Grace

Tom Shrader begins a men's conference by sharing his personal testimony of conversion and introducing the foundational concept of grace. Using Ephesians 2:1-10, he explains that grace is the one word that separates biblical Christianity from all religion, emphasizing that salvation is entirely God's work rather than human effort. He challenges men to understand that their fundamental problem is not needing more knowledge about marriage or parenting, but getting their relationship with God right first.

“There is one thing that separates biblical Christianity from everything else - it is one word that is absolutely foreign to religion, and religion hates this word, and that word is grace.”

— Tom Shrader

Series: September 2007

Recorded: 2007 at Cannon Beach Conference Center

Duration: 50 min

Themes: grace, salvation, conversion, testimony, faith, forgiveness, redemption, relationship, men seeking purpose, new believer, husband, father, struggling with works, men's conference, spiritual foundation, questioning faith

Scripture: Ephesians 2:1-10, Romans, John, 2 Corinthians 5:14, Romans 1

Theological Themes: soteriology, salvation by grace, justification, ephesians, biblical authority, scripture, sanctification, gospel

Full Transcript

Do you have a safe trip, obviously? We'll be back. Close our time. We sang a wonderful song, Your Name. We'll close with that a little bit tonight. How are you guys tonight? Well? Full. Yeah.

So let me make sure I get this. You're full, and you've had a long day, and you're tired. Go ahead, Tom. Have fun. Talk to them. Perfect. Ideal situation.

Well, it's good to be with you. I see some of you for the first time at Canon Beach, but some of you look familiar to me, like we've had a conference or two together up here. How many of you have been up here when I've been up here? A couple of you. All sitting in the back. That's inspirational too. Everything's going exactly like I hoped it would from the very beginning.

A Test for Real Men

We're going to spend some time together, and I used to do a ton of these conferences. I remember one year I did 27 men's conferences in the course of a year, and I just don't hardly ever do it anymore. To be here is a special privilege.

One of the problems that I observed, and one of the reasons I quit, is we started getting guys coming to these things that weren't real men. So I developed a test. This is odd, perhaps you're uncomfortable with it, but we're going to take a test. If you can't pass this test, Jeff's going to give you your money back and ask you to leave.

It's a multiple choice test. You ready? A couple of questions. I think I have one, two, three, five. In your opinion, the ideal pet is A, a cat, B, a dog, C, a dog that eats cats. Now, how many of you would say C? Okay, C. They're real men. It's good to have men. If anybody said A, a cat, you can leave right now.

Here you go. Alien beings from a highly advanced society have visited Earth. You're the first human being they encounter, and as a token of intergalactic friendship, they present you with a small but incredible, sophisticated device that is capable of curing all disease, providing infinite supply of clean energy, wiping out hunger and poverty, permanently eliminating oppression and violence on Earth. Do you A, present it to the President of the United States, B, present it to the Secretary General of the United Nations, C, take it apart? Which one was it? C. They're real men.

This one's iffy, and I'm not sure of this. When is it okay to kiss another man? A, when you wish to display simple pure affection without regard to narrow-minded social convictions, B, when he's the Pope, C, when he's your brother and your Al Pacino, and the only way to really, in a sportsmanlike way, let him know that for business purposes, you're going to have to kill him. It'd be C.

That's a tough one. Any single guys here? Single guys, this is a test for you especially. You've been seeing a woman for several years. She's attractive, intelligent, and you've always enjoyed being with her. One leisurely Sunday afternoon, the two of you are taking it easy, and you're watching a football game. She's reading the paper when suddenly, out of the clear blue, she tells you that she thinks she really loves you, but she can no longer bear the uncertainty of not knowing where you're going in the relationship. She says she's not asking you whether you want to get married, only whether you believe that you have some kind of future together. What do you say? A, that you sincerely believe the two of you have a future, but you don't want to rush it. B, that although you also have strong feelings for her, you can't honestly say that you'll be ready any time soon to make a lasting commitment, but you don't want to hurt her by putting her on hold with false hope. Or C, that you can't believe the Seahawks just called a drama play on 3rd and 17th.

Can't believe. That's true too. I'll tell you what. The Seahawks lost to the Cardinals. That just gives you a clue of how long your season's going to be.

