Latest / Mission: 300 Podcast / Episode 91 - Understanding the farmer

Transcript

Episode 91 - Understanding the farmer · Mission: 300 Podcast

0:00
Well, hello everyone. Welcome back to the Mission 300 podcast.
0:03
This is my second run at our intro for the episode.
0:07
You do not want to know what happened in the first one, but my name is Jason,
0:10
joined as always by Brian, David, and Tommy, usually Caleb, but Caleb is not
0:16
with us this evening, and so it's going to be nice not having to hear his voice for one episode.
0:20
But, Tommy, you look...
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Caleb, I know you're going to hear this later. I love you, buddy.
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I miss you. But, Tommy, are you ready to get this started tonight?
0:29
I am ready to get going. We'll miss Caleb, but we know he's listening. I'm sure he is.
0:36
David, I know because of the daylight savings, you've gotten an extra hour of
0:39
sleep to prepare for this. Do you think it helped?
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It helped so much more than you could possibly imagine.
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You were literally saying that as you were rubbing your eyes
0:49
as if you just got out of bed so i i
0:53
don't believe you well not even a little
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bit but brian you seem a little bit more cheery than david a little bit more
1:00
peppy ready to do this i'm ready to do it coffee's in i'm just gonna warn you
1:06
caleb will probably come back with a vengeance next week so be ready jason it's
1:12
true i'm gonna get all my cheap shots in in this episode when he's not here here to defend himself,
1:16
and then we'll just let it ride and see what happens, you know?
1:19
High risk, high reward kind of a situation.
1:21
But anyways, we want to get into our topic here. So in the last few episodes,
1:25
we've been going over this passage in 2 Timothy 2.
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In the first section, we covered this area where it's actually in verses 4 through 6,
1:38
that we've really been focusing on in 2 Timothy 2, where he talks about the
1:42
good soldier, soldier, the athlete, and the farmer.
1:46
And as we've talked about these different aspects or these different characters,
1:50
you have to go back and listen to the episodes to get a fuller take on them.
1:54
But so far, when we were talking about the soldier, there were certain aspects
1:57
we brought out where you're in a situation where you don't really own your own
2:01
life. It belongs to others.
2:03
You're in service, under a commander, and in a military.
2:07
And so there's different dynamics to to that. You can't be distracted by the
2:11
petty things of life. You have to endure a lot of unique hardships.
2:15
You have to deal with differences in authority in the ranks of people above you and beneath you.
2:21
And then we looked at the athlete in the next one where it's more of an individual,
2:26
character, more of an individualistic or personal aspect where you're choosing a path to go down.
2:33
You're choosing something to train and dedicate your life to.
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And in that, you have to know what what you're getting into.
2:40
You have to know the rules of the contest.
2:43
There's different dynamics there. But as we're going to talk about the farmer
2:47
here, this one always stood out to me as being kind of different because you
2:50
see the soldier and he says, endure hardship as a good soldier.
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You know, don't entangle yourself with the affairs of everyday life.
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And then we see the athlete who has to compete according to the rules that he's engaged in.
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And we have a soldier and an athlete, which are kind of comparable.
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But then we have this farmer thrown in there.
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And it's not a message of, you know, be like the hardworking farmer who is up
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at the break of dawn, who works through dusk and is just, you know,
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also working hard like the athlete and the soldier. He doesn't say that.
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He says, look at the hardworking farmer who should be the first to receive his share of the crops.
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And that seems like such a different shift
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from the first two and so we're just going to peel back
3:32
layers of this onion and see what in the world this is
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talking about here so you guys have any initial thoughts well the first thing
3:38
i wanted to ask was if you were in a situation like timothy and i think jason
3:43
maybe you could kind of break down timothy's background just for a moment of
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what he was in the middle of when these words came and all of a sudden the person
3:51
that is like your father figure, the one you admire,
3:53
gives you these final words, how would that encourage you?
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Like, would it encourage you or would it feel like, oh, don't worry, you got this.
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As we talked about before, probably the worst words that you could speak to
4:06
someone who's actually wanting some advice, you know, I'm not saying they're
4:10
always the worst words, but the receiver takes them as thanks a lot.
4:14
Thanks. Thanks for all your help.
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But maybe could you you just kind of give a little bit, go back and kind of
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recap where Timothy is in his life and where Paul is in his life when these words come?
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And then I guess I kind of want to start before we get into the farmer.
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How would this encourage you, inspire you, bring clarity to you?
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Would these be words that would be helpful? Because I think it's just really
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powerful that Paul chose to encourage Timothy in this manner?
4:44
Yeah, so if you go back into chapter one, or at the end of chapter one of 2
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Timothy, and this whole letter is obviously from Paul to Timothy.
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Paul is sort of a father figure to Timothy.
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We don't really know who Timothy's dad was, but Paul had taken on this father
5:01
figure role, kind of a spiritual father to him.
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And this is actually near the end of Paul's life.
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This is one of the final things he's going to be having in communication to
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Timothy and this book is actually where we get Paul saying, I have fought the good fight.
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I have finished the race. So he's kind of coming to the end of his life and his ministry.
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And right before this section in chapter two, the ending of chapter one,
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we have Paul explaining these things of, hey, you're aware a lot of people have abandoned me.
