 Welcome to Hope Today. We are so glad that you have joined us. Do you know that God is an amazing God, a great God, a magnificent God? Better than we know. We're learning how to follow him. We're learning who he is. We're gonna talk a lot about that today. By the way, I'm Tom Hollis. This is Amy Schaefer at Amy. We are gonna be talking about this God and the grace that he gives us. And you know what? We are right in the middle of holy week. And if there is ever a time for this message today, it is now. Do you ever wonder, is something wrong with me? Is my faith real? Have I let God down? Should I just try harder? Is that your default answer? Well, on Hope Today, we have author Kyle Winkler here with his new book, Permission to Be Imperfect, How to Strive Less, Stress Less and Sin Less. Tom, I need this message today. I need this permission. I need the permission to be imperfect because I'm not going to be perfect. I've found that out a long time ago. And no, but it's gonna be a great conversation because we're, like I said in the open, we're learning who God is. We're learning what he really is like. I mean, we know a little bit. We've learned some things from our church. Like I grew up in the church, so I learned some good things, but also picked up some things about maybe distortions of how God is. So we're gonna find out about that. Yeah, and you know what? Why did Jesus say, be perfect as I am perfect? I mean, we've got to unpack that. You know, and later today in the program, we're gonna be praying for you. We're gonna be ministering to you. Please give us a call at 888-665-4483. And more than anything this week, we're just believing God that you will come to see Jesus, know Jesus, have a greater revelation of who Jesus is in your life, what he did on the cross for you, the price that was paid for you, and that, Tom, that we would walk in that victory, really, that Christ died for us. Well, and it's interesting being Holy Week. You think, well, this would be the perfect week, right? But it's also the week that sometimes we can click back into our religious upbringing about the cross and about the resurrection and all the trappings that go with it. And what is God really saying about who he is? You can see his love in him offering himself on the cross. You can see his power in the resurrection, but who is he really? We're gonna find out about that on the program today. Who is he? Do you ever feel burnt out, ashamed, discouraged? If so, this is how many of us Christians feel in our constant desire to please God. Our next guest, though, believes that we don't have to always strive for perfection because that method tends to only lead to failure. Kyle Winkler is a Bible teacher, app creator, and author. He has a new book coming out, April the 9th, called Permission to Be Imperfect. You can take a big deep breath now. He joins us to tell us how we can strive less, stress less, sin less. Kyle, it's great to have you back with us on Hope Today. Oh, it's good to be back, Amy and Tom. Thanks so much for having me. Kyle, that is a big promise in that little sentence. Strive less, sin less, and stress less. I mean, have you found the secret sauce? Yes, but it's not what most people think. You know, for me, like I grew up when you were saying earlier in the program as you introduced the show, that most people think that striving less and stressing less, and especially that sin less part, is all about do more, be more, discipline yourself more, work harder, you know, so much of my early faith, like the first 10 years of my life, is Lord, what more do I need to do in order to experience your blessings and your promises? And as God showed me, my problem was actually doing more. That made me worse, not better. And so it's when he showed me, really, that I have permission to be imperfect. I have permission to be human. He knows, okay, that I'm going to make mistakes. He knows that I can't live up to this perfect standard. It's when I rested in that, and really rested in Jesus and his grace, that actually helped me to do better and be better more automatically than I ever did by trying to do it. And there comes in the strive less and the stress less part too. Let's talk about the do, the doing. You know, I do more. I perform better. I strive more. You know, so many religions are based on performance. You know, our acts of service or how we're working for God. How can we shift and change that mindset? Yeah, just as you said, so many religions are about the do. Achieving something to gain God's pleasure, to gain God's blessing. And that's really, especially in this holy week, this is really something to reflect upon because we're leading up to Good Friday, what Jesus accomplished on the cross and then what was validated by the resurrection. And the difference between Christianity is in that. Every other religion says do. Christianity says it's done. There's nothing that you can do. And you know, you mentioned that verse earlier, Matthew 548, it's part of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount where he says, be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect. And a lot of people look at that and they think, well, Jesus is telling us, we've got to try really hard. And that is a verse that's part of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount. And he says some difficult things in that Sermon on the Mount, like if you've even had a thought of lust, you've committed adultery in your heart. If your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. If your hand causes you to sin, pluck it out. And then he goes into this, loving your enemies unconditionally like God and then he finishes, be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect. So like I said, a lot of people think, oh, wow, that's impossible. But I got to try to do it. But Jesus' whole point in that was to show people who are depending on their self-righteousness that you can't do it. He's trying to show people that you need a savior. It is impossible for you to achieve that level. But I am here