ways yeah and think we're confusing people right and a lot of times we think we're being deep but we're just being muddy you know it's like it would be easy for me to confuse people okay jesus said profound things in simple ways simple doesn't mean shallow simple doesn't mean simplistic simple just means it's clear so i think i wrote pdl basically about a fourth grade level and that's why it's the most translated book because it's easy to translate it's not it it's straight and to the point let me clarify one thing you just said uh it is the most translated book short of the bible on the planet earth okay so how many languages now 137 137 languages this book is now and by the way it is our offer to you and thank you rick for this amazing version of this it's a amazing thing so you didn't have any idea that purpose-driven life would do this no what what made you write that yeah well i think first you know as a pastor for so many years i've counseled thousands and thousands of people and i've also stood at the bedside of countless number of people as they took their last breath okay and when people are dying though and they know they're dying what they say at the end is often very profound yeah very very profound and very important because i think these are my last words on this side of eternity and i i kept hearing people talk about purpose relationships love the stuff that really matters and what i've discovered as a pastor is we eventually figure out what matters most it just takes us so long okay not a single person that i've been with when they're dying has said bring me my trophies i want to see my golf trophy bring me my diploma i want to look at it one more time bring me that gold watch i got from the business i get no when people die you know what they want they want people around them they want relationships and eventually we always learn it's about love okay it's all about love now god has five purposes for our lives but we're not gonna go into all of them but there are five your your plan for god's pleasure you're you're formed for god's family you're created to become like christ you're uh shaped to serve god and you're made for a mission these five purposes are modeled in acts 2 by the first church they're explained by paul in ephesians 4 jesus prays for them in uh john 17 he says this the five things i did with the the disciples but they're best summarized in the five verbs of the great commandment and the great commission so if nobody gets anything else that i say right now this is pdl summarized one day jesus is walking down the street and guy comes up says lord what's the most important command he goes oh that's not rocket science it's easy i could summarize all the law and the prophets in two verses okay here's the whole old testament two verses love god love god with all your heart soul mind and strength oh and by the way love your neighbor as yourself okay now we'll come back that but we get two of the purposes of life from the great commandment love god with all your heart and love your neighbors yourself then right before jesus went back to heaven he gives his last words last words are important the very last thing jesus says is go make disciples baptize them in the name of the father son and holy spirit and teach them to do everything i've commanded you these three purposes from the great commission and two purposes from the great commandment are the purposes of life and they're also the purposes of the church the purpose of the church is to help you fulfill the five purposes for your life so what are they love god with all your heart soul mind and strength the word for that in the bible is called worship worship is simply expressing love to god it is the first purpose of my life my the father seeks worshipers okay now i could be expressing love by myself in a quiet time with you in a small group you and laurie in a small group or with a thousand people it's still worship any time i'm expressing love to god i'm worshiping okay love your neighbor as yourself the word for that is called ministry or service the greek word is diaconia service deacon we get it from that it means to serve and when i love god with all my heart and i serve him that's worship when i love other people with all my heart and i serve them that's service or ministry so we get worship and ministry from the great commission commandment in the great commission it says go make disciples that's evangelism we're to tell other people the good news we're to pass it on the only reason i'm saved somebody told me right okay somebody told me so i'm supposed to tell other people and then it says teach them to do everything i've told you that's discipleship okay that's another purpose of my life to grow in christ to beco where and and then in the middle it says by the way baptize them what's that baptism is the symbol that you're part of a family it's a symbol of fellowship it says i'm not just a believer i'm a belonger and you guys know we've heard a lot today we have here people say well i love jesus i just don't need a church well that's like saying i'm a bee but i don't need a hive or i'm a football player but i don't want to be on any team or i want to be in the army but not any platoon the bible says a christian without a church family is an orphan and so we're not just believers we're belongers and so that's the element of fellowship that we're better together so the book's all about all five purposes the most important one though and i want to say it here is the first one that your number one purpose in life is to let god love you oh my goodness not for you to love god but to let god love you now let me explain this from cover to cover in this book from genesis revelation the bible says that the whole reason the universe exists is god wanted a family god wanted a family okay he didn't need a family he wasn't lonely the father son and holy spirit are in relationship to themselves and love relations but he wanted a family the bible says god is love not that he has love that he is love it's his essence it's his nature it's his character the only reason there's any love in the universe is because god created us and he's a god of love if god was