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He calls some people out by name, which is something we don't talk a lot about
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today, but he calls people out by name that have abandoned him,
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groups of people that have left him behind and people that have supported him.
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And then he says in the first part of this chapter, therefore you,
5:48
because of all this stuff going on, you need to be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus.
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And the things that I've been teaching you that you've heard from me,
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you need to teach those to other people and entrust other people.
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So it's almost this last final charge from a father to a son as there's a transition happening.
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As Paul's fading out and Timothy is stepping into probably a larger role of
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ministry as a pastor and other things going on in his ministry.
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And so it really is this charge from a father to
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a son something's changing my time's up
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it's your turn to keep pressing on and pursuing
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things here's some stuff to keep in mind now
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and so from that we get the context of
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the soldier the athlete and the farmer and i think it it is very much a i i
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don't know that i would see this as like a hey you go and get them buddy as
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as i'm kind of done and i'm leaving so you go get get him, Tiger,
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because you're still going to be alive for a while.
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It seems to me that there's a lot more depth to this because it's specific,
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it's a charge, and it's kind of like you're starting this mission or you're
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continuing this mission.
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And Paul knows there's going to be perils. He knows there's going to be opposition and a lot of issues.
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And so he's equipping Timothy and he's He's reminding him of some really core
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and really central things that he's going to need to get through life,
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especially after Paul's gone.
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Given some of that background, it's interesting to look at, you know,
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what is Paul saying, you know, when he says soldier, athlete,
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I know we talked about him before, but like.
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Authority and then the the choice of an athlete right the athletes choosing
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this race it's individual it's personal and there's rules but then you go to
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look at the farmer it's like,
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they're the part partaker of the first fruits what
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does that mean i think it it means a lot of different things the one thing that
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maybe sticks out to me the most and maybe you guys can push back or give some
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of your thoughts on this but i think i think what the farmer means is is take
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risk and be the partaker in the rewards of that.
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And maybe I'm wrong, but what I've seen in my personal experience is,
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for those who don't know, I'm in sales.
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The background industry is agriculture.
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And I work specifically in seed conditioning industry.
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It's a super niche industry, but it's super vital to the backbone of agriculture. culture.
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So here's some context, seed conditioning, what they're doing is they're basically
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removing impurities from seed lines.
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And so the companies I work with, they're actually seed multipliers.
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What they do is they grow seed for the purpose of replanting to sell that seed to farmers.
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Given all that, what I've seen is that farming is a boom or a bust.
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You have great years and and you have bad years, and you have to deal with a
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lot of different challenges and a lot of different things.
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Recently, I would say the developments have made it so that farmers can make a lot of money.
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They can also lose a lot of money. But with that comes a lot of different choices.
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And I know, Brian, you talked a little bit about a documentary you were talking
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about earlier about having to choose just different hybrids of different seed.
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And I can tell you for a fact. That's true.
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Farmers are planting different varieties all over the place to try and mitigate
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risk, but also trying to determine what's going to do best for this field.
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What's going to do best for this field?
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How am I going to maximize profitability with also all these unknown risks,
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whether even just bad planting conditions, bad harvesting conditions?
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I think of just recently, I was in southern Minnesota, northern Iowa,
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and they got hit with snow.
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Unpredictable, right? Makes the ground wet, makes it hard for them to get out and harvest.
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And so there's just all these different risks that a farmer has to mitigate,
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but ultimately, they get the reward of the crop.
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Whether that's a boom or a bust, they get that reward. Lord.
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And so looking back at this in the context of Paul and Timothy,
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it's like Paul was taking risks for the gospel.
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And he gets those rewards that he risked. And to me, it's taking a father and
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saying, here you go, son. Here's all the things I've learned.
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Now you actually got to go do something with it. Go take the risk.
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Go sow the seed and see if a harvest comes.
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Go sow the seed and see if you have to start all over again the next year.
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And you know, what's crazy about that too, because I live in an area that is
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surrounded by farmland.
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They're like that's all that it is out here it's it's farmland and most farmers
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are just finishing up harvest right now most have finished up this week or the week before.
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But talking to some of the guys that have helped out with and
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a friend of mine has a a relatively small farm
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it's a lot of acres but relatively small but i think a lot of people misunderstand
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what it's like to be a farmer when you only look at it through the modern lens
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You imagine every farm has irrigation systems and all these high-end tractors and stuff.
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But the one friend of mine, they actually don't have an irrigation system on any of their acreage.
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And that's the case for a lot of farmers. And we don't realize that that makes
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you completely dependent on getting rain.
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And so the farmer, when I look at that, there's a lot of things that are outside of their control.
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And there's a lot of things they can control, but you can't make it rain.
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I mean, maybe, I guess, if someone wants to talk about cloud seeding and all
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that, that's not really my area of expertise, but here at least,
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we can't make it rain. We can't make...
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And locusts leave us alone. I mean, we have sprays and stuff to a degree,
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but there's a lot about farming that you can't control.
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You can't control when snow is melting in the spring, when it's going to start
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to snow in the next fall and winter, how hot it is, the level of rain we get.
