Latest / North Bible Recap / Episode 58: Mark and Judges

Transcript

Episode 58: Mark and Judges · North Bible Recap

• 0:11
  SPEAKER_00: Well, good day, everybody, and I am so thrilled that you have tuned in for another episode.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_00: Episode actually number seven.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, I'm about to run out of fingers, so uh, which is actually a good thing in regards to um the production of these uh podcasts.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_00: So I am thrilled that you joined us.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: I hope that you will share this with somebody.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: I hope that you will dig in a little bit, go deeper with us into God's word as we look at our North Church reading, readings one and reading two.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: Just to remind you, reading one covers all the New Testament, Psalms and Proverbs in one year.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, reading two covers the rest of the Bible.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: Read one and two, you cover the whole Bible.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_00: And so uh we're taking each week to dive a little deeper.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: Obviously, time restricts us if we're trying to do this in 60 minutes or so to cover everything.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but we want to give you maybe some little tidbits, uh, some extra insight that you might not get otherwise uh from a general read, and maybe just also some of our own personal uh things that God is speaking to us.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: And so, Pastor Stampson, good to have you again.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_00: It's good to be back.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: We're excited.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: I'm looking forward to this conversation.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, like I said last time, we pray right before we start, like God help us.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: He does.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: Because it's not like we just sit around studying all the time, both of us, and I think we give ourselves to our daily devo time of um feeding on God's word and and even discussing it with other people.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_00: But this is a lot of extra added, and we still got our administrative work of the church and the things that we got to accomplish.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_00: So I know that you're digging in and putting a lot of effort in.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_00: So thank you.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_01: And I've been listening, honestly, Pastor Rodney.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_01: I've gone back and listened to several of the all of them actually by now.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but man, I just really loved the last two episodes that you guys did uh with Pastor Christian uh and talking about the messianic secret, talking about the the Mark and sandwiches.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_01: Like it was it was all so good.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_01: And so if you haven't had a chance to go listen back, go listen back because they've been excellent.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I I I feel like that they've been you know productive and good and fruitful for people.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_00: Today we are diving into uh the book of Mark, continuing.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, we left off with Pastor Christian, but we're gonna look at chapters 11, 12, and 13.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: That's right today, and then we're gonna dive into the book of Judges, which is a crazy book.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: There's a lot.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: And so we're gonna cover chapters one through nine there, and then we're gonna look at uh Proverbs, uh chapter 27 and take a you know, some of Proverb, my Proverb takes, and then also uh we're gonna look at Psalms 119, specifically between 57 through 176.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but we're we're gonna try to cover, and I want to give some extra thoughts uh from Psalms 119.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: So why don't we just dive into um the book of Mark and lead the way?
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_01: So, Mark up to this point, uh, so Jesus has been doing his work mainly in Galilee.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and now Jesus is coming to Jerusalem, and that's really what's happening in Mark 11.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_01: So this is the famous scene where Jesus rides in on the donkey.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes we call it the triumphant entry, uh, where Jesus comes in riding in on the donkey.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and you see, one of the first things that he does in Jerusalem is he curses a fig tree, which you know we talked about last week.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_01: Pastor Christian brought that up last week.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_01: He curses the fig trees, and then he goes into the temple and he clears the temple.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_01: Obviously, this is another famous scene where Jesus goes and he flips over tables, uh, grabs a whip and whips people, like all that fun stuff happens right there.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_01: And then Jesus makes a statement in Mark 11, 17.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_01: He says, uh, he said to them, the scriptures declare, my temple will be called a house of prayer for all nations, but you have turned it into a den of thieves.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_01: And what is happening here is that Jesus has been rejected by the system of leadership of that day, right?
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_01: The Jewish leaders have rejected Jesus.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_01: They don't want anything to do with him.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_01: And even though he is the rightful king, and he's looking at what's happening in the temple, he's like, This, you have missed the point of what my kingdom is supposed to be, God's kingdom is supposed to be all about.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_01: And now I'm here to correct it, and I am the rightful king.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_01: However, they are rejecting it as a whole.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: That's so good.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_00: So good.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, when you talk about the rejection, um, Jesus is coming to Jerusalem because he knows what this is gonna mean.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: And we're gonna dive into it a little bit there.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: And because he knows coming back into Jerusalem means um the end of his earthly ministry, yeah.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, because he knows it's gonna point to the cross.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: And his disciples are disillusioned, they don't understand, they don't know.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_00: And just kind of remind people again of what the book of Mark who wrote it.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: Just if you if you just now tuning in, you didn't hear the past week.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, basically the book of Mark is identified as the writer of being John Mark.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so he two names, John Mark, that's his name, John Mark.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, I love people with two names.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: I always like, why don't I have two names?
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_00: You know, Mark John and David, you know, Mark David and all these other James.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: And but anyway, it is um, but it was really actually uh the one giving uh the story uh was Peter.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_00: And so Peter is actually more the author of the um of the book of Mark.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and it's just John Mark that's actually writing down he he is a disciple of Peter, and so he is actually the one recording all that's going on.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_00: And you start at the very first verse pointing to he wants to say it makes it very clear, Peter does, and of course John Mark is writing it down, is that Jesus is the Messiah.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: And then there's no more um from Peter's viewpoint or from John's viewpoint defending that as much as allowing uh the eyewitness accounts and all the people, yeah, and it's pointing to Jesus being the Messiah.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_00: And now we are preparing his entry back into Jerusalem.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: You're going down, he's confronting the religious leaders, like you said, and it's leading toward the cross.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_01: And you actually see this in Mark uh chapter 11, where at the end of the chapter, they're challenging his authority, right?
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_01: They begin to ask, Well, like where who gave you the power uh to come in here and tell us how we're supposed to operate the temple?
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_01: Like, who what where do you get this authority from?
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_01: And it's a trick because they're trying to they're trying to figure out how to get Jesus because they're trying to end him.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and so Jesus doesn't fall into the trick.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_01: He he, you know, Jesus is pretty smart, he's he's wise.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: And so in that moment, instead of answering that question, he says, I'll answer your question, but uh tell me where did John get his authority from, that John the Baptizer, right?
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_01: Because he knew that the people loved John the Baptist, right?
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_01: They they respect him.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, some of them thought he was the Messiah.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_01: The general population, the general population, but the but but not the religious leaders, not the religious leaders, they didn't like John either.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_01: And so he's saying, if you tell me where John got his authority, then I'll tell you where I got mine.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_01: And so he he kind of turns it around.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_01: And then at that point, they're just like, I we can't say because it's it's too political for them.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_01: And so they want to move away.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_01: But already you're seeing they have rejected Jesus.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_01: As soon as he's coming in, the the people recognize Jesus, but the people who should recognize Jesus, the elite, the people who've studied their whole lives and waited for this moment, they don't see Jesus.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_01: They're blind to him.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, and that's what takes us to the what happens is Jesus stays in Jerusalem, and that's what the next chapter is.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_01: And he is trying to, in in a lot of ways, he's trying to convince these people of their own blindness.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_01: Um, not because they're gonna change, because they won't, um, but he is just like God did in the Old Testament, time and time again, where he sent prophets to people who are deaf even though they could hear and blind even though they could see.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um, he is preaching to them, giving them another chance after another chance to turn their hearts around.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's where we get to Mark chapter 12.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_01: And so Mark chapter 12, uh, Jesus tells a story of uh the tenant farmers.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_01: And so the story kind of goes like this there's a guy who plants a vineyard, um, and he hires some tenant farmers to stay and take care of it while he goes and lives in a different country.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_01: And then, you know, he sends messengers back to collect his due, right?
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_01: Because he's owed from that, from that harvest.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and every time he sends messengers, at first they just beat him up and send him back, and then eventually they start killing the messengers and rejecting them.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_01: And finally, the master says, You know what?
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna send my son because they'll respect my son.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_01: And it even says it's his son that who he loved.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_01: And so he sends the son, and this is what it says in verse seven.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_01: It says in Mark chapter 12, verse 7, he says, But the tenant farmers said to one another, here comes the heir to this estate.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_01: Let's kill him and get the estate for ourselves.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_01: So they grabbed him and murdered him and threw his body out of the vineyard.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_01: What do you suppose the owner of this of the vineyard will do?
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_01: Jesus asked.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_01: I'll tell you, he'll come and kill those farmers and lease the vineyard to others.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_01: Didn't you ever read in the scriptures the stone that the reject the builders rejected has now become the cornerstone?
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_01: This is the Lord's doing.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_01: It is wonderful to see.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_01: And look at verse 12.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_01: It says, The religious leaders wanted to arrest Jesus because they realized he was telling the story against them.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_01: They were wicked farmers, they were the wicked farmers, but they were afraid of the crowd, so they left him and went away.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_01: And so you see that fig tree that he curses at the very beginning of this thing.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_01: Well, it's it's a representation of these people, right?
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_01: They never get Jesus, they are the evil tenant farmers who are just trying to take power for themselves and reject Jesus and take over his kingdom.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_00: You know, you talk about them being so far away, uh, but there was others that were listening into all of this that were not so far away.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_00: And that were, I mean, basically they were coming closer and closer while Jesus was being rejected uh by the leadership, uh, being prepared uh for eventually their um strategy to uh kill him.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um there was others that were being drawn toward him.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_00: And that their hearts were being drawn.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_00: Because you talk about that a little bit.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_01: So at the end of this chapter, um, there just there's a person that comes and asks Jesus, hey, what's the what's the greatest commandment?
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know, that's the famous, you know, love God, love people.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we kind of got that from somewhere, right?
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and so Jesus states that, and and you could see that this person is so interested.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_01: And actually, this is what it says in verse 34.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_01: Realizing this is Jesus, realizing how much the man understood, this man who asked the question, Jesus said to him, You are not far from the kingdom of God.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_01: After that, no one dared asked him any more questions.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_01: And so there were some people there that were so close to believing, and maybe they had believed after the fact, but they were really close to believing Jesus.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_01: But for whatever reason, they just weren't there yet, right?
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_01: And we know what it's gonna take for them to believe Jesus would have to die and be resurrected because that's what this is all pointing us to.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_01: That's what Mark is taking us to.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_01: Is the most important event in Mark is Jesus' death and resurrection, and that's where he's taking us to.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_01: That's when they will truly see that tenant farmer son, right?
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_01: Or the the sorry, the master son uh being killed by the tenant farmers, right?
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_01: That's when they will see the stone that's rejected becoming the cornerstone, and they're waiting for that moment.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_00: That's so good.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_00: You know, you you continue on in that chapter, and Jesus addresses um, you know, he's talking, matter of fact, says in verse number 35, later, as Jesus was teaching the people in the temple, he asked, Why do the teachers, the religious law who claim that the Messiah is the son of David?