Last question. When's it okay to throw away a set of veteran underwear? A, when it's turned the color of dead whales and developed new holes so large that you're not sure which ones were originally intended for your legs. Some of you are voting A on this one. I'm a little concerned about this. B, when it's down to eight loosely connected underwear molecules that have to be handled with tweezers. Or C, it's never okay to throw away veteran underwear, and a real guy checks the garbage regularly in case somebody, we're not naming names, but most likely his wife, is trying to quietly discard his underwear, which she frankly is jealous of because the guy seems to have a more intimate relationship with it than her.

I'm going to guess you survived those, therefore we'll proceed with this time together.

The Foundation of Grace

I am glad that you are here. Jeff said that when you leave he wants you to be a little different. It strikes me that some of you came in a little different. But I think what he meant was different than when we got here, and that's my hope.

My hope is that we're going to spend four sessions together, and that when we leave, we leave with at least a different view of who you are, and who God is, and what He wants to do in your life. We just sang I Surrender All. It was a wonderful song. But I doubt that there's a person here who can honestly sing that song, which is interesting because you all sang it, so we're beginning with the basis that you're hypocrites. No, I'm teasing about that part.

But we all sang that song, I Surrender All. Here's what I want you to see. In your life, you're never going to reach that point though you strive for it, and this is a big deal that I want you to get. As though you never reach that point, God loves you anyway.

to get. The nature of the weekend is this. You're going to learn a lot about me just by my talking, and some of you I've probably spent a little bit of time with. But the nature of this is that it's kind of going to be this way, and then my hope is that God uses it, becomes vertical.

Some of you came with church groups. I met a gentleman who was here alone. There may be others of you like that. He came alone, and part of what he does every year is take three or four days, and this is one of those things he does. So you may look around and see somebody who's here alone, and I would encourage you to reach out to them.

You come with different expectations. I know that. Some of you come simply to get away. There's nothing wrong with that. Some of you come to hang with other guys. You're part of churches, and you came together as a church. Some of you came with some level of spiritual expectation.

You may be a Christian, and you're hoping God does something here. You may have come really healthy. You may come with everything going great, or you may have come and things aren't going so well. You may be here as a guest of a guy who is a Christian, and you would say you're not, and you are kind of his version of a science project.

A Word to Those Who Aren't Sure Why They're Here

He's got you up here. You're not really sure why. Maybe you're even uncomfortable with it, but you heard free food, and he paid for it, and he said, what the heck? I can endure anything, even a short, fat guy for a while. That was kind of the thought process you had.

By the way, if you're in that group, I want you to understand this is really, really, really important, and I have no idea. One of the great things, I normally say this at the beginning every time, and I want to make sure I get this out. Nobody tells me what to say or what not to say. Nobody said. Jeff didn't say. Janet didn't say when she booked it. She didn't say, okay, say this. The guys are here. Don't say this.

So if today and the next couple of days I say something that offends you, you probably should have done a disclaimer at the beginning. Clanton Beach Conference Center is not responsible for the opinions expressed from the front of the thing. But I'm not here to manipulate you, and I'm not here to try to do. I'm just here as a guy who loves Jesus and wants you to love Him, too, and love Him more than I do, and one day we'll spend eternity in heaven. That's kind of it.

That's what I tell. I do summer camp with our students from our church. We take 700 kids to Point Loma every summer. It's the most intimidating thing I do all year. I take 700 junior high and high school kids to camp, and I tell them the same thing every year. Love God, hate sin. That's kind of our goal.

If you're here and somebody's kind of got you here, and you really aren't in this, and you're not really sure what's going on, and you're afraid that we're going to ask you to stand and sing by yourself and that kind of thing, we aren't. That's for our own benefit, frankly. We don't want to hear you.

Their Motive Is Love

But if they brought you here, I want you to understand their motive. Their motive is they really do love you and care for you. My old business partner and his son ultimately married my daughter, so we're pretty closely knit. Hired a guy, a young Jewish fellow, wonderful guy, and in just the course of doing business together, living life together, the Jewish fellow saw that there was a difference in him, and he told him it was Jesus, and so he began to struggle with the claims of Christ.

And this young man told his mother, who again is a Jewish mother, that he was in this process of wrestling these things to the ground. And she said, watch out, because if they convert one of us, they get a Mercedes. And, which I didn't know, because I'd have been more targeted in evangelism, I guess. This guy ended up coming to Christ in repentance and faith, and he gave my friend a little toy Mercedes as a picture of that.