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So you are kind of dependent or you are functioning in an environment where
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at times you're subject to the elements and it's outside of your control.
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Whereas the other two characters, the soldier and the athlete,
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it's very much you're controlling the outcome.
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As a soldier, you're controlling the outcome for how you stand in that military.
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You might not be able to control the outcome of the war, but you can at least
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take care of everything you're responsible for.
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The athlete, you're the only one that can push yourself to be that highest level athlete.
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There's nothing stopping you but you. But the farmer has all these other things to deal with.
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And I think that can apply at times to someone in a position like Timothy.
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And we see this in the parables of Jesus sometimes where the sower will scatter
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the seed, and it's nothing the sower did wrong, but some seed doesn't return
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a harvest. Some seed gets snatched away.
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And so, as the hardworking farmer, when there is a harvest and a crop,
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you should be the first to receive a share from that, whatever that means,
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looks like. I think you brought up a couple of interesting points.
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And Tommy, I think you, maybe it's not the whole encompassing of what that story is,
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but what you just communicated really brought my eyes open is almost like dealing
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with, we make choices, let's say we make plans for our life.
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And we, we think we have, if I make this plan and this environment stays the
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same, like with this, like you said, Jason, with the soldier,
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his whole role is just to basically follow the orders and then do it and do it properly.
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That that's really the main, main role.
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Now there's factors they can't control that, you know, they may be in inclement
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weather, they may be tested in the training, but ultimately there's a path.
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And they do have an expectation that we can die. Like, if we go to war, we can die.
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So the death part is out of their control, but the role is similar.
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The athlete, you know, you could damage your body. You could get injured.
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You could lose motivation.
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But I like how you're bringing up that personal. So there's a risk in each one.
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But the farmer really is something very unique in the sense that you,
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you kind of choose to be a farmer.
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Like you could say, I didn't choose it. My family passed it down,
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but you can walk away from it.
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If you walk away from it, you're going to walk away from something,
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but it's not like your life is over.
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The athlete can walk away. Soldier can't walk away.
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So we have these, these different factors, but the thing that's really standing
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out to me with the farmer farmer is this risk side that you just brought up, Tommy.
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And I'm thinking of the closure of Paul's life that he sowed and he sowed and
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he farmed in the sense of people's hearts, right?
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To find himself appearing to have no crop.
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It's almost like nothing, like all this stuff, The churches are turning away.
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They're following other things like you labor for nothing.
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But in a way, Timothy is his reward.
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Timothy is kind of that first fruit that stood out.
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And I think this could be a good picture too, why Jesus, you know,
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we always talk about what a great ministry would look like or a great,
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how the best way to reach the entire world with the gospel or whatever. ever.
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And Jesus would probably be, I'm just going to say this. I'm going to,
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I'm going to stretch the limits of our thinking here.
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Probably the master of evangelism. I'm just saying, I'm just saying,
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I know, I know I'm stretching it out there, but maybe the master of evangelism
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and church planting and ministry. And he's the master.
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Now, someone out there might disagree with me because he didn't have a YouTube
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channel. He didn't have a lot of followers.
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But to leave with 120, it's almost like if you go back to the hardworking farmer,
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he got the best seeds for the crop that he wants to plant.
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And so I'm kind of looking at that a little bit like Timothy really exploded.
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And there's others too, but Timothy's one that really exploded the church.
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And that relationship between Paul and Timothy, they have two books written,
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and so many churches use that model of leadership and how to structure a church
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and how to do all those things.
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Timothy really is the seed that Paul participating in his first fruit,
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because that's the one he's really leaving behind to continue this process in
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a powerful way, as far as to be written about in Scripture and all that stuff.
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And think about the risk of your life, that you go through your life,
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as Paul did, to be the most prolific writer and impactful spokesman of the mysteries
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of the kingdom of God through the whole New Testament,
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even to the point where Peter's saying, Paul's teachings are hard, but they're right.
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They're hard to understand, but they're right. So even Peter,
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who is the pillar of the church, quote unquote,
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one of the three closest to Jesus is saying, Paul has things that I'm even trying
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to get ahold of that are true.
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Like he, he has this understanding to come to the point where you are.
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And I just think it's interesting. It almost looks like they digress.
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But if you look at a good farmer, let's go back to a day you didn't buy your seed.
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But we can put it in today's context. You need to make enough money off your
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crop in order to buy the seed that's going to make you more money the next year.
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So the first thing that you're looking at is after I do my harvest.
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I need to make enough profit to not just take care of things,
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but to pay for the seed that I'm going to plant in the next year.
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So of priorities of investment, the seed is the first thing,
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but he's saying the farmer gets to partake of that first crop.
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So some of the best he gets to partake of. And I see Jesus with his disciples
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and in the last moments and him going in after he raises from the dead and goes interacts. That's his.
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I'm adding to this, so don't theologically challenge me here,
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but it's almost like, hey, you guys are my first fruits.
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You're this thing that I'm going to seed the rest with.
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And Timothy is like that seed. And so there's two metaphors.
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There's one, the natural side of a farmer, right?
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So there needs to be some profit. If you just go and do all this and then there's
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no seed at the end, what value is that?
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You get one season and it's over, but instead there's this crop and this harvest
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and you get to partake of that.