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_00: And it's interesting that passage there because um, you know he pulls out what what David actually was quoted, says, The Lord said to my Lord, uh, sit on the place of honor at my right hand until I humble your enemies beneath your feet.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_00: And so what is Jesus doing there?
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_00: He's actually kind of revealing to them what David is prophesying and speaking to.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_00: He's speaking to his Lord, but he's speaking to you know, Heavenly Father, but he he's saying uh that there is coming a Lord, there is coming a king, there is coming someone that's greater than I am, yeah, uh, that is going to be the one that's going to rule all the world.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_00: And now his kingdom, as we'd find out, that was one of the hard things for the people to understand because they were thinking about a kingdom now.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_00: They were thinking about a kingdom that was ruled by the the sword of man.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_00: And Jesus said, No, this is a sword of the spirit.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, this kingdom is going to be not of this world.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it is an eternal kingdom uh of restoring what was lost in the Garden of Eden.
• 13:34
  unknown: Yeah.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_00: And so um, I think it's very beautifully how he kind of wraps up that chapter with those thoughts.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, one thing, I'll I'll say this.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_01: So he actually wraps up by talking about say, hey, watch out for the religious leaders, right?
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_01: Uh watch out for the scribes and the Pharisees, because they're over there devouring widows, right?
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_01: And then the very next scene is this widow that comes and puts the little bit that she has the two two pennies, uh, right.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_01: And Jesus sees them.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_01: And what does a good king do?
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_01: A good king, a good king brings in the justice and righteousness of God, right?
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_01: And Jesus is the son of David, he is the good king, and so he sees even the widow who who is putting in the very least, he's not ignoring, he's not trying to take advantage, like the the leaders are trying to take advantage of her.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_01: No, he is recognizing her and honoring her.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_01: Pastor, I got a Pastor Rodney story.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_01: Can I share it?
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_01: No.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, I remember, I guess.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_01: We'll see.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_00: We'll see.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_00: Uh we may edit this part.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: We'll wait and see.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_01: No, this is a good one.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_01: So I remember I was interviewing uh to work at North Church's at now 14 plus years ago.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and we went out to lunch.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_01: And um right before we were beginning to eat our meal, um, Pastor Rodney prays.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_01: You pray.
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_01: And I remember your prayer.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_01: I'll never forget it, because I was I was hungry, I was nervous, right?
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and you're you prayed something like God, we thank you uh for the the people who work so hard and give to the church so we can participate in a meal like this.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_01: We thank you for the widows uh who give sacrificially of their tithes, uh, so we can serve God and serve the kingdom.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_01: And then, you know, you just pray and said, Amen.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_01: And then at that point, I kind of lost my appetite.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, I'm not trying to eat widows' food, you know, like that's funny.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_01: But no, I I think there was one of the things I I think great leaders do is they they not only see the the people with means they give, but they also recognize the people who give with very little means and give sacrificially.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_01: And that's what a good leader, that's what a good king does.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_01: And that's what Jesus is trying to point out.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_01: He's like, this is how I would rule if I was the one put in charge, but that time is not yet.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_00: So good.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_00: You're you're you're you're so rotten, uh a good king.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_00: He is a king that separates himself from all the kings.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_00: That's why he's the king of kings.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, king capital K and of all kings, lower case K.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_00: And because he's pointing out not only he notices the least among them, but also he sees the motive of the heart.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_00: He realizes, you know, who is given not only the most, and because he doesn't measure the most by how much is in the offer, he measured the most by who gives their most of their heart and the most of themselves.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and so that's what you have here.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_00: Beautiful.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_00: So kind of going into chapter number 13, let's dive into it.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, because it it it's getting good.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_01: And so if you're an end times prophecy person, chapter 13, you're very familiar with.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_01: So chapter 13 is typically called the all of it discourse, uh, because Jesus is on the Mount of Olives, and you know, it says that he's kind of overlooking Jerusalem.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I actually have never physically been there.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_01: You've been there, Pastor Rodney.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_01: So maybe you can kind of describe the scene, but uh, he's standing on the Mount of Olives and he's looking over, looking all of the beautiful buildings, and disciples are even like, look at all the beautiful buildings.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: And Jesus is going to talk about what's going to happen here prophetically, um, but then also what would happen that would usher in his second coming.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's where it says in verse three.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: It says, Later, Jesus sat on the Mount of Olives across the valley of the temple.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_01: Peter, James, uh, John, and Andrew came to him privately and asked him, Tell us when will all this happen?
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_01: What sign will show us the things that are for are about to be fulfilled?
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_01: And so Jesus begins speaking about the end times and about his second coming.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_01: And there's two interesting connections that I want us to notice.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_01: Um, Jesus references the book of Daniel two times in this passage.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, the first is in verse 14, where Jesus references uh what's typically called the abomination of desolation.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_01: If you've ever studied end times prophecy, you're probably familiar with that term.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but Daniel makes this prophecy uh in Daniel chapter 9 and James chapter 11.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and that happens uh within in between the what we call the intertestament period, uh where the temple is desecrated uh by a uh a foreign king, and he comes and he offers uh an unclean animal on the temple, uh, on the temple altar.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_01: And that happens in that time, but it Daniel's also prophesying about a future event that would come again.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_01: Jesus is doing kind of the same thing, right?
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_01: He is alluding to uh what's gonna happen here.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_01: The the temple is gonna be destroyed.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, in AD 70, if you didn't know the history of it, in 80 70, the Roman government would come and they would completely besiege the city uh city of Jerusalem, they would destroy the temple, just like Jesus prophesied.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, one of the reasons that a lot of liberal scholars tend to give the gospels a later date, saying that it was written in the third or fourth century, is because it's hard for them to believe that Jesus would be able to predict the future because they just don't believe in supernatural signs.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_01: But uh if you look at the evidence, the evidence, earliest evidence of is within the lifetime of the apostles, uh, is when these scriptures are being written and being uh being uh moved around, right?
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_01: And so this is an evidence of Jesus' supernatural power to see into the future.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_01: And so he's predicting the time of the destruction of the temple, but it also has far-reaching because this thing could still happen again, right?
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_01: The the further desecration of the temple.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_01: Whatever that means, you'd have to really study some eschatology and times prophecy to get into it.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_01: But what I really am fascinated by is the second reference to Daniel, and I think this is the more important and significant one.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, in Mark 13, 26, right?
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, Jesus says, and then you will see the Son of Man coming in the clouds with great power and glory.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_01: And that scripture happens one other time in the Old Testament, and that's in the book of Daniel, chapter seven.
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_01: Daniel talks about one like the son of man coming in the clouds in power and glory.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_01: Now, in the book of Daniel, the Son of Man is a divine figure, right?
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_01: Because in the book of Daniel, there's the ancient of days, there's God Yahweh, there, and to him comes one like the Son of Man, according to Daniel.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_01: And Daniel's describing this vision that he's seeing.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe he doesn't even fully understand what he's seeing, but it's this divine being coming and Yahweh puts him on the seat of all of the world.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_01: And so when even when Daniel prophesied, they didn't fully understand what all this meant.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_01: But this is a divine, this is God, right?
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_01: And so when Jesus calls himself the son of man, sometimes we make this mistake.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_01: We think that he's appealing to his humanity.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_01: But when Jesus calls himself the son of man, he's actually appealing to his divinity.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_01: He is saying in this passage, I am God, right?
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_01: I am the one that Daniel prophesied about.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_01: That's what he's pointing out here.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_00: That's so that that is so good, so good.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_00: You know, when it when it comes to the end time eschatology, uh, there's so many people get it so excited about it, wrapped up in it, which is absolutely, you know, okay.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's nothing wrong with that at all.
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_00: But the thing that I want to encourage people that are listening and is that be careful not to get caught up on uh dating, uh begin to establish uh that we know it all, because we look through a glass darkly.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_00: And I think Christ is not meant the end time prophecies are not meant to give us a spelled out exactly this is what's going to happen, as much as an anticipation of who is coming and how to be ready for his coming.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, it says in verse number 33 of chapter 13, it says, just since you uh don't know when the time will come, be on guard, stay alert.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_00: Who's coming?
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_00: The Son of Man.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, Jesus Christ is going to come again, he's gonna establish his kingdom.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_00: Let's be careful not to get so caught up on the details that we miss.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: Out on that divine moment of his coming.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_00: Because that's what we're just supposed to be ready.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_00: And here's the thing.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_00: I've met numbers of people over the years that have been making these predictions of coming.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_00: And personally I even know.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, there's people right now that um well, one guy specifically I'm thinking about is yet.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, he's well known with uh teaching great marriage stuff, great pastor, leader.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_00: And remember me making a prediction, it was like a few years back that it was gonna come, and then finally he said, no, it's gonna come before 2021 for sure, he's gonna come.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: It Jesus hasn't come.
• 22:34
  unknown: Yeah.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_00: A day is a thousand years, and a thousand years is a day, the scripture says.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_00: And we've got to be very careful.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_00: What we have to live is live ready.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, live on purpose.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_00: And even if he's coming tomorrow, it doesn't mean we go bury ourselves in some, you know, room and protect ourselves from no, no.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_00: It's all the more reason we got to go out into the harvest field and do what Jesus instructed us to do is to go into all the world and preach this good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ because he is coming again.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_00: And we are to be preaching the good news and making disciples until he comes.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_00: That's the whole point of some of these um many of his parables is to find people that are doing and that are obedient uh while he's gone.
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_00: So that when he shows up, we are actually doing what he has told us to do.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_00: He says on verse number 36, there toward the end, says, Don't let him, don't let Jesus uh find you sleeping when he arrives without warning.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_00: I say to you and to everyone, watch for him.
• 23:37
  unknown: Yeah.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_00: And that watching for him is simply through being obedient to what he's asked us to do.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_00: Is to love God, love people.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_00: And let that be evident by we're following and doing things the way Christ did things.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_00: And we're preaching the good news.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_00: We are baptizing people, we are um making disciples, teaching them everything that he has taught us, and that is Genesis through revelation, yeah, and then allowing the Holy Spirit to lead us every day.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the way to be ready.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_00: That's the way to be ready, not just to bury ourselves in some area and protect ourselves a lot of food and stuff.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_00: No, no, no.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_00: We if we have cataclysmic things happen, then yes, we are to store up.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_00: Then we use it to share with people, we use it to give to people, we use it to invite people into um the kingdom of God.
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_01: And I love that.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_01: My Bible says stay awake, or another version, be stay alert.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and there is a sense of urgency to the message.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_01: And so we can't miss the boat, you know, we can't uh, you know, miss the forest for the trees and get lost in the weeds of all all the little things that could happen, all when the dates are.
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you, Pastor.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_00: That's so good.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_00: So we're gonna continue um next week.
