Latest / Deep-Grace Diving with Tim Wright and Terey Summers / Episode #6: Apples, Lambs, and Sin

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Episode #6: Apples, Lambs, and Sin · Deep-Grace Diving with Tim Wright and Terey Summers

• 0:11
  Bye.
• 0:12
  Bye.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: Hey everyone,
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_00: Tim Wright here,
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_00: along with Terry Summers,
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: in another episode of the Deep Grace Diving Podcast with Tim Wright and Terry Summers.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: And we are talking about Christianity,
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_00: we're talking about faith,
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  SPEAKER_00: we're talking about the Bible,
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  SPEAKER_00: we're talking about God's view of us and how God works in our lives,
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: all through the lens of grace.
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  SPEAKER_00: And hopefully we're providing for you a different perspective perhaps than maybe you often hear
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: perspective of a God who loves you and cares passionately about you,
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_00: no matter who you are,
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  SPEAKER_00: no matter what you've done,
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  SPEAKER_00: which brings us to our topic for today.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_00: Terry, this is a question that you asked me about was what about sin?
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_00: And so first of all, I want to ask Terry, why you're so fascinated with sin?
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I've heard about it all my life.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
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  SPEAKER_00: You've heard other people do it.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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  SPEAKER_01: Of course, I'm sure, you know, it doesn't apply to me, but I have just been intrigued hearing it.
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  SPEAKER_01: Actually,
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  SPEAKER_01: you know,
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  SPEAKER_01: sin feels divisive,
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  SPEAKER_01: and maybe because,
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  SPEAKER_01: in fact,
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  SPEAKER_01: it is dividing just by its nature,
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  SPEAKER_01: but...
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  SPEAKER_01: I know,
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  SPEAKER_01: and much of my questioning of you and the source of our exchanges on my end
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  SPEAKER_01: happened to be driven by my upbringing in church.
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  SPEAKER_01: And as we've discussed in other episodes.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_01: So sin, sinner, I'm just wondering...
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  SPEAKER_01: and an explanation on how that falls in a grace conversation.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_01: Because I know grace covers us.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_01: But what really is sin, Tim?
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_01: Like, how would you break it down?
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  SPEAKER_00: So before we do that,
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  SPEAKER_00: I'm going to ask you,
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  SPEAKER_00: growing up,
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  SPEAKER_00: based on what you were taught,
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  SPEAKER_00: give us two or three sentences of what you were taught sin is.
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  SPEAKER_01: Sin is...
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  SPEAKER_01: The wrong that myself as a human brings to life and that it separates me from God
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  SPEAKER_01: and that there is a need to be forgiven.
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  SPEAKER_01: For it.
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  SPEAKER_01: That it creates.
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  SPEAKER_01: A cavernous gap.
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  SPEAKER_01: Between me and God.
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  SPEAKER_01: The ideas of bridging.
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  SPEAKER_01: From my sinful person.
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  SPEAKER_01: To God.
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  SPEAKER_01: Came by the way of Jesus.
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  SPEAKER_01: Made that bridge.
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  SPEAKER_01: Sin is bad.
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  SPEAKER_01: I read someone.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_01: Breaking it down.
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  SPEAKER_01: Not sin specifically.
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  SPEAKER_01: But in a book.
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  SPEAKER_01: It called it.
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  SPEAKER_01: the bad part of us or the bad that we think of in terms of us as human beings.
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  SPEAKER_01: We're sinful by nature.
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  SPEAKER_01: Those kinds of phrases that I heard growing up and I'm not challenging any of that.
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  SPEAKER_01: I just, all of these discussions for a gal that was reared years and years ago and
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  SPEAKER_01: as a little thing in and up into my teenage years, initially in a Southern Baptist denomination.
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  SPEAKER_01: And then it,
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  SPEAKER_01: it transitioned into American Baptist,
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  SPEAKER_01: which was quite different still,
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  SPEAKER_01: but still this is what I,
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  SPEAKER_01: these things are what I have looked at and struggled at in the light of grace.
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  SPEAKER_01: Like I'm trying to see how they illuminate the, how they are illuminated by grace.
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  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah,
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  SPEAKER_00: I think in some ways I was raised with similar understanding that grace,
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  SPEAKER_00: to put it somewhat simply,
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  SPEAKER_00: is behavior oriented.