So, if you're here and you're one of those guys, and you're like, I'm not really here, I don't know why, it's because somebody loves you and they care for you more than you can even imagine, and that's why they invited you here.

My Story - We're All the Same

I want to tell you my story, not because it's that interesting, and not even because it's really that unique, because I am just like you. We are all the same. Kind of different heights and shapes and colors, economic differences, but inside all the same.

I was born and raised in Davenport, Iowa. Anybody here from Iowa? Really, where are you from, sir? Wait, I'm sorry? No, I heard you, I'm just sorry. Every time. They go for this every time. I mean, it works every time. Unbelievable.

Anyway, he said council votes. Where are you from? There's no joke to this. Nebraska and Iowa. No, Nebraska and Iowa. We're in Iowa. Where is it? Clear Lake. Clear Lake. So, there's always Iowans around. It's a great, it's a wonderful place.

I think I told this story, and you all wouldn't have heard it, but I think I told this story almost every time I'm in a new place. Because one of the most difficult things we do is, I don't know you, you don't know me, I don't know what to talk about, really. And this is a hard, this is an important, this is an important time. Because this sets the basis for the whole weekend. If you don't like me now, we're going to have a long haul.

The Introduction Story

And so, this whole introduction thing. I am one time emceeing an FCA dinner or fundraiser or something. I don't know what it was. And Neil Lomax, who you all from Portland would know Lomax pretty well, and certainly from his days when he, at one point in his life was an athlete. And I'm introducing Lomax, and I've never met him before. I've never even met him.

But I, you know, what the heck. He's at that time playing for the Cardinals, and he's there. And he had Roy Green, you remember Lomax. You remember Roy Green? Roy Green, a wonderful receiver, really a wonderful player. And so, I'm introducing, this is a long story, but

I'm introducing him, and I'm saying, our guest speaker tonight is Neil Lomax, and we're excited to have him here. I was at the Cardinal game the other day, and Lomax is quarterbacking, and in fact, Roy's with him. Roy ran a little out, and Neil took it and just launched the thing, missed him a mile. The guy behind me sent him to where he ran. I thought, gosh, that's harsh.

Then he ran a little pattern over the middle, Roy did, and boom, he throws it, misses him again a mile, sent him to where he ran. Right before half, Roy runs a post. Neil drops back, throws it, just launches the ball almost into the front row. The guy behind him sent him to where he ran. So I said at halftime to the guy, "You know, Neil's having a bad half, but 'sent him to where he ran' seems harsh. What do you mean by that?" He said, "I'm convinced the State Department could use him because he's the only guy we have that could overthrow the Ayatollah."

So I don't know Lomax. So I said, "All right, welcome, Neil Lomax." Well, if you remember, Neil is a wonderful guy, an incredible athlete. Neil at that point was just getting ready to have his hips worked on. So he came up, and you've got to get this. I've never met the guy in my life. I don't know him.

An Unexpected Turn

So he finally gets up. It's this dramatic thing, and I sit down. He said, "Tom, thank you for that wonderful introduction. By the way, it's good to see you in men's clothing again." Then, I don't have a clue how he knows this. He said, "Tom's from Iowa. I owe the world an apology. Idiot's out wandering around." Lomax does five minutes on me, and I said, "This didn't work at all the way this was supposed to work."

So introductions and all that stuff can be iffy. In our church, Jeff mentioned, we're part of a group that started a church about 15 years ago, and God's blessed, and all that stuff. It's really good. Last spring, we do baby dedications. Maybe you do them in your churches where it's really more to dedicate the parents than the baby, and we have this baby dedication time.

I get a note that this girl wants to do a baby dedication. She's 15 years old. There's no father around, and she wants to do a baby dedication. Well, I know our people, and their shorts can get in a knot pretty fast sometimes. So I'm thinking, they're not going to like this because now we're endorsing premarital sex and all this. But I'm going to do this. I'm going to do it myself. I want to make sure I'm doing it so that we're in there.

A Testament to Grace

I meet with her, and she's got this little girl, wonderful little baby named Pearl. She said, "Thanks for doing this, Tom." She said, "It was after I got pregnant is when I really came to know Jesus, and He really became real to me and alive to me. I've been around church all my life, but it was there I was converted. I know this is wrong, and I know what I did was wrong, but God's used it in a marvelous way."

Here's what she said: "I know my testimony's not typical." I said, "No, sweetie, it's exactly typical. We are all, those of us who know Jesus, nothing more than poster boys for His amazing grace."

