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The Bible Passage Skeptics Use Against Christianity · Relish: a Christian podcast

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  Think those marriages will likely stick longer because they have more glue.
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  Go up, you bald head. Go up, you bald head. Well, that's really weird.
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  And he turned around, looked at them, and called down a curse.
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  He's forgiven us for things that we could never atone for,
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  and made it right between us and God.
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  Relish pleasing or zestful flavor a quantity just sufficient to flavor to be
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  pleased or gratified by enjoy we are hoping that what we bring to your table
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  today might add some spice to your life.
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  Welcome back to another episode of relish this is don patterson i am rowan miller,
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  don how are you doing today present accounted for he's here i counted for i
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  think i'm counted for you.
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  Yeah, I think so. I've got a question for you. All righty.
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  How have you seen God answer prayer?
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  Yeah. I mean, definitely with, I've said this before, but with college decision
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  and even most recently, like preaching,
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  I was kind of stressed out about it during the week a little bit because I was just like, man,
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  I already had the sermon written because it was for a class.
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  But then i was like man what am i gonna like how am i gonna practice this like
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  how's this gonna work and,
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  i just i was at peace like saturday sunday so that's cool especially since it
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  was your first time yeah that's good yeah i wasn't too nervous at all i mean
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  definitely a little but right yeah,
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  we are i'm still nervous when i go preach yeah i think that's uh that keeps our edge Mm-hmm.
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  Right. Somebody told me it was after I preached. After you preached.
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  Well, if you weren't nervous and you didn't care or something like that.
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  It didn't matter much. Yeah. That's true.
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  That's true. Those things that we invest in that matter quite a bit,
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  we will have some anxiety about making sure it happens the way we want it to.
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  Yeah. Yeah, that's true.
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  All righty well we got kind of a long question here about marriage with some
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  some stats in here oh okay so,
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  nowadays men women at men marry at 30 and women marry at 28 on average or in
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  the 1900s it used to be at 22 and 20,
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  and now they say roughly 40 percent of people will get divorced in their life and then,
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  Um, families now average under two children while they used to average over three.
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  So why, I mean, this, this might not be so much of a Bible question,
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  but why did these numbers, why are they changing?
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  And then if you could like walk us through what the Bible tells us about marriage
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  and what purpose of marriage is and how we can kind of change and become more like that.
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  And I think some of our Christian families are living into those stats a little
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  differently, because I know several families who are Christian specifically,
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  and are making sure that they have not only two kids to replace them,
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  but also understanding that our Christian population maybe should be growing.
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  And so, that's evangelism in the bedroom.
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  That's what we used to call it, you know? But the reality is,
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  so those figures are right on. I mean, that is what I see.
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  And part of it is, well, I have a men's Bible study and they're saying,
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  well, we just can't find good Christian girls.
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  And so, do you know any, Don, you know, Christian girls?
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  And so part of that is saying, the guys are saying, I'm not just not going to marry just anybody.
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  Right. And I'm going to take my time in this decision and find the right one.
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  And we'll, uh, because the intention is to live our entire lives together.
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  Um, and that's great. We can approach it that way. That's a good way to approach
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  it. But that also means that that date of getting married might go into the
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  thirties and early thirties because we can't find that person.
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  Um, and I think, uh,
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  The belief that I've always had is there's a right person, and sometimes it
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  takes a while to find that right person.
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  There's not just a select, oh, all six of these would be good candidates,
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  and I don't think we want to go there.
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  There's also intensity in that process that I hope will start driving that 42% down.
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  So that there are fewer divorces among Christians because they're taking that seriously.
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  The biblical example would go back to Genesis and one man for one woman and,
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  uniquely created to be there.
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  And yes, I think it's 1.27, Genesis 1.27, we're to multiply, you know.
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  Oh, no, 27 is made man in our image. And then you go down in Genesis and it's to multiply.
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  And, uh, I was reading an article the other day that said that,
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  uh, Adam and Eve had 53 children.
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  Really? I thought, where did you get that from? Goodness. Well,
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  it came out of the book, out of the, uh, the book of Enoch, I think.
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  And so it, uh, yeah. Yeah.
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  He blessed them, be fruitful and increase, verse 28. Fill the earth,
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  subdue it, rule over fish and sea, birds of the air.
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  And so it's sort of giving an indication that this being created man and woman was to be fruitful.
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  And I really think that what happened was It was normed to have many children
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  Because you knew that you had to have at least four,
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  To make sure that two would live to adulthood I mean, the infant mortality rate
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  was such At the turn of the 18th,
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  19th century.
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  Let's see Yeah. It's off line. Right, it is.