not a god of love you and i would not have the ability to give and receive love the only reason we have the ability to give love and receive love is we're made in god's image cows don't love slugs don't love worms don't love fish don't love only created in his image is the ability to love now the bible says god is love if i have all this love and i don't bestow it on something a person a pet something what good is the love god wanted to show his love and so he created the universe and he created a universe just to create this galaxy just to create this planet just so it sets on the axis that one degree this way we'd burn up the only degree this way we'd freeze up it's just perfectly designed for human life just to create the human race just so he could create matt and lori just so he could love you wow that's beautiful so for those who are listening you got to realize that if god paid that much attention the whole universe was created because he wanted to create you so he could love you if god loves me and i love me you don't like me what's your problem okay in other words i i don't need your approval to be happy right you know what i'm saying if i'm loved by the father yeah okay so what kind of love does god have well it's unconditional god loves you on your good days and on your bad days he loves you when you feel it and you don't feel it he loves you when you think you deserve it and when you think you don't deserve it you can't make god stop loving you you can try but you will fail there's nothing you can do to make god stop loving you because god's love is not based on who you are it's based on who he is that's the first purpose is to let god love me you were planned for god's pleasure people go why am i made i'll tell you why you're made god made you to love you if he had wanted to love you you would not exist god made you to love you now where in the world is that message not needed this is why the book keeps selling because it is the fundamental issue of life why am i here i'm here to be loved by god and the bible says we love him because he first loved us our love's a response we don't start with loving god people tell me all the time you know pastor you know i think my problem is i don't love god enough i say no that's not your problem your problem is not that you don't love god enough your problem is you don't really feel and understand how much he loves you because if you really understood and felt how much god loves you you can't help but love him okay it's not a duty it's just i have to love somebody who loves me that much and so i start with the first purpose of living in god's love letting god love me and then learning to love him back and that's called worship hello friends tbn is helping millions around the world discover their purpose and destiny and this would not be possible without your faithful partnership with this strategic television ministry you know when i think about purpose and destiny it takes me back to the moment i first became aware of god towards the end of the vietnam war as a young man i had no concept of purpose in fact i had the misguided idea that if i didn't make it out alive it really wouldn't matter much then god got a hold of my life and i learned he had a divine plan for me that's why i'm so excited to offer x multiply your god-given potential author john bevere uses god's word to help us identify and fulfill the call god has on each of our lives it's our way of saying thank you this month for your gift of support in any amount every single person has a calling on their life and what god does is he gives us these supernatural abilities now these abilities are not natural they're actually his abilities that he entrusts to us as stewards and he gives us these abilities to be able to accomplish what he's created us to do and for your gift of support for sixty dollars or more we'll send you the special leather-bound edition of the purpose-driven life pastor rick warren will help you move beyond mere survival or even success to a life of god-empowered significance the life you were meant to live you were planned for god's pleasure people go why am i made i'll tell you why you're made god made you to love you if he had wanted to love you you would not exist god made you they love you now where in the world is that message not needed friends thank you from the bottom of my heart for enabling us to help millions find their purpose and destiny around the world please call now operators are standing by there's a whole lot of people that understand the heart of the author of this book pastor rick it's a beautiful introduction to what we're talking about here and there's a lot of people that knows a family member a son or a daughter you haven't talked to her you don't talk to a lot and a relative somebody down the street on your street this is the type of thing to get to give to them um as you're talking about this love you know what um we were talking about earlier pastor rick that there was a there was an unfulfilled question in the heart i believe this is my opinion and you know maybe maybe it wasn't but it felt like on cnn it was it felt like larry king since he shot his show in los angeles yeah you were often honest right and more times than not he doesn't matter what the subject that you were there where you're going [Laughter] if god is love right why do bad things happen to good people yeah well let me just that's a great question matt and i'm so glad you're asking it because when you look at these five purposes knowing christ and worship loving christ growing in christ serving christ sharing christ there's lots of different ways to say these five purposes worship fellowship discipleship ministry evangelism and god uses problems and pain to build all five purposes in our lives my goodness okay now you would know in your own life if i asked you lori when have your times of worship been closer to god in pain when you felt the heat on both of you when you felt like we're misunderstood we're we're being criticized uh we things are not going the way we want them to uh the finances aren't there whatever it is those are your deepest times of worship yeah not god c.s lewis said god whispers to us