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And so I'm kind of looking at that risk reward and the cost to get to that point.
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And here, Christianity is the largest religion in the world per se,
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referring to as religion, but it's gone the furthest because of that seed.
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And so I think staying on the idea of seeds and the idea of the risk but would
19:56
you be willing to take the risk not knowing if the crop is going to come through
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I mean I have a few other thoughts but I want to hear your commentary on that
20:06
I kind of have something but it's kind of unrelated,
20:08
but I feel like there's a lot there's a lot of symbolism with farming for the
20:15
bible Bible, like everywhere.
20:19
I mean, everywhere, probably every
20:20
book in the Bible has some reference to farming. Don't quote me on that.
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But I feel like one of the big, I mean, I don't know if this is the thing it's
20:30
talking about, but I think it does specifically say the hardworking farmer.
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And I kind of have a genuine question of how hard should you work?
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Because I've seen like, If you've seen the movie Faith Like Potatoes,
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the entire beginning of the movie is him overworking himself into misery as a farmer.
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Then he gets saved and everything turns around.
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He has Faith Like Potatoes. It's a good movie.
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I'm kind of curious what your guys' thoughts are on that. Of how hard is too
21:07
hard to work in this light? How hard is too hard?
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How hard is not enough? know because i mean there is not enough because it says
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if you don't work you shouldn't eat,
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and i mean there is something that you have to do essentially
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but you're kind of curious because i mean
21:26
it's hard because the gospel is not based on works but if we should take inspiration
21:31
of the hard-working farmer then what does hard-working mean i'll i'll even throw
21:36
another wrench into that that just to well just to throw a wrench in it and
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so that hard-working farmer the farmer that toils,
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in the greek it's the same phrase used in in
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in matthew when jesus says why are you worried about clothing or aren't observe
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the lilies of the field they don't toil nor do they spin and yet they're clothed
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so there's this idea of hey why are you guys worried so much the the flowers
22:01
don't work work hard, and they're taken care of.
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So there we go. All right, well, then let's put that into context.
22:09
No, I think this is a great question, because here we are talking about hardworking.
22:15
We just watched a...
22:18
We liked the Rocky series and Sylvester Stallone and I know he's a natural guy
22:24
and did it the world, you know,
22:26
whatever, but there's something that you enjoy about someone who was at nothing
22:32
and broke through and establish something.
22:36
Right. But I thought it was interesting. He goes through his life and everything that he impacted.
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He changed the action hero. He changed, you know, just from a,
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from a movie point of view, He changed everything and he has this character
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that's kind of heroic and it's not only personal,
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like in his personal life, but also in his movie life.
22:58
But then when you come to the end, it was almost like he was starting over.
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Like now he's just going to start over. So kind of the documentary goes,
23:09
he's selling off his house.
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He's getting rid of everything and he's going to go start new.
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You know, he's 77 years old, 76 years old, whatever.
23:20
But it was interesting based on this story. It's almost like he doesn't have
23:24
fruit of, he doesn't have seed for the future.
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He just has this crop that he worked for.
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And it's very interesting. He was hardworking, but there's no seed going forward
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that is established in someone else's.
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And it kind of fits in this, like Paul wasn't doing this just to get his reward.
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Now you get to partake, but you know what the big time of the crop is, is for the future.
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And it's throughout history and how throughout the Bible, it's always about
24:00
and about the offspring.
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I mean, Abraham's greatest treasure he could have was children's children,
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like his children's children that he was always thinking generationally ahead. head.
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Even the founding of this nation, when you had George Washington spending all
24:15
of his own money to fund the constitutional army or the revolutionary army,
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you have many wealthy people that gave up their whole fortunes to win this war.
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And after the war, they had nothing.
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But if you read some of their writings, it was, I want my children's children to have a home.
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And I think we don't have that mindset. So now when we're thinking about work
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and hardworking, and not that I don't admire the success of Sylvester Stallone,
24:48
I still like him, but there's an end to it.
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Someone else is now going to do something different.
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And you might have taught some things, but you'll just be known as a character,
25:00
but what you are doesn't keep, the spirit of what you are doesn't keep going.
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It's something new and it just kind of keeps moving on
25:08
and and he even said it he goes i wasn't
25:12
there for my family so he's now trying now to be the thing that he wanted that
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he ignored during that whole journey so when i think about hard working i think
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we have to switch because Because Paul says, by the grace of God,
25:29
I labor more than you all.
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It is an outflow. It's seeing something beyond.
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It's no longer you becoming. It's what you are, and it becomes the outflow,
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and you're willing to exhaust yourself into that outflow.
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Because you see something in the future. I think that actually answers David's question and yours.
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Yours is about the risk and David's about the hard work.
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I don't think it's about the degree of work that's the problem,
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but it's more of the goal of the degree of work.
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So if I'm killing myself because I want to make a lot of money because that's
26:14
fun and enjoyable and comfortable, that's the wrong way to work hard.
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And that kind of hard work is not beneficial in the grand scheme of things.
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But if I understand my position in the kingdom and my family and the generations
26:32
to come afterwards, then my hard work is in pursuit of that.
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And it is by that grace and through that grace that I work hard.