That's really an important thing to grasp. Some of you seemed more lost than others. I was born and raised in Iowa, moved out to Arizona in 1975, and I went out really just to party and play golf until my money ran out. I partied pretty well, so money ran out quickly.

My Own Story of Grace

I got a job and met a girl next door. I moved in an apartment 202. She moved in an apartment 201. I started dating her. I was a drinking guy, and one night after a Christmas party, she said, "I don't want to see you anymore." I had heard that from so many girls I thought it was a come on line, really, because I heard that from a lot of them.

So I pursued her. For three months I called her every day until finally she agreed to go out with me. We ended up getting married. Her name's Susan. She's my wife today. We've been married about three months, and she said to me, or I said to her one night, "I'm not happy. We got three months, 90 days. I mean, that's a reasonable time. I said, I'm not happy. I married you to make me happy. I'm not happy."

She said, "Well, listen, slick, I married you to make me happy. I'm not very happy either." So when you have two people whose marriage is falling apart, what do you do? That's exactly right. Have a baby. Who said that? You are a genius, my friend. That's exactly what we do. We have a baby.

Rock Bottom

She is eight and a half months pregnant. I am kind of a sports fan. I know enough just to talk about it. College football is my deal. I know a lot. I know a little bit about a lot of stuff. So if you ask me questions, I'm done then. I'm out of energy.

But Ed Tutal Jones, you remember him? Tutal decided he was going to be a boxer. Remember that? So he was going to fight in Phoenix. He's fighting, and Ray Boom Boom Mancini is on the undercard. So I go down to Civic Plaza for the fight. It's my friend's birthday. We drank all day.

So we're driving home, and I get to a place. I only went to nice places. So there was a place called Tuba City Truck Stop and Country Club. So I went there. I'm a classy guy. Had a few more drinks, and I pulled out onto Camelback Road, which those of you that know Phoenix, it's kind of a main drag, and I'm driving home. I see these emergency lights flashing, so I pull over to let the emergency vehicle by, and the emergency vehicle pulls over behind me.

God has just this wonderful sense of humor. Out comes, and you've got to know me a little bit to appreciate this part, a female officer, Barbara. That's what it said, Barbara. Now, here's something. There's some things you don't know until you're in these situations. Police officers do not like to be called Babs. How am I going to know that? I don't know that.

So in I go, and I call Susan, and this is the third

Every time we got issues. And I wake up the next morning, and I said, I've got to do something. My life is out of control. I've got a baby coming. I've got a wife that doesn't care about me. I don't care about her. I've got to do something.

And I went to a friend at work, and I said, here's the situation. Here's what happened last night. I've got real problems. I've got real issues. And here's what he said to me: You need Jesus. And I said to him, have you got anything else? Have you got a pill, a class? Have you got anything other than that, anything else? He said, no.

A Reluctant Journey to Faith

Three months later, uninvited, I went to a Bible study. And a man got up, and he began to open a Bible, which I had never read in my life. I'd been in church all my life. I was born and raised. I had a Catholic background. I'd been in church all my life. I knew a lot of concepts that were really helpful. The Trinity was something I was familiar with. Those were not new concepts to me. But I never understood them.

And he taught from the book of Romans. And I went back to my office literally trembling, not figuratively, literally shaking. His name was Larry Wright, W-R-I-G-H-T. I opened the phone book, and there are pages of Wrights. And there are columns of Lawrences. And I went like this. And I called that Larry Wright. And a man answered. I said, is there any chance you do Bible studies? He said, yeah, I did one this morning. And I said, well, I was there. Can I meet with you?

And he sat me down, and I asked him all the questions about Adam and Eve and all that. Jonah, floods, everything. He said, read the Gospel of John. I went home. I read the Gospel of John. It made absolutely no sense to me at all.

The next day, I'm sitting in my car waiting for a client to come. And I said, God, here's what I'm learning so far. Number one, I'm a sinner. And I've got empirical data to support that one. That one we got. I got that one. Jesus came, and He was Your son. And I got that kind of in my heritage culture. I guess I'm going to buy that. And that He died on the cross in my place. Don't fully get all that. And somehow, I find salvation in that. And I'm saying, you know what? I don't know. Here's what I know, God. I got three decades of this life, and it's a mess. It's Yours. You tell me what to do. Let's figure this out, and let's go.