in our pleasure and shouts to us on our pain wow pain is god's megaphone so god uses pain to deepen our worship god uses pain to deepen our fellowship when i'm i don't grow close to you by bragging to you i grow close to you when i tell you where i'm hurting and then it draws us close i've been in a small group with some other couples in southern california for 18 years we've been through deaths in the family cancer job loss suicide you name it all kinds of different problems and we're we actually are closer together my wife and i are closer together after losing our son to mental illness than we were before because the pain actually drew us closer together and maybe we could talk about that a little bit because purpose doesn't prevent you from pain let me say that again purpose does not prevent you from pain okay you're going to have pain in your life and it's actually part of the purpose and then in in growth we grow through pain romans chapter 8 talks about how we grow through pain we be if god's going to make me like jesus christ that's his number one goal to make me like christ he's going to take me through everything jesus went through wow were there times when jesus was lonely yes misunderstood yes criticized yes discouraged yes were there times when he was tempted yes every one of those things why would god take his son through those things and not take me the bible says jesus learned obedience through suffering the bible says jesus was made perfect through suffering how do i think i'm going to learn those things same way okay so it's not a lack of faith it's part of discipleship so god uses pain to deepen my worship to deepen my fellowship he uses pain to deepen my spiritual growth there's some things we only learn through pain and then god uses pain to give us a ministry to serve others your greatest ministry will likely come out of your deepest hurt okay your greatest ministry will likely come out of your deepest hurt if you'll be honest to god honest to yourself and honest with others to share it so you have said pain yeah causes growth yeah those are you have to own those words too i have okay what is the most painful event in the 20 years in your life and how do these words help you through that yeah well i would have said until matthew's death uh k's cancer and kaye got cancer right after i i wrote this book and honestly when in the early years when this book was selling a million copies every other month uh honestly the last thing i was thinking of is oh this is great i'm on the cover of time magazine i'm thinking i'm holding the bedpan while my wife throws up and her hair is falling out and i'm going am i going to be alone with three kids and and k wrote a book one time uh called choose joy and on it it's a pair of railroad tracks and this goes to your point in that i used to think that we had good times and bad times and that life was like mountains and valleys okay you have high mountaintops and you have low valleys but the truth is life is more like a pair of railroad tracks where you get both at the same time my goodness the good and the bad are constantly and no matter how good things are in your life there's always something bad you got to be working on okay and no matter how bad things are in your life there's always something you can be thankful for you can be grateful for wow my son my youngest son matthew struggled with mental illness his entire life he was born as a as a child we could see he was clinically depressed as a child and i remember when he was 17 years old he came to me in tears he loved the lord he had a tender heart a tortured mind tender heart tortured he led people to christ he gave my book out to people he would witness to people on suicide sites he said dad it just doesn't work for me i just can't get the depression out and when 17 he came to me and he said dad it's real obvious i'm not going to be healed he said we've we have gone to the best doctors i've had the best medicine dad i've gone to the best healers men of faith women of faith i said dad you're a man of faith mom is a woman of faith you've prayed for me intercessors i've gone to the best counselors he said it's real clear i'm not going to get well why can't i just die and go on to heaven i know where i'm going why can't i just go on i just don't want the pain anymore that'll break your heart as a father okay to have your son and in tears i'm standing there flooding tears down my face and i said matthew i don't think you want to die i just think you want to be over the pain you want relief and i said here's my prayer one i will never stop praying for a miracle because miracles do happen as a pastor i've seen thousands of miracles stop physical miracles i've seen many many miracles so i know they happen but because they're miracles because they don't always happen not every time uh and so sometimes it doesn't and and i said my prayer is a you'll be miraculously cured okay and i will never stop praying for that and i do have a prayer ministry it's number two though if not i pray that through your own spiritual growth and maturity good counselor good medication you'll be able to manage because matthew the truth is on this earth not everything gets healed this is heave not heaven this is earth in heaven there's no more sadness sorrow sickness suffering but he said there's pain here on earth and that's why we are to pray in the lord's prayer thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven because in heaven god's will is done perfectly completely instantly and continuously on earth none of that's true i often don't do god's will you often don't do god's will other people and so we hurt people intentionally unintentionally and there is everything is broken on this planet by sin the weather's broken the economy is broken our bodies are broken our minds are broken everything's we live in a broken planet and that's why the bible says in romans creation groans for the day of salvation so i said what do you do when a problem can't be solved and there if i have a child who has cerebral palsy that child is going to have it the rest of its life most likely and those kind of things you have to manage the problem and some problems