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Does God Make You Sick? · Red Couch Theology

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Hello, hello, and welcome to another episode of the Red Couch
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Theology Podcast. Hey, this week on our episode,
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we're talking about some miracles.
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We're talking about the strange statement that Jesus makes to a
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healed man about, hey, if you keep sinning, worse stuff's
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going to happen to you, and so you better stop sinning.
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Otherwise worse things than being lame are going to happen
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to you. And what does he mean by that?
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Is Jesus going to harm him or something?
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Or is what's worse than being lame?
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What's up with all of that? All right, without any further
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ado, let's dive right into the episode.
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Hello. Hello.
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Welcome to the show, the Red Couch Theology podcast.
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And if you're in the wrong, if that's not the class you signed
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up for, then you're in the wrong class.
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The red couch. Do you ever have professors do
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that? You know, I, my immerses were
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pretty small. Yeah.
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But we also, hilariously had, like, in theory, about like,
1:00
three times the number, four times the number signed up on
1:03
paper because we had a lot of people coming from different
1:06
continents. And so we never knew who was
1:08
going to turn up. It was quite fun, really
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interesting. A lot of African pastors would
1:14
come to my seminary. Yeah, because it had a
1:16
reputation. The guy had done a lot of stuff
1:18
in Africa, so they'd come there, but you just never knew who'd
1:21
get a visa at the end of the day.
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So they'd be like, we're coming, and then they just wouldn't
1:24
come. They just wouldn't come.
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All right, so I'm going to go fix the camera.
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What's wrong with the camera? Do I look more tan than you
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again? No, we both look way too white.
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It's a problem and that's a problem.
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But before I fix the camera I would just like to point out
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I've I've done the analytics and I'm right the video is better.
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How did you do those analytics? Just how many views we get in
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one versus the other and listens.
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Interesting. My video peeps out there showing
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up for me and all of the time where Alex is like, no one's
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seeing this why do you care? That that that is not what I
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said. I simply said you only care
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about the video. No, I just so.
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If you're out there and listening and not watching, I
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love you and Aaron does not. Well, if you're watching and not
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just listening, then Alex doesn't love you as much.
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That's not what I'm saying. I am saying that I I love both
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mediums. But you know, you're always
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like, oh, the video people, the video people, the video people.
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So if you're there on video, we love you.
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I mean, we love you. All right, right.
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So this week, this week on the episode, here's a couple things
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we're going to be talking about, at least to start, right.
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And no guarantee once we get rolling, all bats are off.
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We have no idea where we're going, but I'm trying this new
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thing where we start with something.
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Yeah, rather than find it 30 minutes in.
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That's unbelievable. So you're like a man?
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Who found a field that was full of a Pearl of great price?
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Oh man, we're getting off the rails already.
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I didn't even said what we're doing.
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OK, so there's this line, there's this weird section in
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the passage you preached where Jesus finds him in the temple
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afterwards. Like the guy doesn't know what
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in the world happened. Like they, the religious leaders
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say, like why are you carrying your mat that's working on the
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Sabbath? And they said it more like, why
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are you carrying your mat? That's I love that voice.
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I've never heard that from you. That voice needs to come out
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more often. But anyway.
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And then later Jesus found him in the temple and said to him,
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see you are well again, stop sinning or something worse may
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happen. So the question is what do we do
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with Jesus warning the man that he should stop sinning or
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something worse then then being disabled theoretically might
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happen to him? Is Jesus blaming the man for his
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own disability? Yeah.
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Yeah. So that's one question we're.
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Going to talk about so we want to.
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I'm going to give a few previews.
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I got it. Got it.
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Yeah. Yeah.
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And then one listen or one person would love to know what
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damson berries are. We'll talk about that and then
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how do I reconcile moments when I pray for a miracle but don't
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see the outcome I hope for? So miracles, do they really
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happen? I prayed really hard.
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I prayed for a long time. Nothing happened, all that
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stuff. So that's some of the things
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that I'm going to ask Alex. I wish there was a way you could
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vote them up or something so that we could like prioritize
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them. But we're going to talk about
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all of them. How's that sound?
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Let's do it. So let's dive into this, the
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maybe the more tense one, text based one.
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Yeah. So yeah, what do you what we got
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on this? Here's the oh, oh, I'm going to
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fix that. I'm going to put on the screen
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in a second, but yeah. So so one I would say to me,
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this passage also nudges in the direction of like healing is not
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Jesus great purpose or greatest purpose.
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Like interestingly, we tend to, I think by nature, focus on the
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healings. But the lame man healed will one
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day become old enough that his legs no longer function.
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The blind man one day will no longer be able to see again.
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Lazarus, raised from the dead, will one day die again.
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And you might step into a puddle of mud and your shoes do get
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dirty. Yeah.
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Imagine that and if. You don't know what I'm talking
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about, Alex. Alex made this hysterical thing
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where he's like, was this a miracle?
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And he tells a story and it's like, oh, intriguing.
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And then there's another one. Was this a miracle?
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Oh, intriguing. And then the end he's like, last
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week I stepped in a puddle of mud with my white new shoes that
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you can see maybe on camera, and they didn't get dirty.
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Miracle or not miracle? Exactly.
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Yeah, who knows? Sorry.
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So eventually all those all of those miracles will become
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undone, even the watering turned into wine will be drunk and
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gone. And so I think there are like
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the miracles point to who Jesus is.
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They give life back to people who feel like life is, you know,
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painful and difficult. And so they're beautiful gifts.
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But as Jesus starts to talk more about where these signs are
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pointing, he clearly starts to point out the greatest miracle
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of all, which is resurrection and, and that promises a life
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that doesn't fade. So I, I think like somewhere,
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there's probably some language here the, the Jesus is, is
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pointing at. I think it's a bit like in the
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synoptics. I'm trying to remember if it's
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in all of them or just one of them.
