On this week's episode, hear Dan's recent talk to the Celebrate Recovery ministry at The Rock of KC Church in Kansas City. Listen for the acronym PAIN, and how it almost cost Dan everything - including his soul. Until, that is, Jesus stepped in.
The Dan Scott Show Podcast
Dan Scott Show, Radio Episode 95 - Speaking In Kansas City (11-3-24)
The following program is a presentation of Grand Slam Ministries. Hi again everybody and welcome to episode 95 of The Dan Scott Show presented as always by our 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization Grand Slam Ministries. I am Dan. It is great to have you with us. For another edition of the show and in the interest of full disclosure, what we're doing today was not planned. I had an interview planned for earlier in the week that we were going to use for today's show but the day we were supposed to do it, I wasn't feeling well and had to cancel or postpone because we were going to reschedule and do that interview. But it left me with a bit of a void as to what we were going to do today. Fortunately, or maybe unfortunately, depending on how you look at it, last week I was blessed to speak in Kansas City at the Rock of Casey Church's Celebrate Recovery Program and you may remember a few episodes ago, we had a guy on by the name of Nilt Getslow. It was his second appearance on the show, Neil runs the Celebrate Recovery Program at the Rock of Casey Church and he invited me to come out and speak and it worked out, it was our off week for Furman football so I was able to get out there and had just a wonderful time with those people. And I have become more and more of a fan of the Celebrate Recovery Program and you're going to hear me talk about why in the talk that I gave that evening. But to that end, we'll take a break, we'll come back and get into me sharing my testimony at the Rock of Casey Church's Celebrate Recovery Program after you hear something from Grand Slam Ministries. Every day there are children who leave school on Friday and eat little and sometimes nothing until they come back to school on Monday. It happens in every community, including yours. Many of these children live in circumstances that deprive them of basic needs necessary for a quality life. At Grand Slam Ministries, we want to change that. We want to invest in our children, giving them hope for the future. That investment includes necessities such as food, clothing, school supplies and a safe environment to play, to study, to live. Please visit our website www.Grand Slam Ministries.org to find out more about our ministry and how you can help. We're just getting started. Will you come alongside us for the children's sake? Again, that's www.Grand Slam Ministries.org. Want to see a listing of our affiliates? Check out videos or listen to past shows and explore our archives. It's all available at our website, dancescotchow.org, and now back to the show. Dancescotchow.org is the one-stop shop for everything that we do here. If you navigate to the Affiliates and Archives page, you can find out where the show airs live on Saturdays and Sundays. You can get the archive of any show. You may have missed there some bonus SoundCloud material. Of course, the website also has the Grand Slam Ministries page there and my bio and all of the other things. Check it out. We'd love to hear from you at dancescotchow.org. Send us an email or use your phone and send us a voice recording no more than 60 seconds. We will play some of those in future shows if you send them to us. Please do so. As I mentioned on this 95th episode of this show, because I had to postpone the interview we had scheduled this week, you're going to hear the talk I gave at the Rock of KC Celebrate Recovery Program in Kansas City last week. For those of you who've heard my testimony before, there will obviously be some familiarity with it. I always try to find something different to add to it. In this one, just look for or listen for I should say the word pain and you'll see what I mean when we get there. Here's my talk at the Celebrate Recovery Program last week at the Rock of KC Church in Kansas City. When Neil told me he was going to play the video, I told him that I was going to tell the God story behind it and he said that's why he played it. He was hoping that I would. As you may have heard, Furman had not been to the NCAA tournament since 1980, it'd been 43 years. We thought we were going the previous year and the Southern Conference basketball tournament and we're in a conference that only gets one bid unlike the big 12 and the other power conferences. We get one, the conference champion. We got into overtime. We had a kid hit a shot with 3.2 seconds to go to give us the lead in overtime. I thought as all of it's playing out, here's my chance because when you're at a big school, you get moments like that all the time. At a small school, you don't nationally and I thought, hey, we might end up on ESPN or something. Well, it turns out a kid from Chattanooga hit about a 38 foot prayer at the buzzer to beat us and they went