aren't miracles some problems are managed for the glory of god johnny gave glory to god without a miracle has done her entire life right okay and many others have done that too who've lived with thorns in the flesh and they gave glory to god either through a miracle or through managing it either way god gets glory so my prayer is that you'll be able to manage it and then god will give you a ministry of helping other people well uh about eight years ago matthew come over to our house for uh dinner one night and we had a good time we watched tv played a few games there's no problem no rift he lived in his own home as he was leaving he said dad i'm just so tired i'm i'm so tired and that was the last we heard from him wow so about 24 hours later we are worried because what we feared might happen someday and what we would pray would never happen we go over to his house his car's in the driveway the door is locked we don't have a key to get into his house and we're waiting for the police to come break down the door to find this terrible moment in our lives and kay and i are standing on the driveway hugging each other sobbing just sobbing and kay reaches down and she's wearing a necklace that has two words that are the words of the title of the book she'd just written choose joy and i look at her and i see how do you choose joy when your heart is breaking in a million pieces how do you choose joy the police came broke the door down found the the inevitable bad news they're carrying my sons out in a body bag and i if i hadn't had a small group i don't know that i'd still be in ministry right now but that meant that group that i'd been in for so many years those couples showed up within 30 minutes 15-20 minutes on that driveway and they didn't say anything they just hugged us okay they just hugged us and and they said we're not going to leave you alone tonight the guys hugged the me and the women hugged k they said we're coming to your house you don't have to say anything we're we're just going to be with you now this is an important thing i want to say to those of you who are watching i teach this to pastors all around the world the deeper the pain the fewer words you use this is an important thing to remember the deeper the pain the fewer words you use if somebody's having a bad hair day you can have a 30-minute you know conversation okay but if somebody's just lost a son to suicide you show up and shut up there's nothing you can say it's the ministry of presence people say i don't know what to say don't say anything just show up and shut up that is the ministry of presence now let me go back to understand how god uses in every purpose out of that pain came for the next 16 weeks i spent it alone with god i was either with k or with god i didn't do any preaching no staff meeting nothing for 16 weeks i had all my buddies okay uh judah smith and judd wilheit and all i had 60 and greg laurie all came in and preached for me for 16 weeks okay and i was either with cod or with kay and just listening i received during that time i'm not exaggerating maybe 30 35 000 letters of condolences and the ones that meant the most to me honestly matt were not the ones from rock stars and presidents and prime ministers they they wrote me many many people that i didn't know wrote me and gave great condolences the ones that meant the most to me were people that matthew had led to christ oh my goodness and they said i know that matthew struggled with mental illness his entire life but he led me to faith and i'm going to be in heaven because of him and he was talking to me on a suicide site and he talked me out of it and i'm going to be in heaven because and i remember writing in my journal that day in god's garden of grace even broken trees bear fruit my goodness and then i wrote and we're all broken okay we're all broken okay so if you think that reading purpose-driven life is going to give you a perfect life don't even bother it will give you a life of purpose and it will help you understand how god uses all these things and the fifth thing was god uses pain to be a witness i actually think that our greatest witness to the world is how we handle pain not how we handle good times there's a guy i've been witnessing to on my block for 20 years and he was not interested in anything he just shut down closed but when matthew died i remember driving by one day and he's out watering his lawn and he looks up at me and he goes i'm going that got to him that got to him and all of a sudden it was real and he was watching how i was handling the worst circumstances of my life and so as i say your greatest ministry will come out of your deepest pain i say that from experience there's not a week go by that somebody famous calls me with either a mental illness issue or a suicide issue and i'm talking about from the highest of the highest people personalities in politics and in celebrity and kay and i did not ask for this ministry of ministering to families with mental illness and ministering to families struggling with suicide of a family member i didn't want that ministry but it's one that god gave us and i'm not gonna waste the pain so i would say to everybody whatever your pain is have you been molested my wife was molested as a little girl in a church she has used that pain to help others okay uh cancer i i don't you're gonna go through pain in life just don't waste it if you're gonna go through pain you might as well use it to help somebody else out hello friends tbn is helping millions around the world discover their purpose and destiny and this would not be possible without your faithful partnership with this television ministry when i think about purpose and destiny i think about being a soldier towards the end of the vietnam war i actually believed that my life wasn't worth much then god got a hold of my life and i learned that he had a divine plan for me and that's why i'm excited to offer x multiply your god-given potential author john bevere helps us identify and fulfill the call god has on each of our lives this message is for everyone i don't care if you're a stay-home mom an er nurse a hair stylist i don't care if you work in a factory this is a message