[Music] does the bible say anything about current events it certainly does it's our focus to be culturally relevant and communicate a perspective from the scriptures as christians we should have a biblical perspective of the news and be able to share that perspective with others [Music] welcome to today's news and biblical views the bible tells us in first chronicles chapter 12 verse 32 that the men of issachar understood the times in which they lived and knew what israel ought to do you and i o
ught to understand the times in which we live and we ought to understand what we ought to do on this program we try to pick up on things that are happening in the news and then show you a biblical perspective and today we're going to be talking about racing racing for god rather than racing for man and we have a special guest with us today who at one time in his life was involved in racing so if you have any friends or relatives that are into formula one racing or nascar or indy car racing pleas
e have them watch this program today's guest is pastor max pera and he is from newark new jersey area and he pastors two different churches max welcome to today's news and biblical views thank you so great to be able to be friends together and pastors and we've known each other now for quite a number of years and uh we're excited to have you on the program i am excited to be here and max could you please tell us uh where you grew up and where you went to school well uh i'm born in sao paulo and
uh i grew up in brazil uh for 25 years i was there i lived in sao paulo until i was seven and then we moved to another state uh up north uh in minnesota ice and that's where i grew up and went to school i went to dentistry school back in brazil in 1987 and i graduated 1992 and i i did some work back in brazil until i came here yes until you came here well you come from a very beautiful country i love brazil i've been there three times and uh i love those chahaskaria restaurants with all that goo
d brazilian where they slice it off like the rios restaurant in nazareth yes you've been there oh been there done that not too many times but it's it's good it's delightful on that yeah it is a wonderful country and you know real football too we enjoy wow yes that's true yeah it's very enjoyable uh max glad that you're here on the show too we also really like to know about our families too and can you tell us a little bit about your family too yes uh well i'm married to priscilla my beautiful wi
fe and we have two kids there are twins a boy and a girl samuel and anna laura right now they're 15 years old they're a joy yes i have met his family really really wonderful family his wife and and the two children max we're going to be talking about racing racing for god rather than racing for men but before we jump into the formal racing uh we're going to talk about your faith how did jesus christ become real to you max well uh i believe it was a long journey my family they were atheists our b
ackground my mother's side is muslim and my father's side was jewish and but they did not believe in god so i i i don't know i always have the pull towards believing in god uh we lived in a beautiful place in brazil and uh my my room had a window towards the sunrise and mountains and every day i look at the sunrise and uh and i i couldn't understand how god would not exist so i i was i was questioning him my parents says oh there's no god there's no god and i think after that there were several
christians that you know tried to share the gospel for me but i think i had a heart that was still heartened uh until i moved to this country and in this country i started like seeking more i had a friend who gave him a bible and i started reading the bible at the time and i was didn't know what church to look for i met some mormon missionaries and they talked to me and i was in the mormon church for about a year i decided to go into their seminary to learn more and then i started comparing the
bible with their scriptures and they wouldn't match so after a while i i believed that i wasn't in the right place and uh and i start reading the bible by myself i start i decided to go through the whole bible i start in genesis 1 and i went through and when came to james uh 1 5 and it said that uh if i need wisdom and i ask i would receive and that's what i prayed that day and i say this is what i need i i wanna know which one is the true church of god in this earth or should i go to an evangel
icals mormons uh what it was and right after that and a few days after a friend of mine uh he liked to fish he went and caught a lot of fish that day and he called me he knew that i love eating fish so he says i have too many come in my house and i want to give you some fish and uh when i got there he had a bible on top of the table uh so he was trying to hook me to so yeah so that day we start talking about the bible he invited me to go to church i went to his church i heard the gospel and i ga
ve my life to jesus christ that day wow recognized your need i did of salvation and that's the man that we met that you saw the day this is an amazing story rob max and i were having lunch together in newark and he's sharing his testimony that he shared now of how jesus christ used another person to help him come to know the lord and while we're talking about his testimony max glanced out the window he said there goes the man right there on the street and you hadn't seen him for years since yeah
i haven't seen him for years and and and i haven't seen him since that day yeah that's a great testimony too and it goes to show even folks that are watching the show that sometimes they're searching and looking right that uh going into the scriptures and reading the scriptures and of course having a person to be able to sit down and it's like so what do you think about jesus who is this jesus and would you have a desire to follow him and confess your sins as well so thank you yes yes yes i was