The Beginning of Something New

I went in the next day back to that Bible study. Been a week. Went the next day into the Bible study. There's Larry in the front. And I said, Larry, yesterday, I prayed that prayer. Yesterday, I gave my life to Christ. And here's what he did. He hugged me. I said, oh, my golly, they're huggers. We're going to be hugging now. Now we got to do all this hugging stuff on top of everything else.

Gentlemen, that started something in my life that has never changed. And here's what I discovered. And I am absolutely free to talk about it, because I know it's true, not based on that experience, but based on what this book says.

I have realized that over the years, we kind of have words that have lost their meaning. Christian is kind of one of them. Truth is one of them. Right before he died, Francis Schaeffer coined the term true truth. What I'm talking about when I say Christian, I add now the term biblical Christian.

The One Thing That Separates Biblical Christianity

This is one simple point. You've had a long day. You're tired. All I want to do is get this on the table. Got a couple more points I want to make, and we'll expand them tomorrow.

There is one thing that separates biblical Christianity from everything else. This is really important. You've got to get this. Some of you wake back up. Here's the deal. Here's biblical Christianity. Here's everything else. I don't care what you call it. I don't care what part of the world it's in. I don't care what they do. Everything else is what we would call religion.

Here's what separates biblical Christianity from everything else. It is one word. It is a word that is absolutely foreign to religion, and religion hates this word, and religion is based on exactly the opposite concept of this word. And that word is grace.

Dead in Trespasses and Sin

I saw some of you haul in Bibles with you. That's a good thing. Why don't you open them now to Ephesians chapter 2, to a passage of Scripture that to many of you is really familiar, to some of you vaguely familiar, to others of you brand new, and to those of you to whom it's brand new, congratulations, because this is big. This is huge.

Ephesians chapter 2, verse 1: "And He"—who's the He there? He, God—"made you alive. You who were dead in your trespasses and sin, in what you once walked according to the course of the world, according to the prince of the power of air, and the spirit that now works in the"—and here's you, me, us, autobiographically speaking before biblical Christianity—"sons of disobedience."

Here's what the Bible says. The Bible said that all of us have sinned. What that means is we fall short of the glory of God. We've missed the mark. God's standard is perfection for entrance into the kingdom of God, into heaven.

What Does It Mean to Be Saved?

So here's a word, and again, for some of you, new word, or maybe you've heard it, but you kind of go, I'm not sure what it means. Here's the word, because people will say to you, have you been saved? Now, if they're real spiritual, they turn it into three syllables. Say-ay-ate. Have you been saved? Have you been delivered? Have you been rescued?

I had not been in Phoenix a month, and I pull up in front of a Circle K, and there's an old Volkswagen van, and on the back of it is a bumper sticker that says, I found it. Do you remember that campaign? Some of you have been around a long time, remember that? So I go to the guy, and I said, hey, I saw the bumper sticker. I found it. What does that

I need to do something. That's religion. Religion says, "All right, I'm a son of disobedience. I'm in trouble. I'm screwed up. Here's what I'll do," and then there's all sorts of variations of that. I'll join that church. I'll give Him money. I'll try to be good. That's kind of the drive behind most of it.

If you go down to Portland or Seattle or any of them, and you go to kind of a common area, and you gather 50 people, and you say, "Do you believe in heaven?" Yes. "What do you have to do to go to heaven?" The number one answer is what? Be good. Be good. Well, how good? Be good. Better than Jeffrey Dahmer. And then you'll say, because I've had these conversations, a million of them, "Well, who goes to heaven?" Pretty much everybody. Not my ex-wife, but pretty much everybody else. That would be their answer to this. Pretty much everybody.

In theological terms, it's justification by death. All you've got to do is die, and you go to heaven. But that's not what the Bible teaches. The Bible does not teach that we are all children of God. The Bible teaches that we are sons of disobedience and children of wrath by nature. Very dark place.

But God

Here you go, verse 4, because that's our condition. That's where we were. Look at verse 3. We were by nature children of wrath. Verse 4, but God. Not you, not religion, but God. But God, who's rich in mercy because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, has made us alive with Christ.

Verse 8, for by—there's the word. Circle the word. Love the word. If you're compelled to get a tattoo, Jimmy Buffett says a tattoo is a permanent reminder of a temporary feeling. If you're compelled to get a tattoo, here's a good one: Grace. Unmerited favor. For by grace you have been saved. Delivered. Rescued. Rescued from what? Your sin and the consequences of your sin.

