Pure Choices

Just a Taste

Three Angels Broadcasting Network

Program transcript

Participants: Joshua Nelson (Host), Brittany Hill, Jeanne Mogusu, John Coaxum, Korey P. Douglas

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Series Code: PC

Program Code: PC000064


00:01 The following program discusses sensitive issues.
00:03 Parents are cautioned that some material
00:04 may be too candid for younger children.
00:40 Hello, and welcome to Pure Choices.
00:41 I'm your host Pastor Joshua Nelson.
00:43 I'm so excited that you decide to join us today
00:46 because we have a good one for you today.
00:47 We are talking about,
00:49 is it okay to try things just once, just a taste?
00:53 You know what I'm talking about.
00:54 I mean, is it okay just to try a little bit of alcohol
00:57 just once?
00:58 Is it okay to maybe have sex, just to try it out,
01:01 see if it's good or not?
01:03 Is it okay to just smoke just once?
01:06 We're talking about all these things
01:08 because we wanna challenge and see,
01:09 should we just try things
01:12 or should we leave something's alone.
01:13 But before we get into this topic
01:15 that I think it's gonna be a good on today,
01:16 let's just pause for a moment of prayer.
01:19 Heavenly Father, we just ask that
01:22 You would guide this discussion today.
01:24 Send Your Spirit in Jesus' name we pray, amen.
01:27 Amen. Amen.
01:28 Let's introduce our panel.
01:30 To my left I have Brittany Hill who is from Andrews University.
01:34 She's there, she's finished up there at the seminary.
01:36 We're so happy to have her with us today.
01:38 Across the way here on the couch,
01:40 we have Pastor John Coaxum who is an associate pastor
01:43 at Glenville, SDA Church in Cleveland, Ohio.
01:46 Happy to have you here, sir. Thank you, man.
01:48 Then we have sister, Dr. Jeanne Mogusu,
01:51 my friend there, who is from the seminary as well,
01:54 just finished there.
01:55 We're happy to have her as well.
01:57 Then we have Pastor KP Douglas from Southeast Missouri,
02:01 has a couple churches out there,
02:02 so we're happy to have him and I'm Pastor Nelson,
02:04 I have two churches in South Carolina.
02:06 So we have a good panel, good topic,
02:09 and so let's get right into it, just a taste.
02:12 What do you all think?
02:14 Should we say it's okay to try things just to try it out
02:17 or should we just leave things totally alone?
02:20 Well, how big we taste? It's just a taste.
02:23 It's whole, little. It's just a sip.
02:26 That's all. That's all.
02:30 We don't want to jump into.
02:32 We're scared, we're scared, we'll jump into it.
02:34 Yeah.
02:35 Well, I mean, I think for some things...
02:38 yeah, for something's it's just not wise.
02:39 Okay.
02:40 It's just not wise to try something once
02:42 especially when you know, what the consequences could be.
02:45 I mean, you basically in a certain sense
02:47 playing Russian roulette with your life with some choices
02:52 that you decide to make.
02:53 And every single choice that you make,
02:55 as far as I'm concerned
02:56 is either pulling you closer to God
02:58 or pulling you further away from Him.
02:59 Okay.
03:00 I would wanna jump onto that and say,
03:02 you can't always live your life safe
03:04 and life is about calculated risk.
03:07 And when you're approaching certain things,
03:09 you have to calculate the risk.
03:10 And I'll say that's the principle.
03:12 Is this going to be worth it? Is it really worth it?
03:16 So when you're sitting down, you're thinking about,
03:17 "Okay, alcohol, should I try it?"
03:19 When you think about
03:21 all the side-effects and everything,
03:22 you may calculate that it's not a risk worth taking.
03:25 Well, I mean, and I like that, as you said there,
03:27 and I would challenge that though and say,
03:28 well, I don't want to be an alcoholic, you know,
03:31 I just wanna taste.
03:32 I just wanna try just a little bit because,
03:34 hey, I mean, there are some "good things out there".
03:37 Everybody is talking about, and I just want to try to say
03:41 that I did it and kind of find out
03:43 what the hype is about, you know...
03:44 So here is my question.
03:46 Yes, you don't want to be an alcoholic,
03:49 but you would just want to taste it once.