to the tournament and we didn't. So fast forward to 2023, instead of getting the conference championship moment, God allowed me to have the NCAA tournament moment. But here's the rub for 24 hours after Fuhrman beat Virginia and my call went viral. My life was kind of chaos. I did seven radio shows the next day, two of them national. People wanting to know who's Fuhrman and who's this loud mouth radio guy and I didn't make the shot but I bet I got 250 text messages, calls from friends and people all over the place so you can imagine what the coaches got. So you know it was a pretty cool moment but you know within 48 hours of that moment nobody knew who I was because the tournament went on, the next big moment happened and everybody moved on to something else and I told Neil that's just God's way of reminding me that he's the one who sets up and he's the one who tears down. So I think that he did that just to make sure that my ego didn't get a little over inflated and as we go through this you'll hear that ego was a problem of mine and something that I still battle from time to time. That thing has probably been seen on Twitter 250,000 times, Neil's probably watched it half of that and I probably watched it the other half so it's a pleasure to be here. I was telling one of the guys here earlier that God has opened the doors for a speaking ministry for me and I've spoken over the last especially two or three years at a lot of churches in our region, South Carolina, North Carolina, but this is the first time that I've gotten to take the show on the road so to speak. Hopefully it's not going to be the last time, we'll find out how that works but when Neil suggested that we do this I said listen man, if God says go I'm going. So it worked out, I can't tell you how happy that I am to be here and I hope that over the next 35 minutes or so that's something I'll say will resonate with you through the Holy Spirit because you're going to hear my voice but it's the Holy Spirit that you need to be listening to. Just very quickly I am in my 14th year at Furman, I've been in sports media for 39 years and I can't believe I just said that out loud, I did baseball and women's basketball at Clemson University for a while, I was a sports editor for a while but settled back into radio. When I was in the sixth grade I was voted the loudest in my class so I went with my strength that yearbooks in my parents' attic somewhere. I'm married, Angela and I have been married for 35 years as of September the 1st, I thought we were done after 22 which you're going to hear a little bit about here tonight too. We have two daughters, we have four grandchildren, three here on earth, one in heaven and we have another one on the way, God willing in April. So it's been a very interesting year for our family when it comes to death in our family but I was telling Neil earlier that God has even in the midst of that losing our nine day old grandson in January losing my aunt and then my dad in June who's a 54 year pastor and preacher. Even in that God has shown us some Romans 828 moments. Everything that happens we try to look for the good and try to give God the glory because ultimately he's the one who deserves it. I will say that I was not Neil's first choice to be here tonight in the entrance of full disclosure. He said that when he wanted to find somebody to fill this role tonight he wanted to find the best, the most dynamic speaker he could find and he called the guy and he said no. He said well if I can't find the best I want to find the most entertaining. So he called the guy and the guy said no. He said well if I can't get the best or the most entertaining let's at least get somebody reasonably good looking so we don't scare these people to death and he called that guy and he said no. So I guess what about a month ago Neil called and asked me if I would come and speak and I really felt bad because I turned him down three times already. It's going to be a good night you guys got it good. By the way I do have to tell you coming from a southern Baptist church I'm a little off put by seeing people in the front rows so if I'm a little nervous tonight forgive me. As I said I am excited and humbled and blessed to have the opportunity to speak to you tonight and as I said I'm going to share what God's put in my heart over these next few minutes and my prayer is that the Holy Spirit is going to move and that you guys will hear the still small voice of Jesus and he is the one who will be glorified tonight. The one thing I'm not going to do and you have my word I'm not going to patronize anybody here by standing up here and pretending that I know what you're going through because I don't and I would never ever insult anybody here by trying to convince you that I know your story or your struggles but what I am going to do is I'm going to share my testimony and share how God took me from a broken shell of a man who was on the verge of losing everything and everyone that he loved and he brought me to a new life in Christ and I pray that by doing that and