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna wrap up the book of Mark.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but let's now just kind of switch gears and move into the old testament.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_00: Come on.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_00: And let's look at one of those incredible books that is kind of discouraging in ways.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_00: And um, but it is it speaks to the depravity of man if we don't keep our eyes on Jesus and the King of Kings.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_00: So take it and start diving into it.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_01: Let's go.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_01: Pastor Roding, what's your favorite movie?
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_01: If you got one, my favorite movie.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I you know what?
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_00: It's been probably two to three years since I've even seen a movie.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm not uh hey, sorry, I know that offends some people out there because I'm not a moviegoer.
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just not.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_00: And um, but I would say probably Gladiator is the original Gladiator, is like my all-time favorite.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_00: Of course, I don't have a whole repertoire of ones to pro pull from, but uh, that was one of those that just it made me want to like, yeah, I'll I'll do what it takes.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_01: The reason I asked that is because when I see that when I read Judges, Judges is like an action movie, right?
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_01: Or like a comic book, whatever you want.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_01: It is uh in and it would be rated R, like if it was made today.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_01: It is not a clean movie either, right?
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_01: It is, but it is action-packed, and it's it's it's incredible uh because what's happening in Judges is is giving you uh the context of what's gonna come with with David and all the kings that would come after it.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_01: But it's kind of this weird time after Joshua comes into the land uh and that generation conquers the land, uh, and then before the kings would rule over Israel.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_01: And so uh after that time, uh some scholars say that it was written by Samuel, uh the prophet.
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and we don't know that for sure.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_01: That's just Jewish tradition.
• 26:52
  SPEAKER_01: But Joshua, uh I'm sorry, Judges and Ruth typically was kind of seen as one book, as one narrative.
• 26:59
  SPEAKER_01: Uh later on, it was separated out uh for Ruth to kind of be it on its own.
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but it's this one kind of epic story, kind of going from the end of Joshua to the very beginning of the king's ruling over Israel.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_01: And that's where we get into, and really the best overview for us is actually chapter one uh and chapter two of Judges.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_01: It kind of gives us the context of what's going to happen in this book.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_01: So chapter one is you see the story of Caleb.
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and Caleb is finishing up the conquering of the land, if you will, in his generation.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and Caleb is leading the charge uh in uh the the the tribe of Judah and they're going in and they're finishing up what they can.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_01: And so they gather the other tribe, the tribe of Simeon, and say, hey, let's go take over.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_01: And they're going and doing that.
• 27:47
  SPEAKER_01: But there's something really interesting in the fact that Caleb is the one doing this.
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_01: Because I only came to learn this recently, and so it kind of blew my mind.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and so I thought we have to look at this.
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so can I nerd out for a second with you, Pastor?
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely, absolutely.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_00: Let me just say this my wife, Shannon, would absolutely loves the nerding out part.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_00: That's what she's always saying.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_00: You need to do more of the nerding out part.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_00: And so, okay, this is for Shannon.
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so here it is, Pastor Shannon.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_01: This is for you.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_01: But Caleb is actually, so the book of Judges constantly, the the point of it is that the Israelites should have, they needed to drive out the people of the land, right?
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_01: The the Canaanites in the land, because of idolatry, right?
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_01: That the way that the Canaanites practiced idolatry was abhorrent to God.
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_01: They not only just worshiped idols, it wasn't just merely just bow down in front of idol, they practiced it by sexual immorality, right?
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_01: They would perform sex acts in front of these idols.
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_01: But not only that, they would offer children as sacrifice, they would burn children in the altars to the gods of Moloch and Baal.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and this was the way that they appeased their God.
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_01: So this was God hated this practice.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_01: And so He's trying to get them to get rid of these practices from the land.
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_01: And so, in doing that, though, sometimes we can read that and we're thinking, well, God hates these people, right?
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_01: God hates the Canaanites, He's trying to get rid of them.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_01: And the truth is, God doesn't hate these people, God loves these people.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, if you look at what was the point of the Israelite nation, well, the point of the Israelite nation, uh, as they came into the land was one to take possession of the land, drive out the idolatry we just talked about, but two was that they were supposed to be a light to the nations.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_01: And other nations should see the way that they live morally uh for God and they should be drawn to that.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_00: Well, go ahead.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_00: So you you you mentioned that.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_00: It I think it's important to understand one, God doesn't hate people.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_00: God hates our sin.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_00: That's right.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_00: And what it does to us and people around us.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_00: But you said to take possession to drive out idolatry.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_00: It wasn't just about driving out the people, it was about driving out adultery, idolatry.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_00: And then if the people weren't going to get rid of their idolatry, then you drive out the people with that.
• 29:51
  SPEAKER_00: That's right.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but it wasn't God always, he has love for the world, for God so loved the world that he gave.
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_00: And so we we may we forever remember that.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, that's incor crucial to understand.
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_01: So then the question is who is Caleb and why is he leading, right?
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_01: So we know Caleb because he was one of the 12 spies.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_01: Moses sent into the land, two gave a good report, ten gave a bad report.
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_01: Joshua and Caleb were the two that gave a good report.
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_01: But it was interesting, it's recently that I found this out.
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_01: So Caleb wasn't an ethnic Jew.
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_01: He was not a Jew by birth.
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_01: He was actually in Numbers chapter 32, it says that Caleb was a son of Jephuna, the Kennesite.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_01: He was a Kennesite.
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_01: Kennesites were part of the part of the the nation of Canaan.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_00: The reason.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_00: See, see, when I hear when I hear good stuff, yeah, and actually I I've heard this for it's been a while.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but and this is the nerd and out part, but I'll start doing this because I don't know, I just start throwing punches.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_00: When I love something like that, I just start throwing punches, and it's just that's good stuff, folks.
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_00: Go ahead.
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_00: Because it's speaking to his whole plan was not for just the Jews.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_00: The Jews were a group of people that he used and he worked through, but it was to be light to the world.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_00: And Caleb was one of those.
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 31:15
  SPEAKER_01: And so, so he is chosen to be a not just a person, uh a part of the family uh of the Jewish people, but he's actually a leader, a tribal leader of the biggest tribe in Israel, the tribe of Judah.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_01: And so he's a Kennesite.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and look in jot in Genesis chapter 15, when God gives a promise to Abraham about the land that he's gonna give his descendants, he names, he says, I'm gonna give you the land and in Genesis 15, verse 19, the land of the Kenites, the Kennesites, the Cadmonites, the Hittites, the Perizzites.
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_01: Well, land, that's the land of Canaan, right?
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_01: And so this was part of the conquered people.
• 31:55
  SPEAKER_01: At some point along this journey, uh Caleb and his family had just been adopted into worshiping Yahweh, right?
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_01: And so these Canaanite people were now added into the family of God.
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, the Jewish people had always been a mixed company.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_01: Think about when they left Egypt.
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_01: When they left Egypt, they were such big champions that Egyptians went with them.
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_01: There were Egyptians that left, it was a mixed company that traveled out of Egypt.
• 32:24
  SPEAKER_01: And so the nation of Israel grew not only by birth, right?
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_01: Not birth count, but also by Egyptians who came to believe in Yahweh, right?
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_01: And then when they go out and they get, they drive out the the idolatry and they're all supposed to drive the land, then they were meant to be a light to the nations and other ethnicities, other people are meant to come in and be a part of this family.
• 32:46
  SPEAKER_01: But here's the sad part, okay?
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_01: The the the sad part of the story is you have at the very beginning of Judges, the story of Caleb, right?
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_01: He's the ideal, he's what you should attain.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_01: And at the very end of uh Judges, or really the story of Ruth, you have Ruth as an example of how it's supposed to be.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_01: And they're kind of bookending this thing.
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_01: So you have Caleb who's a Kennesite, you have Ruth who's a Moabite, and they're added into the family of God.
• 33:14
  SPEAKER_01: But all through the middle of that is the family of God rejecting God, right?
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_01: Instead of being a light to the nations, they just become like the nations and they become like their neighbors.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_01: And that's the sad part, right?
• 33:29
  SPEAKER_01: We see that in chapter one.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_01: They just become like everyone else.
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_00: You know, what of course you you said one of the key roles here, people here is Caleb, and you you pointed out so wonderfully.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_00: What to me is so great about Caleb is that you have him as part of one of the spies uh that is being sent uh many, many years before.
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and they come back, 12 spas.
• 33:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um the spas were not to determine if they should go in, they were just to go scout it and tell the layout of the land.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_00: It wasn't like they were supposed to convince yes or no.
• 34:05
  SPEAKER_00: The answer was already yes, go take the land.
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_00: They come back, and it was Joshua and Caleb that um say, Yes, we can.
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_00: And they were determined uh to let's go take this land, let's go push out adult idolatry, let's go be light into the nations, let's go do this.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_00: And then, of course, it's a no-go, and there's 40 years of now waiting.
• 34:28
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but God chooses to allow uh Joshua uh to lead them into the promised land, and then Caleb and their families to go into the promised land.
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_00: And it's interesting, they go in now.
• 34:39
  SPEAKER_00: He's 80 years of age, going into the promised land, fighting the battles at 80 years of age.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_00: But five years after that is when um Caleb comes to Joshua because he still hasn't got his land.
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_00: He's been fighting for everybody else in their land, and he says, I still haven't gotten what, and he said, I want the hill country up there.
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_00: And Joshua said, Go for it.
• 35:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and he literally, Caleb says this he says, I'm just as strong and I'm just as vigorous, and I can just I can go do it today.
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_00: Come on, give me that, I will I will go take that land.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I love that about him.
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_00: Come on, and so which brings me to the I did, was he really physically just as fit at 85 years of age as he was when he was 40 or 25 or 30?
• 35:21
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_00: God can do anything for first, but I don't think he probably was physically fit.
• 35:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but I believe mentally and spiritually, he was stronger than ever.
• 35:32
  SPEAKER_02: Come on.
• 35:32
  SPEAKER_00: Which brings me to this is that that Caleb's spirit is what I want to have.
• 35:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah I want you to have that are listening here, that never gives up.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_00: We are in spiritual warfare all the way to the end.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_00: Come on.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's not like I get past my teenage years and now no, I get I've seen more adults fall by the wayside and fall into sin as I have young people.
• 35:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 35:53
  SPEAKER_00: And so it is a constant spiritual warfare and fight.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_00: And we've got to have that Caleb spirit that says, I'm gonna go, I'm gonna take this land, I'm going to fight.
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_00: Because if not, then we become like the people of that are found in the book of Judges.
• 36:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we wake up one day and where's God?
• 36:09
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 36:10
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 36:11
  SPEAKER_01: And so it's it's powerful because that's that's where we start, and then we get to chapter two.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_01: Chapter two, it really kind of gives us the overview of what's gonna happen during this time period of the judges.
• 36:21
  SPEAKER_01: So chapter two, verse 10 actually says this.
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_00: Which is the one of the saddest verses in the Bible.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_01: Real sad.
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_01: Look at this.