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Because just as everyone in Hebrews 11 was looking forward to the reward that they didn't receive,
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yet they did all these great things in faith and planted all these seeds that
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they never saw harvest from until our time or the time of Christ.
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That's the mindset I think he's trying to communicate. And I think that answers
27:05
the question of, well, what are you willing to risk?
27:07
Risk or how hard are you willing to work and
27:10
how hard is too hard if your if
27:13
your motive and your goal is is the kingdom
27:16
and the generations to come it's a very different game because someone who just
27:22
kills himself and works so hard to build their empire and then they die at 85
27:27
and leave everything to charity or their kids that they never talked to that's
27:32
a complete failure of a life,
27:34
and all that hard work was for nothing.
27:37
Let me just throw one more thought in that. As you're saying that,
27:39
a lot of things are just kind of popping in my mind is.
27:43
He first tells them endure hardness as a good soldier. So now the mindset is
27:46
I'm going to, I'm, I'm committed to this regardless.
27:49
I'm not going to consider my own life. I'm going to consider the life of the
27:53
one above me and I'm going to live this life.
27:56
And then Paul says, okay, that's the right mindset. Now add to that mindset.
28:00
You're choosing this. There is a prize, but you got to run according to the rules.
28:04
So, so now you have this mindset of, but it's, it is your, you're an individual
28:09
too, in the middle of this.
28:11
It's not, you're just lost in a blob. job. You're an individual too.
28:14
You need to go after this knowing that there's a prize, but compete according
28:19
to the rules and he switches over.
28:21
So you kind of get those two thoughts. So you're living selfless,
28:24
but now you're pursuing something.
28:26
Now we get to the farmer, maybe adds in, don't forget the farmer gets to be
28:31
the first partakers of the fruit because maybe the mindset could shift to,
28:36
I'm just going to farm and I don't care what I get out of it.
28:40
I'm just going to work I don't care what I get out of it. I'm just going to
28:43
work at it, and I don't care what I get out of it. I'm just going to work hard and go.
28:48
And he said, but don't forget to stop and know that you get to be the first part.
28:53
Enjoy the fruit of that, but keep doing that.
28:57
And that kind of ties into something that in Hebrews, it says that he that comes
29:03
to God must believe that he is and that he's a rewarder of those who diligently seek him.
29:09
So just believing that he is, is not enough. There has to be something that pulls us in.
29:15
And so the idea that, man, God rewards this isn't a selfish focus,
29:20
but it's a reminder that there's something to pursue in this too,
29:26
that has a bigger benefit and that he rewards that.
29:31
And I think we get so convoluted in our way of the world of we're either way
29:38
too individualistic or way too we could do whatever we want,
29:41
or the worst is that we're just victims.
29:45
We're victims of everything. We're victims of this. We're victims of that.
29:48
We're victims of this. We're victims of that. So we do nothing.
29:52
And it's almost like Paul has to bring all three mindsets into this picture,
29:57
but they don't stand alone. It's not just the soldier.
30:02
It's not just the athlete. It's not just the hardworking farmer.
30:06
All three mindsets are working into what we are. Maybe to touch on this too,
30:11
just in terms of like farmer.
30:17
There's a time to work and there's a time to enjoy, right?
30:21
During harvest, a farmer has to work. You have to work hard.
30:25
You can't look away, but there comes a time where it's now winter.
30:32
You now have time to enjoy the fruits of what you produced.
30:37
And ultimately, I think like what we're talking about here is if you're working
30:43
just to work, it doesn't matter, right?
30:47
There's supposed to be enjoyment in what you work towards.
30:51
That doesn't mean once you've grabbed or achieved this, right?
30:55
You had a good season of farming, right? You got your first fruits.
31:00
You still have to plan for the next year. So it's not like your race is ever over.
31:06
It's not over until God takes you up, right?
31:09
Paul was still fighting until the day he died. But there was a time where he
31:15
enjoyed what he was producing.
31:18
And so my one pushback might be, we live in a generation who doesn't want to work hard.
31:25
So maybe it's time to work hard and maybe see what's a little too much.
31:31
I know I've experienced both ends. I've experienced, I go to school and just
31:38
kind of let everything pass by and just whatever, not work hard, but still get by.
31:46
And then I've also been in the boats where it's like, okay, I'm not even enjoying
31:50
what I've worked so hard for.
31:53
One immediate things of this, like example, you know, taking a reward is, you know.
32:00
I worked like a dog to pay for a wedding. And then to enjoy that time made it all special.
32:08
That was the first fruits of all the labor that we had put in.
32:12
Me and my wife, we put a lot of time into this. And we did it in different ways.
32:18
She put a lot of time planning into executing all that stuff.
32:22
I put a lot of time into working long hours, being away, picking up an extra
32:27
job, doing all this other stuff. So that we could enjoy this time.
32:32
And now I'm in a season where I'm enjoying that time where we're together.
32:37
But there's also going to be another season where, okay, now we want a house
32:42
that we can call our own, that we can raise a family in.
32:44
Okay, it's time to get ready. It's time to prepare.
32:48
It's time to work. It's time to sacrifice. It's time to put in the hours.
32:51
It's time to do this to then get the reward of the house.