bearing my soul here in front of you tonight that God will use something in here to speak to somebody here tonight and what I want to talk about is dealing with the past. When it comes to our past we have two choices we can let our past define us and not just bring us down but keep us down or we can give that past to Jesus and we can turn our lives over to him and let him turn that mess into a message and those trials into our testimony and if anybody knew about having their past sins forgiven it was King David. If you know your Bible story David called a man after God's own heart and yet it was his greatest failure lusting after Bathsheba another man's wife that also stands as one of the prime examples of God's forgiveness. Not only did David have an illicit affair with Bathsheba an affair that ultimately led to a child being born out of wedlock and David having Bathsheba's wife murdered. Yeah husband murdered well these days who knows be a husband you're right forgive me Lord. If you know the story which apparently I don't after about a year God sent Nathan to profit to confront David about his sin and Nathan told David a story about a rich man stealing a lamb from a man who had nothing it was the only thing that he had and Nathan set him up so well and David the King he was outraged and basically said that the man needs to die and then whatever he took needs to be restored and this is just my imagination but I picture Nathan as kind of an older man and I think he pointed a crooked finger in David's face and he said you are the man. Could have got he killed by the way but he was on a mission from God not like the blues brothers but when David finally confessed his sin God for David now the relationship was a little different and David's family would be in conflict for the rest of his life but his sins were forgiven and in the 103rd Psalm David praised God for that forgiveness. In verse 2 he said bless the Lord oh my soul. Somebody should put that into a song shouldn't they. And forget not all his benefits who forgives all your iniquity and heals all your diseases and then in verse 11 he said for as high as the heavens are above the earth so great as his steadfast love toward those who fear him. As far as the east is from the west so far as he removed our transgressions from us. Aren't you thankful for that kind of forgiveness and men and women this is one of Satan's favorite tricks though the Bible tells us that God can't remember our sins once we confess them and he forgives them the devil constantly constantly wants to remind us of our failures can I get a witness and it's a strategy quite honestly that took me a long time to recognize. I grew up in a Christian home I mentioned my dad who passed in June was a pastor and a preacher for 54 years these single best men that I know faithful and matter of fact the last message he preached the Sunday before he went in the hospital was called bringing men to Jesus and that's that's who he was that's what his life was about but growing up as a preacher son I always tell the old preacher son joke and at one point I thought maybe it's not appropriate for this but I don't care we're friends right I always joke about having the preacher son joke about having the drug problem I was drug to church every time the doors are open as a kid. I had the proper upbringing I knew right from wrong I saw firsthand what a Christian marriage was supposed to be between my dad and my mom and yet in my own marriage as a husband and a father I failed over and over and over listen to me people sin ruled and it almost ruined my life. Circumstances happened when I was young that that fester in me and affected me in ways that I really never could have imagined then and didn't really come to grips with until many years later but when I was seven or eight years old in that neighborhood I was sexually abused by a group of older boys who lived in the area where my grandmother did and it went on for a while until one man praised the Lord and I don't think he ever became a Christian but one man found out about it and spoke up and put a stop to it. I didn't realize it then but one of the effects it had on me was it obviously warped the way that I've used sex but it also contributed to just massive insecurity all through my childhood years all through school and to some extent even today it surprises people when I say that because of my job and the fact that I do things like this but it does pop up from time to time. For much of the first 22 years of my marriage I was leading a double life. I had developed dual personalities. My favorite television show growing up was Mash. Any Mash fans here in the house? What a great show that was. I became very much like Hawkeye Pierce especially in school and later. Loud, wise cracking, practical joker right? Who kept his public persona here because nobody really knew what was going on with Hawkeye in here. In fact some of the best episodes of that show were the rare moments that you got to peek behind the curtain and see the conflicted person that he really