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What's the synoptic? Sorry, the the three other
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biographies of Jesus, Matthew, Mark and Luke, I think this, I
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can't remember. It's in all of them.
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He says things like what do you gain if you gain the whole world
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and lose your soul? Yeah, this is like kind of
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language like that. What do you gain if you gain the
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ability to walk but lose your soul Again, That's that's my
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guess. Other people might point to the
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fact that sometimes in the stories across Scripture,
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someone who's had an experience of God is judged more severely
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for their actions than someone who hasn't.
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So you know, there's like you've been given grace, like whatever
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you do, don't go back to all patterns and find that you know
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that something worse comes upon you.
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So I think it seems to perform another a few functions in the
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text me the one is this miracle isn't the thing above all things
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OK, and two, that theoretically the condition you were in is not
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the worst condition you could be in.
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Yes, yeah. And I think, I mean, so I wrote
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a daily devotional on this one on this line, and that's kind of
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where I landed. Is that like the the worst thing
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that could happen to you is not to be lame.
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It's to it. It's to be in sin.
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OK, so then why? Why is that like, why is sin
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that bad? Well, it's like sin is like
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behaving contrary to design. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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And so it's. Like a lawnmower, like trying to
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brush your teeth with a lawnmower.
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It doesn't function well. Yeah, like, yeah, yeah, yeah.
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It's, it's behaving contrary to design and it and and the
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outcome is not ideal. Yeah.
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So yeah, yeah, absolutely. So if you buy into the
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Asclepius. Asclepius.
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Yeah, You know, so if you heard the sermon, there's a whole
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bunch of writers, commentators that are like, this seems like
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it's not a Jewish thing at all, that he's participating.
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It feels more Greco Roman. Like it's hard to find.
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It's hard to find stories like that across the Jewish
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scriptures where the pool is the thing as opposed to someone
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saying go to the, you know, the stories about healings and
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rivers and things like, and as Elijah, Elijah says, to name
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name like go to go to the pool, go to the Jordan and wash.
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So there's like miracles connected with a person who uses
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a thing as a. Function of water.
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Yeah, a couple of times he'll do it with the Pool of Siloam.
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And he does it with spit. So yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
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It's pretty interesting. But but the there's not as far
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as I can remember, places where it mentions like oh there's this
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pool and this is a healing pool and could be wrong.
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Yeah, it may just be. So if you buy into that theory
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that he's gone to someone who he thinks can help him, then in
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some ways, yeah, yeah, Jesus could be saying stop going to
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Pagan things like, or something worse may happen to you.
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Like if that's the sin, stop going to someone who isn't God.
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And and of course, now he's shown this sign of like he's
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back in the temple now. So it's like if you read that
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narrative like that, there's some interesting movements where
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he's come back from the thing he was at to the thing.
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And Jesus is like, yeah, don't go anywhere else again.
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Yeah, yeah. And like so.
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But either way, whether you read it that way or there's some
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other sin that he's warning him about, the the bottom line is
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the worst thing that could happen to you is not actually a
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physical ailment. It's that it like that's how bad
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sin is. It's just so it's so dangerous
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for your soul. Now here's the the next question
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is, is Jesus going to make the bad thing happen?
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Well, well, so so. Is God going to make?
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The bad thing happen to you that that that.
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That's a bit of a there's a nuanced answer there.
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I think the New Testament as a whole is fairly comfortable with
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the fact that certain types of sin can result in sickness.
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In Corinthians, Paul talks to the Corinthians about their kind
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of LAX attitude towards communion.
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You know that the he talks about them taking it without thought,
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without contemplation, without real appreciation.
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And he says for this reason, some of you are sick and some of
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you sleep. So he's quite comfortable with
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the fact that there are ways that you can approach God or
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ways that you can act towards God that can result in sickness.
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Now, he doesn't define God did that thing, but he certainly
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seems to push towards allowed it.
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And so so, I mean, I mean, I, I can buy the argument that God
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doesn't, God doesn't put the sickness on you.
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But there's certainly plenty of bits of language across the
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Scriptures that it's allowed. I mean, it's, you know, whether
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that's the Job language of Yeah, you know, the the dialogue
12:28
between God and Satan, which seems seems like a later
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amendment to the text in some way.
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But but the language of see my servant Job, there's nothing
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like him. And the conversation with Satan
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or just the accuser is let me make him sick.
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Let me see how he handles that. Like let let me see how he
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worships you when he's covered in boils.
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And, and you do see a tendency for us as followers of Jesus,
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for the for some of us in sickness, we distance ourselves
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from God and some of us in sickness, we actually grow close
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to God. Yeah.
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So like I guess on the theological spectrum you have
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more of a Calvinist mindset or a Determinist mindset that would
13:12
that would make the argument that every single thing is an
13:16
aged and God is the agent of all actions in the universe.
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And then and then the theological justification for
13:23
like, how is God not the author of evil?
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Is that he authors the ends, not the ends justify the means.
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Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That he actually is authoring
13:35
the ends and he uses some evil things to accomplish some stuff.
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And that's more of on the extreme Calvinist side and then
13:46
on the more extreme Armenian side.
13:48
Or like what would theologians would call like a libertarian
13:52
free will? It's God is much less in the
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weeds of the day in day out stuff of the of the like where
14:02
his hands actually tipping the scales and various different
14:05
things. And a ton of God's will is
14:09
accomplished in how He designed the universe.
14:13
Showing my cars. I tend to leave a little bit
14:15
more towards that. I used to be a hardcore
14:18
Calvinist, but now I so. Hard to picture.
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Yeah, you know, I was just, you know, I was, I was a jolly
14:25
Calvinist. A jolly.
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Yeah, so I. Picture you like one of those
14:29
theology Bros that's like super intense and you.