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  So, but about 1900, the mentality was you still needed to have four kids because
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  the infant mortality rate was high enough that maybe half of them would live to adulthood.
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  And, uh...
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  When we came into the Great Depression, that really made it hard for households,
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  especially in the city, to make sure that they could raise that many kids.
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  In fact, there were orphan trains because of the 1920 Spanish flu killed parents,
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  and then children might live.
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  They were orphaned in orphanages and then set out on a train to find other places
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  to live because that wasn't.
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  So the idea of let's have just as many kids as we know we can get to adulthood that we can afford.
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  And that is sort of why we went back down to two kids or 1.38 kids.
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  I don't know how you get that. But, yeah.
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  So that mindset in the church then, I think, is going through a transition that
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  we need to take marriage more seriously than we used to.
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  Maybe even have premarital counseling in the dating stage.
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  I've done a couple of those where a couple started dating and decided,
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  well, maybe we need to talk to somebody to talk this through to see if this
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  is the right person, even before they were engaged.
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  And those have been interesting counseling sessions And some of them have stuck really well.
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  Taking the marriage seriously It's not just about sex Not just about finding
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  the right one It's about living into a mission together Instead of just,
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  oh, I found the right one now,
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  Yeah. It's living into a mission together. And I'm finding that more in Christian
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  circles than I did earlier.
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  And I think that's positive. Yeah. Then I think those marriages will likely
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  stick longer because they have more glue.
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  They not only have the glue of, oh, I like, I like, I like her. I really like her.
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  It also has the glue of spiritual relationships. So we believe the same things,
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  and spiritually we pray the same.
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  We spend time with the Lord together.
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  And then beyond that, the mission that we've adopted as a couple,
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  it drives us forward as a couple and we engage it together.
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  That's good sticky stuff to keep a relationship together.
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  Then you might want to have more kids. Did I get the whole question? I believe so.
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  Oh, why? I just am really encouraged by some of our Christian families living
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  into their vision and mission together. Yeah.
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  All right. This strange Old Testament passage here. Oh, strange Old Testament. Yeah. Okay.
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  2 Kings 2. I don't know if it's 1 Kings.
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  It's when, let's see, who was it?
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  Like the Lord it was Elijah and
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  Elisha and Elijah just left and Elisha was going out of their where was it,
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  Uh, wherever he was, he was going out to Bethel or something and some kids were
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  calling him a baldy or something.
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  Oh, just after Elijah has gone up into heaven with the chariots of fire,
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  she's succeeding him. Yes.
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  He sends a bunch of kids call him a baldy so then he sends some the Lord sends
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  two female bears out of the woods
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  and mauled 42 of the children and then Elisha goes on his business too.
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  Yes so here it is 2nd Kings chapter 2 and it's verse 23 to 25 and yes why does this happen Yeah.
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  Well, like, it just seems a little strange, but. It does seem a little strange.
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  I agree a hundred percent.
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  And I'm not sure there's any theologian can actually put it into context other,
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  than here's a prophet, young prophet.
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  And all of a sudden he's been given a double portion of Elijah's power.
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  Yeah. He's received the mantle and maybe, you know, uh, have you ever watched Superman?
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  Uh, and right after he, he's a vistas visits his father, Jarrell or whatever that is anyway, he's,
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  all of a sudden is given this ability to fly, but he doesn't know how to do it yet.
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  He's working into it a little bit. And so he's calling out and turned around
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  and looked at them and called down a curse on them in the name of the Lord.
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  And I think maybe he didn't know how effective that curse was going to be.
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  And so I have to put it maybe as the young prophet didn't know his power yet.
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  And he's sort of, yeah. And interesting that he was already bald at that, whatever age.
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  I mean, we know he was younger than Elijah, but Elisha was already bald.
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  And here these kids come out. I don't know whether he was funny looking,
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  you know, maybe he was funny looking and bald or maybe he walks strange, but go up, you bald head.
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  Go up, you bald head. Well, that's really weird.
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  And he turned around, looked at them, and called down a curse on them in the
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  name of the Lord. Then two bears came out in the woods and mauled 42 youth.
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  Doesn't say killed them, but definitely gave them a beaten up,
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  if they remember. The bottom says the Hebrew word for mauled means to tear to pieces.
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  Oh. So I think they may be killed. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. They may be killed.
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  It might have been a lesson for Elisha.
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  Oh dear, I've got to watch what I say now that I'm in this position. Watch what I say.
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  It's definitely overreaction on Elisha's part.
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  Uh, which means, oh, Elisha wasn't perfect either.
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  Yeah. I mean, how many of us have said something like that where we're just
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  like, man, I wish they would, whatever, whatever, I would, whatever.