03:51 How do you think the alcoholic started?
03:54 I mean, he didn't just wake up in one morning and decide,
03:58 "Oh, I'm gonna down four, five bottles of rum or whisky."
04:01 You see, what I'm saying. Yeah.
04:03 I mean, he started with a taste.
04:05 Right, right, right.
04:06 And it's my understanding that some of these things
04:08 are an acquired taste.
04:10 So you'll taste it once, and it's not so bad,
04:12 you taste it again and it's not so bad
04:14 and you cannot start, once a fire starts,
04:18 you cannot quench it.
04:19 It's like they tell you,
04:21 I believe sometimes during the summer,
04:23 there are some places where it's even illegal
04:25 to have fireworks because that little spark,
04:29 that little spark can cause acres...
04:32 Wildfire. Thousands of acres to burn.
04:34 So why would you want to put yourself in that risk,
04:37 in that position?
04:38 Okay.
04:39 Yeah, I think it's difficult to going back to
04:42 what Brittany says about calculating risk,
04:44 is it worth it?
04:45 Because now you got to talk about worth it
04:47 according to what?
04:49 And what's your definition of worth it?
04:50 'Cause I'm trying to have a good time,
04:52 it may be worth it.
04:53 You know, for me to have a good time
04:55 so I mean, is sin, sin is sin.
04:58 I think I'll just say that. Should you try it?
05:00 No, it's sin.
05:02 Unfortunately, we're born in sin
05:03 and shapen in inequity,
05:04 and so there are certain things that, you know,
05:06 we probably have tried certain things
05:07 that we have in our system
05:09 even before we're born or when we're born,
05:11 for instance we talk about alcoholism,
05:12 there're some people who are born with that propensity
05:15 because of what their parents have done.
05:17 You know, but we're talking about,
05:18 you actually making a choice for yourself,
05:21 I just think you should just stay away.
05:23 If you have that ability, just choose not to do it.
05:26 Yeah.
05:27 You know, unfortunately the sad truth is
05:29 there are some lessons we will not learn,
05:32 unless, you know, we go through it.
05:33 And I think sometimes, you know,
05:35 I think all the time God gives us a choice,
05:37 He is a God of free will,
05:38 and He allows us to make our own decisions,
05:39 and we have to calculate the risk for ourselves
05:41 and see, you know, do I wanna make this choice?
05:43 But even if somebody would come to us and tell us,
05:46 "Listen, you don't want to go down this path, you know,
05:48 there's a pit down here, don't go down this path."
05:50 Some of us say, "Well, I don't really believe you,
05:52 I want to try for myself, and see for myself."
05:54 And the only way we're going to learn is that
05:56 we go walking down that path and fall into the same thing.
05:57 Yeah.
05:59 And so I like that we're going there
06:00 and let's talk about that.
06:02 Because you know, many of us have made poor choices,
06:03 you know, instead of pure choice.
06:04 We've made some mistakes and we're gonna talk about
06:06 little bit of those in more detail but, you know,
06:08 how come we weren't able to listen to someone who say,
06:12 "Hey, I've gone down that road, I've tried that just once,
06:15 just to taste, and this is now where I am,
06:18 and I have regrets for it."
06:19 Why is it so hard for us especially, as young people,
06:21 to not be able to listen to the counsel?
06:24 Or even someone watching now
06:25 not able to listen to the counsel that,
06:27 you know, we're giving?
06:28 I think it's arrogance.
06:31 I think it just boils down to pride and arrogance.
06:34 I think that somehow I am stronger than, you know,
06:38 somebody else in my family who has, 'cause it's true,
06:41 we have alcoholism and it runs in our family.
06:44 So I may think that I'm stronger than the person
06:46 who is a drunk, you know...
06:48 Right.
06:50 So I will decide I want to take a taste.
06:53 And next thing, you know,
06:54 you are just like the person that
06:57 who is you detest.
06:59 You know, it boils down to arrogance.
07:02 We somehow think that we are stronger...
07:04 An exempt.
07:05 Yeah, an exempt from the rules of nature
07:08 that govern everybody else.
07:09 We think we kind of defy ourselves.
07:12 We're too good, we're not as bad,
07:14 we don't have it as bad as they do.
07:16 So yeah, I think that's what it is.