14:32
Know no, I just silently judged people.
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Yeah, it's brilliant. Yeah.
14:37
So, but yeah, so. But I think we've talked about
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like my favorite John Piper quote and I only have one
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because I really. Strong point Calvinist, by the
14:48
way. Probably, yeah, Probably extra
14:50
and probably growing, you know, Yeah, 12:15.
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No, just 9. Like 9.
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I and I never really got over the whole John Piper Rob Bell
15:01
thing, the farewell Rob Rob Bell moment.
15:04
I'm like, we are the only group of people in the world that eat
15:08
our own. Like, in the end, like you go,
15:10
you step out and you're just like, you know, yeah, you just
15:14
removed from all conversation fellowship.
15:16
There's no like grace a lot of the time.
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I think with the evangelical church, we're always looking for
15:22
those reasons to poke holes in people.
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But one of the things that he said that I love is someone said
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to him, like, you know, are you a Calvinist or something like
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that, some kind of question? And he starts reading these
15:34
scriptures and you know, they're all Calvinist scriptures and he
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goes through them and he says so.
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And this is what God says. And he also says whoever will
15:44
may come. And he also says this and he
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also says this. And he says, if you think my
15:50
tiny human brain can compute that this is what God says about
15:55
himself. Like I, I just have to say yes
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to those things. I can't figure that out.
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Yeah. And in that sense, I loved.
16:05
Yeah. I mean, the beauty of like, like
16:08
a John Piper is like if you were to pin him in a corner and say,
16:11
name all the things, or if you read one of a one of his more
16:14
theological works, you'd pin him down and more in the Calvinist
16:17
camp. But because he's a Bible
16:18
teacher, he doesn't have to play that game that I've heard John
16:21
Piper sermons where I'm like, this guys definitely an
16:23
Armenian. And I've heard John Piper
16:25
sermons where the I'm like, no, this guy's so hardcore
16:28
Calvinist. And that's the beauty of being a
16:30
Bible teacher is if you just try and teach the text faithfully,
16:32
you're going to sound like one-on-one day and like another
16:35
on another day. Yeah, it's like, it's like the,
16:40
when we talked about the Sermon on the Mount, like Jesus is
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going to say stuff, whatever you, however you position
16:46
yourself, that's going to leave you a little bit like, wait,
16:50
hold on. Because he doesn't do camps.
16:52
He doesn't do like sides. He does the heart of the Father.
16:59
And so I, I think that when you, when you live in those spaces,
17:04
you know, you, you, you might find yourself like the, the most
17:09
conservative liberal and the most liberal conservative or
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something like that. Like I, I don't even know how to
17:14
express that fully. Like you've, you've, you're
17:16
going to reflect to the mystery that he's got.
17:20
And so when we talk about these things, we're just trying to
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peel back to the layers on who God is.
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If our job is to solve God, that's going to be a boring
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eternity. Like if you can figure out God
17:35
here, like, you know, that that would be very strange.
17:39
So I think, I think that's, yeah, us trying to understand
17:42
the best we can that it seems like God might occasionally
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choose a journey of sickness. It seems that he certainly
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allows a journey of sickness. And it seems like he definitely
17:57
at times uses sickness. Yeah, for his good purposes.
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So, all right, a slight pivot on this question.
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I think most followers of Jesus or people who call themselves
18:12
Christians, if you were to ask them, can you earn your
18:16
salvation, I'd say that there's a, the bulk of evangelicals
18:20
would say no, like it's salvation is by grace through
18:23
faith. And they may not be able to like
18:26
quote some theologian in a super elegant way, but they would say
18:31
that. But then a lot of them of the
18:35
same ones actually feel like, yeah, like that's how you get
18:40
saved. But I don't get any extra
18:42
brownie points with God unless I'm good and I can't.
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Like, if I'm really good, then good things are going to happen
18:50
to me. And if I'm really bad, bad
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things are going to happen to me.
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And can we blame them for feeling that way with passages
18:57
like this in the Bible? No, that, that's, yeah, that's
19:00
fair. And and I think it's pretty
19:03
widespread. Barna did some research
19:05
recently. I think it was Barna, 50% of
19:07
pastors still feel like they earn God's favor.
19:12
I mean, so 50% of pastors feel that way.
19:15
Yep. Like most of whom are spending
19:17
more time in Scripture than the average person who are going
19:21
through these things and navigating them, who
19:23
theoretically are sharing it more with others.
19:25
Like they might feel make a theological mental ascent almost
19:29
not that way, but they feel like.
19:31
Yes, they almost always theologically ascent to no, I
19:34
don't have to do that. And then at least 50% of the
19:38
time say, oh, there's definitely times in my life where I, if I'm
19:42
honest, that's what I'm doing. Yep.
19:43
So, so again, again that that's. I don't know anything about
19:46
that. So so I I I think that.
19:50
I'm surprised it's not 100% of them.
19:53
Yeah, and, and maybe 50% of them were being honest.
19:55
Yeah, yeah, 50% of them try to earn God's favour and 50% of
20:00
them are liars. I.
20:01
Think there's a latent, yeah, there's a latent tendency toward
20:04
that even in the most pure Jesus understanding people.
20:07
But yeah. So you, you know, you might know
20:10
a lot of things that say you don't need to do that, but it
20:13
goes back to the, the language of like the year articulated
20:16
around Jesus return. A lot of people might say
20:20
something like, Oh yeah, I'd like Jesus to come back.
20:24
But like when I've got better at prayer, when I'm like in a place
20:29
where I'm, you know, reading the scriptures more, I'm serving
20:31
more, I'm giving more or whatever, like I.
20:33
I hope he catches me in that window where I'm being good.