was. Out here was Dan Scott and as long as people saw this guy nobody saw Daniel. And this was going on pretty much the first as I said 22 years of my marriage. I did a sports talk show on the Clemson University flagship station for 11 years and we raised in my time slot alone. We raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for charity. It's so much good work. This was going on the double life the entire time I was on the air doing that while Dan Scott was hosting that show and doing the fundraising and impacting community in positive ways. Behind the scenes Daniel was chasing money. At one time during the old talk show days of four maybe five year period I pulled in about $90,000 a year and that's may not be a lot of money to some of you but it was a lot of money to my wife and I and yet virtually every single month we struggled to make the house payment because I was wasting that money trying to find something to fill a hole in here. I was drinking way too much. It's not a joking matter but I used to joke that I got to the point that I was spelling drink with a you instead of an I. I was falling deeper and deeper into a pornography addiction. I talked about having my view of sex warped and as I know Neil knows this and maybe somebody else here I don't know but if you've ever been down that road once you start going it doesn't get better. It gets worse and worse and worse every single day and I don't know what the stats are now but I know just a few years ago in the church men and women in the church the stats are or were that at least one in every three men looked at pornography at least once a month and I think for a long time the church was far too silent on that among other things. Thankfully thank God there are programs like celebrate recovery that the church is embracing. I've been blessed to speak at four or five different celebrate recovery meetings at different churches in our area. I thank God for every single one of them because as Neil said earlier it's not just drugs and alcohol. It's all of those other things but I had that pornography addiction. I'm not proud about this but it's part of the story. I cheated on my wife Angela multiple times over the years physically and emotionally. I had small town celebrity status because of the radio show and the baseball broadcast that I was doing for Clemson at the time and believe me when I tell you that I used that status to my advantage every opportunity I could. And when I was looking at this last week I always go over it and if there's something I can tweak or something I need to emphasize a little more. Where the Holy Spirit leads. It dawned on me. Porn, alcohol, infidelity, notoriety, P-A-I-N, pain. I was in pain, I caused pain and brother I was a pain. And it's funny the Bible has a way of speaking to all of this. A little over a year ago maybe almost two years now was preparing to speak at another church and my daily Bible reading had me in the book of Jude. Now if we were in a full church service I would say that I'm not going to test the pastor's shepherding of the flock by asking the congregation if they know how many chapters are in the book of Jude. But anyway, Jude 16 says now listen to this after what I just told you okay listen to this. Jude 16 these are grumblers, complainers walking according to their own lusts and they mouth great swelling words flattering people to gain advantage. And somehow, you know, this was ten years after I got saved somehow I'd never really zeroed in on that verse until that morning and I thought man that's the Bible telling me who I was. Men and women to the outside world I was a great husband and father an upstanding member of the community. But see they couldn't see inside. They couldn't see that Angela and I weren't communicating. They couldn't see that I wasn't modeling what a Christian father looks like to his daughters. They couldn't see the nights that I'd literally lay and beg crying trying to find a way out of the mess that I'd created not just for me but for my family. But again, the Bible is always right. And what does Proverbs 22-6 tell us? Train up a child in the way he should go and he gets old he won't depart from it. I was raised in a Christian home. So all that time, all the time I was doing all of that stuff. Day after day, year after year. I knew I was wrong. I knew that I needed Christ in my life. I knew that I needed to change. But you see folks, Satan's devious. And this ain't his first rodeo. And I don't know how it is in this church. But I know that in a lot of our churches in the south now, we don't even say Satan's name anymore. He's not all powerful and he is a defeated foe. But man he can cause trouble Kenny. And the illustration that I like to use is that he kept giving me rote. Maybe some would have heard that expression before. You want to go drink? Sure. Here's some rote. Go ahead. You want to mess with another man's wife? Here's some rote. Want to look at something on the computer? Go ahead. And you think you're having a good time. And the Bible says there's