07:18 We wouldn't fall for that.
07:19 We wouldn't fall for that, we're too bright.
07:21 We're brighter than everybody else has gone
07:22 before us and fallen down.
07:24 We know better. Yeah. Yeah.
07:25 And, Brittany, go ahead.
07:27 I think I would add this also the presentation of,
07:30 when my mom told me not to do certain things,
07:33 she presented some things better than she did others.
07:36 So it's based on how you present it.
07:38 If you want to tell somebody, "Don't drink alcohol."
07:41 "Why not?" "Because I said so."
07:43 That's not really a good presentation of
07:45 do not do this,
07:46 it all boils down to how you actually presenting this,
07:49 are you presenting it in a good way as in,
07:51 do not do this because of this reason,
07:53 or you're just saying, "Oh, because I said so."
07:55 Okay.
07:56 And that also plays into the fact of there
07:58 hasn't been enough of us,
07:59 maybe our age looking at those who are younger mentoring them.
08:02 Maybe even parents being vulnerable and saying,
08:04 "Look, you know, I tried this in my life,
08:07 I tried weed and this is what happened to me."
08:10 You know, almost trying to keep that perfect image,
08:12 you know, so that, you know,
08:13 we won't look at them in a wrong way.
08:14 But that really is not good because it doesn't give us
08:17 the trueness, or the realness of the experience
08:19 that happened and why we shouldn't do it.
08:21 You know, I think that there are actually many reasons
08:23 why we just don't listen to the advice
08:26 or learn from the mistakes of other people.
08:29 One, I would just thought there as curiosity.
08:30 You know, some of us, some people,
08:32 we're just curious.
08:33 You know, we want to experience things
08:35 for ourselves.
08:36 We don't care if you tell us, or even if, you know,
08:37 something bad happened,
08:39 we want to experience for ourselves.
08:40 The other thing is if we're real society,
08:42 kind of trains us not to listen to people
08:45 who have come before us.
08:47 It tells us that we are our own people,
08:49 we make our own decisions, rules are meant to be broken,
08:52 you know, and so...
08:53 YOLO.
08:54 When you told that into, yeah, YOLO, you know,
08:56 you only live once, so you might as well try it,
08:58 you know and so, you know,
08:59 would you throw that kind of stuff in the mix,
09:01 I don't know, you know,
09:03 sometimes we want to paint it as well,
09:04 we're just being rebellious but we're kind of trained
09:06 to pave our own path.
09:08 We does, honestly just want try it.
09:10 Yeah, we just wanna learn for ourselves.
09:12 Yeah, yeah, that's a good point.
09:14 You want to add something, John?
09:15 No. Okay, okay.
09:16 Well, let me just go here then because, you know,
09:18 a lot of people also saying, you know,
09:19 we hear this on talking about what society talks about,
09:21 it teaches us, you know, when you're trying to get,
09:25 say in a relationship with someone
09:26 and you want to maybe go to further step
09:28 of marrying them, you know,
09:30 it is basically not even a thought
09:32 in modern society that you're going to try,
09:36 you gonna have sex with them, you know,
09:37 before you get married.
09:38 Just to kind of try it out,
09:40 you know and I think that idea has seeped
09:42 even into the churches.
09:43 I know that, you know, that's even been, you know,
09:45 my corrupted mindset to think,
09:46 "Okay, well, I don't know if I wanna be with this person
09:48 because I'm not sure,
09:49 that the sex really going to be good or you know..."
09:51 Try before you buy it.
09:53 Yeah, try before you buy, you know, type of mindset.
09:55 So with, where does this kind of thinking come from?
09:59 You know, let's just start there.
10:00 You know, and why should it be,
10:02 and why are we even thinking on those terms as Christians?
10:04 I think, first of all, I think it comes from the basics of it
10:08 as from an unconverted mind and an unconverted life
10:12 because if you are totally sold out for Christ
10:16 and your choices will automatically be pure.
10:20 And I also think part of it is a sense of identity,
10:24 you want to make sure, it's like we,
10:26 some of these things we want to try
10:29 so at the root of it
10:31 because we want to have some sort of identity
10:35 that is wrapped up in this thing.