20:36
Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
20:38
yeah. If you could come back a week, I
20:39
prayed. You know, there's about like one
20:41
week a month that you know. Yeah.
20:43
So, so, so I think it now again, as soon as you start saying
20:47
things like that, you get to say, well, yeah, that's because
20:52
I actually believe he's more pleased with me when I'm doing
20:56
well. But even even though I think the
21:02
theology, the language is pretty clear and no need to earn favor,
21:08
it still speaks with a good deal of caution around just casually
21:13
living a lifestyle that's not the lifestyle that God shares
21:18
with us, and on all sorts of levels.
21:20
And so here, the reason I'm like drilling in on this question is
21:24
I think 1 like you, and I've talked about this over the
21:28
years, like maybe the fear that some churches have about talking
21:36
about sin at all on one side of the spectrum.
21:41
And then on the other side of the spectrum, everything's a
21:44
sin. And, and it's also you should be
21:48
really ashamed about it. And God probably doesn't like
21:50
you because you're doing it. And I think the reality is the,
21:54
the scriptures teach something a little bit more nuanced that I
21:59
think a passage like this is actually hammering on.
22:02
They're like, sin is like eating too much sugar.
22:07
It's bad now, but on steroids. Like your Physiology wasn't
22:13
designed for sin, Your brain wasn't designed for sin, Your
22:16
relationships weren't designed for sin.
22:19
Your communion with the Father wasn't designed for sin.
22:21
And so when we're in sin, it's like we're no longer breathing
22:27
oxygen anymore. We're choosing to breathe some
22:29
sort of chemical that like we're kind of alive, but not really
22:34
alive. And so when the Bible speaks
22:36
about sinning, it's warning US against these like this really
22:40
toxic thing that's in our life. It's really damaging the
22:43
goodness that could be. That changes the vibe of talking
22:47
about sin quite a bit and. I had a really interesting
22:50
moment the other day. I was listening, a little clip
22:52
came up on my one of my feeds, a fairly well known preacher in
22:59
Texas, and he was talking about like the shift he had where he
23:04
said. I was suddenly like, no longer
23:06
afraid to say whatever. I thought about something
23:09
because, you know, like my job is to get people to heaven or
23:18
something like that. Yeah.
23:19
Yeah. You know, and, and I for a
23:21
moment it hit me. I was like, oh, man.
23:23
Like, you know, like the things I don't say, blah, blah, blah,
23:25
blah. And then after a while, I was
23:26
like, oh, wait, hold on a second.
23:29
I don't think my job is to get people to heaven.
23:33
And that's God's job to do that. Like it's my job to help them
23:37
live in the way of Jesus. So like part of that is sharing
23:43
the beautiful gift that Jesus has for them that ultimately is
23:48
about his salvation and his works.
23:51
That is a conversation between them and the Holy Spirit that is
23:55
somewhat led by me, but primarily led by him like, and I
24:00
think there is a a theory for some people.
24:03
Oswald Chambers talks about this actually the the famous
24:06
devotionalist. He's got these amazing, my
24:08
utmost for his highest is his famous devotion.
24:12
And he talks about Jesus comment that he's going to make his
24:15
disciples fishers of men. And he says, you know what kind
24:19
of fishing he's talking about. He's talking about dragonet
24:22
fishing, the the the most unskilled form of fishing in the
24:27
world. You throw a net in, you drag it
24:30
through the waters and you maybe get lucky.
24:32
This is not fly fishing in a river.
24:34
No, it's not by any means. We have to choose the right fly
24:38
and like, are you going to drop it down to the bottom or sit it
24:41
on top? No.
24:42
This is the opposite of that. This is just a big old net.
24:45
Throw it down, yeah. Now there's some skill in going
24:47
to the right spots, but even then there's luck and new
24:49
springs appear and, you know, some of it's just working
24:52
knowledge of trial and, you know, whatever.
24:54
Yeah. And he said that's the kind of
24:55
thing he's talking about. And, and when we think of it in
24:58
those terms, it's mainly about provision in the water, not
25:02
about the skill of the person doing it.
25:05
And he says, I, I, I've been around the people that think
25:08
it's all about them and how well they can articulate the story
25:12
and like their bold confidence in going to people over and over
25:16
again. And he has this brilliant
25:17
phrase. He says those people usually end
25:19
up smelling like gunpowder, Like, like they've got this
25:23
vague sense of like, you know, yeah, firing shots all the time.
25:27
And like, you know, they just have a.
25:29
Yeah. And and it's not that they, it's
25:33
not that they, again, I, I don't know that I'm right on those
25:37
things. This is just me talking about
25:39
how I tend to think through my call as a, as a teacher.
25:43
When I was in Michigan, we hired a director of evangelism.
25:48
We'd had outreach for ages, and this person was supposed to come
25:51
in and be more evangelistic, and he would go to our food bank
25:56
where we'd have people come in and grab a meal while they were
25:59
waiting for their food to be, you know, collected and stuff
26:02
like that. And he'd come out and he'd be
26:04
like 6 decisions, 7 decisions. Like he'd always have a number
26:10
and and after a while you'd be like with a gun or without a
26:14
gun. Like you felt like it was a
26:15
gunpoint at times. It was like a push like.
26:18
Like I'll give you the sandwich if you pray.
26:20
The prayer, Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
26:22
Or dessert, like, yeah, dessert if you pray the prayer.
26:24
But after that, he didn't care about them at all.
26:26
Like there was no follow up. There was no like he just wanted
26:30
an an an an A tick, A notch in the gun almost.
26:36
Yeah, interesting. And that's what I think Oswald
26:39
Chambers is getting at. There's like a now when you go
26:44
back to the early 19th, like the 19th century revival movements
26:49
over here, 17th century, the different times where that
26:52
happened, they would operate with a fair amount of fear, but
26:58
there was always discipleship alongside it.