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  SPEAKER_00: It's the things that I do that are wrong,
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  SPEAKER_00: outside of God's will,
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  SPEAKER_00: harmful to me,
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  SPEAKER_00: harmful to others,
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  SPEAKER_00: breaks God's heart.
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  SPEAKER_00: And
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  SPEAKER_00: The problem with sin,
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  SPEAKER_00: of course,
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  SPEAKER_00: is everybody has a different list of sins on their bucket list of things that
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  SPEAKER_00: people should and shouldn't do.
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  SPEAKER_00: When I was growing up,
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  SPEAKER_00: I grew up in an environment where dancing was a sin because dancing was a vertical
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  SPEAKER_00: expression of a horizontal idea.
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  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I've heard it.
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  SPEAKER_00: Yep, yep.
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  SPEAKER_00: So we couldn't dance, couldn't play cards.
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  SPEAKER_00: I was raised...
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  SPEAKER_00: pretty much in a teetotal family.
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  SPEAKER_00: And then when I went over to my grandma's family's house,
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  SPEAKER_00: they were drinking beer and I thought,
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  SPEAKER_00: and they call themselves Christians.
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  SPEAKER_00: How is that even possible?
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  SPEAKER_00: Yes, we have a similar perspective.
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  SPEAKER_00: And we had a new pastor at our church, our Lutheran church when I was a kid.
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  SPEAKER_00: And he and my dad were out smoking one day and I just thought,
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  SPEAKER_00: pastor who smokes are you kidding me this isn't even possible right right so we
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  SPEAKER_00: have all of these lists of what sin is because we define sin as behavior and then
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  SPEAKER_00: the the thing we get caught up in if sin is about behavior uh we start getting
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  SPEAKER_00: caught up in sin management
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  SPEAKER_00: trying to live our lives, not to sin.
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  SPEAKER_00: And if I, now this I'll speak just for me.
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  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
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  SPEAKER_00: And I still have some of these old tapes play in my mind.
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  SPEAKER_00: If I do something that,
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  SPEAKER_00: I think is a sin or somebody might call a sin or something that I just don't want to do in my life.
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  SPEAKER_00: I don't want to be a part of my life.
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  SPEAKER_00: Then I sort of barter with God and I say, now, if I don't do this thing for a week, can we be good again?
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  SPEAKER_00: And so there's this pressure to change my behavior.
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  SPEAKER_00: so that God will love me and accept me,
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  SPEAKER_00: is based,
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  SPEAKER_00: I think,
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  SPEAKER_00: a lot in,
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  SPEAKER_00: first of all,
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  SPEAKER_00: a behavior-oriented view of sin,
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  SPEAKER_00: and then a repentance-oriented view of salvation.
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  SPEAKER_00: By that, I mean we have to repent before God can forgive us.
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  SPEAKER_00: And we know the word repentance means to turn and go the other way.
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  SPEAKER_00: And until I turn away from that behavior toward God, I can't be forgiven.
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  SPEAKER_00: And it gets us into all kinds of trouble.
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  SPEAKER_00: Because now we're managing sin,
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  SPEAKER_00: we're trying to earn our way back into God's good graces,
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  SPEAKER_00: and we just live in this constant guilt.
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  SPEAKER_00: And I think we talked about this in one of the other podcasts,
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  SPEAKER_00: these folks who feel like they have to go forward at the altar call every week
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  SPEAKER_00: because they're never really sure.
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  SPEAKER_00: Right.
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  SPEAKER_00: So let's look at, if we dare, let's look at some images the Bible gives us for sin.
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  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
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  SPEAKER_00: And we're going to start controversially right from the very beginning.
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  SPEAKER_00: We're going to go to Genesis chapter 3.
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  SPEAKER_00: Why do you say controversially?
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  SPEAKER_00: You'll understand here in a moment.
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  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
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  SPEAKER_00: Genesis chapter 3 is the story of Adam and Eve eating, we say apple.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_00: It just says fruit.
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  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
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  SPEAKER_00: Here's controversial.
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  SPEAKER_00: I'd like to suggest that this is not a historic story.
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  SPEAKER_00: Got it.