10:38 I want to try, you know, maybe I should sleep with
10:42 so and so because somehow if they value me enough,
10:47 or they like me enough to sleep with me
10:48 then that means they must really like me,
10:51 you know, or I wanna try and drink
10:54 because if I can drink and hold myself
10:57 and hold it down then, you know,
10:59 I'm some kind of bad, you know.
11:00 Right. Right.
11:02 That kind of... Yeah.
11:03 Okay, okay.
11:05 Well, if I could kinda go back
11:06 in which Jeanne is absolutely right.
11:07 If I could kinda go back a little bit,
11:09 society teaches us to try things
11:11 before we buy it.
11:12 When you go to the car dealership,
11:14 you can test drive the car.
11:16 I mean, I'm talking about down to frozen yogurt.
11:18 When I go to FroYo, I can taste the yogurt
11:21 before I buy it.
11:22 You know, this is how we've been taught
11:24 which whereas way back in a day,
11:26 you just wore what was given to you.
11:27 You just did what was expected of you.
11:29 You know, now you go to school
11:30 and you can go through a whole semester
11:32 before you declare you're major
11:34 because you get a chance to kind of test
11:36 and try everything out.
11:37 And everywhere we look television, you know,
11:40 all and I don't want to do any shows like that,
11:42 I can't name any shows.
11:43 Right.
11:45 But there are shows that literally say,
11:46 "Well, you need to have sex with people to see
11:48 which person would suit you best for life.
11:50 Because having sex is such an important thing
11:53 and you've got to make sure, you know you're gonna enjoy it,
11:55 you know, before you choose the partner."
11:56 Yeah.
11:58 And so you know, when we're steeped
11:59 in that kind of culture, you know,
12:00 we're gonna tend to go that way.
12:02 At the heart though, I believe that that's just
12:03 who we naturally are.
12:05 We are people
12:06 who are looking out for ourselves.
12:07 Right.
12:09 You know, if we go down to the hard with the man,
12:10 carnal man wants to please himself.
12:12 Yeah.
12:13 And that's why we want to have that just a taste.
12:16 You wanna please ourselves,
12:17 you want to experience something from ourselves.
12:20 Yeah, I think Korey and Jeanne make a very good point
12:22 when they talk about the unconverted mind
12:23 as well as, you know, try before you buy it.
12:25 That's the mindset of the world today,
12:27 but that's not God's mindset at all.
12:29 Neither does that fit
12:30 with biblical or spiritual things.
12:32 God teaches us that we have to walk by faith
12:34 and not by sight.
12:35 So that means when we decide to marry
12:37 somebody based on,
12:38 you know, this is the person God wants me to be with,
12:40 we have to trust that the sex is gonna be good
12:42 because God put us together.
12:44 We have to trust that all the resources
12:45 and the finances are gonna be taken care off,
12:47 and our social life is going to be well.
12:49 And I think God wants us to enjoy life,
12:51 we don't have to secure a good life
12:53 before we finally make that commitment.
12:55 Yeah, that's so true. I mean, it's a powerful point.
12:57 God is not sitting there and saying,
12:59 "I don't want you to experience the good things
13:01 that I have for you in this life."
13:03 You know, He wants us to be happy
13:04 and so we have to trust that if we're making pure choices,
13:07 making the choice that He has for us
13:09 that our life still want to be good
13:10 even if we don't try that one thing.
13:14 Was someone else gonna chime in?
13:15 Okay, I want to go to the next thing and that is,
13:19 let's just talk about ourselves,
13:20 have we made some mistakes?
13:21 Have we lived a life or we maybe had some regrets
13:25 that we wish we hadn't done?
13:26 And in saying that maybe share some of those things
13:28 and what advice would we give to someone else
13:31 who is thinking about tasting and trying something.
13:35 Well, who wants to be brave and start...
13:38 Well, I mean, honestly, I've tried a lot, you know,
13:41 try not as much as other people.
13:43 But, you know,
13:44 I give all credit and glory to God,
13:46 you know, for bringing me through.
13:48 And what I would say to someone as a word of advice is,
13:52 you can try to be like the prodigal son
13:53 and go out into a far country but the sad truth is
13:57 unfortunately some people don't make it back
13:59 from the choices that they make in life.
14:01 The prodigal son is the exception to the rule.
14:04 He was able to come to himself, realize where he was,
14:07 and then go back home
14:08 and his father was waiting there for him.