pleasure in sin for a season. But he kept giving me rope and he kept giving me rope and the next thing that you know, he's taking that rope. And he's got you bound hand and foot. And there's nothing in your human strength that you can do to break loose. And I tried. It helped me. I tried. I swore and it ended funny how guilt works. You do something and you feel terrible about it after you think you're having a good time. And I swore I'm never going to do that again. And I might go six weeks. I might go three months. I might go six months. Just when you think things are going along rather smoothly, he'll jerk that rope. And he's got your right back in. And I used to have these imaginary conversations with Satan that tells you where I was, right? But he would say, yeah, you know, you do need to give your life to Christ. Again, the Bible's clear. Satan knows who Jesus is. Satan knows the scriptures. When he tempted Christ, he tried to twist scripture. He would say you do need to give to life your Christ. But to do that, you're going to have to tell your wife what you've been doing. You're going to have to tell your children what you've been doing. You're going to have to tell your church. I was going to church. You're going to have to tell your parents, your radio audience. Everybody is going to know what a fraud you've been all of these years. And are you ready for that to happen? Sadly, for a long time, the answer to that question was no, I wasn't ready. Whether it was a seared conscience or whether it was fear or whatever it was. But aren't you glad men and women that we have a God who pursues us? And when I say pursues, people, he pulled the rug out from under me, sent me flipping over head over hills cartoon style. He knew that I wasn't going to tell people what I was doing. So he told them for me. In rapid succession, I lost my job at the radio station. I lost a baseball broadcasting gig. My status in the community was blown up. My plans to leave Angela, I was actually living in a hotel for about 10 days. In rapid succession, God removed everything in my life that was a roadblock. First time it happened was December 23rd of 2011, it blew up. That's when the cover came off of it. That time I was a little more sorry I got caught than I was sorry. But even then looking back now, I can still see God, his hand working on things. I told Angela the only way that I'll go to marriage counseling is if we find a Christian counselor. Folks I wasn't a Christian. And looking back on it, I assume that I thought we wouldn't find one. That on it, you know we did. Wonderful lady named Kim McManus who God used over the next six months to help in a Christian setting, a Christian counseling setting put our marriage back together. But my days of being an upper head weren't over because I would leave those counseling sessions and I would go drink or I would go call another woman. I would still do some of the other things. Not either not wanting to or not able to let go. And then on June 9th of 2012, it blew up again. And this time it blew up for real. The proverbial line in the sand was drawn. Angela had gone as far as she could go. My children were disgusted with me. We all have these indelible moments of things good or bad that will stay burned in our memory forever. It was June 9th of 2012. My oldest daughter was going to be married six weeks later. And she's crushed. I mean this is her dad being an idiot. Okay. She ran out of the house. She got in her car. She was going to go to her fiance's house. Our driveway slopes down to the road. She got to the bottom. She slammed on the brakes. She flung the door open. She marched back up the driveway. She put a finger in my face and said you can forget about walking me down the aisle. Try that one on precise. Now to circle back because sometimes when I tell that story I forget to tell the people that by the grace of God I did get to walk her down the aisle. But we're coming to that. Folks I had hit bottom. The scales finally fell off my eyes. And I realized at that moment I was going to lose everything and everyone that I loved. But more than that I realized that if I died I was going to hell. This is honest and as open and as plain as I can say it without Jesus in my life I was doomed to an eternity in hell. And Angela said what's it going to be? And I said I got to talk to my dad. It's about 9.30 at night. We drove over five hours through the night to West Virginia. Got there about 2.30 in the morning at 7.30 I was sitting on the couch waiting on my dad to come in. And all the way up there I'm thinking how in the world am I going to tell him this? Because growing up with a preacher for a dad I've heard a lecture or two. More than my share probably. But again here's God orchestrating things that I didn't know. I didn't know to Angela had been talking to them for weeks telling them what was going on and trying to get some advice about what to do. And my dad got blessed. He walked in and he sat down in his recliner. No judgment. No anger. No lecture. All he said was son what's going