• 36:29
  SPEAKER_01: It says, After that generation died, the the Joshua generation, another generation grew up who did not acknowledge the Lord or remember the mighty things he had done for Israel.
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_01: Man, how many families, Pastor Rodney?
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_01: How many situations, how many people have we seen?
• 36:49
  SPEAKER_01: Man, they they they come from great godly families, they have great heritage, but man, they do not follow God.
• 36:57
  SPEAKER_01: They do not live for him, and it's such a sad thing to see because it's one thing when you're you have no background to God, but it's another thing when you have such a rich history and a rich background, and yet you don't acknowledge him.
• 37:11
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's where we get the judges, and and who were the judges?
• 37:15
  SPEAKER_01: Well, it's it says in verse 16 and 17 it says, Then the Lord raised up judges to rescue the Israelites from their attackers.
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yet Israel did not listen to the judges, but prostituted themselves by worshiping other gods.
• 37:29
  SPEAKER_01: How quickly they turned away from the path of their ancestors who walked in obedience to God's commandments.
• 37:36
  SPEAKER_01: So who are these judges?
• 37:37
  SPEAKER_01: They were these charismatic leaders that God raised up.
• 37:41
  SPEAKER_01: And initially, the judges start off as good, faithful followers of Yahweh, right?
• 37:47
  SPEAKER_01: But they progressively get worse, right?
• 37:49
  SPEAKER_01: So Atniel is actually Caleb's son-in-law.
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_01: He's the first major judge.
• 37:56
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and then after him, it just progressively gets worse and worse, right?
• 38:02
  SPEAKER_01: Leading up to Samson, who I'm actually named after, unfortunately.
• 38:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yay! That's right.
• 38:08
  SPEAKER_01: And he is the worst judge.
• 38:11
  SPEAKER_01: He is the worst judge.
• 38:13
  SPEAKER_01: And so you're seeing it's it's it's I think it's I think of it, it's like a cycle, uh, and that's the next thing you're seeing, but it's like a cycle that's also a downward spiral.
• 38:21
  SPEAKER_00: Well, let's pick up Judges chapter two, verse 18 and 19.
• 38:24
  SPEAKER_00: Let me let me read this.
• 38:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 38:25
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 38:26
  SPEAKER_00: Whenever the Lord raised up a judge over Israel, he was with that judge and rescued the people from their enemies throughout the judge's lifetime.
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_00: For the Lord took pity on his people, who were burdened by oppression and suffering.
• 38:43
  SPEAKER_00: But when the judge died, the people returned to their corrupt ways, behaving worse than those who had lived before them.
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_00: They went after other gods, serving and worshiping them, and they refused to give up their evil practices and stubborn ways.
• 39:02
  unknown: Yeah.
• 39:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and this is where you see that cycle, right?
• 39:05
  SPEAKER_01: And so, right in that passage, what's described is the cycle that you see repeated over and over and over again in Jesus.
• 39:12
  SPEAKER_01: It goes like this First, the people sin, right?
• 39:14
  SPEAKER_01: They're unfaithful to Yahweh, they start worshiping false idols, then they're suffering.
• 39:20
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 39:20
  SPEAKER_01: So God gives them over to their enemies and they're taken over by the people of the land, then there's supplication, right?
• 39:26
  SPEAKER_01: They begin to cry out to Yahweh for help.
• 39:29
  SPEAKER_01: And so then that God sends a savior, right?
• 39:31
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's where we see these judges step up and they get progressively worse, but he sends saviors, and then finally there's peace, but it's short-lived, right?
• 39:40
  SPEAKER_01: For a short period of time until the next time they sin, um, they experience peace.
• 39:45
  SPEAKER_01: And there's two sets of refrains, these two repeated lines all through the book of Judges.
• 39:50
  SPEAKER_01: One is the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord.
• 39:54
  SPEAKER_01: That's repeated over and over and over again in the book of Judges.
• 39:58
  SPEAKER_01: And the second line is in those days, Israel had no king.
• 40:02
  SPEAKER_01: And watch this, everyone did as they saw fit.
• 40:08
  SPEAKER_00: Help us, Lord.
• 40:09
  SPEAKER_00: Help us, Lord, because those two refrains are still the very thing that that human nature can be inclined to default to.
• 40:23
  SPEAKER_00: And that is doing what's right in our own eyes and making ourselves king.
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 40:29
  SPEAKER_00: And when we do, and I'll tell you, whoever it is that's listening out there, doesn't matter how long you've been serving Christ, that's why Paul talked about die day daily.
• 40:37
  SPEAKER_00: That's why every day we have to have our manna from heaven, yeah, uh, our daily food.
• 40:43
  SPEAKER_00: It's why every day we've got to invite the presence of God.
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_00: Every day, because the devil is so sly, so subtle.
• 40:51
  SPEAKER_00: And when we begin to think, you know, we make decisions based upon what we feel like is right, the way we see things versus through the lens of scripture and the Holy Spirit and the people of God, um, then we begin to kind of elevate and make you know our choices and will and way king versus the king of kings.
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 41:14
  SPEAKER_01: And and then we ask these questions of judges, like, what did the judges really save the Israelites?
• 41:20
  SPEAKER_01: And the answer is yes and no, right?
• 41:22
  SPEAKER_01: Um that it was short-lived when they saved him, right?
• 41:26
  SPEAKER_01: The people were disobedient, uh, and they would just go back to the way that they normally lived.
• 41:31
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and then two, the judges were they progressively got worse.
• 41:34
  SPEAKER_01: Like we taught it was just this downward spiral.
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_00: And and that's exactly what happens so many times.
• 41:38
  SPEAKER_00: I I and all of us can fall into this, but I see this happen oftentimes with people coming in.
• 41:42
  SPEAKER_00: Life goes hard and they come back to Christ and they cry and weep and like I'm gonna make things right, and then they then they fall away after you know a couple of months, and then they repeat that cycle again and again because they never got rooted in the word of God, the people of God, that and so therefore they keep repeating these same things that you're talking about.
• 42:03
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 42:03
  SPEAKER_01: And then the second question is how does God deal with sin and covenant breaking?
• 42:08
  SPEAKER_01: Because realistically, the way that God painted in Deuteronomy is that God should totally abandon these people because they were living sinfully and not chasing after him, they were breaking covenant, but God is extremely patient with the Israelites.
• 42:22
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, I I don't you hate it, Pastor, whenever people always talk about like the Old Testament God versus the New Testament God, like as if it's two different gods.
• 42:31
  SPEAKER_01: No, no, constantly you're seeing the same God, he's just as patient, just as kind.
• 42:36
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, his patience is seen all the more uh in in light of Jesus, right?
• 42:42
  SPEAKER_01: The fact that they are storing up the punishment that Jesus is going to endure because of their sin and because of our sin.
• 42:51
  SPEAKER_01: And so God is extremely patient.
• 42:54
  SPEAKER_01: So every time he sends punishment, it's really a punishment to try to get them to come back, right?
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_01: And you you talk about this really well, maybe you can say it again, but how like sometimes we misunderstand God of you know, like it's like seeing someone scream at uh you're talking about how you're walking with your your mother-in-law and you're like crap.
• 43:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, she she didn't she didn't like that.
• 43:17
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so what basically is what happened is we're going across a um uh a road there, and it was just uh, and as we did, there a car turns and literally is going to hit her.
• 43:28
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and I just grab her and yank her out of the way.
• 43:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, because I don't have time to, hey Gail, do I want to move right now?
• 43:36
  SPEAKER_00: It's like it's like it's not gonna happen.
• 43:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 43:39
  SPEAKER_00: So I just grabbed her and yanked her.
• 43:40
  SPEAKER_00: And when I yanked her, she just immediately looked at me like, What are you doing?
• 43:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 43:45
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, I just saved your life.
• 43:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 43:49
  SPEAKER_00: What am I doing?
• 43:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 43:50
  SPEAKER_00: And I think it's it's very much how our relationship with God is sometimes is that literally his sense of our punishment is really just trying to save our lives.
• 43:58
  SPEAKER_00: That's right.
• 43:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_01: It is an act of God's grace when he sends discipline in our lives.
• 44:05
  SPEAKER_01: Constantly in the Bible says God disciplines the sons that he loves, right?
• 44:09
  SPEAKER_01: And then the last question is how does the need for a king point to something greater?
• 44:14
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 44:14
  SPEAKER_01: That we see that line over and over again.
• 44:17
  SPEAKER_01: In those days there was no king.
• 44:18
  SPEAKER_01: And so there is immediately pointing towards a good king that's going to come.
• 44:23
  SPEAKER_01: And that's going to be David, because that's where remember these two books were together, Ruth and Judges.
• 44:28
  SPEAKER_01: And so Ruth is the lineage of David.
• 44:30
  SPEAKER_01: Ruth is the great-great-great-grandmother of David.
• 44:33
  SPEAKER_01: But there's also David doesn't fully live up to this, even though he is a good king.
• 44:40
  SPEAKER_01: He doesn't fully set up this, you know, place, this light of the nations that all the nations come to.
• 44:46
  SPEAKER_01: What where actually that kind of happens is actually David's son, the son of David, Solomon, who all the nations do come to see Solomon because the kingdom was great, was in its golden age.
• 44:57
  SPEAKER_01: But then Solomon doesn't leave up to that either.
• 45:00
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 45:01
  SPEAKER_01: And so there's a question: who is the king that is really going to step up to the plate and bring justice, right?
• 45:10
  SPEAKER_01: And be the kind of king Israel needs.
• 45:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, yes.
• 45:13
  SPEAKER_00: So let's let's do a a review again of the um judges.
• 45:18
  SPEAKER_00: You talked about some minor uh judges and then some major judges.
• 45:22
  SPEAKER_00: And what we do know, and you mentioned this, they they get they they get worse over time.
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_00: And so really the first three, first four are uh really seemingly pretty good people that make some um lead the people in the right way.
• 45:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um they're a temporary fix, obviously, we understand that.
• 45:42
  SPEAKER_00: But then they start getting worse and they get bad.
• 45:46
  SPEAKER_00: And you talked about how it climaxes with your namesake uh Samson.
• 45:50
  SPEAKER_00: So so let's go through so people can understand that these are not in a um chronological order, but it gives people also an understanding of who are the six minor judges, what made them minor, by the way, and what made the ones major, by the way.
• 46:02
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 46:03
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so the minor, just they're minor because there's not much said about them.
• 46:06
  SPEAKER_01: That's the only reason they're minor, and the major are the ones there's a lot more.
• 46:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I think it's pretty simple to understand too, even when it comes to minor prophets versus major prophets in the Bible.
• 46:14
  SPEAKER_00: You just look at those and they're just like one or two chapters on Habakkuk or Malachi, and it becomes a minor prophet versus a major prophet, being, you know, uh Ezekiel, uh uh Daniel, yeah, uh Jeremiah, and so forth.