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  SPEAKER_00: That this is something that happened in time and what we have is a newspaper
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  SPEAKER_00: account of two people talking to a talking snake.
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  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
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  SPEAKER_00: I'd like to suggest...
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  SPEAKER_00: that a better way to understand this story is the way the ancients would have
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  SPEAKER_00: understood this story,
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  SPEAKER_00: not as a true story,
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  SPEAKER_00: but as a truth story.
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  SPEAKER_00: A story that conveys meaning and truth.
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  SPEAKER_00: So think of it like Jesus with his parables.
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  SPEAKER_00: Jesus would tell parables.
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  SPEAKER_00: They weren't necessarily historic true stories.
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  SPEAKER_00: They were truth stories, stories meant to convey truths that help us understand the meaning of life.
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  SPEAKER_00: So that's the perspective I'm going to go with.
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  SPEAKER_00: And in some podcasts coming up,
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  SPEAKER_00: we'll look specifically at how to understand Genesis,
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  SPEAKER_00: how to understand the Bible in ways that are far more true to the Bible perspective.
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  SPEAKER_00: than maybe are the way we often interpret today.
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  SPEAKER_00: So let's imagine,
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  SPEAKER_00: for example,
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  SPEAKER_00: that you've got your tribe sitting around the campfire and you've been telling
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  SPEAKER_00: stories about this God who creates the heavens and the earth and creates human beings,
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  SPEAKER_00: creates human beings in God's image,
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  SPEAKER_00: male and female,
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  SPEAKER_00: created equally.
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  SPEAKER_00: And then you,
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  SPEAKER_00: Terry,
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  SPEAKER_00: because you're inquisitive,
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  SPEAKER_00: you raise your hand and say,
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  SPEAKER_00: well,
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  SPEAKER_00: if all that's true,
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  SPEAKER_00: what the heck went wrong?
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  SPEAKER_00: Why do we seem so broken?
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  SPEAKER_00: Why is life so hard?
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  SPEAKER_00: Why do we hurt others?
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  SPEAKER_00: Why is it sometimes God seems so distant?
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  SPEAKER_00: What went wrong?
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  SPEAKER_00: And so the storyteller in your village tells a story to give some meaning and perspective.
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  SPEAKER_00: Let's say tells a parable.
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  SPEAKER_00: And in this particular parable, there is a garden.
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  SPEAKER_00: And in this garden, the Creator has provided everything that these two people could possibly need.
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  SPEAKER_00: They have access to every single tree in the garden except for one.
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  SPEAKER_00: And God says, this tree belongs to me.
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  SPEAKER_00: Because there's just stuff that belongs to God and there's stuff that belongs to humans.
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  SPEAKER_00: And as long as we are really clear about
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  SPEAKER_00: that I'm God and you're not,
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  SPEAKER_00: but I want to live in relationship with you and treat you as my children,
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  SPEAKER_00: then we're going to be good.
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  SPEAKER_00: So one day a snake comes along and this snake happens to talk and says to Eve,
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  SPEAKER_00: boy,
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  SPEAKER_00: is it really true that God told you you can't eat from any trees,
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  SPEAKER_00: fruit of any trees?
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  SPEAKER_00: Now, already we know that's a lie because that's not what God said.
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  SPEAKER_00: Right.
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  SPEAKER_00: So Eve says,
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  SPEAKER_00: sort of understands and she says no he didn't quite say that he said we can eat
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  SPEAKER_00: from any tree except this one here and we shouldn't even touch this fruit or we'll
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  SPEAKER_00: die well god didn't say that either didn't say anything about touching so already
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  SPEAKER_00: eve's a bit confused okay her understanding of god is being challenged got it she's
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_00: a bit confused okay
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  SPEAKER_00: So as she is looking at this fruit and the serpent says, you know, if you eat this, you can be like God.
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  SPEAKER_00: Because what God's doing is God's holding something back from you.
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  SPEAKER_00: God is holding back from you the wisdom and knowledge of the gods.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_00: You can be like God.
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  SPEAKER_00: So she's looking at this and her ideas of God are being challenged.
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  SPEAKER_00: This parent who cares for her now suddenly is holding something back from her.
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  SPEAKER_00: This fruit looks so good.
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  SPEAKER_00: It's the greenest, ripest Granny Smith apple she's ever seen in her life.