32:55
Right and so i i see this in
32:58
a in a physical sense but you also see this
33:00
in spiritual right with discipleship and
33:04
with planting and with sewing and with all the
33:07
stuff there is reward in that it's not just like part of the thing i really
33:13
struggle with is with christianity sometimes it seems like or even any sort
33:21
of religion when you're when you're looking to the plant a church,
33:25
you can become so focused on the work that you never actually enjoy what you have.
33:31
Me and my wife, we joined a church plant here in Minneapolis.
33:35
And you can labor and labor and labor and invite people.
33:39
But if you never enjoy the three people that are there with you,
33:43
you're going to have nothing.
33:44
Well, think of that even in the context of our farmer. Let's say you work your
33:48
entire year as a farmer to produce this great crop.
33:52
Thanksgiving comes comes around, you have this big feast with your family,
33:55
and the only thing you're doing during that Thanksgiving feast is complaining
33:58
about how hard you worked all year, and thinking about how hard you worked.
34:01
You've completely ruined the whole point of producing the harvest,
34:06
or you've completely lost it, and you're probably ruining it for other people too.
34:11
Let me just throw an idea out there, Tommy, because I know you enough,
34:15
so I'm not really pushing back on you, because I kind of know your thought process,
34:19
but just for the listener.
34:22
So you worked hard to do the wedding and you're going to work hard to get the house.
34:28
What is the goal of that working hard to have a super spectacular wedding?
34:34
Couldn't you just go to a judge and just get married? Like, why did you have to spend all that labor?
34:41
Now, I know there's a good reason for this. I'm looking at kind of being a little
34:45
bit of a pushback from the work side of things.
34:48
Wasn't that just for you to kind of spectate yourself?
34:52
Now you're going to go get a house. What kind of house? What is the purpose of your house?
34:56
So you could live better and not have to rent or your place is too small.
35:01
I find it interesting. You go to the old farms, like the old farms,
35:04
like the original farmers that labored and actually built the fields.
35:08
I'm not talking about the new people that came in and bought up the fields and
35:11
the new money cash flowing in.
35:13
I'm talking about the old farmers. Have you ever seen how big their fields are,
35:16
and they have this little house on the corner.
35:20
The barn is five times bigger than their house.
35:24
All the equipment, the supplies, all of that to run the farm is top-notch,
35:31
and they have this little house.
35:33
The house served a purpose for the farm.
35:38
So me and my wife were just talking talking about this the other day.
35:43
We were just talking about how it is like the upper middle class 40 years ago,
35:50
like in the community, go to an upper middle class community 40 years ago,
35:54
50 years ago, and see the size of houses.
35:58
Then you go buy one of those houses and you're
36:01
upper middle class now and it is like the
36:05
smallest worst little floor plan
36:08
and and ineffective to our
36:10
current world of need it it doesn't
36:14
fit the flow of our tv room it doesn't fit the flow of it served a purpose and
36:20
it was good but they didn't have all the extra things necessary that you need
36:26
need a much bigger house to hold the things that we've accumulated in our current,
36:32
if you're to say this is upper middle class and current upper middle class.
36:36
It's like everything is shifted.
36:38
The dynamics and the needs have shifted.
36:40
And I think that's what kind of makes it challenging when we're looking at setting
36:44
goals is we have to see from the perspective of what God is seeing in that because
36:52
God has no problem with you prospering.
36:55
But do I need a bigger house because it's really on my heart to have a big family
37:00
and this is where God's taking my life or I know God is taking me.
37:05
Let's say you're going on missions or whatever.
37:07
Now, what kind of house do you need to buy? Or.
37:11
How do we pick those things? Because I think that becomes the biggest challenge
37:15
of it just sounds like you're doing the American dream, quote unquote.
37:20
That's just the American dream. You have the big wedding, you go get the big
37:24
house, and then you keep getting a bigger house and then you work harder,
37:27
but you really never paid for the bigger house.
37:29
You're still paying off the bigger house. And now you're in this cycle and now
37:32
you're you're working all these hours.
37:34
Now you're at a job that you really don't like, but you make really good money
37:38
in order order to pay for the life that you just built, but you're miserable at the job that you are.
37:43
And then they ask you to do something that goes against your ethics,
37:46
but you have to go against your ethics because you can't afford to lose that
37:49
job because you've just accumulated all these things.
37:52
I know that's kind of a little off topic where we're at, but it kind of fits into this motivation.
37:58
And I'm going to just tie it back real quick to this Sylvester
38:02
Stallone documentary that we watched his whole
38:05
motive like he was he was hard working
38:08
he lost he almost lost his whole family that's how
38:10
hard working he was like he was hard working morning
38:14
night everyone who knew him one of the hardest workers to
38:17
build everything that he built but at
38:20
the end he didn't have anything because he
38:22
said i have all this but it's so empty like it
38:27
what what did i build but in through
38:30
the little theme through the whole story is his
38:33
dad was extremely abusive and jealous of
38:36
him all growing up so you have this theme of
38:39
his father keep popping in and then at
38:41
the very end they finally make this reconciliation at the end of the the time
38:47
and this there's a question i forgot how they worded it but it's almost like
38:52
you're pursuing to deal because he brought up this movie that impacted him of
38:58
the need to be accepted and loved.