For by grace you've been saved through faith, and that's not of yourself. It's a gift of God. What's a gift of God? The faith. Not of works, lest anyone should boast. If you are here today and you are a follower of Christ, it's utterly, completely, entirely a work of God and what He did in your life.

You Are the Problem

If you are here today and you would say, "I don't buy this, I don't understand this, this doesn't make any sense to me," let me tell you, your problem is you. Your solution is Christ.

I'm with a guy, and he's on his fifth marriage. Now, he said, "Let me take you through"—nobody anymore can just have a problem. They've got to take you through it. So he said, "Let me tell you about Him." Well, he takes me through all four of these marriages. He's married tall ones, thin ones, fat ones. He's married a Caucasian, a Latino, an African-American, rich ones, poor ones. He's done it all. He said, "What do you think?" I said, "Well, we can only find—you're ahead of me on this, aren't you? We can only find one common link in all of these. You're the problem." And here's what makes this really difficult: you aren't the solution.

Believe it or not, what dictated where I decided to go in these four sessions happened about three months ago. A guy came into my office, and he said, "You're kind of my last hope here at the church. I've met with three people, your counseling people and two others, for marriage counseling. And they won't listen to me." And I said, "All right." He said, "I keep telling them I don't need marriage counseling." And I said, "Really?" He said, "No. I'm selfish, prideful, arrogant." He said, "I have a wonderful five-year-old daughter, a beautiful girl who I care about half the time. I don't need marriage counseling. The problem isn't my marriage. The problem is me." And I said, "You know what? You don't need marriage counseling. You are the problem."

The Real Issue

Like I said, I've done a lot of men's conferences. You've probably been to some, too. And kind of the typical pattern is to talk about marriage for a while and then kids for a while and then kind of those things. And we're going to break that pattern. And you may be frustrated by that. And if so, I apologize. But you don't need, most of you, another lesson on marriage, another book on marriage. Hey, this is really—here's the marriage deal: Love your wife. We're done. I don't know how to stretch that into four sessions. I don't know how else to say that. That is not that difficult to understand or comprehend.

My problem, and most of the guys I deal with, is not they're going, "Gee, I don't know what to do." The problem is what? I don't know how to do it. Or I don't want to do it. This guy didn't need marriage counseling. Now, there are some tips. I got that. We need to learn to communicate and listen and all that stuff that they keep saying that I don't ever hear. That kind of stuff. You know, listen to me. I got it. And so we can talk about some of that. We'll talk a little bit about kids. We'll talk about all those things.

But fundamentally, here's what we need to get. We need to get this relationship here between you and God. We need to get this relationship right and this relationship healthy. And all this other stuff starts to take care of itself. You know what? Nobody seems to like that. It's that simple.

This Christian gig is not that hard to figure out. It's just not that hard to figure out. It's just not that hard to figure out. Love God and hate sin. I mean, it is that. It is not that hard to figure out.

The Problem Isn't Knowledge, It's Application

My problem is not figuring out the Christian life. I used to travel a ton and speak, and I kind of quit doing it. I got frustrated in a lot of ways. These people kept wanting lessons and lessons and lessons. Why do you want to learn anything new? Let me ask you this: Are you doing what you know? No. Then why do you want to learn more?

I don't understand it. Why do you want me to come in and dump 5,000 other things on you? Are you just some sort of a spiritual masochist where you go, "I'm awful. I'm terrible. I don't know this. Why don't I get it?" My fundamental problem when I'm with Susan, my fundamental problem with Susan and when we do poorly is when I'm not right with Christ. That's my problem.

Here's my problem I have in my marriage: When I care more about me than her. That's my problem. I have two girls. Both are now raised, and they are now having kids. I think I was an okay dad. They'd give me higher marks probably. When I was a lousy dad, you know why? Because being a good dad is a hassle. It takes a lot of work to be a good dad. You know when I stunk as a co-worker? When I cared more about me than you?

Simple Rules, Not Complex Systems

I realized a long time ago, I don't think I need a lot more rules. I'm not a big rule guy. We have a staff. They tell me—I've never read it or seen it—a policy manual. I guess we had to have one for the government or something. I'm saying, guys, we're not going to have a bunch of rules. Jeff probably manages a bit. I don't know how he manages. I shouldn't say that. But I don't have a lot of rules.