14:09 Where some people don't make it back
14:11 and sometimes some choices could even cost your life.
14:13 Yeah, yeah.
14:14 And I'll say that too, you know,
14:16 that many of the decisions and choices
14:18 I've made in trying something's just once has led me
14:23 to really live with a compromised state of being
14:26 where I just kind of don't see things
14:28 as deep as they used to be.
14:30 You know, when I was younger,
14:31 I would never think of doing certain things.
14:33 You know, I just stop for sure, you know,
14:34 certain things would just be, you know, not in my life.
14:36 But as I kept doing things or try things,
14:40 now things didn't seem as bad anymore, you know,
14:42 and I would say to someone who's watching
14:45 that you may think you can just try it out,
14:48 but as you go down that path,
14:49 you may start seeing that your morals
14:52 and your ethics begin to change,
14:53 you know, because of you're trying something, you know.
14:56 Jeanne, go ahead.
14:58 And I'll too, I would tell someone
14:59 who wants to try right now that it's not,
15:03 sometimes it looks like when people tell you
15:05 not to do something and everybody else is saying
15:07 how great and awesome it is to do it...
15:09 It just feels like
15:11 you're getting contradictory messages,
15:13 but I would say don't try and do something today
15:16 that tomorrow you're gonna look back
15:18 and think, "Why did I do that?"
15:20 'Cause there're sometimes,
15:22 like you don't want to get into,
15:23 you know, that someone is bad for you,
15:26 you've heard everything about them
15:29 and even your personal experience
15:31 with that person has been such that
15:33 they're not good for you but somehow you think,
15:36 "Oh, wow, I just want to..."
15:37 You know, there's something about them
15:39 that just drives you.
15:40 And at the end of the day you don't want to be
15:42 ducking people in the hallways
15:43 because, you know, you don't want to cop to the idea
15:48 that you actually fell for this person
15:51 or you did this thing that made you,
15:54 like why would you go and get yourself dead drunk?
15:57 You know, or now I hear people are
16:00 even trying this strangulation thing because,
16:03 why would you do something that would put you in a position
16:05 where you could hurt yourself?
16:07 Yeah. Yeah. Or worse yet hurt other people?
16:09 You know, there's no one who wakes up in the morning
16:11 and says, "Hey, I wanna go and kill somebody today
16:14 'cause I'm drunk."
16:16 But there are people, but they're crazy.
16:17 Yeah. Exactly. Yeah.
16:18 Yeah, no person in their right mind that should say,
16:21 in their right mind.
16:22 You never know what will happen,
16:24 what things will lead to...?
16:25 What those things will lead to? Yeah.
16:26 And I know, what you're saying, you know, I know that,
16:28 you know, when I was, I guess in college
16:30 there was this girl that everybody was talking about
16:32 and I want to be with that person so bad,
16:34 you know and I remember all my friends saying,
16:37 "Don't give with this girl, you know, she's not,
16:38 she's, you know, she's about nothing only to be with her."
16:41 But others were saying, "No, you know, she's bad,
16:43 you know, you need to be with her."
16:44 And so, you know, weighing options but I decide,
16:46 "I'm just gonna try it out."
16:48 And went ahead and talk to this girl,
16:49 dated this girl, and ended up
16:51 being a very, very bad relationship, you know.
16:53 So bad that even in that relationship
16:55 I was trying to keep the relationship so much
16:56 that I was willing to compromise
16:58 and I remember I tried for the first time,
17:00 I tried alcohol when I was with this person,
17:02 you know, went to, you know, parties and clubs.
17:04 I've never done that before
17:06 but because I was with this individual,
17:07 I was trying to live up to this image.
17:09 Yeah.
17:10 You know, and it kind of destroyed me in later on.
17:12 Even now to where I'm thinking that my morals and values,
17:16 I look back and say, "Wow, they've really changed
17:17 but it's because of decisions like that."
17:20 That my choices now have even been skewed
17:22 and I had to pray to get myself back
17:24 to where I need to be.
17:25 Wow.
17:27 I would also add to that,
17:28 that this whole calculated risk,
17:30 there're some things you just can't really calculate.
17:31 Yeah.
17:33 And these are a few things where you just should just
17:34 toss it aside and not even think about it.