• 46:27
  SPEAKER_00: So absolutely go ahead.
• 46:28
  SPEAKER_01: They're just as important.
• 46:29
  SPEAKER_01: So we start with Shamgar, uh, who killed 600 Philistines with an ox god.
• 46:34
  SPEAKER_01: Great story.
• 46:34
  SPEAKER_01: He's a very resourceful guy.
• 46:37
  SPEAKER_01: Uh then there's Tola, uh, there's Jair, uh, who had was famous for having 30 sons, 30, who rode 30 donkeys and ruled 30 towns, right?
• 46:46
  SPEAKER_01: That's his golden number, 30.
• 46:48
  SPEAKER_01: That's great.
• 46:48
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, then there's Ibzon, uh, there's Elon, and there's Abdon.
• 46:53
  SPEAKER_01: Most of these guys, you're probably these are not household names, okay?
• 46:56
  SPEAKER_01: But then you get to the major prophets, and this is where we see the pattern of the town.
• 47:00
  SPEAKER_01: The major judges.
• 47:01
  SPEAKER_01: The major judge, sorry.
• 47:01
  SPEAKER_01: The major judge, you see the pattern uh get worse and worse, right?
• 47:05
  SPEAKER_01: So Atniel, obviously, we know he's he's related to Caleb.
• 47:09
  SPEAKER_01: Uh he's a good judge.
• 47:10
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the next is Ehud.
• 47:12
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and we'll talk about Ehud here in a second because he's got a fun story, the left-handed guy.
• 47:18
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, then there's Deborah, who's notable as a female judge, a female leader of Israel at this time.
• 47:24
  SPEAKER_01: This is incredible.
• 47:25
  SPEAKER_01: And there's Gideon, who most people are familiar with.
• 47:28
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and uh you start to see uh Gideon kind of start out great, but then kind of not end so great.
• 47:35
  SPEAKER_01: His anger got the best of him.
• 47:36
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 47:37
  SPEAKER_01: And then you see Jephtha, who is not that great, and then it ends with Samson, who is, like I said, the worse.
• 47:46
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and so that kind of rounds it out where you have uh the final judge not really even much of a follower of Yahweh, even though he's given chance after chance.
• 47:54
  SPEAKER_01: But that that gets us into chapter three, which is Ehud.
• 47:58
  SPEAKER_01: And if there was gonna be a comic book made, uh Ehud's story has to be a comic book, okay?
• 48:05
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so here's how it goes.
• 48:07
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, chapter uh three, verse 12.
• 48:09
  SPEAKER_01: It says, Once again the Israelites did evil in the Lord's sight, and the Lord gave King Eglon of Moab control over Israel because of their evil.
• 48:18
  SPEAKER_01: Eglon enlisted the Ammonites and the Amalekites as allies, and they went out and defeated Israel, taking possession of Jericho, the city of Palms, and the Israelites served Eglon of Moab for 18 years.
• 48:32
  SPEAKER_01: But when the people of Israel cried out to the Lord Yahweh for help, the Lord raised again, raised up a rescuer to save them.
• 48:41
  SPEAKER_01: His name was Ehud, son of Gerah, a left-handed man of the tribe of Benjamin.
• 48:47
  SPEAKER_01: So we see right in there the cycle.
• 48:50
  SPEAKER_01: They sin, so they're suffering.
• 48:52
  SPEAKER_01: Eglon is brought in to rule over them, and he's cruel to them, and so they cry out, and God sends them a savior.
• 48:58
  SPEAKER_01: And so here is that cycle happening over and over again.
• 49:02
  SPEAKER_01: And this is the where the story gets interesting uh because Eglon's enemy is or I'm sorry, uh, because Ehud, uh, is his enemy is Eglon, and Eglon, according to the Bible, is a pretty fat guy.
• 49:15
  SPEAKER_01: Uh he's he hasn't taken his azimbic, all right.
• 49:18
  SPEAKER_01: He's he needs to lose some weight.
• 49:20
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and so Ehud sneaks in, or he doesn't really see, he comes in pretending to pay tribute, and he and he says, Hey, I need to tell you a secret.
• 49:29
  SPEAKER_00: He also asks for some private time with him.
• 49:31
  SPEAKER_01: Some private time.
• 49:31
  SPEAKER_00: So they they people kind of leave.
• 49:32
  SPEAKER_00: The king says, Oh, y'all leave me alone, and it gets pretty nasty.
• 49:36
  SPEAKER_01: And so then Ehud comes in, he pulls this a dagger out, the double-edged dagger, and he sticks it into Eglon, and Eglon is so big that the fat rolls over on the hand.
• 49:48
  SPEAKER_01: He can't even pull the the weapon out, he just leaves it and goes.
• 49:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and then it says that all of his poop came out.
• 49:57
  SPEAKER_01: And there he and and it's so bad that the servants outside the door are like, Oh, he must be going to the bathroom right now.
• 50:03
  SPEAKER_00: Well, he was.
• 50:05
  SPEAKER_00: He was.
• 50:06
  SPEAKER_00: And some of you are like, I didn't read that in the Bible.
• 50:09
  SPEAKER_00: Well, it's where it says his the king's bowels.
• 50:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that is that means just what he said.
• 50:15
  SPEAKER_00: I can't say that because I'm trying to teach my grandchildren not to use that word.
• 50:20
  SPEAKER_00: So make sure they don't listen.
• 50:22
  SPEAKER_00: Cover your eyes to this this podcast.
• 50:24
  SPEAKER_00: That's right.
• 50:25
  SPEAKER_00: And but yeah, and so uh then you got uh Deborah, yeah, which is an amazing story of a woman leader that literally leads them not only as um a prophet, yeah, uh, but leads them into battle.
• 50:39
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 50:40
  SPEAKER_00: Now you understand in the scripture, like God was actually trying to find a man, but it's okay, I'm gonna use a woman.
• 50:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and the woman becomes the leader um of the nation of Israel.
• 50:49
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 50:50
  SPEAKER_01: And so you see it right there.
• 50:51
  SPEAKER_01: So after Ehud's death, chapter four, right?
• 50:54
  SPEAKER_01: The they turned, uh, the the Israelites turned away, and it says that King Jabin, uh a Canaanite king, takes over and he starts to rule over the Israelites.
• 51:05
  SPEAKER_01: These are all nations they're supposed to be ruling over, are ruling over them.
• 51:08
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 51:09
  SPEAKER_01: And his uh commander of his army was Sisera, uh, and Sisera had 900 chariots, uh, which think of it like, hey, this is an advanced, they got drone situations, they got tanks.
• 51:21
  SPEAKER_01: This is an advanced army in this day.
• 51:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and so the children of Israel cry out because they don't have any way of defeating these enemies, and they're being ruled over for 20 years ruthlessly.
• 51:32
  SPEAKER_01: And so they cry out, and God uses in verse 4 Deborah, the wife of Lapidath, who was a prophet who was judging Israel at that time.
• 51:42
  SPEAKER_03: Right?
• 51:43
  SPEAKER_01: So there's that cycle again.
• 51:44
  SPEAKER_01: They sin, they because they sin, they suffer, because they suffer, they cry out, and because they cry out, God sends a rescuer and happens to be a woman in this case.
• 51:54
  SPEAKER_01: And Deborah rises as a prophet, as a female judge, and she enlists this guy named Barak or Barak, uh, and he's the commander of Israel.
• 52:03
  SPEAKER_01: And he tells him, Hey, she tells him, Hey, go into battle.
• 52:07
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but he says, Hey, I'll go, but you know, only if you go with me, which, you know, why would you take a prophet into battle?
• 52:14
  SPEAKER_01: Why would you take a girl into battle at this time?
• 52:16
  SPEAKER_00: Well, and the judge, which is basically the leader of the country.
• 52:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 52:19
  SPEAKER_00: And so she she's several things.
• 52:21
  SPEAKER_00: One, she is a prophet first, and then she is a wife, a prophet, uh, then a judge, the premier leader, it'd be like the president of the United States.
• 52:30
  SPEAKER_00: She has the and then now she becomes the military commander.
• 52:33
  SPEAKER_00: Obviously, she's over the military, but now she's like, okay, I'll have to go in and I will lead into battle.
• 52:38
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 52:39
  SPEAKER_01: And Deborah says, Well, very well, you know, I'll go with you, but you will receive no honor in this venture, for the Lord's victory over Siser will be in the hands of a woman.
• 52:48
  SPEAKER_01: Now, that woman actually isn't Deborah, it's actually another woman uh who gets kind of the glory at the end of the day.
• 52:55
  SPEAKER_00: This is a great story.
• 52:56
  SPEAKER_00: This is a great story.
• 52:57
  SPEAKER_00: This is a great story.
• 52:58
  SPEAKER_00: I'm talking about you don't have a woman power.
• 53:00
  SPEAKER_00: You're gonna woman power in this chapter here.
• 53:02
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 53:03
  SPEAKER_00: So tell us what happens.
• 53:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 53:04
  SPEAKER_01: So verse 21.
• 53:06
  SPEAKER_01: So the battle happens, and right away, the children of Israel are winning.
• 53:10
  SPEAKER_01: Uh somehow, it's this is a miracle.
• 53:12
  SPEAKER_01: They have they're just on feet and they're fighting with people with iron chariots, right?
• 53:16
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and somehow they're chasing the chariots, which is a miracle in itself.
• 53:20
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and so Sisera, who's the captain of the army of the enemy, uh, runs away.
• 53:25
  SPEAKER_01: He flees, he's off the chariot, and he runs into the tent uh of a woman named Jael, uh, who is a Kenite.
• 53:32
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, here's another one of those tribes, those people groups that they're supposed to be taking over, but somehow has adopted itself into the nation of Israel.
• 53:41
  SPEAKER_01: She he runs into the tent of Jael and it says this, okay.
• 53:45
  SPEAKER_01: He he asked her for some milk or some water, and she gives him milk, right?
• 53:49
  SPEAKER_01: So that means she's really kind of playing it up.
• 53:52
  SPEAKER_01: He goes to sleep, and it says in verses, but when Sisera fell asleep from exhaustion, Jael quietly crept up to him with a hammer and a tent peg in her hand, and she drove the tent peg through his temple and into the ground, so he died.
• 54:11
  SPEAKER_00: Ouch, that hurts.
• 54:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that makes sense.
• 54:14
  SPEAKER_00: You had a headache reading that.
• 54:16
  SPEAKER_00: Like I feel like, oh my god, I'm gonna have to protect myself.
• 54:20
  SPEAKER_00: I know Crystal comes around and one of the ladies are gonna be like, I protect myself.
• 54:24
  SPEAKER_01: You better just watch it.
• 54:25
  SPEAKER_01: Crystal doesn't have any tent pegs in her hand or a hammer.