27:00
Yeah. Yeah.
27:01
So you'd do things like that actually have like special
27:05
chairs for people that were under conviction.
27:08
You could come and sit in the chair, acknowledge that you were
27:12
someone that God was working on. Like they're called like the
27:15
earnest seats or something like that.
27:18
Fascinating stuff. And again, they would they, they
27:20
would like, you know, Jonathan Edwards famous sermon Sinner in
27:26
the hands of an angry guard, like he would push those
27:29
buttons. But there was always
27:30
discipleship afterwards. So it was.
27:32
It was always contained within a small church.
27:34
Yeah, it's actually really unfortunate that Jonathan
27:36
Edwards basically his entire brilliance has been wrapped up
27:40
in this one sermon. If you listen to some of his
27:42
other sermons or, or read some of his other sermons, they're
27:45
just like saturated in grace and mercy, all these things.
27:49
So yeah. Anyway, but yeah, you're right.
27:51
Like he, he felt convicted to to preach the sermon and, and he
27:54
did. People were like weeping and
27:56
gnashing of teeth and coming in droves.
27:58
And he's like in this, like read this monotone sermon over them.
28:04
Mind you, if you've ever read it, it is powerful.
28:07
Language yeah very powerful but again most of his sermons were
28:09
about the love of God Yep so so it's it is interesting how we
28:14
interpret those things how we how we see our core and yeah I
28:22
think if you. Feel I want to see Alex preach
28:24
as sinners in the hands of an angry God to sermon.
28:27
If you feel it's job to get people to heaven, I I don't know
28:32
if you can do that, if that's anyone's call.
28:37
Yeah. Oh, man, We could just, like,
28:39
rabbit hole that for a while. What is evangelism?
28:43
What is evangelicalism? Yeah, all of those sorts of
28:47
things. But I feel like we should do
28:49
what we promised and get to. Sure.
28:52
Another question, if that's OK. Yeah.
28:54
And maybe we'll circle back around what on earth are dams
28:58
and berries? So damsons I.
29:01
Love that this question came in after you told a story about
29:05
your dad almost dying. They're just sitting there like
29:07
what's a Damson Berry? I was laughing at it.
29:11
This is my big conundrum. Didn't hear the rest of the
29:12
story. Yeah.
29:14
OK, because you love the people online.
29:19
Oh yeah, should I? Pull it up.
29:20
No, no, I got it. Don't worry.
29:25
Like how are you going to show? I will just put it on.
29:27
There's no way really. It's not focused.
29:31
It's not on autofocus dude. Dude.
29:34
That's not working. No, like I have all this
29:36
technology and you want to all right, A Damson Berry.
29:43
You got it then, so it's all on you.
29:46
What? What do you how do you spell
29:47
that? DAMSON.
29:55
OK, all right, here we go. There's a Damson Berry.
30:00
So it's actually more like a small plum than it is like a
30:04
Berry. Yeah.
30:08
And you can eat them fresh and they are delicious.
30:13
People make gin with them. And gin, gin.
30:17
You can make jam out of them. Dams and jam is a big deal.
30:20
Yeah. So my it tastes like, like Berry
30:25
fruit. I mean like how do you
30:27
articulate the difference between cherry and Raspberry?
30:30
If I said to you, what's the difference between Cherry and
30:31
Raspberry, what would you say? I don't know, I would have to go
30:35
to like one of those like taste testing or scent classes.
30:39
It's not. Quite like a It's not.
30:40
Quite a plum, it's not. It has.
30:41
Like it's, it's like it's got cherry notes, but it has like a
30:46
little bit of like, you know, grass or something in it.
30:52
I don't know. I don't know what I'm talking
30:53
about. So anyway, we used to the house
30:55
I used to live in used to have it this huge damson tree.
30:58
Unfortunately it came down when they were redoing some fencing
31:02
so it so it it's gone now. But it was at the time this just
31:06
giant of a thing that got laden with berries in the fall.
31:11
So very desirable. Not tons of them.
31:14
People really love them or hate them depending on their
31:18
particular, you know, pilot or whatever.
31:22
But when when I have, I had them, there was this guy my wife
31:25
worked with and he'd just like happily take bags of them
31:28
because he would use them for like, yeah, he loved to make
31:31
Jane, loved to make Damson Jane. Yeah.
31:35
So. Your Your dad was climbing up a
31:38
scaffolding to pick these things, and he fell off.
31:40
He was. Probably about 25 foot high, OK,
31:44
at the highest point. And so he grabbed this
31:47
scaffolding that we'd been using to redo some stuff on the House,
31:50
whipped it up there, and the ground was just too soft.
31:55
It was 4 and it had been raining and.
31:59
It sunk in and tipped. Or something.
32:01
Yeah. And just suddenly it just was
32:03
watching it topple and. Well, there you go.
32:06
Y'all been educated? Yeah, about the four, the
32:09
foreign ways. Don't exist over here.
32:12
Maybe they're an East Coast thing.
32:14
Maybe, but there you go. There's our theology question of
32:18
the. Day amazing if there was like
32:21
they were a thing here, but they just.
32:24
Had a different name. Different they're.
32:26
Just plums. They just look like plums to me
32:30
all. Right.
32:31
They're a lot smaller than plums.
32:33
They come in like bunches. More like so.
32:38
They're just. They're probably like this big.
32:41
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I, I, I put up a picture
32:44
of a guy holding some so that you could kind of get the scale.
32:49
All right, so. So yes, damsons are grown in the
32:52
US and have been for a long time.
32:54
English settlers introduced them to the American colonies.
32:58
Oh, you English. Revolution and they are still
33:01
cultivated today, both in home gardens and commercially,
33:04
particularly the blue Damson variety.
33:07
You can also find them growing wild in areas like Idaho.