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  SPEAKER_00: And she takes it and she takes a bite.
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  SPEAKER_00: And then she hands it over to Adam and he takes a bite.
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  SPEAKER_00: Now we call that story the fall.
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  SPEAKER_00: Theologically, that's when humanity fell.
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  SPEAKER_00: Got it.
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  SPEAKER_00: I think a better way of saying it, that this is a parable to sort of illustrate what sin is.
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  SPEAKER_00: And while you could get wrapped up in the behavior of what Adam and Eve did,
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  SPEAKER_00: the essence of the story is that Adam and Eve lost their way.
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  SPEAKER_00: They were living in relationship with God, and then they wandered away from God.
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  SPEAKER_00: In this case,
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  SPEAKER_00: because they wanted to be like God,
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  SPEAKER_00: they wanted to take for themselves what didn't belong to them,
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  SPEAKER_00: but they were lost.
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  SPEAKER_00: And that's in a sense what it meant that they would die, that they would lose their way.
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  SPEAKER_00: And so, yeah, let me just say they took a bite into lostness.
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  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
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  SPEAKER_00: And that the essence of sin is not first and foremost behavior.
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  SPEAKER_00: It's being lost.
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  SPEAKER_00: It's a wayness.
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  SPEAKER_00: It's having wandered away from God.
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  SPEAKER_00: And I'll give you another couple examples of that in a moment.
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  SPEAKER_00: But go ahead.
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  SPEAKER_01: No.
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  SPEAKER_01: So were they prone?
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  SPEAKER_01: And I've just seen that term used in a poetic way.
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  SPEAKER_01: But were they, in this story, were they prone to wander?
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  SPEAKER_01: Or was it the exchange with the snake that...
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_00: planted an idea that's a really good question are they prone to wander so let's
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  SPEAKER_00: look at a second story okay uh in isaiah when the bible is when the prophets talk
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  SPEAKER_00: about sin the bible says all we like sheep have gone astray we have turned everyone
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  SPEAKER_00: to his or her own way okay
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  SPEAKER_00: So it's really another metaphor for what we heard in the apple story.
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  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
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  SPEAKER_00: About us wandering away.
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  SPEAKER_00: And here's the interesting thing about sheep.
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  SPEAKER_00: Sheep have this tendency to nibble their way to lostness.
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  SPEAKER_00: Because they keep their heads down.
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  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
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  SPEAKER_00: And they just nibble wherever the grass takes them.
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  SPEAKER_00: Interesting.
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
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  SPEAKER_00: And so the shepherd has to call them back.
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  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_00: I'm with you.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_00: The shepherd has to keep their eye on them all the time.
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  SPEAKER_00: Or they will nibble their way to lostness.
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  SPEAKER_00: Jesus tells three stories about sin in Luke 15.
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  SPEAKER_00: And we've focused on one of them.
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  SPEAKER_00: I guess technically you could say four because they're two brothers.
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  SPEAKER_00: The first story is about the lost sheep.
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  SPEAKER_00: who has nibbled its way to lostness and can't find its way back home.
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  SPEAKER_00: It's lost.
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  SPEAKER_00: So it's the shepherd who goes out, the shepherd risks his life
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  SPEAKER_00: to find the sheep.
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  SPEAKER_00: Well, how does he risk his life?
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_00: Well,
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  SPEAKER_00: first of all,
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  SPEAKER_00: he risks his life because that sheep is so scared and so lost,
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  SPEAKER_00: it's bleeding out loud and is paralyzed now to inaction.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_00: It can't move.
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  SPEAKER_00: And so it is calling out basically to all the predators, I'm here, come and eat me.
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  SPEAKER_00: So the shepherd is going to have to fight off all of these predators.
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  SPEAKER_00: And then because this sheep,
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  SPEAKER_00: which weighs over 100 pounds,
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  SPEAKER_00: is paralyzed with fear,
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  SPEAKER_00: the shepherd has to put the sheep over his shoulders and then carry this big,
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  SPEAKER_00: heavy sheep over very rocky,
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  SPEAKER_00: uneven terrain to get back to the fold.
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  SPEAKER_00: And so that became, for the early Christians, the defining picture of the crucifixion of Jesus.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_00: They didn't walk around wearing crosses at first.