• 54:27
  SPEAKER_00: And if you are thinking, who's Crystal?
• 54:29
  SPEAKER_00: Crystal's the one running things right now, so she may shut us off.
• 54:33
  SPEAKER_00: Who knows?
• 54:35
  SPEAKER_01: And so it you always say it, Pastor.
• 54:38
  SPEAKER_01: The Bible's not boring.
• 54:40
  SPEAKER_01: You're boring.
• 54:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, because this is this is one of those comic book action movie stories, okay?
• 54:46
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and then chapter five is one of the longest songs, actually, the longest song by a woman in the Bible, and it's Deborah.
• 54:54
  SPEAKER_01: Deborah sings the song celebrating the victory, and she elevates JL because Jay's the one who saves the day.
• 55:01
  SPEAKER_01: A woman gets the glory.
• 55:03
  SPEAKER_00: So good, so good.
• 55:04
  SPEAKER_00: Love this.
• 55:05
  SPEAKER_00: I love God's word.
• 55:06
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I don't know why people uh don't embrace and love God's word.
• 55:13
  SPEAKER_00: I just to me, it's just the most wonderful gift that's been given to mankind is the word of God.
• 55:22
  SPEAKER_00: And so let's let's dive into uh Gideon.
• 55:25
  SPEAKER_00: Now, we don't have time to cover everybody.
• 55:27
  SPEAKER_00: We're not we're not even gonna dive into Samson.
• 55:28
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think, and actually, I think most people listen.
• 55:31
  SPEAKER_00: If you know any of these characters, Samson's gonna be the one you're gonna know the most.
• 55:35
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, you've heard him talked about, preached about over the years.
• 55:38
  SPEAKER_01: You've seen the movie.
• 55:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you've seen the there you go.
• 55:40
  SPEAKER_00: You've seen the movie.
• 55:42
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but Gideon, let's let's talk a little bit about Gideon uh as we kind of wrap up the book of Judges.
• 55:46
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 55:47
  SPEAKER_01: So Gideon's story is in chapter six, and it kind of goes from chapter six to chapter nine.
• 55:51
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, it's an interesting story.
• 55:53
  SPEAKER_01: So during this time, the Midianites are the ones that are oppressing the children of Israel.
• 55:58
  SPEAKER_01: Once again, another nation within the Canaanite people.
• 56:00
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and they're oppressing, and they're especially cruel.
• 56:03
  SPEAKER_01: They're essentially uh starving out uh the children of Israel.
• 56:06
  SPEAKER_01: Anytime there's a harvest, there's crops, they come in and they take it all, they take away their animals, all of it.
• 56:12
  SPEAKER_01: And so Israel is reduced to starvation, is what verse six of chapter six says uh by the Midianites, and the Israelites cried out.
• 56:19
  SPEAKER_01: So here's that pattern the Israelites did evil in the sight of God.
• 56:22
  SPEAKER_01: God raises up, they cry out, God raises up a savior, and that's Gideon.
• 56:27
  SPEAKER_01: And it says in verse 12 that the angel of the Lord appeared to him, to Gideon, and said, Mighty hero, the Lord is with you.
• 56:36
  SPEAKER_01: Now here's the thing Gideon is not doing anything mighty, particularly at this very moment.
• 56:40
  SPEAKER_01: It says Gideon is actually hiding uh and threshing wheat uh while this is happening in the wine press.
• 56:47
  SPEAKER_01: So the wine press was typically this little concave, caved-in area.
• 56:51
  SPEAKER_01: And so he's he's trying to thresh out wheat, he's trying to make, you know, get food, flour, right?
• 56:56
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and he's doing it in hiding.
• 56:58
  SPEAKER_01: And so while he's hiding, the angel comes to him of the Lord and says, mighty man of valor, right?
• 57:04
  SPEAKER_01: Mighty hero.
• 57:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and either he's making fun of him, but I don't think that's what's happening.
• 57:09
  SPEAKER_00: No, no, no, no, no.
• 57:10
  SPEAKER_00: God, God is speaking what he sees in us.
• 57:13
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 57:14
  SPEAKER_00: And every single person, listen, no matter what you feel about yourself, no matter what other people have said over you, uh, no matter what your failures have created inside of you, uh, know this that your identity is not determined by those things, it's by what God says about you.
• 57:33
  SPEAKER_00: And you got to embrace that.
• 57:34
  SPEAKER_00: You got to walk in it, you got to realize that God has got special, wonderful plans for you.
• 57:42
  SPEAKER_00: And and that's the same with Gideon.
• 57:44
  SPEAKER_00: I think Gideon's a great example of that.
• 57:46
  SPEAKER_01: And it's interesting because what Gideon says shows you kind of Gideon's who he is.
• 57:50
  SPEAKER_01: Because Gideon is scared of the Midianites, because that's why he's hiding, right?
• 57:52
  SPEAKER_01: He's scared of the Midianites, but he's not scared of God at this moment.
• 57:56
  SPEAKER_01: Um, because the thing that he says back to God or to the angel of the Lord is he says, Well, if you're with me, if you're with us, then why are we suffering?
• 58:06
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 58:07
  SPEAKER_01: Why are bad things happening to us?
• 58:09
  SPEAKER_01: Now, forget the fact that it says that Israel was living in sin, right?
• 58:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 58:14
  SPEAKER_01: Don't we ask the same question sometimes?
• 58:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 58:16
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 58:17
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's it might be our fault, but we're willing to put the blame on God.
• 58:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 58:20
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 58:21
  SPEAKER_01: And so then you see uh Gideon is interesting because he's uh he's brave at moments, but he's also scared at moments.
• 58:28
  SPEAKER_01: And Gideon constantly needs kind of this reassurance, he needs signs, and so there's three kind of big signs that happen.
• 58:34
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, one is um Gideon realizes this might be an angel from the Lord, so he says, Hey, wait right here, let me go get you some food, right?
• 58:41
  SPEAKER_01: And he comes and he brings it to serve food.
• 58:44
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and it's it's a lot of food.
• 58:45
  SPEAKER_01: And you got to think there, these people are starving at this time, and so Gideon's gift is a pretty good one, right?
• 58:50
  SPEAKER_01: To the Lord.
• 58:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and so he puts it on the rock and it says angel lord touches it, and send fire from heaven comes and it burns up all the food as a sacrifice to Yahweh.
• 58:59
  SPEAKER_01: And then at that point, Gideon's like, oh my god, like literally, oh my god.
• 59:03
  SPEAKER_01: This I just looked at the angel Lord face to face, and I'm alive somehow, right?
• 59:09
  SPEAKER_01: He's scared now, and he realized the second sign uh is the sign of the fleece.
• 59:14
  SPEAKER_01: And you might have you know heard about this before.
• 59:17
  SPEAKER_01: This is a famous one, uh, where he kind of asked for the same sign twice backwards, right?
• 59:22
  SPEAKER_01: The first is uh he's he says, God, if you really want to use me, can you you know put the fleece on the ground?
• 59:27
  SPEAKER_01: And I think it was the first, he's like, make the fleece wet and the ground dry, and then vice versa, the second time around, but he needs another sign, right?
• 59:34
  SPEAKER_01: And I think we we operate that way sometimes from God when we're really scared about something.
• 59:39
  SPEAKER_01: We're like, God, can you please send me a sign?
• 59:41
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 59:41
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and then the last sign that you see in the story of Gideon is towards the end of the story when right before Israel goes into battle, um, where Gideon and one other man sneaks into the the camp of the enemy.
• 59:53
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and in the camp, he overhears two soldiers talking about a dream that one soldier has, uh, and suddenly it Gideon sees that God is on the move, right?
• 1:00:04
  SPEAKER_01: And so he needs reassurance.
• 1:00:06
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but I don't know, Pastor, if you if you've ever operated this way, I know there's been times I've asked for God for signs um or some sort of clear this is it, you know.
• 1:00:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um or maybe you've talked to people, how do you encourage somebody who's just like, I just kind of wish God would give me a sign like he just did for Gideon?
• 1:00:22
  SPEAKER_01: Because he doesn't always do that for us.
• 1:00:24
  SPEAKER_00: Uh no, he doesn't.
• 1:00:26
  SPEAKER_00: Uh he he matter of fact, oftentimes he doesn't want to give us a sign because he wants us just to trust him.
• 1:00:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 1:00:32
  SPEAKER_00: He wants us just to obey his word, not to and and sometimes he does.
• 1:00:36
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I I I can't explain why he chooses it other than this.
• 1:00:40
  SPEAKER_00: God knows what's best and he knows um what we need uh to be able to and for him, that that's an amazing it's just let's just take and look at Gideon's uh army.
• 1:00:52
  SPEAKER_00: So he he he gives the call after he realizes all this stuff, he gives the call.
• 1:00:56
  SPEAKER_00: And actually, the um he had already made the call before the dream happened and all this stuff.
• 1:01:01
  SPEAKER_00: So it was in between the fleece and the enemy's dream that he calls together the people of Israel that want 32,000 men show up, yeah, which is active a very small number of the men of Israel, but that many shows up, which uh okay, I got that many, but you're going up against over 300,000, the 400,000 men.
• 1:01:19
  SPEAKER_00: Scripture says.
• 1:01:20
  SPEAKER_00: And then of course God tells him that's too many.
• 1:01:23
  SPEAKER_00: Like that doesn't make sense.
• 1:01:25
  SPEAKER_00: You're dealing you got 10% or less than what they have, but now you got too many.
• 1:01:29
  SPEAKER_00: So he says to them, if you're scared, go home, and 22,000 people go home.
• 1:01:34
  SPEAKER_00: Now you got 10,000 men.
• 1:01:36
  SPEAKER_00: And so he's like, Okay, God still says this is too many.
• 1:01:40
  SPEAKER_00: So he gives them a test, and that's the drinking out of the um out of the river, yeah, drinking from the water, uh, test.
• 1:01:46
  SPEAKER_00: And whoever laps it up like a dog uh from the hand, those who kneel down, you know, basically just he's separating them on how they drink.
• 1:01:54
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 1:01:54
  SPEAKER_00: And I think it's funny that getting gets the dog people, right?
• 1:01:58
  SPEAKER_01: I know, yeah.
• 1:01:59
  SPEAKER_01: He gets the the ones that lap it up like a dog, that's the ones he gets.
• 1:02:02
  SPEAKER_00: Well, you know, it almost speaks to God saying, I'm giving you the worst of the worst.
• 1:02:06
  unknown: Yeah.
• 1:02:06
  SPEAKER_00: There you go.
• 1:02:07
  SPEAKER_00: There you go.
• 1:02:08
  SPEAKER_00: And but why does he do that?
• 1:02:10
  SPEAKER_00: To prove that he is God.
• 1:02:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:02:14
  SPEAKER_00: To realize that you do not do this by your might or your power, but it's by the Spirit of the Lord.