33:14
Next to potatoes. Oh, there we go, Idaho.
33:17
Potatoes and damson Berry, Yep. So there we go.
33:22
All right, there you have it. You came to this theology
33:25
podcast to get your Berry knowledge increased and now you
33:29
have. I'm going to buy a damson tree
33:31
and plant it on the on the church property and then people
33:36
can gather around it and. Make wine out of it or
33:40
something. Yeah, there we go.
33:42
I don't know. All right.
33:43
So another question. How do I reconcile moments when
33:48
I pray for a miracle but don't see the outcome I hoped for, or
33:51
nothing happens, or it's just silent or whatever you want to
33:54
fill in the blank? What's up with that and what do
33:58
we do with that? Yeah, I mean, that that that's,
34:02
that's a super tough 1 based on like partly on the sermon, like,
34:07
not now. Paul uses the language of a
34:10
thorn in the flesh. Like there's a lot of back and
34:13
forth as to what he means by that.
34:15
Like some people think he had a problem with his eyes because he
34:18
asks for someone to scribe one of his letters or something like
34:22
that. Some people think it's like
34:24
something physical. Some people think it's a person
34:28
that keeps bugging him, like, you know, we have really great
34:31
elders, but imagine if one of them was really annoying that
34:34
kept complaining about everything.
34:36
Like, you know, it could be all sorts of things.
34:40
Yeah, yeah, hypothetical for us, but but, but I think that like
34:45
the fact that in some people's minds it could be eyes, that it
34:48
could be a physical thing suggests there's times where
34:52
where God is specifically using them.
34:55
Like he, Paul talks about that to keep him humble to keep him.
34:59
Yeah, yeah, with a sense of. So I I think I'm more.
35:02
Like how about all the other people around this pool that
35:05
Jesus didn't heal? Sure.
35:06
Yeah. But but I think the focus on
35:07
Paul for a second helps because Paul actually says, I asked God
35:11
three times to take it away. Yeah.
35:14
And every time he said, my grace is sufficient for you.
35:17
Yeah. So somewhere there's this
35:18
narrative for Paul of at least praying for something to happen
35:22
and God saying, no, this is you're exactly where I want you
35:24
right now. That's not an easy thing to
35:27
take. And I'm sure it wasn't for Paul,
35:29
but he goes away with the sense of God is working some good
35:33
purpose in it. And so so that that was partly
35:37
for me, like a silent inspiration for the flow of the
35:41
the the the sermon, which was this is a beautiful passage
35:45
about leaping, which leaves a load of blank areas just
35:49
floating around like that. We don't know.
35:51
Jesus didn't clear out the pool. Yeah, I mean, like the man goes,
35:56
he says he didn't know where Jesus was.
35:58
Jesus could have gone around and healed everyone else.
36:00
Maybe there was no pool of Bethesda after this because
36:02
Jesus healed everyone. That's right.
36:04
Yeah, Bethesda. And maybe he didn't.
36:08
Maybe there was just this one man that was beautifully healed
36:11
and then Jesus went on his way. Yeah, like a couple weeks from
36:16
now we're here about like the feeding of the 5000 like in in
36:20
the John account, it's not 100% clear why there's 5000 people
36:25
there. You kind of make some
36:26
assumptions there to hear him teach and or get healed because
36:30
we see that. So like, does Jesus actually
36:34
have the time? Like what kind of line is that?
36:36
Like if you're coming up to get healing and if you're in the
36:38
back of the line, like eventually some sandwich gets
36:43
passed to you with some fish and bread, you're like, great, I had
36:46
lunch. I came here for healing.
36:48
And Jesus then sneaks away to to something else.
36:51
You're like, I stood in line all day.
36:53
I mean, I'm glad I got lunch. Yeah.
36:56
But yeah. Yeah.
36:57
Yeah. And and then there's other
36:58
scriptures in the synoptics that Matthew, Mark, Luke, Matthew,
37:02
Mark and Luke that that say things like Jesus went to a town
37:06
and healed all, they're sick. Yeah.
37:09
And then we're left with the sense of like, well, does all
37:11
mean all? Does it mean all that came for
37:13
healing? Does it mean everyone in the
37:14
town regardless of whether they wanted to be healed or not like.
37:18
God, our preachers say once, all means all.
37:21
The Greek word for all means all means.
37:23
All or whatever voice I did before, Yeah.
37:26
Means all, Yeah. That, that that sense of like
37:31
mystery there is, is really apparent.
37:35
So Jacob comes out from his encounter with God limping.
37:39
This man comes out of his encounter with God leaping.
37:43
And we have to be OK with both stories to a degree.
37:48
Yeah. And so I think, I think
37:51
certainly regular prayer for healing is a beautiful gift.
38:00
And I think there's a few things that go alongside with that.
38:04
I do think taking the Corinthians passage seriously
38:07
around for this reason, some of you are sick and some of you
38:11
sleep, which is his word for Christian death.
38:15
I do think taking seriously in sickness, is there anything
38:19
unrepented from, is there any lifestyle that's like I'm living
38:23
out of like out of line with how how God lives is is actually a
38:28
great practice to go through. And so like if I've had times
38:34
where I've been sick, like actually for me, communion is a
38:36
big deal because I want to approach that believing like,
38:40
no, there's healing in this thing.
38:41
This is like a a moment. God isn't just, it's not symbols
38:45
only, it's God is present in particular ways.
38:49
Like there's this theology that I tend to lean towards of God's
38:52
real presence and communion. Yeah.
38:55
The the isn't quite the Catholic transubstantiation concept.
39:00
Yeah, let's talk about the three main views.
39:02
Yeah, yeah. So, so, so that that sense of
39:04
like the, the, the, the Catholics have that the bread
39:08
and the wine become the literal body and blood of Jesus and, and
39:13
then all the way down to the the.