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  SPEAKER_00: At first,
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  SPEAKER_00: the symbol of the crucifixion was the shepherd carrying this overly large sheep on
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  SPEAKER_00: his shoulders because they understood that,
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  SPEAKER_00: first of all,
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  SPEAKER_00: it's the shepherd finding the lost sheep and the shepherd sacrificing his life to
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_00: bring that lost sheep back.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_00: The woman has 10 coins.
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  SPEAKER_00: She's lost one of them.
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  SPEAKER_00: Now, obviously a coin can't save itself.
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  SPEAKER_00: So the woman tears apart the house to find that one lost coin.
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  SPEAKER_00: And then we have the lost son.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_00: We talked about that before.
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  SPEAKER_00: We'll keep coming back to it.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_00: This son wandered away from his father.
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  SPEAKER_00: He was lost and he was dead.
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  SPEAKER_00: And it was the father who ran to find him, raised him back to life again.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_00: The son of mine was lost.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_00: I found him.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_00: The son of mine was dead.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_00: I raised him to life.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_00: And so over and over again,
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  SPEAKER_00: when the Bible talks about sin,
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  SPEAKER_00: there are other metaphors,
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  SPEAKER_00: missing the mark,
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  SPEAKER_00: losing our way,
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  SPEAKER_00: taking a wrong turn.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_00: They're never first and foremost about behavior.
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  SPEAKER_00: They're about our relationship with Jesus and how we have nibbled our way to lostness.
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  SPEAKER_00: Chasing after things, looking for things to satisfy what only God can satisfy.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_00: I have chills.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, the apple, I can be like God.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_00: The sheep nibbling their way.
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  SPEAKER_00: This is where the food is.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_00: The son thinking that if he can get all of his dad's money,
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_00: he's just going to be a whole lot happier than he is now.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_00: Discovers that it was with his father that the joy was all along.
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_00: So the Bible talks in two ways about sin.
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  SPEAKER_00: The first being lost.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_00: And so lost that we can't find our way back.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_00: And that then...
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_00: results in certain behaviors.
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  SPEAKER_00: We act out of our lostness.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_01: Got it.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_00: And when we're lost,
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_00: we will do things that are hurtful to ourselves,
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_00: hurtful to our neighbors,
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_00: even hurtful to God.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_00: And so it's not a far stretch then for Paul to use not only language of lostness, but of death.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_00: He talks in Romans 6, we are dead in our trespasses and sin.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_00: And dead people can't make any decisions.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_00: Dead people can't raise themselves to life again.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_00: Just as these lost sheep can't find their way back home.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_00: A dead person can't save himself or herself.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_00: And that's where grace comes in.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_00: And God finds us.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_00: The shepherd finds us.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_00: The father runs to us.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_00: The father puts robes around Adam and Eve,
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_00: even though they were lost,
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_00: and reclaims them by putting robes on them and saying,
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_00: I'm still going to care for you.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_00: So when we think about sin, we tend to think about behaviors we need to avoid.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_00: When God thinks about sin,
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_00: he thinks about his children who are lost,
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_00: and all God can think about is finding us,
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_00: and he'll go to the death to do that.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_00: So sin is not first and foremost behavior.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_00: It's relational.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_01: Relational.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_00: And it's Jesus,
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_00: God through Jesus,
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_00: who makes that relationship right again,
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_00: who raises us to life,
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_00: who reconciles us to God's self.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_00: And so that in part is,
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_00: I think,
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_00: helpful for us to realize that God is not looking at me,
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_00: waiting for me to make the next mistake.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_00: God is looking at me and all God can do is love me and just keeps reaching out to
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_00: me over and over and over again.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_00: Let me give you two quotes from Martin Luther and then we can see what this raises for you.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_00: Martin Luther is the reformer who 500 some years ago brought reformation to the
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_00: Christian church by helping us rediscover grace.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_00: And he says two things about, among others, about sin.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_00: First of all, he says, be aware,
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_00: Of aspiring to such purity that you no longer wish to be a sinner or to be looked upon as one.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_00: Because Christ dwells only in sinners.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_00: So be aware of aspiring to such purity that you no longer wish to be seen as a sinner or to be one.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_00: For Christ dwells only in sinners.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_00: And secondly, he says...