• 1:02:18
  SPEAKER_00: That's right.
• 1:02:19
  SPEAKER_00: So 9,700 go home, you got 300 men left.
• 1:02:21
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 1:02:22
  SPEAKER_00: And then God says, Okay, now you're ready.
• 1:02:23
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 1:02:24
  SPEAKER_00: And like, I'm thinking, no, I'm not ready.
• 1:02:26
  SPEAKER_00: And you talked about the dream already.
• 1:02:27
  SPEAKER_00: God moves to the dream.
• 1:02:28
  SPEAKER_00: He he goes down, like, is this really happening?
• 1:02:30
  SPEAKER_00: He goes down to the dream.
• 1:02:31
  SPEAKER_00: And then the dream, so people ask, What is what is the dream?
• 1:02:34
  SPEAKER_00: The dream was this guy's in a tent and he's sleeping and he has the dream of a dinner roll.
• 1:02:39
  SPEAKER_00: Come on.
• 1:02:40
  SPEAKER_00: Like just a dinner roll that was huge and enormous, rolling down the hill and crushes the whole camp.
• 1:02:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:02:45
  SPEAKER_00: Which is like, why does I mean God chooses some of the most crazy things to move?
• 1:02:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:02:53
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, throughout the Bible, God doesn't repeat the same thing every time.
• 1:02:58
  SPEAKER_00: And it's just key to remember because sometimes when God moves in our life, we expect him to move in the future the way he moved in the past.
• 1:03:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:03:05
  SPEAKER_00: And he doesn't.
• 1:03:05
  SPEAKER_00: He always is going to have creative new ways in how he's moving.
• 1:03:09
  SPEAKER_00: And so therefore, getting like, okay, and it goes back up, the men get ready and they have their instruments ready, their horn, they got their um jar and their fire that they're going to light with and crush it and lit, and and then here they're kind of spread out around the hillside in groups of 50, I think.
• 1:03:29
  SPEAKER_00: And then all of a sudden, there's this just roar that goes out from blowing.
• 1:03:33
  SPEAKER_00: And then in the camp, you got the combination of the video the um the dream that somebody had that begins to spread around the camp.
• 1:03:40
  SPEAKER_00: Come on.
• 1:03:41
  SPEAKER_00: Then the combination of the blowing of the horns and then the smashing of the jars and the lighting of these things.
• 1:03:47
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, they're just like, and they went crazy.
• 1:03:50
  SPEAKER_00: And in their chaos, they begin to kill each other.
• 1:03:52
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 1:03:53
  SPEAKER_00: And they begin to wipe each other out.
• 1:03:54
  SPEAKER_00: Many of them begin fled, but most of them begin to just because it's dark, they don't have time to light everything.
• 1:03:59
  SPEAKER_00: There's like they just begin to fight among each other and they're killing each other.
• 1:04:02
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:04:03
  SPEAKER_00: And God gets an incredible victory.
• 1:04:05
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 1:04:06
  SPEAKER_01: And so Gideon starts and his army starts chasing these people, and they start calling at that point, they start calling the surrounding tribes that are there to come and attack, right?
• 1:04:15
  SPEAKER_01: And so uh they start to attack, and so God gives them this incredible victory.
• 1:04:19
  SPEAKER_01: So Gideon's story at this point is this amazing story of someone who was scared at the very beginning, but God sees the courage in him, God calls it out of him, he steps up to the plate, amazing victory.
• 1:04:33
  SPEAKER_01: And you wish that's kind of the way the story would end.
• 1:04:36
  SPEAKER_00: No, Gideon has a horrible decline.
• 1:04:39
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 1:04:39
  SPEAKER_00: You've seen the hand of God work, yeah, but yet you still choose to live life your way.
• 1:04:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:04:46
  SPEAKER_00: So go ahead.
• 1:04:47
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:04:47
  SPEAKER_01: So then at the end of chapter eight, uh, you see Gideon decides when he comes back home.
• 1:04:53
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so in in chapter eight, there is this Gideon acting in anger, or he's frustrated some people that didn't fight with him, and so he kills them.
• 1:05:00
  SPEAKER_01: And these are Israelites, fellow Israelites that he kills, right?
• 1:05:03
  SPEAKER_01: So he's acting in anger, and he even asks his son, who is a seems like a young person, to come and actually kill.
• 1:05:10
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and he doesn't because he's too scared.
• 1:05:12
  SPEAKER_01: Um, those are the the enemy uh kings.
• 1:05:15
  SPEAKER_01: But then he gets acts in anger, kills uh his own Israelite, fellow Israelites, because they didn't help at the time he needed help.
• 1:05:22
  SPEAKER_01: And then finally, when there's victory, it says that Gideon, as his reward, asked for earrings from each one of the men.
• 1:05:28
  SPEAKER_01: And he it says in verse 27, Gideon made a sacred ephod uh from gold and put it in offer.
• 1:05:35
  SPEAKER_01: And that's where God appeared to him, right?
• 1:05:37
  SPEAKER_01: In his hometown.
• 1:05:38
  SPEAKER_01: So an ephod was something that a priest wore um as a way of somehow hearing from God.
• 1:05:45
  SPEAKER_01: We don't know exactly the mechanics of it, but it was a way of them hearing.
• 1:05:48
  SPEAKER_01: And so the high priest would wear an ephod uh, and it was a symbol of Israel, uh, and it was also a symbol of God speaking to this high priest.
• 1:05:56
  SPEAKER_01: And so for some reason, Gideon decides to build one for himself, for his home.
• 1:06:00
  SPEAKER_01: And he sets it up.
• 1:06:01
  SPEAKER_01: And it doesn't seem like maybe Gideon has ill intentions with this, but you actually see it says in verse 27 but soon all the Israelites prostituted themselves by worshiping it, the ephod, and it became a trap for Gideon and his family.
• 1:06:18
  SPEAKER_01: And so what seems like started off as this kind of innocent thing becomes a trap for his own family and for all of Israel.
• 1:06:26
  SPEAKER_01: They start worshiping the stupid thing.
• 1:06:29
  SPEAKER_01: How sad is that?
• 1:06:31
  SPEAKER_00: Sad.
• 1:06:32
  SPEAKER_00: So sad.
• 1:06:34
  SPEAKER_01: And then you see the further decline of Gideon.
• 1:06:37
  SPEAKER_01: And you see it in actually in the following verses.
• 1:06:40
  SPEAKER_01: It says that when Gideon returns home, verse 29, he had verse 30, he had 70 sons born to him, for he had many wives.
• 1:06:49
  SPEAKER_01: So Gideon is multiplying wives.
• 1:06:52
  SPEAKER_01: And he also had a concubine in Shechem, which is another town, and who gave birth to a son whom he named Abimelech.
• 1:07:01
  SPEAKER_01: Now, why is this one person named?
• 1:07:04
  SPEAKER_01: And it's just a son of a concubine, right?
• 1:07:06
  SPEAKER_01: A concubine wasn't even a wife, it was essentially a slave woman, right?
• 1:07:11
  SPEAKER_01: And so why is this person highlighted?
• 1:07:13
  SPEAKER_01: Well, unfortunately, is because this person, Abimelech, is going to be a thorn in the side of Gideon's family.
• 1:07:20
  SPEAKER_01: Abimelech in chapter nine is gonna rise up and he's gonna lead uh ten men and he's gonna go and he's gonna kill all but one of Gideon's 70 sons.
• 1:07:31
  SPEAKER_01: He's gonna try to wipe out the lineage of Gideon, right?
• 1:07:35
  SPEAKER_01: And so the legacy of Gideon dies with his sons because of Gideon's compromise.
• 1:07:42
  SPEAKER_00: Your sins will find you out.
• 1:07:44
  SPEAKER_00: Come on, your sins will find you out.
• 1:07:47
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so we're kind of wrapping up the book of Judges, and the book of Judges basically ends um with it's horribly sad.
• 1:07:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but it also kind of ends with a sense of like maybe there is a king coming.
• 1:08:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and obviously there would be a king David.
• 1:08:07
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 1:08:07
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but that was a temporary fix.
• 1:08:10
  SPEAKER_00: That's right.
• 1:08:11
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but it was pointing to a future king, yeah, King Jesus.
• 1:08:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:08:15
  SPEAKER_00: It's so good.
• 1:08:16
  SPEAKER_00: It's so good.
• 1:08:17
  SPEAKER_00: So let's let's move on to Psalms, okay?
• 1:08:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um, we we're gonna wrap this thing up a little bit here, but let's look at the book of Psalms 119.
• 1:08:25
  SPEAKER_00: All right, and um pick me up, give me a verse there, kind of what what it speaks to you.
• 1:08:30
  SPEAKER_01: You know, this is one of my favorite verses, Psalm 119, verse 105, probably familiar with it.
• 1:08:35
  SPEAKER_01: It says, Your word is a lamp to guide my feet and a light for my path.
• 1:08:41
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, you know, if when you read Psalm 119, you see the psalmist love for God's word.
• 1:08:46
  SPEAKER_01: Uh his love, and at that point, it's just the Old Testament word, right?
• 1:08:50
  SPEAKER_01: The laws of Moses, right?
• 1:08:52
  SPEAKER_01: But there is a love for God's word.
• 1:08:55
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and he says it is God's word is a lamp to guide my feet, it is a light for my path.
• 1:09:02
  SPEAKER_01: And the truth is, when we are looking like Gideon for signs and saying, God, would you speak to me?
• 1:09:07
  SPEAKER_01: Would you give direction?
• 1:09:08
  SPEAKER_01: I'll just challenge you to go to God's word first, right?
• 1:09:12
  SPEAKER_01: Open up his word and just listen.
• 1:09:15
  SPEAKER_01: It's amazing how many times, Pastor Rodney, I know you've had this happen too, where man, there it's not like when you open up, and it's maybe it would be more of a miracle if I randomly open up and stick my finger somewhere and there's a verse, right?
• 1:09:26
  SPEAKER_01: But whenever I'm reading, actually from our scripture reading, a lot of times I might be dealing with something or be challenged by something.
• 1:09:32
  SPEAKER_01: It just happens to be that particular verse, that particular scripture in that morning.
• 1:09:37
  SPEAKER_01: It's good, is what I need for that day.
• 1:09:39
  SPEAKER_01: So good.
• 1:09:40
  SPEAKER_01: Or that moment or that decision.
• 1:09:41
  SPEAKER_01: So good.
• 1:09:41
  SPEAKER_01: That happens more often than I could count.
• 1:09:43
  SPEAKER_01: Ooh.
• 1:09:44
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 1:09:44
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm I'm gonna give a kind of a quick overview of uh 119.
• 1:09:48
  SPEAKER_00: It is the center of the Bible.
• 1:09:49
  SPEAKER_00: Let me let me just, I'm just gonna, it's it's a masterpiece.