Here's why: Because I believe if you're going to have a rule, you've got to enforce it. So I don't want a lot of rules. And I don't think God gives you a lot of rules. In fact, I can really see that there's kind of two that He kind of tries to come at you with.

He comes at you this way. He says, here's an idea for you: Love me with all your heart and your mind and your soul. And then love your neighbor as yourself. Now, there's a principle. And here's one more: Go. Go and make disciples of all nations and baptize them and teach them. That's kind of what this is all about.

From Black and White to Love's Motivation

God saved me in 1975. Since then, it's been a wonderful ride. When I first was a follower of Christ, I found myself attracted to a black and white God. I don't think God is confused. I love truth. I never read a book in my life. My junior year of college is the first time I read a book, and it was a book on Muhammad Ali. Mark Twain said he never let school interfere with his education, and that was the way I approached college.

I would still be there. They finally said, "You've got 458 hours. You've got to graduate." But all of a sudden, when God saved me, He made me a reader. I started to read. The more that I got into this, the more I saw this wasn't about what don't do this and this. I love what He says. I'm not saying it doesn't matter how you live. But I'm saying, why do you do what you do?

You don't have to turn there, but you might want to make a note of this. Second Corinthians 5:14. Paul said this: "The love of Christ compels us."

When Love Meets Skepticism

I have a guy who's become an acquaintance. He's an older man. He's about 75. He comes to one of my studies. He is SMART. He's a guy who developed the first mechanical heart and did the first mechanical heart transplant in the state of Arizona. This guy is brilliant. He loves art. He writes novels. He's brilliant.

He came up to me Thursday and said, "I need your help." His 25-year-old granddaughter, who graduated from the Cronkite School of Broadcasting, so she's smart also and articulate and bright—you can't get in Cronkite unless you're that—he called her and said, "I want you to go to lunch with me." She said, "Grandpa, I'd love to go to lunch with you." He said, "I want to bring you to a Bible study." She called on Monday and said, "I don't want to go." He said, "How come?" She said, "I'm not ready for that. That's not where I am."

He said, "Well, sweetie, I want to take you." Here's what she said. I love this: "Show me the data."

The Limits of Scientific Proof

Romans chapter 1, Paul says this: that creation is God's first missionary. When I look at creation, you sang it: "You put the stars in the sky and you know them by name." She said, "Show me the data." I get that all the time. "Give me the scientific method."

Scientific method has part of its core being able to replicate something. Do the experiment. You can't do it again. It was created once. You can't do it again. In that sense, really, I could look at you and say, I can't even prove that you were born. Because we can't do it again. We weren't there. But your existence kind of screams that perhaps you were born.

The Power of Love Over Arguments

"Show me the data." This brilliant man said, "Tom, I don't know what to do." I mean literally the tears—I'm not exaggerating here—the tears are pouring down his face. Men who love Christ as they get older tend to cry. He said, "What do I do?"

Here's what I told him. I said, "Call her up and take her to lunch and have one two-minute conversation where you say, 'All right, babe, I'm not going to bring it up again.' And let her see those tears." Nothing moves someone like love.

I have three grandkids. The oldest was 20 months. Braden is his name. I'm having a blast with him. His latest thing is to look at you and say, "Hi, Bob." You know, when we had kids, we didn't know what we were doing. Had them and tried to get them through and not hurt them. They learn the sign language and stuff now. So they've taught him. He stutters. They've taught him "all done."

when he's eating. And he'll go, "all done." What he's learned is that that applies to all areas of life. And he doesn't like people. This is a quality I admire in him. He doesn't like people.

So I had him at church the other night and I'm holding him and all the people know him. And he's got red hair. And I've never been around this red hair stuff. But this red hair is a babe magnet. If I'm ever single, I'm going to rent a redhead kid.

So I'm holding him. And this girl comes up and they all know him, Brayden. And they're going, "hey, Brayden, hey, Brayden." And they're getting a little closer to him. And he goes, "all done." And I said, "he's done with you now, next."

Brayden's dad works for me, with me. He came down to ASU to play baseball. He's a great athlete, great guy, great kid. And one of the things he tries to do is eat correctly, which I don't fully comprehend. But he does this. And he doesn't want to watch any television.

So I have had to gradually, because I'm a big advocate of television. You need a solid 8 to 10 hours of TV a day in my mind. So I've had to gradually expose him to television, of which he is mesmerized. So now his mom lets him watch Sesame Street. And his favorite character on Sesame Street is Elmo. He loves Elmo. When Elmo comes on, he stops.