a proud man i i did a lot of things in my life i like sports i you know i was building my career so i had a lot of pride in my heart and my accomplishments and everything and and when i read the bible and i i saw that none of that i did would would make it so i need to humble myself and and just trust jesus christ for my salvation makes life a lot more precious and richer in many ways so one of the things that you were kind of describing and folks probably listening to so dentist pastor and rac
ing so a few careers here can you share a little bit about that some of the careers that you've had well yes uh well the my at a technical level before i went to uh degree school i did chemistry and i start work with that i decided that's not what i want to do i want to advance my studies then i always loved medicine at the time and i ended up going to dental school and i loved working as a dentist back in brazil it was uh very interesting i was able to do some work with poor people and to go in
to medical missions not christian missions just medical missions and i from there i start and i i thought that would be wonderful to be able to help more people so i enjoyed that later i decided to come to america my family uh my parents were divorced and my mother and my sisters they moved to america uh 1987 and i haven't seen them a lot so i was you know looking for opportunity to learn english i didn't speak in english when i came here and uh to advance on my studies and to be you know some t
ime with my family too so that's when i came and and god saved me here well wow you know it's amazing because uh sometimes somebody may ask is like wow with all the different experiences that you've had and and you're what only 25 years old it's amazing but being able to shape us and make us uh who we are and of course we're gonna we're gonna take a break and then we're gonna come back and we're gonna talk a little bit more particularly about the racing and some opportunities on that thank you f
or joining us on today's news and biblical views and we'll be back right after this message welcome back to today's news and biblical views and today we're talking with pastor max about racing for god and uh max it's been a delight talking at this point and uh we're going to get into the racing aspects of our conversation so larry you may have a question or two here yeah brazil is really well known for its racing yes and uh you grew up in brazil in fact your father was a race driver a race drive
r and had a factory making race cars and uh so tell us how did you get interested then was it mostly through your father oh definitely yes uh uh i don't know i think i started like racing before i walked you know my father was my best friend ever uh and uh and we're very close and i know his influence definitely uh shaped uh i know me and you know i love racing since i was really young i dressed up on suits and i had a helmet and you know since i was little and as soon as i had the opportunity y
ou know to be in you know in my little pedal cars that would be and i'm racing someone yeah so and i loved uh you know being with my father and racing and then as he raced and and and we're able he was always taking me together and being part of that so that's how i i got to love phrasing as a child it's amazing how things happen as a child and they carry through in life yeah that's so true and you know racing is all around especially in our region i've we've had the opportunity to go see some o
f the quarter midgets right bonnie when she was teaching first grade she had some of her first creators that were actually driving quarter midgets and it is just wonderful and then just recently my neighbor was doing junk car racing and i said well i'll go check that out at one of the local fairgrounds that was a two because now now they're racing but they're also banging into each other so there's all these different types of razors a little close to it but this is a different type of racing in
many ways but can you kind of describe the difference because i don't even think i know formula one indycar world sports sports car championship and nascar races what's the difference between all those because we have so many different ones oh yes they're different like uh indies and formal ones there are open wheel cars uh there are more uh like racing built you know engines uh and and cars uh they are built for speed uh they are very fast uh they have wings uh to help them uh glue to the floo
r yes uh they're very fast forming one is the top uh racing uh car uh they're well developed and a lot of money into it uh factories uh the best drivers uh will be on formula one uh indy is not too far behind uh they're very close they're very fast cars uh while formula one became more international uh indy it's more like a north american sports that became international too uh they they go sometimes out uh but it's more like let's say a local sports and but they build fast cars much cheaper so
the entry level is easier for drivers to go but it still requires uh the same skills as a formula one driver so we have great drivers from uh indy cars too yeah the wood sports car they're more like a prototype uh kind of car uh it's different than open wheels they're enclosed cars so you're inside a car and the wheels are covered around with fenders uh it's it's different but it's still a racing machine so there's a lot of development engine and chassis and everything they're very fast and they
're built for endurance so most of the races are 6 12 24 hours so usually one car will have more than one driver driving during the race they will switch drivers it is it is a fun but it's a long racing it is uh very interesting uh so that's test endurance of the driver uh the machine and everything uh nascar it's a stock car uh uh it begun as a stock car as cars came out of the factory uh nowadays is not that you know they look like those cars but they're not they are also racing machines they