• 1:09:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:09:53
  SPEAKER_00: Uh both theologically rich, um, artistically crafted.
• 1:10:00
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, it is the longest chapter in the Bible, if you don't know.
• 1:10:04
  SPEAKER_00: And put it this way, if you start reading it, you realize it.
• 1:10:07
  SPEAKER_00: That's why in our daily reading plan, we broke it up to several days.
• 1:10:10
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:10:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and it's devoted to the power and beauty of God's word.
• 1:10:16
  SPEAKER_00: Heaven and earth pass away, but God's word remains.
• 1:10:19
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm gonna give you C seven key things uh from Psalms 119.
• 1:10:23
  SPEAKER_00: And one, it's the longest chapter in the Bible.
• 1:10:25
  SPEAKER_00: I've already mentioned that, 176 verses.
• 1:10:28
  SPEAKER_00: It's divided into 22 sections.
• 1:10:30
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 1:10:30
  SPEAKER_00: And each one of those sections, if you look, each one of the sections, there's a word there that, like, what is that word?
• 1:10:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's actually the out Hebrew alphabet.
• 1:10:37
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 1:10:38
  SPEAKER_00: And so there's 22 uh letters in the Hebrew alphabet.
• 1:10:42
  SPEAKER_00: Unlike the English language, there's 26, okay, uh, but um, 22.
• 1:10:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and each section has eight verses.
• 1:10:52
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 1:10:52
  SPEAKER_00: And every verse within the section begins with the same Hebrew letter.
• 1:10:57
  SPEAKER_00: Just just brilliant.
• 1:10:59
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 1:10:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:10:59
  SPEAKER_00: And to really be able to dive into it, and of course, you don't know that unless you study the Hebrew.
• 1:11:03
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't study the Hebrew, you've got some Hebrew uh behind you.
• 1:11:07
  SPEAKER_00: Um but but there's still so much, so many resources today that you can learn this stuff.
• 1:11:12
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 1:11:13
  SPEAKER_00: And um the the structure is ordered, it has completeness, uh memorability of it, it's just the flow of it.
• 1:11:21
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and it's just showing um that life with God's word covers everything from A to Z in our life.
• 1:11:30
  SPEAKER_01: Come on, wow.
• 1:11:31
  SPEAKER_01: Oof.
• 1:11:32
  SPEAKER_00: And so secondly, it's uh an acrostic poem poem, which basically um is about God's word, and nearly every verse except just a few uh refers to God's word uh using semonyms like law or Torah, um statutes, precepts, commands, testimonies, decrees, word, promise, all of those are speaking to uh God's word.
• 1:12:00
  SPEAKER_00: And the psalm is a is a love song.
• 1:12:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, uh, the psalm is to the scripture.
• 1:12:05
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 1:12:05
  SPEAKER_00: It's just a way of just expressing the love for God's word and celebrating how it shapes every part of our life.
• 1:12:12
  SPEAKER_00: And three, the central theme is loving and living by God's word.
• 1:12:17
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 1:12:18
  SPEAKER_00: And the writer who is possibly David, maybe Ezra, but here's what we do know is that all the Psalms, uh, basically 71 of them, 72 probably, are written by David and they're confirmed uh by King David, Shepherd Boy David, King David.
• 1:12:35
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but but even the rest of them are influenced heavily by David.
• 1:12:40
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 1:12:41
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 1:12:42
  SPEAKER_00: And so it speaks to a deep affection and dependence on God's word.
• 1:12:47
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, verse number 97 in our reading um this week is, Oh, how I love your law.
• 1:12:54
  SPEAKER_00: Exclamation point.
• 1:12:55
  SPEAKER_02: Come on.
• 1:12:55
  SPEAKER_00: I meditate on it all day long.
• 1:12:58
  SPEAKER_00: Come on.
• 1:12:59
  SPEAKER_00: This is a relationship.
• 1:13:01
  SPEAKER_00: It's speaking to um obedience, not as a duty, but out of love to God.
• 1:13:06
  SPEAKER_02: Come on.
• 1:13:07
  SPEAKER_00: And then number four, it emphasizes the transforming power of scripture.
• 1:13:10
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, God's word, he speaks just words like this.
• 1:13:13
  SPEAKER_00: He guides, which you already covered in verse 105, purifies in verse number nine.
• 1:13:18
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, that word of I hid my heart that I might not sin against God.
• 1:13:21
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, strengthens, uh, my soul melts with heaviness, strengthen me, according to your word, oh God.
• 1:13:30
  SPEAKER_00: Verse number 28 comforts us in verse number 50.
• 1:13:33
  SPEAKER_00: Beautiful.
• 1:13:34
  SPEAKER_00: And number five is that it portrays the life of a fully devoted follower of God.
• 1:13:41
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 1:13:42
  SPEAKER_00: And it today is a fully devoted follower of Jesus Christ.
• 1:13:45
  SPEAKER_02: Come on.
• 1:13:45
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, the psalmist walks through seasons of affliction, uh, opposition, and testing, yet continually clings to God's word.
• 1:13:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:13:53
  SPEAKER_00: And you find the rhythms of honesty, struggle, surrender throughout there.
• 1:13:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it's beautiful.
• 1:13:59
  SPEAKER_00: And number six, it shows that obedience brings blessing in our life.
• 1:14:04
  SPEAKER_02: Amen.
• 1:14:05
  SPEAKER_00: The psalmist opens in verse one and two.
• 1:14:08
  SPEAKER_00: Blessed are those whose ways are blameless, who walk according to the law of the Lord.
• 1:14:15
  SPEAKER_00: Blessed means happy, it means fulfilled, it means flourishing, it means fruitful, it means all those things that really we all want in life.
• 1:14:22
  SPEAKER_00: And obedience isn't burdensome.
• 1:14:24
  SPEAKER_00: It emphasizes that it should be a joy, a joy that brings freedom, stability in our lives.
• 1:14:33
  SPEAKER_00: And then also at basically Psalms 119 anticipates Jesus, the living word who would come.
• 1:14:40
  SPEAKER_00: Psalms 119 points forward to Christ, who perfectly embodies the word of God.
• 1:14:47
  SPEAKER_00: Because we talk about, you know, this example, Jesus actually lived this out perfectly.
• 1:14:53
  SPEAKER_00: None of us do.
• 1:14:54
  SPEAKER_00: We're in progress, uh, we're being purified, we're being worked, but Jesus lived it out perfectly.
• 1:14:59
  SPEAKER_00: He fulfilled the law, he lived the law, he was the word made flesh.
• 1:15:06
  SPEAKER_00: And every verse throughout this delights in the word that is to come.
• 1:15:12
  SPEAKER_00: The essence, it's delighting in Jesus, the ultimate revelation of who God is among us.
• 1:15:18
  SPEAKER_01: Come on.
• 1:15:18
  SPEAKER_01: Pastor Rodney, how is it, because I I've I know uh I've heard people ask this question, but how do you cultivate that love for God's word?
• 1:15:31
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I think just reading the word is not going to be enough.
• 1:15:35
  SPEAKER_00: I think that you do read the word of God, but you have to ask God to give you a heart for the things of God.
• 1:15:42
  SPEAKER_00: And because uh otherwise it can just become memorization, it becomes information versus inspiration.
• 1:15:49
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, there has to be a moment that we are we have an encounter with God.
• 1:15:53
  SPEAKER_00: And I even, you know, heard one of our um pastors today, one of our resident pastors, uh, Pastor LeJo talk about that.
• 1:16:00
  SPEAKER_00: Is that there's a big difference between this transactional and a transformational relationship, yeah.
• 1:16:06
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, between having information and having an encounter with God.
• 1:16:11
  SPEAKER_00: And I would just encourage people that are listening to ask God to show himself real to you.
• 1:16:17
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:16:17
  SPEAKER_00: Ask him to show himself through the scripture.
• 1:16:20
  SPEAKER_00: And it's amazing how things would just jump out.
• 1:16:23
  SPEAKER_00: And um, but we need to have an encounter with a living being, with the God of this universe who wants to live inside of us and ignite a fire in us.
• 1:16:32
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:16:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:16:33
  SPEAKER_01: I, you know, I think for me, one of the things I I've seen is the more I study God's word, the more passionate, the more I love it.
• 1:16:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 1:16:41
  SPEAKER_01: You know, and so doing things like this, even sharing this with other people, talking to people about uh God's word, uh, that's how you cultivate that love, that heart uh for God's word.
• 1:16:52
  SPEAKER_01: Because it there's nothing more powerful, like you said, um, like Jesus said, uh, everything else will pass away, but my word remains.
• 1:17:00
  SPEAKER_00: So let's wrap up with uh two Proverbs, okay?
• 1:17:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um I'm gonna go Proverbs chapter 27, verse number one, and also Proverbs 27, verse number two.
• 1:17:09
  SPEAKER_00: This is from my personal reading, my writing.
• 1:17:11
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, don't brag about tomorrow since you don't know what the day will bring as Proverbs 27 and verse 1.
• 1:17:17
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:17:17
  SPEAKER_00: Powerful.
• 1:17:18
  SPEAKER_00: I just wrote, Don't brag.
• 1:17:19
  SPEAKER_00: Boasting about things beyond your control is empty and unwise.
• 1:17:24
  SPEAKER_00: Instead, humbly walk by trusting Jesus with your future and boasting only in him.
• 1:17:29
  SPEAKER_00: He alone knows what tomorrow holds and how to prepare you for it.
• 1:17:34
  SPEAKER_00: And then also Proverbs 27 and verse number two, let someone else praise you, not your own lips, not your own mouth, a stranger, not your own lips.
• 1:17:43
  SPEAKER_00: And I wrote, It is so challenging to resist um not tooting my own horn.
• 1:17:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:17:51
  SPEAKER_00: I want to create, I want credit for what I've done, and I desire others to acknowledge my accomplishments.
• 1:17:57
  SPEAKER_00: I like being seen and recognized at least at some level, but this is not the way of a follower of Jesus.
• 1:18:05
  SPEAKER_00: They are okay with realizing that God sees everything and waiting for him to bring the good they've done to light.
• 1:18:15
  SPEAKER_00: Come on.
• 1:18:16
  SPEAKER_02: Amen.
• 1:18:16
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 1:18:17
  SPEAKER_01: Amen, amen.
• 1:18:17
  SPEAKER_00: We made it through.
• 1:18:18
  SPEAKER_00: We did it.
• 1:18:19
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you very much.
• 1:18:20
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 1:18:21
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, looking forward to next week for North Bible Recap.
• 1:18:25
  SPEAKER_00: I'm so glad you joined us today.
• 1:18:27
  SPEAKER_00: Let us know what you're getting from this.
• 1:18:29
  SPEAKER_00: Share it with somebody, and we'll see you next week.