to do it for you. So he's warming them up and saying, be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect. He's really wanting us to see that we cannot possibly do this on our own. We're not meant to do this on our own. We need something else. We need a savior. And we can find our perfection really, our wholeness in the savior. And that's really the message of Christianity. That's the message of this holy week. It's not about do, it's about done. I like that it's about done. Let me ask you, I was really attracted to the one chapter, get a new God, okay? Because I find that in my own life, I had to work through who God is and really understand him. And sometimes we have a feeling of God as a judgmental, mean God that he is just waiting to smack us every time we mess up. Can you kind of dive into that a little bit and let us know maybe your journey in that whole arena? Yeah, so I was raised in a tradition that really, I mean, I literally heard constantly whether it was from the denomination school I went to or even sometimes my own family, better not do that or watch out because God's gonna get you. And so I had this idea of God was this at best, kind of a schizophrenic God, half love, half mean, and you didn't quite know what you were gonna get one day. So you just had to make sure that you were always just doing your absolute best, otherwise he might zap you dead at any minute. And for this chapter, get a new God that I wrote, it was of course inspired by my journey there, but I came across while I was studying for it an article on the internet where it was by an atheist and he had a title that was something like I propose we give up God. And I thought, okay, this is interesting. Let's see what he has to say. And he cited all of these verses from the Old Testament to show how in his opinion, God is mean and God is a bully and a lot of other colorful words. And so he said, we need to give up God because of this. And I thought, well, we don't really need to give up God, what we need to do is get a new God because the picture that we're seeing largely in the Old Testament of God is an incomplete picture. You see, in the Old Testament, when we read of God is unishing people and all of these things that let's be honest can make God out to look not so good. Of course he was dealing with sin at a time when sin had not been dealt with yet because of Jesus. But he's also being described by people that didn't have the full picture. They saw him through a veil, through a lens of sin. And so what we know because of Jesus is that Jesus is the fullness of God in the flesh. The apostle Paul called him the perfect image of the unseen God. And the apostle John in John 114 says that here's what he looks like. He looks like unfailing love and faithfulness. He looks like pure grace. So yes, there are things in the Old Testament that it says about God that can be difficult to understand. But when you realize they didn't have the full picture but now we do because of Jesus, we can know that he's not an angry God looking to smite us whenever we are imperfect. But because of Jesus, he is full of love. He is full of grace. The sin issue is dealt with. We don't have to fear that anymore. Now we get to bask in his love knowing that because of Jesus, we can't let him down. You know, I'm reading my Bible every morning and I go through an Old Testament, New Testament, you know, Psalms and Proverbs. And right now I'm in the Old Testament of Deuteronomy. You know, if you do this, this curses are gonna come on you. If you do this, these blessings will come upon you. Then I'm in the New Testament and I'm reading all about Jesus and what Jesus did. And let's really dive into that issue of the law and the grace and how grace frees us and how grace liberates us. But that's not so that we can keep on sinning because grace abounds. Can you kind of unpack that conversation of the law and grace? Such a good question because a lot of people will look at the law which starts with the 10 commandments. You know, those aren't really a separate set of commandments. They are the first 10 of 613 laws that God gave through Moses to Israel for a good reason. Ultimately, you know, at that time, they were using the law to please God and they had to do sacrifices and stay away from all kinds of different things. But God established the law so that we could look back on it and see our need for a savior. The law, the 10 commandments, really any dues, they're all to show us that we cannot do it. They're, I mean, really the Bible says that they prove our guilt. They show that we need a savior. And today that is the extent of what the law is good for to show us that we need a savior. So Jesus came and he said, I've not come to do away with the law. Of course, it still stands there. And as I said, it still stands there to show us our need for Jesus. But he said, I have fulfilled the law. So I like to liken it as kind of a mortgage. If you get a letter in the mail saying your mortgage is fulfilled, it is paid in full, you don't keep sending payments to it. No, you stop the payments. Well, it's the same with the law of Moses. It was fulfilled by Jesus. We don't have to keep abiding by the law in order to please God. All we have to do, if anything, is look to it to realize we need Jesus. And if you have Jesus, you're good with God. That's grace right there. That's the freedom we get to live in right there. Before I get to my question, what is Shut Up Devil? You have an app, don't you? You have a- That's right. Yeah, that's what started all of this for me ministry and everything. And so you see the sign in the background, that's my podcast, The Shut Up Devil Show, which was inspired by the Shut Up Devil app. And it's just a tool that puts God's truths in your pocket related to the human issues that we face from fever to depression, anxiety, loneliness, all of those things. So it's just a way to keep the truth of God's word on your mind so that you live in the power of who God says that you are. Yeah, well, that's wonderful. I'm glad you have