that i believe god burned in my heart for everyone who desires to advance the kingdom and for your gift of support for 60 or more we'll send the special leather-bound edition of the purpose-driven life pastor rick warren will help you move beyond mere survival or even success to a life of god-empowered significance your problem is not that you don't love god enough your problem is you don't really feel and understand how much he loves you friends thank you for enabling us to help millions find their purpose and destiny around the world call now operators are standing by god bless we have been unpacking purpose-driven life what on earth am i here for and we need this program now rick to be purpose-driven and that you know you didn't write this book and we're not sitting here with cameras and tv to do anything other than one thing and that's lead people to jesus would you look into the camera and get someone's life started on that journey that you know it would be my honor matt thank you you know um i don't know who you are where you came from or what your background is but i do know this you mattered god you matter to god and the reason that you exist is god made you to love you he made you to love you if he hadn't wanted to love you you wouldn't exist and if god were to say to you today these words he would say i thought you up i formed you in your mother's womb i have watched every day of your life the good days the bad days the ups and downs the highest lows and i have never never stopped loving you and all of the pain that you've gone through i have wept the bible says god cries i have wept at the pains that you have gone through [Music] and i have waited for this day and i i want you to know me we're not talking about religion we're talking about a personal relationship i made you for a friendship you know i am a friend of god i have walked with him now for over 50 years i know his voice i know his touch and i know that no matter what i face in the future i'll handle it because god is with me he's never not with me have you ever thought that maybe the pain you're going through right now is to get your attention and for god to say to you i'm standing here waiting for you but he's a gentleman he doesn't come into your life until you invite him in they say what will happen if i open my life to the love of jesus christ three things will happen in your life past present future first your past forgiven second purpose for living third a home in heaven past forgiven purpose for living home in heaven who else can offer that to you nobody nobody you were made by god and you were made for god until you understand that life will never make sense the purpose of your life is not your career the purpose of your life is not your family the purpose of your life is not your hobbies those are all good things they're all gifts of god but what the purpose of your life is is to let god love you and to learn to love him back you say what do i do you just be honest it really doesn't matter the words you say as much as a humble attitude that says god i need you there was a guy who came to jesus one time who had a daughter who needed to be healed and he said lord i need you to heal my daughter and jesus said well do you believe i can heal her and he said lord i i want to believe help me with my unbelief jesus said that's good enough and he healed it right on the spot i wish somebody had told me years ago that i didn't have to have all my questions answered in order to open up my life to jesus christ i didn't have to have all of my excuses fulfilled and all my reasons and rationales answered i just had to take a simple step of faith lord i want to believe help me with my doubts i've walked to the lord now all these many many years there's still things in this book i don't understand and i go wow i don't know that i would have done it that way if i was god thank god i'm not god his ways are not my ways but i don't have to understand the chemistry of digestion to eat a steak and enjoy it and i don't have to understand how internal combustion works to drive a car i don't even have to understand how right now tv waves are going through the air and going right through my body and you're seeing this but it doesn't keep me from benefiting from it so i'm going to ask you to make a simple step of faith right now and that is to lay aside all the doubts and all the questions we'll work on those and there are legitimate answers to but to take a simple state say lord i want to believe help me with my doubt help me with my doubt one night many many years ago in a cabin in northern california at a christian camp i was working as the lifeguard at a christian camp and i walked into that cabin at night and i got down on my knees and i prayed a simple prayer something like this and i said god if there is a god i want to know you and if you can give me a better life then i'm living right now i want it i want it yeah i'd like to go to heaven but i really would like a better life right now and so as much as i know how i open my life to you and i say yes yes i'm giving you a blank check and i'm signing my name you fill in the amount and for the rest of my life i will live for you and i'll love you and i'll learn to serve you because you made me you saved me you have a purpose for my life you want me with you forever the whole reason i exist is because of your love and you know when i prayed that simple prayer you know what happened nothing i didn't actually feel any different no angels came down no wings fluttered no brining light my hair didn't turn white like charlton heston but that was the turning point in my life and that simple decision changed the rest of my life it's kind of like one day i stood in front of a bunch of people and i said two words that changed my life said them to my wife i said i do two words i do when i said those two words i had no idea what i was doing and the rest of my life for 45 years i've been working out the implications of two words i do it's like that's in the fine print and k will say yeah that's part of the i do oh okay that's in the idea yeah okay then i do that too i do too you don't have to understand it all right now you just have to