39:01
And it's a scene between an old, it's an old movie, a scene where a king is
39:07
renouncing his son as his son and said, you will get nothing from me and how that impacted him.
39:15
So you see this drive going on in his building.
39:19
And I'm not saying he wouldn't have worked hard, but how many of the drive is
39:23
is subconsciously, if I can get here, then I will have.
39:32
And I'm not talking about status in society. I'm talking about that internal
39:35
question, if I could just get here, if I could just get here.
39:40
And I just kind of picture that with the rich young ruler that comes to Jesus.
39:44
Jesus wasn't telling everyone with money to get rid of it. Otherwise,
39:47
you wouldn't have had the disciple of...
39:52
Joseph of Arimathea, who gave up his tomb, who was rich, that actually had so
39:56
much status, he could go ask the Roman leader to give him the body of Jesus.
40:02
I mean, that's how much status this guy had.
40:04
So it wasn't about money, but this guy had done everything.
40:08
He had done everything right. He worked hard. He fulfilled the law.
40:11
He did everything. And he became very wealthy because according to the law,
40:15
if you do it all, you are going to get blessed.
40:17
So he got that point. And And then he gets to the very end. Jesus says,
40:20
sell all you have, give to the poor. It wasn't saying if you have money,
40:23
sell all you have given poor.
40:24
It's like your motive for why you did all these things.
40:28
I want to take that away because you're missing the point.
40:33
And you see this later in life with some of these quote unquote successful people.
40:37
So now let's go back to this hardworking farmer.
40:40
We get to partake. We're running a race to win a prize. We are enduring hardness
40:46
as a good soldier and we're becoming a good soldier. We're giving ourselves to these things.
40:52
But the key thing that Paul tells Timothy is be strong in the grace that has been given to you,
41:00
which means your identity and your position has to be strong first before any
41:06
of these three examples can truly bear the witness of your life.
41:13
What are your thoughts? That was kind of a deep thought, but.
41:16
So just to address your two questions that you started with,
41:20
the purpose of the wedding, purpose of the house, to give some context to people,
41:26
those who don't know me, it's not just to live the American dream,
41:31
have a nice big wedding, get a house you can't afford,
41:34
to stay in a job you can't stand to get up in the morning, but you have to just to get divorced, right?
41:42
The purpose for our wedding, and you would be surprised, we actually did it on a budget.
41:50
We counted the cost before we went to build, right?
41:54
So we took this concept, and what we did is we invited a lot of friends and
42:00
family that might not come from our faith background.
42:05
And we wanted that to be a moment of celebration, not only for me and my wife's
42:10
relationship, but also a moment for them to remember what true love in God looks like.
42:19
And I don't know, maybe the people at the wedding can judge how we did.
42:23
I know we had a lot of conversations with people. So I know it accomplished our purpose.
42:29
And now our purpose is still being fulfilled with our marriage and living that out.
42:33
Now, looking at the house.
42:36
We weren't ever thinking about doing a house this soon.
42:40
We're now at a point where we want to move forward into a house with the purpose
42:46
of our church plant. They're doing home churches.
42:49
We want a space where we can give and provide to our church.
42:55
And so our house search is probably much different from maybe people in our position in our age.
43:02
We're looking for something very specific. and we're
43:06
not going to give up on that specific search
43:10
and it's not a search for just like we
43:13
want a hot tub or oh we want this room we want
43:17
a nice big master suite we want a nice big bathroom it's like no we want a space
43:22
where we can use for ministry and so ultimately i would say the hard worker
43:28
farmer what is he toiling for the the first fruits but it's for his purpose
43:34
what you What is the purpose of a farmer?
43:36
The purpose of a farmer is to feed the world.
43:40
Is that not the first reason?
43:44
Especially in this context, back in those times, it was less of a money-making
43:50
industry and more of a, hey, we have to do this to survive.
43:53
And I would say even today, and maybe not every farmer agrees with me,
43:59
you don't get into farming to make money.
44:02
Not while you get into farming. There's something beyond that that pushes you to get in.
44:08
And I think that has a lot to do with like what you're talking about,
44:11
Brian, about leaving something for generations and generations to come.
44:15
A farm is a very like real representation of that, right?
44:20
Like working the land, training your son how to take over that land and giving
44:24
that land to them, right?
44:25
It's not like you're cashing out on a big exit, right?
44:29
And there are farmers who do that, right? But very much back,
44:34
look into the context of when this was written, that purpose is to feed your
44:41
community, but also to have enough to replant the next year.
44:47
And so there's something far beyond just the fruit of what you get.
44:52
It's truly your purpose. And why are you doing this? What makes a hardworking
44:58
farmer get up every morning is he's got his purpose to do this.
45:02
If he doesn't do this, people don't get fed.
45:06
How are you getting up in the morning knowing that's your reality?
45:11
Now take that into the context of Timothy. How is Timothy getting up in the morning?
45:16
Is he going to rest on the laurels and let what Paul did happen?
45:23
Is he just going to ride that out? Or is he going to get up and work and toil
45:28
too, but also get the reward?