on. And it just bubbled up and exploded. And I unloaded everything on him. And I said I can't go on anymore. I can. And folks being in church all my life I had heard the gospel. I can't tell you how many times over and over and over again. But that dear sweet man. He sat there and he explained it to me like I had never heard it before. And by eight o'clock that morning I give him a life to Christ. And I promise you it's the best decision that I've ever made. He forgave me folks. He changed me. Do you hear what I'm saying? He forgave me. And nothing. Hear me. Nothing Satan says or does can change that. And he likes to bring up the past. He likes to bring up all of your failures. But again what did we read earlier? When God forgives our sins he puts them as far as the east is from the west. Another place in the Bible says he buries them in the depths of the deepest ocean. And you know I hear people say sometimes well I know God has forgiven me or maybe God can forgive me but I just can't forgive myself. So pitiful me. And Nilla I don't but I want to grab him by the scruff of the neck and shake him. And you're telling me that your standards are higher than God's? Come on. And just a thought I know nothing about any of your stories here. Okay. But if you think now or have ever thought that you're too far gone to be saved. That your lifestyle has been so bad that God won't accept you. Then I would encourage you to read the story of King Manasseh. Second Kings 21 and second Chronicles 32 and 33. Manasseh was the son of King Hezekiah in the southern kingdom of Judah and Hezekiah had done remarkable work in bringing Judah back to worship of God. But when Manasseh became king he said about to undo everything that his dad had done. And he led Israel into blatant and willful disobedience. Billy Graves says he thought that Manasseh was worse than Hitler. He erected altars to Baal and Asherah, the two gods that the one true God hated worship of more than anything. He built altars to other gods in the temple of the Lord. He sacrificed his own son by burning him on one of those altars. He practiced witchcraft. He saw omens. He consulted mediums. He killed so many innocent people that the Bible says blood ran from one end of Jerusalem to the other. And while it's not in the Bible, Jewish tradition says that Manasseh had the prophet Isaiah strung up between two trees and sawed him in half. That's how Isaiah died. God had finally had enough and he sent the Assyrians to conquer Judah and they took Manasseh away to Babylon and they threw him in a dungeon. And while he was in that dungeon, do you know that he had the unmitigated gall to feel bad about what he had done and repent and ask God to forgive him? Can you believe that? If you were God, what would you do? What would you do to this man who had done so much evil, who had killed so many people, who had caused the nation to be overthrown? Would you forgive him? God not only forgave him, he sent him back to Judah and put him back on the throne, where he tried to undo all of the mess that he had created and reinstilled worship in the one true God. So if God will do that for Manasseh, I can promise you he'll do it for you. Now, I feel duty bound to tell you, because I've experienced this in my life, some of you may have as well, I don't know, but you can be forgiven of your sin, but there can still be consequences of your sin. And the way I like to describe it, if Dan Scott goes out and robs the bank, okay, and I get caught, which I would because I'm a bumbling idiot, and I get sentenced to 25 years in prison, and year two, I find Jesus and I get saved, legitimate, heartfelt repentance, and he forgives me and he saves me. I'm saved and I'm going to heaven, but I ain't getting out of jail. And if you continue to read in Second Chronicles, even though Manasseh repented and was forgiven and tried to undo all the stuff he did, it's written in there that Israel is ultimately conquered once and for all because of the sins of Manasseh. So there are consequences even after forgiveness, but thank God he can forgive us. God has done a miracle in my life, folks. Several in fact, but I still struggle. I have to throw myself on the mercy of Jesus to carry me through things that I don't have the strength to do myself. Dr. David Jeremiah, a wonderful preacher and teacher of God's Word once said in a message the following quote, "The Christian life is not just about fellowship and forgiveness, it's also about fighting the war. The forgiveness of past sins has got to be followed by the deliverance from present sins. If you're not at war, you might not even be a Christian. I don't think it's possible he said to be a believer and not be at war in your heart." And I know we're a little bit past your time, so I'm going to try to hurry and get through this. Even though I'm a Christian, my life and my life has been changed, I still have the old sin nature. And I'll have it until I get to heaven in my glorified body, a place that's 100% free from sin and 100% rule by the power, glory, and majesty