that resource because I'll tell you, even with all this talk about grace and everything, I can still sometimes hear the devil whispering about displeasing God and you're not doing right. And even for a Christian who's walked with the Lord for a long time, we can still struggle with this. How are we gonna get the victory? What verses or what thoughts do you have for us to kind of really get the final victory here? Yeah, and that's what people need to realize about the enemy. He's called the accuser and he accuses based on what you do or what you didn't do. It's always about doing. It's always about, as I've been saying, do more, be more. His name in Greek, which is Diabolos, I go through it in the book, it actually means slander. He's out to try to defame your reputation, which is in Christ. So it's not about doing more to prove anything to him or to prove anything to God, really. It's about believing more. It's about resting in the truth of what God says about you. Not trying to strive to do something that Jesus already achieved or prove something he already proved, but it's remembering who you are. That you are loved unconditionally. I love 2 Corinthians 521, that he who knew no sin took on our sin. That's the cross right there, to make us right. I love Romans 322 through really 30. It says everyone who believes, not who does more, not who disciplines themselves more, not who strives more, it says everyone who believes is made right. I love Colossians 210 because of the cross Jesus has completed us. We're not lacking. There's nothing more we need to fix. We're good with God because of Jesus. And then I love this one, 1 Corinthians 611. It goes through this list of identities and it says, such were some of you. But the blood of Jesus worked. You were washed, you were justified, you were sanctified, a trinity of cleansing. Again, not by doing it says, by your faith in Christ, by the spirit of our God. God finishes the work he starts in you. You don't have to finish it yourself. You're called God's handiwork, not your own handiwork. Those scriptures are so powerful. And I know that so many of us and so many of our family that are watching right now, they really want to please God. Can you explain and unpack what it means? And you said to live for God's pleasure versus living in and from God's pleasure. Right, most of us, myself included, we think more Bible reading, more prayer. Good things, of course. Good things, more fasting. That's going to please God. Maybe then we'll kind of convince him, twist his arm a little bit to bless us, give us something, be happy with us, whatever. But I think of something that people ask Jesus. In the book of John, I believe, they ask him, what more must we do? And he says, believe in the one who sent me. Or the book of Hebrews says that it's faith that pleases God. Not some sort of faith that you kind of conjure up to try to get God to make your dreams come true, but it's faith that says that God exists and that he is good. That's what pleases God. It's not your doing, you cannot do enough. And if you're trying, you're going to come to the hopeless state that trying leads you to, the exhaustion, because it's supposed to point you to the Savior who made you enough. So when you stop trying to live for God's pleasure and you start realizing I am already in God's pleasure from Jesus, boy, you enter a rest. You enter that rest that Hebrews talks about. And that doesn't just help you stress less, but as I say in the book, it helps you with toxic emotions. It helps you with addictions. So many of our battles in life are all because we have a wrong perspective of God and what he wants and a wrong perspective of us. But when you know because of Jesus, God is good and you are good with God, that's a breath of fresh air that's gonna bring you victory in every area of your life. All right, Kyle, before we close, you've got a big sign behind you, shut up, devil. What are some thoughts that are being blasted into believers' minds right now that we need to say shut up, devil? So many people are battling symptoms and the enemy makes you think that those symptoms are something that you did wrong that God is getting you back for. So many people are battling financial issues and they're afraid, the enemy's saying, oh, you did something, so therefore God has pulled his hand away from you and that's what this is all about. You know, you mess up and you're feeling guilty and that guilt then leads into shame, not just I did wrong, but I am wrong. That's what the enemy does. He wants to make you feel like you or someone that is wrong. Well, the Bible says resist the devil and that's not about fighting him. It's just about standing against him in belief about what the cross finished, what Jesus did on your behalf. Stand in the victory of the one who defeated the devil. God is good, you are good with God, you are unconditionally loved. The devil hates the truth. He flees at that truth. Well said, Kyle. And I would say shut up, devil. I have permission to be imperfect because of our guest author, Kyle Winkler. Thank you so much for this powerful book, this powerful message. I know that it has impacted people's lives and we'll see you again with your next book. Looking forward to it. Thanks, Tom and Amy. Thanks so much. We'll be right back after this break. We're gonna pray for you and we're gonna talk about some really important things. We'll see you in just a minute. Discover what God's word has to say about healing and deliverance. Bestselling author John Eckhart makes topical Bible study easy with his new book, Scriptures for Faith, Deliverance and Healing. This handy reference is for those who want to have a greater understanding of healing and deliverance to incorporate God's word into their prayers. Eckhart also includes targeting commentary to highlight key scriptures and life application. His spirit-filled perspective will enhance your time in God's word and encourages the spiritual disciplines of memorization and meditation. Request scriptures for faith, deliverance and healing