17:36 Looking back at my own life, right now I have to go through
17:39 the process of trying to recover from this,
17:42 Oh, I'm just gonna try this once.
17:43 Wow.
17:44 And the recovery is not easy which makes this not worth it.
17:47 It's hard having to recalculate your mind, reprogram it,
17:52 trying to figure out, "Okay, how do I approach this?
17:54 How do I approach that?"
17:56 It's more complicated now that I've just tried it versus
17:59 if I never tried it, I would never have to think
18:02 or ask the questions that I now ask.
18:03 Exactly. Exactly.
18:04 Yeah, the danger with,
18:06 first of all trying it is such an arbitrary thing.
18:09 There are things that I've tried,
18:10 then there's things that I did.
18:11 Just gonna put it that way.
18:13 There's things that I wasn't trying to do,
18:14 they just kind of happen.
18:15 You know, what I'm saying.
18:17 So I think it's dangerous just to go on say,
18:18 "I'm gonna try something."
18:20 That's very dangerous. Yeah.
18:21 You know, as I look back, it's so dangerous
18:24 'cause as John said I know people who,
18:25 We used to go to the club,
18:27 where they had died right outside the club,
18:28 take that shot outside the club.
18:30 I know people who, you know, I used to smoke with,
18:33 who graduated from marijuana to cocaine,
18:39 from cocaine to meth.
18:40 Some people like John said, "Don't make it back."
18:42 It's is very, very dangerous, you know, to just say,
18:46 "Well, I'm just gonna do a little bit."
18:47 Because honestly you don't know
18:49 what kind of effect it has on you.
18:50 You don't know your physical makeup,
18:52 you don't know someone in your family used to struggle
18:53 with some of these things and that you're enabling,
18:55 you know, generational curses, you just never know, you know,
18:58 what you're gonna get yourself into,
19:00 and so it is always best to stay away from it.
19:02 You know, and like I said, I have friends, you know,
19:04 we all went to, most of us went to school together.
19:06 I have friends, I started Oakwood University with
19:08 that did not graduate with me.
19:10 Yeah.
19:11 I have friends that started
19:13 Oakwood full Arise scholarships,
19:14 they lost their scholarships after their first year.
19:16 They're still trying to get out of school.
19:18 You know, friends, that died at, you know,
19:19 in school because of decisions that they made, you know,
19:23 and we may think that, you know,
19:25 just because it's trying it that the effect of the decision
19:28 will last as long as the decision,
19:30 but the effects are sometimes lifelong.
19:32 Yup. Yeah, it's so true.
19:34 And I mean, you know, and that's kind of, you know,
19:37 the scary part about it.
19:38 You know, you don't know where it's gonna take you
19:40 but somebody may say,
19:41 "You know, hey, I'm not gonna go that far.
19:42 You know, I'm not gonna go that far."
19:44 And that's exactly what I said.
19:45 Yeah. You know.
19:46 And really I didn't, never really went that far
19:49 I would say, you know, to the extreme
19:51 where I could have been
19:52 because I always try to keep my Christianity still intact.
19:54 So it still looks like I wasn't that far,
19:56 but the worse thing is when you know inside,
19:59 your war against the image you created outside
20:01 and that's the thing that really kills you
20:03 because you are now having to live a life
20:06 that you don't even really belief yourself, you know.
20:09 And you began to live this life and you think,
20:10 "Oh, I'm not going that far."
20:12 But inside you're not saved, you know,
20:14 inside your mind is gone, you know.
20:16 They say our greatest battle is with ourselves.
20:19 Yeah.
20:21 You know, especially in the Christian walk,
20:23 we always used to say,
20:24 "Oh, the devil is trying to get me..."
20:26 The devil doesn't have a lot of more anymore ammunition
20:30 than what you've already given yourself.
20:33 You know, you battle with yourself,
20:35 your inward person...
20:36 Right.
20:38 That part of you that wants to do right,
20:39 and that part of you that wants to do wrong are
20:42 what are ultimately clashing.
20:44 Right.
20:46 And for the person who says, "Oh, YOLO, you only live once."
20:49 I'll ask them, how do you think the person who said,
20:51 "I'm gonna try sex for the first time?