of Christ. But until then, I have to be on guard every single day. How many of you have heard someone say God will never give you more than you can handle? What a crock. God will most certainly give you more than you can handle because if you can handle it, you wouldn't need God. That's nowhere in the Bible, by the way. That's bad Facebook theology. And I need him every day. And the deaths of our grandson and my aunt and my dad have made this a challenging year. I can promise you. But he's always there and he's faithful. And I can only tell you my own experience. Again, I'm not going to try to pretend I know any of your struggles. But once I got saved, my desire to drink went away like that. And only rarely does Satan tempt me with alcohol. But sex, women, pornography, that's a battle that I have to take to the foot of the cross every day, sometimes multiple times a day. Folks, I work on a college campus and in the south where it's hot for a long time. And when it's hot, people don't wear as much clothes as they do when it's cold. Or doing basketball games and you're sitting courtside during a timeout and what happens during timeouts, cheerleaders and dance teams. I spend a lot of time like this looking at my notes. The devil knows my weakness just like he knows yours. He knows where to attack. And I soon discover that I couldn't withstand those attacks on my own. But you see, I don't have to because I've got Jesus. He's the strength I don't have. He fights battles that I can't win. And now whenever Satan tempts me, it happens every day. I pray. I pray for God to put a filter on my thoughts to put blinders on my eyes and to help me remain faithful to the woman I love. And for a little over 12 years now, since that day, June 10th of 2012, when I gave him my life, he's been faithful to me. I've been faithful to her. He won't always thank you. He won't always remove the source of temptation or keep us from going through difficult times, but he's always faithful to provide a way out to walk with us through the difficult times and carry us when we don't have the strength to walk on our own. 1 Corinthians 1031 tells us that no temptation has overtaken us except such as his common demand. But God is faithful who will not allow us to be tempted above what we are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape that we may be able to bear it. And that way of escape, that off-ramp may only come in a split second, but man, you better take it. It didn't say he was going to make you take it. He said he was going to provide the way out. I don't know the heart of everybody here tonight. So what I want to leave you here tonight with tonight is this. Jesus loves you. And he willingly came to earth in full human form, lived a sinless life, died on the cross as a perfect sacrifice for your sins, from my sins. He rose the third day victorious over sin and death, and now he sits in heaven on the right hand of the Father, making intercession for you. He wants a relationship with you. He's paved the way, folks. The song says Jesus paid it all. It's a free gift, and all you have to do is accept it. And that can be difficult to grasp sometimes, especially for men, because some of us, at least of a certain generation, have been taught that we have to work for everything that we get. And if it's broken, we need to fix it. Since August, we've been going through a home renovation at my house, and Angela will tell you if I try to fix something that's broken, it usually gets more broken. But when it comes to salvation, there's nothing that we can do. No amount of work, no good deeds, no charitable donations, no church attendance, no giving to the church. Nothing. Jesus has already done it. He has fulfilled the requirement. He has paid the penalty. And all we have to do, and I made this so much harder than it needed to be. It's literally as easy as ABC. And I learned this in Sunday school as a six-year-old. Ask him to come into your life, believe that he is the only way to heaven and confess your sins to him. Ask, believe, and confess. It's that simple. If you'll do it and not just say it, but really mean it, then you can experience what the Bible calls joy unspeakable and full of glory. It's a free gift. Let's think if you have to ask for it. So if you're here tonight, and you're not sure that if you died tonight, that you would be with Jesus, will you make the most important decision that you can ever make by accepting Christ? Will you do that tonight? You may have questions, and I can promise you all that you'll never understand it intellectually. Not all of it, you can't. That's why you have to come to him by faith. And Jesus talked about having the faith of a mustard seed. A mustard seed is almost invisible to the human eye. And yet when it's planted and when it's tended the way it's supposed to be, it grows into this marvelous, huge, beautiful plant. If you'll come to Jesus with just that much faith, honestly seeking that relationship and honestly repenting of your sins and asking forgiveness, then he will come into your