are built from the scratch but there is some parameters uh that they have to follow and all the dimensions and look uh it's kind of similar to the stock car that you have in a street so it's pretty pretty fascinating on those different uh types of cars and we were talking before the show a little bit that i guess in the future is uh electric cars that are coming into those spaces too well not in the future they're here already uh yeah so now they have the formal one that's electric the formula e
uh so uh they have been racing i don't know for three or four years already uh around around the world uh there are other uh cars uh uh and the lower levels also uh doing you know electrical so uh gas uh we'll we will have that in the future i don't know if that will be the future uh but definitely they will be with uh gas engines too max in this whole area here of the lehigh valley the name of mario andretti of course is right world famous because the andretti family live many of them are righ
t here in nazareth and you had the opportunity back in 2003 2004 to actually sign a contract with the andretti's tell us about that well uh yes i was doing some racing and uh marco was the grandson of mario the son of michael he was a young teenager he was racing and getting skills getting prepared for his career into the family and he had people helping him uh and i was raising some circuits that sometimes he would be there and someone from the company saw me racing and i was already you know a
mature man i wasn't a young kid at the time so they were looking for people to help him uh uh grow and the skills so at the time someone talked to me and uh offered me to join uh you know their company and be part of you know preparing a marco for the future and i would have some opportunities also to race in different because i know dendritis they are raising everything they have whales and and if you don't mind me even mentioning this i believe you mentioned that contract was for 250 000 and
you passed it up he passed up that contract and your next question is going to lead into what happened that he passed up this contract yeah yeah so one sunday morning you're in a church service and an amazing and incredible opportunity here and uh yeah what connected with that contract and you were just getting ready to sign that tell us a little bit about that oh yeah what wasn't sunday monday was sunday night our church brazilian church they usually meet at night not in the morning yeah so i u
h and that was a good thing for me because i raced on sundays uh and i would sometimes just have uh enough time just to get back to the church and not even get home so that day i just finished the race down here in pennsylvania and i drove up to newark and i had my suit that was dirty it was smelling few and rubber and so i when i when i had to go to church straight from the track many times i just sat in the back of the church in a corner they had the sound system so nobody was sitting around s
o i wouldn't bother anybody with my smell and my wife came and sat you know graciously next to me uh and i heard the message i i had my my heart really aching for being available to serve the lord uh more deeply i was involved in church a lot and uh even in racing uh i i did a lot of evangelism a prayer and the track uh but i wanted to be more involved and that day uh we were end of the service we were worshiping and i you know i just hear this voice you know talking to me are you willing to giv
e up what you love most and i was like what is that i thought someone spoke to me and i looked in the side this is the wall and the other side it's my wife just singing and say well i guess god is speaking to me and i just close my eyes again and i start praying and he says again are you willing to give up what you love most and i was like yes uh i was recently married i just had bought a house i was like what you want you want my wife you won my house what are you asking for me uh so from there
the service ended i was sitting with my wife and then a couple came to me that they were they were in pastor they're just leading the youth uh group and they was going they were going to have a retreat and they asked me if i could come and help i used to be a boy scout leader and uh i had experience and i loved work with young people so my pastor told them that they could try with me so they came and talked to me if i was involved to be chaperones on that uh camp and i say yes i am available an
d then you know i ask when is that gonna happen and when they say that they it was the day they were supposed to be meeting with the headquarters wow yeah yeah that's spectacular right then god intervened yeah yeah and you know the beauty of that is we see making ourselves available saying god whatever and wherever you would have me to go and then also the calling into ministry uh far too many times we don't hear about that but god may be tugging in someone's heart and maybe someone watching the
show too that not only just being in a business world but maybe also to be a pastor and a shepherd and a church too we're going to take a break and we're going to come back thank you again for being with us on today's news and we'll be back right after this message welcome back to today's news and biblical views and i'm rob fields along with pastor larry bird and today we're talking with pastor max on the topic of racing for god and before we went to the break uh max you're sharing about god ca