45:31
That's a great point. We can also add into it. If you look at the farm that
45:34
Timothy was given, which was people's hearts that came from Paul.
45:39
So you have two things motivating you not only to feed the world or to feed
45:44
that community or feed, provide something for that community,
45:48
but it's also the legacy you've been given.
45:51
So you have the weight of the legacy of your father,
45:55
passing down the farm so you don't want
45:58
to let the farm fail because it will wreck the family lineage
46:02
it will it'll it'll mar the family lineage because i think you're right you
46:07
don't have new farmers just going in like someone goes to school and say i think
46:11
i want to be a farmer and goes and buys a thousand acres you have history there
46:17
now that's different when you have this huge,
46:19
global conglomerate that buys up land and but in a way they they've not i don't
46:25
necessarily like it but they produced a manufacturing way to do that so in a
46:29
sense they built a different kind of farm,
46:32
they built a business type of farm that's being done but like the family pass on farm.
46:38
That's hard work because your family passed it on
46:41
and so there's something about your legacy legacy that's
46:44
going to so the hard-working farmer has two different
46:47
it's almost like two motivations in that and sometimes
46:51
you do hit it big but most of the time you're in stress over whether all the
46:55
elements are going to come together for that thing to come to play out like
46:59
you like i guess to kind of wrap up and give my final thought here i just want
47:06
to once again emphasize emphasize emphasize,
47:09
the farmer, what they're doing is they're taking a risk.
47:13
They're taking a risk, though, on their purpose, which I think ultimately is
47:17
going to produce something good, right?
47:21
You may have setbacks, you may have trials, you may have things you have to overcome.
47:24
But if you're really pursuing your purpose and taking a step,
47:29
taking a risk into your purpose, there's going to be a a fruit that comes from that.
47:34
And that fruit ultimately is your reward.
47:37
And I think of like, just on like a little level, like taking one step into
47:43
your calling, you get to own the rewards, the outcome that come from it.
47:49
And the position and the identity you get when you start walking out that purpose,
47:55
it's almost like it's something that feeds you that you just,
47:59
you hunger for again and again and again.
48:02
I think of like the first time for my work, you know, getting the sales,
48:07
that first sale and that first time where I fully walked someone through the
48:12
process by myself, I now began to own that process.
48:16
And it, and it, it began in me, like I wasn't up to someone else to begin to walk this out.
48:23
And I think that's something that's really sticking out to me here is that.
48:29
Find that purpose, take the risk, walk it out, but also find a father in that arena.
48:37
Find someone who can help you walk through that, whether that be a mentor or
48:42
whether that just be a connection with you and God.
48:44
And I think ultimately it'll come down to both.
48:47
I'm going to throw out, since we're kind of closing out the series with Timothy and Paul,
48:53
is we're kind of talking about eating
48:56
of the first fruits the partaking the reward
48:59
maybe a different level of authority that
49:02
happens with a soldier and you understand that and
49:06
the maybe there's privilege that comes with that i
49:09
think sometimes when even like when i brought up the the scripture
49:12
in hebrews that there's a reward
49:15
it's not a selfish pursuit
49:19
revelation chapter 4 10 and 11
49:22
the 24 elders fall down
49:25
before him who sits on the throne and worship him who lives
49:28
forever and ever and they cast their crowns
49:32
before the throne saying you are worthy oh
49:35
lord to receive glory honor and power for you created all
49:38
things and by your will they exist and were created in other words there is
49:44
rewards for what we do there is crowns but when you the heart is right Look
49:51
at the heart of what the elders who earned those crowns did with it.
49:56
They honored the one who gave them the power to get the crown.
50:01
That, to me, is the ultimate heart of reward.
50:06
So just a thought with that when we're
50:09
looking through these things and be encouraged to
50:12
pursue to work hard to do those things by being strong
50:15
in the grace the position you've been given you
50:18
don't have to earn any this ain't earning it's creating such
50:21
a value from what has been given to you you
50:24
can't help but to want to exhaust yourself in that
50:27
pursuit as paul did like this
50:30
this episode i'm more here to learn because i don't
50:33
have a job yet so but you could
50:37
be a great farmer someday thank you appreciate it
50:41
well we're gonna wrap it up with that if you guys are this is the first episode
50:46
you've tuned into for a while go back and listen to the two before this one
50:50
where we give a lot of context and again we go into our more depth in-depth
50:55
dives on the the soldier and the athlete i just want to leave you guys with
50:58
this last thing which is what paul,
51:01
writes in second timothy here after he's talking about these three people he
51:04
says understand what i say for the lord will give you insight in everything
51:08
and so that's one thing i hope we all take away from this is as we're trying
51:13
to sort through all these things and all these dynamics,
51:17
your father will give you an insight keep your ears open stay in contact with
51:22
him he's with you he will give you insight into everything that you need and
51:26
everywhere going to go and brian's to say one more thing there and be willing
51:29
to take the risk with it and not just accept it.
51:35
Absolutely amen to that well as always we appreciate you guys tuning in stick
51:41
around with us a lot more good to come and again in the next episode we'll hopefully
51:44
get caleb back in here so he can defend himself and attack me for all the terrible
51:50
things i've said about him today,
51:51
so until next time keep the faith stay in the fight.