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  And not realizing that something could really happen.
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  Yes, for sure. So, um, that's the way I read it.
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  I haven't gone to a lot of commentators on it. definitely have not preached
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  this passage yeah and I have no notes in here that I preached this passage this
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  dream but it seems like it has to do with the fact that oh this is a inexperienced prophet,
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  that's got this power that he's just now beginning to understand how to wield it,
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  that's my interpretation yeah so hopefully well we know he got that sort of
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  under control as time went on yeah Yeah.
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  Because he used it. Actually, we have a lot more miracles recorded from Elisha's
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  work than we do Elijah's.
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  I mean, Elijah's prophet, the prophet Elijah is the one that is referred to
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  into the New Testament, John the Baptist.
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  And yet we don't have a lot of recorded work of Elijah compared to Elisha.
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  And we've got a lot, a lot more, especially in second Kings.
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  Of the work that Elisha did. Yeah.
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  That double portion is probably why.
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  I think that's exactly, yeah. Yeah, that's true.
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  Yeah, good question. Provocative question. Provocative question.
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  I'm going to think about that through lunch hour.
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  How do we atone for our sins? Yeah.
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  Well, as Christians, we don't.
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  We accept the atonement that has come to us through Jesus Christ.
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  And maybe it would be better if we did atone for our sins.
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  Because, okay, so if you've done something wrong and you have to pay the price
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  for it, it leaves a definite impression that you carry on.
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  And what was common in the Hebrew culture was you did two to four times.
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  So if you,
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  took an item, stole an item, you would pay for it four times over.
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  Okay. So that you'd remember, you're not going to go out and steal because it
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  costs so much to steal. It costs way more to steal than to just go up and buy it the first time.
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  And so, with that, you were atoning for it by what you paid back.
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  We can't pay the price of our sin.
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  We can't atone for that. Jesus did.
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  I think...
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  And the bottom line of it is to make it right again, make us one again.
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  And Christ did that for us between he and God for us.
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  I think atonement might be something we need to do between each other to make
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  sure that relationships stay in harmony.
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  But we're even having a hard time doing forgiveness in the modern church, right?
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  And so to think of forgiveness and then needing to do atonement,
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  probably isn't on our radar right now. So atonement would be that part where we make it right again.
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  If I've done something wrong, I make sure that you know that I'm sorry,
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  but I also make it right with you.
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  And we probably need to do some more atonement in the church.
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  I'm not sure who we'd use as judge and jury to say, well, this is what you need
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  to do, and this is how we prescribe it.
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  It would seem like, okay, here's, I'm going on a rabbit trail.
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  All right. It would seem like people who have received forgiveness,
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  from Christ and know all that he's forgiven us for would be the first to make
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  sure that we don't need to make things right between each other.
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  We would make sure we did it right the first time.
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  But in reality, we're still human. We're still going to step on each other's feet. How do we...
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  As Christians, better walk with each other,
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  like our relationship with Jesus.
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  He's forgiven us for things that we could never atone for,
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  and made it right between us and God. We're at one.
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  Why can't we do that with each other better,
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  it seems like with that model in the back of our head we should be able to do it better,
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  yeah but it doesn't happen,
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  and I you know I could say okay Satan's in the middle of it it could be Satan's
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  in the middle of it and causing all the grief that we're bearing that could well be,
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  Maybe that's too easy. I was going to say, that's pretty easy,
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  letting us off because we've given Satan credit.
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  I don't know. He needs any credit.
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  He takes it off already. Yeah. So, yeah.
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  Good concept, good thing to be thinking about. We've been atoned for by Christ's blood.
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  How do we live that out today among us?
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  Being forgiven so much, can we ever forgive that much?
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  Yeah. Very good. I don't know that we've been asked even close to forgive like Christ did. Yeah.
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  Yeah, that's a good question. That's going to have me thinking through the lunch hour.
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  Some good questions in that episode, huh? There is. Yeah. Yes.
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  You know what Don will be doing during his lunch hour.
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  I think maybe you've been with your brother too much.
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  Oh, man. Good questions. Good questions. Well, I hope you guys enjoyed. I know I did.
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  I like some of those Old Testament ones. That was interesting stories or things
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  that happened. Definitely. And that's one of them.
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  All the bald guys in the church know that passage. Every bald guy in the church knows that passage.
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  I'll never call anyone bald one.
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  All righty. Thank you guys for joining us. We'll see you next time. Lord willing.
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  Thank you for joining us for this podcast. Feel free to become part of this
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  ministry by sharing with others.
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  Our goal is to help each other grow deeper in our understanding of who God is
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  and is calling to us in our daily lives.
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  Thank you again for joining us and may God bless your day.