life and that small, almost invisible faith will grow. And I can promise you, everybody in this room tonight is going to make a decision. If you haven't already, you're going to say yes, you're going to say no, or you're going to say the devil's favorite word maybe. I'll do it later. But remember this, not to decide is to decide not to. There's no guarantee that any of us will see tomorrow, much less next week, next month or next year. That's why the Bible says now is the accepted time. Today is the day of salvation. You may never have another chance quite like this. Holy Spirit's here. I can feel it. He's here. And right now you've probably got two voices speaking to you. One, the devil's telling you, this guy appears crazy. You've got plenty of time or maybe he's telling you like we talked about came in acid. Maybe he's telling you that you've been too bad and you've got to get yourself cleaned up first. That God can't forgive you the way you are. But Jesus is saying, come unto me, all ye who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. Turn your burdens over to Christ tonight. Give him your sins, your struggles, your anger, your shame, your inability to cope, your inability to forgive. Whatever your hangup, that's the word right now, whatever your hangup, Jesus is asking you to come to him tonight. And whatever the battle is moving forward, he's going to be there. He'll be with you every step of the way. Folks, don't let your past rob you of a future with Christ, a future that guarantees you eternal life, an eternal life that can start right here tonight. I'm going to pray and then I'm going to turn it back over to Neil. Heavenly Father, thank you for the privilege we have of coming to you tonight. I thank you for every single person and family that is represented here. And Lord, you are here. I could feel it. And I just pray that before we walk out of these doors this evening that everyone's heart is right and they're at peace with where they are in a relationship with you. Watch over it says we make our way home this evening. Thank you for Neil and his friendship and his leadership of this group. And I just pray that it continues to grow and flourish. And everything this accomplish will give you the praise in Jesus name. Amen. I hope you enjoyed that and it was a blessing to somebody out there. We'll be back to close out the show in just a moment. Here at Grand Slam Ministries, our goal is to share the love of Jesus Christ through multiple platforms, while at the same time executing our core missions of mentorship and helping children in need. The primary way we can effectively do all of those things is through the Dan Scott Show, our weekly Christian radio show that airs in multiple markets around the nation and the world. We are asking you to partner with us to not only sustain what we are currently doing, but to grow both our on-air, online presence, and our ability to fund those core missions. Can you spare as little as $25 per month? How about $10 per month? If we can get 200 partners to join us at each of those small, sustainable levels, we can begin to accomplish everything we believe God has called us to do. So can you help us today with a donation of either $25 or $10 per month? Please go to www.Grand Slam Ministries.org for your donation to get more information or to ask questions. That's Grand Slam Ministries.org and thank you for supporting the Dan Scott Show and Grand Slam Ministries. Like what you hear? Have a question or comment? Maybe a guest suggestion. Drop us an email and let us know. Dan@DanScottShow.org. And now back to the Dan Scott Show presented by Grand Slam Ministries. Quick final segment of this week's show, episode 95. Thank you for continuing to listen and support us. Just share what we do and help us grow. We want to continue to grow this thing and reach beyond our 39 over-the-air affiliates and 8+ internet-only affiliates nationally and internationally. Thank each and every one of you stations for continuing to carry the program as well. Now, if all goes according to plan and I am feeling better than I did when I couldn't do the original interview last week, we will be back on track with some all new interviews beginning next week. So be on the lookout for that. And as always, we covet your prayers and just ask you to prayerfully consider how you can support us. Everybody out there can pray. If God leads you to do something monetarily, Dan@DanScottShow.org. That's the email address. You have any questions you can donate at DanScottShow.org. But more than anything, we want you to continue to pray and continue to share. We'll see you again next week. Thank you for tuning in. I'm Dan Scott. God bless you and so long everybody. Thank you for listening to this week's Dan Scott Show. To hear it again, catch up on past shows or find out more about Grand Slam Ministries, please visit our website, DanScottShow.org. And while there, prayerfully consider making a gift to help us in our mission to share the love of Jesus Christ. That's the DanScottShow.org. [BLANK_AUDIO]