The Message of Elmo

So Susan, who loves Brayden, bought him an Elmo doll. Unbeknownst to us, this Elmo doll speaks. Now here's Elmo. This is my Christmas message. I'm going to do a trial run on you, and we'll see if this is going to work here at Christmas.

Here's Elmo. They're trying to communicate something. Elmo only says three different things. So whatever they're trying to communicate, and these people, whoever create all these Sesame Street, they got this thing figured out, man.

When you take Elmo and you touch him, here's what he says: "Elmo loves you." If you push him again, he'll say, "Elmo loves you more." We're a bunch of real men. But you know what your heart needs to hear desperately? Not that Elmo loves you. Although some of you, that might be a starting place.

Here's what you need to hear more than anything else desperately. Your heart yearns to hear this. You need to hear God loves you. For God so loved the world. God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son.

The Magnitude of God's Love

How big is your sin and the consequence of your sin? Well, one of the ways to calculate how big your transgression is is to see the size of the remedy. How big is your sin and the consequence of your sin? Well, look at what God did.

See, I almost said what God had to do. God didn't have to do that. That's a big thing. God didn't have to send His son. God could have said, "you know what? You want this? Have it."

He didn't, did He? He created paradise. Adam chose this. I want to go down this road and I'll save it for tomorrow. We'll go to the mall. God loves you.

When we're done at the end of this week, here's my goal. At the end of this week, I want you to see and understand God's grace and God's love and understand that God delivered you and saved you for a reason. If you were here last summer, here's how we say it: We are saved by God. This is a cool thing. From God. What am I saved from? I'm saved from God. I'm saved from God's wrath and judgment. And God's a big part of this. Listen, I'm saved by God, from God, for God. God saved you for a reason and for a purpose.

If you're here and you don't know Him, I plead with you in the course of this weekend to talk to one of the guys that invited you here today. Find out what this whole thing means. I've learned over the years that there's no way in some session like this you're going to answer everybody's question. It's just a matter of just saying, here, God loves you. And if you wonder about His love, you look to the cross.

The Power of the Cross

Think about the cross for a second. It is generally regarded as the most horrific, torturous way to die ever created by man. If you took somebody from the time of Christ and they came walking around and we took them to our jewelry store and you saw a little crucifixes there in a chain, they'd say, "you've got to be kidding me." That would be like having an electric chair or a noose or a lethal injection table. That's what that would be.

Think about how powerful God's love is. He took the most horrific example we can think of and turned it into the greatest picture of grace and mercy and love. And He did that for you, for me, for us.

So here's what I want you to do is I want you to understand the magnitude of God, the power of God, the love of God that He saved you for a reason. God loved you, and now He says to you, "I want you to love, love Him, love one another."

Looking Ahead

We're going to talk about what it means to be a real man. I will tell you, I've read through this book a couple of times. I'll bet you have, some of you. And I came across a passage of Scripture that my suspicion is has been there all along. I mean, I didn't get a latest edition. And I've been all along because I was going, you know, I'm doing another men's deal and I'm a little raw at this. And I need perhaps some new way of approaching this. And I came across a passage of Scripture.

And tomorrow morning, we're going to look at this little passage. And then from there, we're going to talk about love. I want to talk about love a little bit. Then we're going to talk about the things that will just simply screw you up along the way. So we want to get all those together.

Let's pray together. The guys are going to come. We want to glorify God when we glorify His name, your name. When we say that, when we talk about God's name, do you understand what we're talking about there? We're talking about all that He is, all of His attributes in this wonderful place. As you cruise down the beach or you look at the stars or you're here and you see God's beauty, it's representative of who He is. When we talk

Prayer for Understanding God's Grace

About the name of God—your name means all that He is: His grace, His mercy, His love. So the guys are going to come. Let us pray as they come.

Father, thank You for Jesus. Thank You for His death, and in it we find life. Thank You for this place. Thank You for Jeff and the staff that care enough to put this together so that we can come and try to eliminate as many distractions as possible from our life so that we can focus on You and You alone.

We have planned and prayed and prepared for this time and place, and we pray that Your Spirit would use this in a significant way. God, we pray that we would worship You, the one true God. Father, help us understand Your love for us. We pray to You in Jesus' name. Amen.