39:17
Super casual. Point of view, which is almost
39:19
like, yeah, the the the bread and the wine become real
39:23
crackers and grape juice, like it's almost like a reductionist
39:26
view of. Well, it's like it's just a
39:28
metaphor. Just a.
39:29
Metaphor. A remembrance?
39:31
Yep. But Paul takes it more seriously
39:34
than that. Yeah, so the middle one, the
39:36
real presence, is that it's not literally turning into the body
39:40
and blood of Jesus, but he's almost promised a unique
39:46
manifestation of his presence around the cup.
39:49
So real. Presence and the Paul is very
39:53
explicit on when you don't take this seriously, you're opening
39:58
yourself up to these things. That's his language.
40:00
Again, he's very close to this early.
40:03
Beginning of things that says, no, this is how we took it at
40:06
least. Yeah.
40:08
So I think for me, like thinking through like, is there something
40:13
in my lifestyle that's like off track?
40:16
And if that's not true, like then sickness is just is part of
40:21
this life and we pray for healing.
40:26
I have never had a theology that I can understand for who is
40:29
healed and who is not. I mean that growing up in that
40:33
culture and especially then overseas of seeing people
40:35
healed, I had never been able to understand the difference
40:39
between the person that was prayed for and healed and the
40:42
person that we gave a few $100 to, to have a serious operation
40:46
in a foreign country where they didn't have access to that.
40:49
Like I I'm just not, I mean, I couldn't tell you a difference
40:52
between the two. So that's a beautiful mystery
40:54
that I get to ask one day in eternity.
40:57
But right now I don't have a theology so.
40:59
So your big idea and I think I might even be able to state it
41:02
somewhat. Yeah.
41:05
With, not perfectly, but it's whether you're leaping with God
41:12
or limping with God, the with guard God is the important part.
41:17
Yeah, something along those lines.
41:18
With God, that matters. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
41:20
Look at. That yeah, look at you.
41:21
Hey, I remembered a thing. You remembered a thing.
41:24
Yeah, as a preacher, that's. That's cold.
41:27
That's cold. You're like, wow.
41:28
Something stuck. Yeah, so so.
41:30
So, so I think it frees you up to say, God, this isn't you
41:34
rejecting me. OK.
41:36
This isn't you mad at me. Something here is designed to
41:41
pull me towards you, or might be symbolic of my walk with you, or
41:47
all sorts of things that enable you to say this isn't.
41:49
This isn't, you know, me being broken.
41:53
So all right, maybe one final question is like we had a couple
41:56
of other thing directions we could have taken, but just by
42:01
way of conclusion, what if that doesn't feel like enough?
42:06
So OK, cool. Yeah.
42:08
All right, God is with me. So like this hypothetical
42:13
nebulous amorphous oblong. Yeah, was it?
42:19
You know, I was talking. About yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
42:21
That most people, when they picture the Holy Spirit for some
42:23
reason, picture a Gray oblong. Yeah.
42:26
Yeah, so, so anyway, this, this very confusing, nebulous,
42:31
distant God, Yeah, he's with me. Like, but when I became a
42:36
Christian, I thought I was like, yes, I had a conviction about my
42:41
sin and I didn't want to go to hell.
42:43
And yeah, OK, so but now that I'm a Christian, I thought that
42:47
there was going to be a little bit more like, you know, isn't
42:51
there a benefits package to this whole deal?
42:54
And to know that the CE OS in the building, is that enough of
43:02
a benefits package to justify all of this effort?
43:07
I. Think all of these things to me
43:08
are like, well, I think we sit in the space of personal
43:11
experience of sickness, which is so, I mean, I've seen that in my
43:16
grandmother and my mother and my dad.
43:19
Like I've been in those spots with them never.
43:23
And experienced myself to to a degree when when my gallbladder
43:26
went out and I was in just this intense pain for like in
43:30
intervals for a few years, like it would come and it would go,
43:35
but it'd be nights where I'd just be up all night just like
43:38
so much agony. And in the midst of that, like
43:45
like I feel so I feel that I am empathize with that a lot.
43:48
At the same time, regularly we don't play those things out to
43:54
the like NTH degree. So does that mean that like,
43:59
becoming a follower of Jesus means everyone's guaranteed just
44:02
drifting off into sleep at a specific year mark with no
44:07
sickness whatsoever? Is that what we expect it to
44:10
look like? Like, oh, it's 95 on the dot,
44:13
and then you just slowly, just peacefully fall.
44:15
Asleep. Or is it like the Lord of the
44:18
Rings where the the the new Menorian kings are able to go at
44:23
the time of their choosing and so they live 200 and something
44:26
years and then are like just like, OK, this is my time.
44:29
And they lie down, and they just.
44:30
Drift off, you just got nerd real fast.
44:33
Oh yeah, I can get nerd. Yeah.
44:35
It's not even getting that I just am a nerd, yeah.
44:37
Yeah, it's just like, Lookout, your nerd is showing.
44:40
Like, yeah. So, so like, because that would
44:45
be the extreme of that viewpoint.
44:48
If everyone who follows Jesus can access that kind of
44:53
experience or beauty like that, that, that, that, yeah, we would
45:00
see that all the time. But it seems like in this world,
45:04
like how you eat, how you live your life do.
45:08
You exercise. Do you exercise?
45:11
Does stress hit you heavy? What do your genetics look like
45:14
or still matter? And God doesn't give just an
45:19
easy get out of those things. So, so like when Jesus says that
45:25
there's healing, sure there is. We see it.
45:29
But when he also says in this world you will have trouble,
45:33
like he means that too. So, so I think this is the hard
45:37
part for me of like I am always willing to continue to play,
45:43
pray for healing for anyone to whom God hasn't gently said this
45:48
is your time to go. Yeah.