take a little bit of faith say well i don't have any faith yeah you do when you sit down in a chair you have faith the chair will hold you up you drive a car you have a faith that you can drive you use faith every moment of your life it's what you put it in so take that little faith right now and i'm gonna lead you in a simple prayer it's gonna change your life not just for the rest of your life [Music] but for all of eternity all right you don't have to close your eyes you can look at me right now i'll look at you and you look at me okay just say these words dear god say that in your life dear god as much as i know how i invite jesus christ into my life i don't understand at all but i know i need you and i want to get to know you and i want to learn to trust you and i want to know your purpose for my life why am i here and what do you want to do with my life and i'm saying yes lord that's my answer even before you ask the question yes thank you for loving me thank you for dying for me i want to give my life completely to you [Music] in your name i pray this now if you prayed that prayer just now the bible says in the book of romans whoever calls in the name of the lord will be saved now would god lie no god god is incapable people say what is there anything god can do yes there are some things god can do god cannot lie and if he says i will save you if you call on my name did you call on his name if you followed me in that prayer you just called on his name then according to scripture no matter what you feel high low or whatever you've been brought into the kingdom of god you brought into the family of god you're a child of god you were always loved by him you were created by him but now you're in his family you know what the first thing you need is family you need to find a family home you need to get a church there are lots of good churches in your area if you don't have one well call tbn call look up saddleback we'll help you find one in your area to find a place and the number one thing you need as a new christian is a family they'll help you get all the other stuff in your life but i will be praying for you matt and lori you guys will be praying for him absolutely and this is the most important decision you've ever made now let me just say this sometimes there's a little bit of delayed reaction i remember when i said those words to my wife i do and i got married and i remember i woke up the next morning after our wedding night and i rolled over in bed and looked at my wife and i said to kay my new wife so i said you know i don't feel very married she said well it doesn't matter whether you feel like it or not buster you're married okay you made a commitment you are married okay well it was about two weeks later i was actually at the end of the honeymoon i remember waking up one morning and i rolled over in bed and i looked at k laying there and i go i get this woman to be my wife for the rest of my life and i got so excited about i got out of bed they started jumping around i go i'm married i'm married i'm married she goes well a little delayed reaction but at least you got it so the emotions can come now or they can come later but when god comes into your life he starts making changes god bless you we've been focusing on the things that mattered right here on this praise program rick what an amazing uh one hour that we've just experienced here i want to give you kind of the final word on what this book means when people get into it and really go through it just kind of finally i would encourage you if you do read this if you've never read purpose driven life read it with a friend yeah it actually it's it's made to be done in a small group i remember in the early years um uh disney there were all kinds of groups corporation did did 40 days of purpose small group walmart did 40 days of purpose small group uh uh ibm did 48 birth uh nfl uh did it baseball teams did it uh corporations did it it's it's been studied in small groups literally all around the world and uh i think we're better together okay in other words people say different things and and it's made to be a discussion guide where people go well you know what do you think about this and there are actually questions at the end of every chapter and and there's some at the end and and churches that want to go through it as a church of course they can do 40 days of purpose which is a campaign uh 38 000 churches in america have done 40 days of purpose some have done it more than once including saddleback and uh uh the average church grows about 28 during 40 days of purpose my goodness so it's it's one out of every 10 churches in america has done 40 days as a campaign and it's one but you can do it with friends yeah i think we all need to do it over again yeah i'll just do it again all you companies that's all we need 21 has um is going to be a refining year you're either going to take 2020 and name it in your mind a dumpster fire yeah or a refining fire oh good and ultimately say that again rick you know as that great theologian matt crouch says you're either going to have a dumpster fire or a refining fire i'm quoting that it'll be on twitter by this afternoon and 12 million people will be thinking i said it instead of matt crouch we'll see you next time bye-bye that was good that's a good ending at tbn our mission is to use every available means to reach as many individuals and families as possible with the life-changing gospel of jesus christ thank you for helping make the gospel of grace go around the world without you we couldn't do it god bless you

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Keywords: rick warren, the purpose driven life, purpose driven life, rick warren 2021, rick warren sermons, rick warren purpose driven life, rick warren relationships, saddleback church, saddleback church service, rick warren son, matthew warren, kay warren cancer, rick warren sermon, praise tbn, praise, tbn, tbn praise, matt crouch, laurie crouch, tbn praise the lord, trinity broadcasting network, trinity broadcasting network live, tbn live, t8b2n6, 8t2b6n, tbn826, 826tbn, pastor, preacher

Id: ZneXln1UtS8

Length: 55min 0sec (3300 seconds)

Published: Wed May 19 2021