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_00: sin boldly but believe more boldly still and and here's what he means by that he
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_00: doesn't mean go out and do all kinds of bad stuff right i didn't gather he means
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_00: rather than living to avoid sin live as a forgiven person live in the power of
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_00: god's forgiveness not in the fear of some sin you might commit
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_00: And that's a whole different way of living.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_01: And how would you say that makes a difference to us in our day to day?
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_00: I think, first of all, it just lifts a huge ton of fear and guilt off of our shoulders.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_00: When you live in the joy of forgiveness rather than the fear of sin and potential punishment,
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_00: boy,
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_00: that's just a much different way to live.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_00: think about the difference between that sheep that's living in terror and the sheep
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_00: who's riding home on the shoulders of the shepherd.
• 21:29
  SPEAKER_00: Right, right.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_00: I think we'd all rather be riding on the shoulders of the shepherd and the joy that
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_00: that brings than living in this constant fear
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_00: of what I might do wrong the next time.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_00: And when you live in sin management,
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_00: trying to avoid sin all the time,
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_00: you just get stuck in this perpetual cycle of trying to save yourself.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_01: And it leads to the similar behaviors that when we were talking about behavior,
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: that it leads to things that we do.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_01: Does it not kind of perpetuate that when you get stuck in it?
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_00: It's a really good point, Terry, because I think we all know this.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: Let's just take dieting, for example.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_00: You're trying to eat healthier.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_00: And then, oh, you have a half a brownie and you say to yourself, well, I ate half a brownie.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just going to eat whatever I want today.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_00: Yep.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_00: We all have been there.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_00: So it's sort of like, well, okay, I...
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_00: I committed this sin.
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_00: I might as well just blow the whole wad today.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_00: Because God's going to be angry anyway.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that,
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_01: not to be dramatic,
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_01: but it feeds into a little bit of a hopelessness because of that spiral situation.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas living in...
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_01: and I'll confess sometimes it feels a little nebulous to think about living in
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_01: forgiveness because the rigidity of don't do this,
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_01: don't do that gives this human like some sort of hard boundaries.
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_01: However, I'm going to just, I'll ask you if living in forgiveness,
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_01: And reminding myself that I'm forgiven ahead of, and that I, I am loved.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_01: Does that not,
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_01: and I feel I can say this of my own self,
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_01: draw me deeper into that relationship that this feels good.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_01: Meaning, and not all about feelings.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_01: I don't mean to say that, but I mean, this is, this is a connected time.
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_01: that I might not feel or experience when I'm in that spiral,
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_01: which does feel like I'm separated from the God that I love and that I believe
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_01: loves me.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_01: So I, and I am honestly processing this in, in real time with you that this is,
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_01: Draws me like, like I was thinking of this image and I know you've seen it.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_01: Well, you, well, I'm assuming you have, but it's a painting.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_01: It's an artist.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_01: It's kind of,
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_01: floating around social media,
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_01: but it's as if the camera view is looking directly at this sheet.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_01: That has, has been lost is running.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_01: somewhat away in trying to discover where they're headed.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_01: And behind the sheep is a painted image of Jesus, his arms out moving in that same direction.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_01: And the compassion that you pick up from that is so powerful that pretty soon Jesus
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_01: is going to grab that sheep.
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_01: And it's like, ah, you know, it's how I feel when I look at it.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_01: And I would venture to say that that experience might make that sheep feel like,
• 25:08
  SPEAKER_01: well,
• 25:08
  SPEAKER_01: I don't want to,
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_01: I prefer to be right here.
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_01: I'm going to be right here.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_01: And then that, that, that would change behaviors too, wouldn't it?
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_00: I, I, I just think we live differently when we live like we're loved.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_00: And I've used the example already several times in these podcasts about my marriage to Jam.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_00: But let's just think of a friendship.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_00: Friendships aren't based on, first and foremost, on rules.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_00: They're based on a relationship of mutual respect and love for each other.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_00: You start putting rules in, it kills the relationship.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_00: It's not a relationship anymore.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_00: It's a contract.
• 25:45
  SPEAKER_00: And that's what I think what Jesus is saving us from is a contract that
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_00: This isn't a business relationship that's based on meeting certain criteria.