as our thank you gift when you support Cornerstone Television this month. Request your copy today. If you want to strengthen the ministry of CTVN, share your best gift by visiting us online at ctvn.org slash donate or call us at 888-665-4483. Thank you for your partnership. Hope happens here. Well, thank you for your partnership and hope does happen here because it's the hope in Jesus. And what a great discussion we just had with Kyle Winkler and the whole idea of knowing God for who he really is and letting God speak to our hearts and speak to our minds and really understanding that he has got some great revelations of his personhood to us. In fact, let's look at Romans 12-2 from the New Living Translation. It says this, let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. I love that. God has changed the way I've thought about him through his word and through walking with him. And he's doing that in all of us. He's revealing himself in new and special ways to us. Amy, what are your thoughts? I mean, changing the way you think is the way that you're going to win, the way that you're going to experience victory. And honestly, sometimes you're going to have to change the way you think about God, change the way you're thinking about religion and really say, God revealed to me the truth in your scripture. You know, Tom, I brought a little check. Now this check was written to me in, I think, 1987. Is that right? Is it? 84. I was 11 years old. And this is a right thing that my parents taught me. They said, Amy, if you work, you will get a check. Yes. And it says in there for cleaning the office. I don't even know if this is legal or not. I see you cashed it. It's a stamp there, right? You definitely cashed it. I'm 11 at that point. So I'm assuming my parents, but they were teaching me, Amy, if you work hard, you will get rewarded with finances. And I think so, which is right. That's true. It's true. Look at the aunt you sluggered. We've got to work for money, but we can take that into religion and into our faith and into God. And we will work to earn this great salvation, this great gift of God. I mean, we're right next to Monday, Thursday, and Good Friday, and Resurrection Easter Sunday. And how has that impacted your life? Actually, the scripture says, for the wages of sin is death, but it is a gift of God. It is a free gift lest any man should boast. And so it really, it's kind of like, what do you mean I don't have to work for it? What do you mean I don't have to earn it? I mean, and we're up here in the Northeast. It is, it's blue-collar land. It's a deeply religious land. It's like, what do you mean? We work, we earn, we do. And if, like, almost like, I don't even know what to do if I, what do you mean rest in that grace? What do you mean be at peace? Just receive, just believe. So I pray today that you will just receive the free gift of salvation and know that you are not right before God because of your works. You are right standing with the Father today because of the price that Jesus paid for you. So there is a rest in that good work of salvation. So we're praying for you today and make sure you give us a call. You say, I'm tired of being on the treadmill of works and earning and really slaving my way to receive this salvation. Today is the day for those chains to break off of you so that you can experience the freedom and the gift of God's grace in your life. Today is the day of freedom and salvation and favor in your life. You know, Amy, having grown up in this area and knowing that blue collar worth ethic and there's so much that is good about that. But when we apply it to our salvation, we get mixed up and we think it depends on us. And it, you know, all we have to do is respond. That's all we have to do to God's free offer of eternal life. And you know how it happens is that you open up that door of your life and you let him come in and he comes in and he does take over as Lord and savior of your life. That's what Lord and savior means. But let me ask you, Christian, one who's already done this. You say, oh yeah, I gave my life to the Lord 40 years ago. I gave my life to Lord 10 years ago. How is it going? Have you moved into that place of understanding God and His grace and how He is? Or are you still trying? See, because the devil, he gets, you know, sly on us. And he gets to where we say, oh, you're not pleasing God. We talked about that with Kyle. You're not pleasing God. You're not doing the things you should do. You're, you're, you know, no, none of that. You know what, you know the difference, Amy, we talk about condemnation versus conviction. Condemnation is when he says, oh, you're not good enough. You're never gonna please God. You know, conviction is when we do something wrong. God says, hey, you did something wrong. Come to me, confess, you receive my forgiveness and move on. So God wants you to see Him as He is and understand Him as He is today. You know, we have friends that pastor a great church in the state of Florida and their main theme and motto for their church is no perfect people allowed. Here's the deal. We're all on the same ground. We're all sinners saved by God's grace. So are you ready to strive less, sin less, and stress less in your life? Amen. Listen, I know the women that are getting ready for Easter and company and family right now, receive the gift of the grace of God in your life. There are no perfect people allowed in the kingdom. We being the number one there. So today receive the freedom and the joy and the peace and the grace that is in Jesus Christ. We'll see you tomorrow. On tomorrow's Hope Today, bringing together Pittsburgh sports and faith-driven stories, Bill Stern, the founder of Four Men Only, shares about an upcoming men's event featuring current and former Pittsburgh Steelers as they discuss their stories of faith that will be sure to inspire you. Don't miss tomorrow's Hope Today. Cornerstone Television wishes to thank all our faithful viewers whose consistent prayers and financial support have made this program possible.