45:50
And there's like to, to your point, there doesn't seem to be
45:55
a formula of like in this scenario, like if the person's
46:00
really, really good and they seem to be really effective in
46:05
some sort of ministry capacity, they're gonna get healed 'cause
46:08
they're like affected. But if the person's, you know,
46:10
kind of like a, a second grade Christian, you know, they like
46:13
come to church sometimes, but those people, they're not really
46:17
moving the ball down the field. So they don't get healing.
46:19
That's just not how it works. The the church I was at in
46:22
Michigan, the founding pastor, Bill Moore.
46:24
Incredible guy, super godly man, loved by everybody that
46:29
encountered and lit up every room he walked into.
46:32
Decided it was time to step back and travel and enjoy some of his
46:36
life and you know, get to know his kids better after working so
46:39
many years. Moved to an associate pastor
46:42
role in the same church. Got sick, died within a year.
46:46
The church prayed for him like crazy.
46:48
I mean this man founded the church and grew it up to 1200
46:51
people. Was beloved by all.
46:54
Yeah. And in the midst of that, people
46:57
were also putting him on their private jets and flying him out
47:01
to hospitals and stuff. Yeah.
47:03
And he still went to be with Jesus.
47:05
So like, like there's there's there's no theology for that for
47:08
me. Yeah, that that gives me this
47:12
easy answer. OK, so then so the presence of
47:17
God is what is promised. Yeah, in either situation.
47:22
And so one of the interesting things to me is when you're
47:28
outside of experiencing really, really first hand suffering, the
47:35
presence of God doesn't feel like is enough.
47:40
But for many who are actually faithful followers of Jesus, the
47:44
presence of God in the midst of suffering, I generally it's
47:51
those folks who are faithful Saints who love Jesus and they
47:54
go into a season of suffering and like, oh, I would take the
47:57
presence of God every. Time.
47:59
They they care about that presence more than.
48:02
Ever and that that's why there's like those that hit the more
48:06
Mystic side of things would say that there's two ways to
48:11
experience God closely in that suffering or contemplation.
48:17
And one is like almost I don't want to use I'm going to use the
48:21
term cheat code, but I don't want that to convey easy.
48:24
But it's like an almost an access that's quicker in the
48:29
midst of very deep suffering. And that's why you hear these
48:32
people who's something happens to one of their children, you
48:36
know, maybe and they're able to say things like, Oh, no, I
48:39
forgive the person because God is just surprisingly with them
48:43
in those spaces. And and then the others is the
48:46
other way is actually to to commit your life to slowing and
48:52
looking and listening to make that your great passion in life.
48:58
Yeah, those people seem to come away with a different sense of
49:02
yeah, this is what I've seen and it's it's beautiful.
49:05
Yeah. And and and all of our work
49:09
actually can be nothing more than just work for the gospel If
49:15
work if we're not listening for that direction and seeing God
49:22
gather glory can actually end up as a story.
49:26
I think it was was it Saint Augustine.
49:27
I can't remember one of the the the church fathers or someone in
49:31
those eras. Reportedly they thought he'd
49:35
passed away and he opened his eyes and looked at everyone
49:39
clearly and he said, I've seen the Lord.
49:41
Everything I wrote is but straw. Yeah.
49:44
Like he just suddenly had this moment where he saw God and he
49:47
was like, yeah, no, didn't matter.
49:50
I didn't get anything. I didn't learn anything from it.
49:53
Like, just so. So I think that that's always
49:57
painted as the picture of the great longing that we should
50:00
have God's presence. God's presence and nothing more.
50:02
Yeah. Man, feeling good feels great.
50:07
Yeah. Like if you, when you're well,
50:09
that's a beautiful gift. Yeah.
50:11
And so I understand why people want it.
50:12
And I certainly wanted that in that season when I just, you
50:16
know, I couldn't, couldn't understand why my body was just
50:21
going crazy at times where I'd have these nights with just this
50:24
intense abdominal pain where I couldn't sleep.
50:27
Yeah. Like nights where I'd be trying
50:29
to throw up to clear something from my body where I, you know,
50:33
I couldn't. Yeah.
50:34
And it was miserable. Yeah.
50:36
And so when you're in those spaces and you know, I would
50:39
have described that pain as 9 because I didn't want to be
50:42
insulting and say 10. Yeah, but but it was I.
50:46
Think the old Brian Regan bit. I feel like breaking your femur
50:50
while pre nine months pregnant. They that's what you're 10 is
50:54
reserved for them right? You know what I'm saying?
50:56
Sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
50:57
Well, on that note, is there? It sounds kind of like there's a
51:04
vacuum cleaner sucking up the back of our building right now.
51:07
I don't know what's going on. I have no idea.
51:11
Like I feel like this wall might come suddenly caving in and
51:14
Malcolm's like riding in. Yeah, like, there's like
51:16
someone's got like a tractor behind this, and this wall is
51:20
about to just explode. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
51:22
What? You see Wrecking Ball?
51:23
Off to the side. Wrecking balls just can't come
51:25
through this wall. You guys probably can't hear
51:28
that. But on that note, I think we're
51:30
going to wrap up the episode. Is there any other final words?
51:35
I think I would go back to the the centerpiece of the sermon,
51:38
which was designed to be you're given the beautiful gift of life
51:41
with God. And that's what I call to
51:45
embrace the healing is a beautiful gift when it comes,
51:49
but the beautiful gift of a follower of Jesus is you're with
51:52
God. And that's true all the time.
51:55
Yeah. Awesome.
51:57
All right. Well on that note, I will look
51:59
for the stop button and because I don't remember how to run a
52:04
podcast, it's been a while. It's the it's the tractor.
52:08
You're you're living in fear. Yeah.
52:10
All right, y'all have a good one.
52:12
We'll see you next week.