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_00: This is a relationship where God runs to us with grace always.
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_00: And you talked about how we're separated from God,
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_00: which is a very real experience that people go through.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_00: God forsakenness.
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_00: And Jesus went through that on the cross.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_00: But what the cross shows us is that God doesn't move.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_00: We move and or we don't go anywhere, but we just feel because of the stuff around us.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_00: But God is always there and God is always pursuing us.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_00: And the same Jesus who said, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_00: A moment later said, Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_00: So grace is always relational.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_00: And so sin is relational in that we lose our way.
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, we lose our way all the time.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_00: We can lose our way daily.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_00: But that doesn't stop Jesus from constantly embracing us with grace, leading us back to love.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_00: And I think the other thing it does for us, I hope, is it makes us less judgmental.
• 27:08
  SPEAKER_00: Because if we're constantly telling up our own sinful behavior,
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_00: We're certainly looking at others.
• 27:14
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_00: In part to justify ourselves and in part because if God's relationship with us is
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_00: based on behavior,
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_00: our behaviors,
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_00: then we're always on the lookout for those who just aren't quite living up to the
• 27:29
  SPEAKER_00: right behaviors.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, boy.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_01: I keep getting chills.
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_01: I think that that.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_01: That's love that I am feeling, you know, from really understanding more and more God's grace.
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_00: God's grace.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_00: It always starts with God's grace.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't start with me.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_00: And it starts with a God who will go to the cross and to the depths of hell to find us.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_00: Hmm.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_00: And he will not stop.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_00: God will not stop.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_00: And in fact, let me, as we close, because we're near the end here, let me just read for you.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_00: This is Romans 8.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_00: What shall we say about such wonderful things as these?
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_00: If God is for us, who can ever be against us?
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_00: Since he did not spare even his own son,
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_00: but gave him up for us all,
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_00: won't he also give us everything else?
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_00: Who dares accuse us whom God has chosen for his own?
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_00: No one, for God himself has given us right standing with himself.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_00: Who will then condemn us?
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_00: No one,
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_00: for Christ Jesus died for us and was raised to life for us,
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_00: and he is sitting in the place of honor at God's right hand.
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_00: Can anything ever separate us from Christ's love?
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_00: Does it mean he no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity or are persecuted
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_00: or hungry or destitute or in danger or threatened with death?
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_00: No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ who loves us.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm convinced that nothing, that's a big word, nothing can ever separate us from God's love.
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_00: Neither death nor life,
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_00: neither angels nor demons,
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_00: neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow,
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_00: not even the powers of hell can separate us from God's love.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_00: I keep promising we're going to talk about hell someday,
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_00: but not even the powers of hell can separate us from God's love.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_00: No power in the sky above or in the earth below.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_00: Indeed,
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_00: nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_00: is revealed in Christ Jesus,
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_00: our Lord.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_00: And Terry, I know you say this with me.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_00: We want those of you listening to understand that that's for you too,
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_00: that nothing can ever separate you from God's love.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_01: And I hope people share this podcast, not to just hear you and I talk, but for the truth that's in it.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_01: And,
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_01: we probably have a wide,
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_01: wide range of audience,
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_01: but for those that you want them to understand God's love and his grace,
• 30:15
  SPEAKER_01: please pass this along.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_01: It's life changing.
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_01: It's life changing from my side of things in my history.
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_01: And I can, I know for anyone who,
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_01: is breathing God's grace changes lives.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, I just entered into a new decade, Tim, and hearing this feels just so celebratory.
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_01: I think every day I can get a little sappy,
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_01: I know,
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_01: but it just feels like this is what I want to carry with me into a new tomorrow,
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_01: a new 24 hours,
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_01: a new week,
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_01: and a new season in my life.
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_01: So thank you, my friend.
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yep.
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_00: And as Terry mentioned, please share it.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_00: You can get this, of course, through Spotify, through Apple.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_00: You can sign up for the email list that I have that sends this out, plus a writing once a week.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_00: That's at recklessgrace.substack.com with a slash at the end.
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_00: recklessgrace.substack.com with a slash at the end.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_00: And we'd love to have you join us.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_00: We'll be back with you next time.
• 31:26
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna leave you with a little Morse code to remind you that you're the one God loves.