20:53 And for just once 'cause I love this guy
20:56 and ended up having AIDS
20:58 and now they have to live with it for decades.
21:02 You know, their whole livelihood is compromised.
21:05 They can't have kids. Right.
21:06 They can't, or if they do,
21:08 they have to take a lot more precautions than,
21:11 you know, their whole life perspective...
21:13 Is changed, yeah.
21:15 Is changed because of that one, you only live once.
21:17 So how, you know, there are some risks,
21:21 yes, you can calculate but there are some risks
21:23 that no matter what kind of mathematician you are,
21:26 the math just does not add up.
21:28 Yeah, yeah.
21:29 You only live once but you got to consider the quality of life
21:31 you gonna have once you make that decision.
21:33 Yeah, that's right. Okay.
21:36 Well, now, you know, what I wanna do is,
21:38 is I really want to allow us to be little open, you know,
21:41 those who are watching and really share some experiences.
21:43 I know Korey, he had experience,
21:45 he wants to share with the viewers.
21:48 Well, I've kind of alluded to my testimony, you know,
21:50 with the whole smoking
21:52 and growing into something bigger.
21:54 But I'm gonna go a little bit further.
21:56 You know, I just recently got engaged
21:58 and I'm not a virgin and so what is that doing for me
22:01 and I wanna say, unfortunately, I'm not a virgin...
22:03 I really wish in hindsight that I was.
22:07 My fiance is a virgin, you know.
22:09 And for me, I mean, that thing we are not married yet,
22:13 but I can already feel the pressure
22:16 that is putting on her that I'm not a virgin.
22:18 I mean, that's, you know, that I'm not a virgin
22:20 and also even those moments that you had,
22:24 you will live those.
22:26 You think about that stuff,
22:27 you can't get rid of those pictures in your head.
22:28 Yeah.
22:30 And unfortunately,
22:31 I'm having to battle myself holding my fiance to a level,
22:36 you know, of experience that she does not have
22:39 because I have that level of experience.
22:41 Yeah, yeah.
22:43 You know, and I can already see how it's,
22:44 it's not causing a riff but you know,
22:46 there is tension and we're not married yet,
22:49 you know, and I don't know exactly
22:50 how it's gonna to play out when we get married.
22:52 You know, but that is the danger, you know,
22:54 you just don't know the effect
22:55 that these things are gonna have on you.
22:56 Yeah, yeah, and I want to add to that
22:59 because me now being married, being in the same situation
23:02 that you were in a few months ago,
23:04 where, you know, I'm looking at the things and say,
23:06 "Hey, I'm not a virgin either."
23:07 You know, and saying, "Man, you know,
23:09 how do I deal with this my wife now?"
23:11 Praise God.
23:12 Who, you know, was a virgin and saying, you know,
23:15 how do I, you know, I'm almost feeling upset at myself
23:18 like, you know, she was able to wait
23:19 but I can't wait for her.
23:21 You know, and it's a horrible place to be in
23:23 and exactly what you're saying trying to say, okay,
23:25 I got to definitely pray really
23:28 and ask God to wash my brain to totally erase them
23:31 and things so I don't have to go into this thing
23:34 with expectations or, you know,
23:37 that ever bring back images from the past and whatnot,
23:39 you know, and really having this
23:41 be a pure marriage, you know.
23:42 And that really I think has been
23:43 the most horrible thing that I had to look at and say,
23:46 "Wow, I wish, you know,
23:49 I hadn't made those poor choices
23:51 so that I wouldn't be in the situation I am now."
23:54 And I want to share some more
23:55 but I do want John wanted to chime in about
23:57 some kind of how the media plays
23:59 into some of this as well.
24:00 Yeah, it's interesting, man, Paul says in Romans 12:2,
24:03 "Be transformed by the renewing of your mind."
24:06 And I was looking at this text, you know,
24:08 I was wondering to myself why did he say that?
24:10 Why your mind?
24:11 And I think any psychologist, you know, any psychiatrist,
24:13 any counselor would tell you the same thing.
24:15 Listen, if you want to change your life,
24:16 you have to change the way that you think.
24:18 It just so happens that
24:19 when we're consuming so much media,
24:21 and we're watching so many movies
24:22 that have so much action,
24:24 we're watching all these reality shows
24:25 where people are sleeping around,
24:26 I mean, they're being physical with one another
24:28 and it seemingly there is no real consequences,
24:30 and if there are consequences they're easily solved.