lling you into a ministry role and uh with the many careers that he has shaped you and brought you into uh into the space but uh thank you again for being on the show and larry you had uh some questions here i just wanted to comment too max how that god had you in that church service where you heard the voice of god in in the spirit speaking to you that what would you be willing to give up and when your wife said to you well that's the date that you're going to sign the contract with the andrett
i family and and you just right then you knew that god was calling you into the ministry so tell us a little bit about your ministry now you're pastoring two churches uh one in newark and one in long branch tell us a little bit yes uh yes uh yes uh well i i discovered that i love church planting and at the church they did a church plant at the time i wasn't a pastor or even and had much theological training but i was available to help so it was part of their church planting in astoria at the tim
e so after that i saw that i had a passion to see start you know church getting started and i decided to go to school so i did an mdiv baptist bible seminar in clark summit pennsylvania and throughout my studies i met pastor ken daves who was the director of project jerusalem who were working planting church in the northeast area of the united states so they had a team for astoria and they asked me if i want to join them so i joined that team and i helped plan emote ethnic church and and queens
at the time uh and then from there i helped plant another church in manhattan and then during that time a church in newark is a brazilian church the pastors had died i had preached there a few times and they invited me to come and to help and i started helping the church they decided they want me as their pastor so i was there for about a year uh after a year the love was gone so they threw me out and uh there was a lot of new believers that were reaching uh was a small church and we had a large
group of new believers that needed to be baptized and discipled and came to a time that says they said we don't want you here and so they told me to leave and start another church so i left and so the next sunday we started a church with 60 people in newark and you know with ministry we know there's challenges we all talk about those and spend a couple of shows on it but what are some of the exciting things when you're describing this of ministry work and with the churches or even with the spac
e that you're in now well i i love newark because it's also multi-ethnic and i like to work with people from all places and languages and attitudes and it's great to be there still no we do portuguese do spanish uh we do english so i'm able to speak those languages i think tools that god gave me that i can use him into ministry so i'm learning new languages right now because i want to be able to reach more people in the area so i i'm excited and then later long branch came into play and they nee
ded some help down there and then we started planting that church so i love being ministry work with young people and right now we have a youth group that's going wonderful i have people coming from manhattan bronx queens uh uh into newark uh just to be part of what we're doing there uh and i think it's amazing uh it's one thing that i love is that preparing people that from different place different countries once they decide to go back they are taking the gospel of them max are there some scri
ptures that have really impacted your life that you'd want to share well uh one i told you james 1 5 uh definitely that was the impact of my life and and the second one is uh second corinthians chapter four verse five uh as i went to the ministry and one thing that i read that paul said that i think it became my motto uh i i preaching on myself i put jesus christ as my lord i think that's what we have to remember yeah you know max i'm sure people are asking this and i remember as paul is writing
a letter to the colossians and he speaks very clearly about not having our minds and a heart set on earthly things but on heavenly things and i guess the question would would be along those lines do you have any regrets of not signing like the contract with the andretti family uh because people would ask that from that earthly heavenly what would you say to that not at all not at all i have no regrets i miss racing yes i do missing race but i have no regrets i uh no no regrets on leaving my pro
fession and living this opportunity i i i found so much joy in jesus christ that uh there's no way to measure or to compare uh i think i'm doing something much greater right now well that's part of that calling too right god's called you into this and there's that degree of obedience but also that peace and just being with him and in the space there unfortunately a lot of people that are in professions that are doing things that's not god's calling in and it's just really rough and tough going o
n max people watching this program today some people are probably racing toward god other people are racing away from god what would you just say to someone who seems to be racing trying to get away from god well uh pull the handbrakes off for uh repentance and uh and spin your car around and give 180 a spin and just step on the gas and follow jesus christ and race towards him this is the best way uh do you know which one is my favorite track in the world your favorite track my favorite track wh
at is your favorite track john 14. uh john 14 says that uh you know he prepared a place for us and then on verse six it says i am the way i am the truth and the life so uh we need to uh you know race towards him and and go uh to find a surprise that's ultimate life eternal life amen how wonderful to be able to interview a man who gave his life fully and completely to christ passed up signing an amazing contract but he's following jesus are you racing toward jesus or are you racing away from him
turn to him you'll never regret it [Music] [Music] you
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