24:32 So each of us has this mental picture in our mind
24:35 or in a sense we're being desensitized
24:37 or we're being callous to certain things in life.
24:40 We're not realizing that consequences come
24:42 as a result of these things that we would do.
24:44 So media plays a huge part in all of the decisions
24:48 that we're making.
24:49 I don't care who you are, where you are,
24:51 there's advertisements everywhere.
24:53 You're constantly being influenced by media
24:55 when you're driving down the highway,
24:56 when you're on your cell phone, Instagram, Twitter.
24:59 I mean, you just you're inundated
25:01 with so much stimuli till your senses get dealt.
25:05 And I think for me in my life, man, I mean, my parents,
25:08 I was raised in a Christian home.
25:09 My parents did an excellent job in raising me, you know,
25:11 if I can say myself,
25:13 they told me all of the things, don't do this, don't do that.
25:14 Right.
25:16 I knew the word, I understood, memorized scripture
25:17 and all this kind of stuff, but somewhere along the line,
25:19 man, when I saw, you know,
25:21 people on TV having so much fun...
25:22 Yeah.
25:23 Enjoying their lives, I was like, yo,
25:25 basically let me get some of this too.
25:27 And try that out, yes.
25:29 And let me try it before I buy it.
25:30 And essentially, you know, that's what I did.
25:31 And in my mind right now
25:33 I realized how much I have doled my senses,
25:36 and how much I want to progress past these things
25:39 but it's very hard for me now
25:41 because all of these mental images are in my mind
25:43 and I still have these experiences
25:45 that I've allowed myself to get into.
25:46 Yeah, yeah, yeah. Good stuff.
25:47 Jeanne? Yeah.
25:49 And I think there's a perception that
25:52 when you're a Christian making pure choices
25:55 that you don't have fun, that life is not good,
25:58 that somehow you're missing out
26:01 but I would like to say that
26:04 it is by being freed that you get,
26:08 you know, it's kind of like you rein in your choices
26:13 by making pure choices.
26:15 Right.
26:16 But because you've done that,
26:17 you expand your possibilities to things
26:20 that you would never have thought of.
26:22 You know, it's like,
26:25 I'm trying to find a good analogy.
26:27 It's like the elephant that you put on a leash,
26:33 you know, that can only go a certain distance.
26:37 You know, I'm trying...
26:38 But when you take the leash off.
26:39 I'm sorry.
26:41 But when you take the leash off,
26:42 it only can, only stay within that distance.
26:45 I know what you're talking about.
26:46 Yeah.
26:47 You're talking about the analogy
26:49 where the elephant, when it's small,
26:50 they put a leash around so every time
26:51 he tries to move he can't break free.
26:54 Because he's so small, but then he grows up
26:55 and grows up with that same leash,
26:57 even though he is big enough to break free from it,
27:00 he can't because he's already been programmed
27:02 that he won't be able to break from it.
27:04 Exactly. Thank you, thank you so much.
27:05 No problem.
27:07 Yeah, and that's exactly what I'm saying.
27:09 So we grow up with all these media and we don't recognize
27:12 that we have been leashed in essence.
27:14 Yeah.
27:15 And what God wants to do is cut us off the leash
27:17 and free us to enjoy, to transform our minds
27:21 and free us to enjoy life like he has created us to enjoy.
27:23 Wow.
27:25 That's so beautiful, you know,
27:26 and I think that for me in my experience right now
27:28 being married now and thinking, man,
27:30 didn't wanna get married
27:32 because I felt I could be tied down whatnot,
27:33 but realizing now that actually marriage is
27:35 actually very liberating.
27:37 We're doing things what God wants you to do.
27:39 I want to end with a scripture text
27:41 on Ephesians 5:3 it says,
27:44 "But among you there must not be
27:46 even a hint of sexual immorality,
27:48 or any kind of immorality, or greed,
27:50 because these are improper for God's holy people."
27:53 Saying that to say, not even a hint God says.
27:56 So don't even try because God knows
27:57 what's best for you.
27:58 Remember to always make pure choices.
28:00 God bless.


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Revised 2017-06-08