Latest / Cumberland Trace Church of Christ (Formerly Lehman Ave Church of Christ) / Men of the New Testament: "Paul" by Kevin Eubanks - Part 10

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Men of the New Testament: "Paul" by Kevin Eubanks - Part 10 · Cumberland Trace Church of Christ (Formerly Lehman Ave Church of Christ)

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Well, I don't know about y'all, but seems
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like I've spent a lifetime making bad decisions.
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They're different now than they used to be, but Neil, when he—
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is this too loud? Is this okay?
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When he put out the text for everybody to pick a character and pick a
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date, I I picked Paul, which wasn't
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necessarily a bad decision. Then I picked the date of the middle of August,
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not really realizing all the other characters,
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everybody has taught on Paul because Paul touches all
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the other New Testament characters' lives. And then to
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beat all that, Neil and Hiram decided to do an in-depth study on
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Sunday nights and covering a lot of Paul's life. So I
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don't know what I've got left to cover, but we're going to see what we
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can figure out. So we're going to start with just who he was,
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work through his life, and then we'll work through some— maybe some things we
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can learn from his life and apply to ours. But so
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Saul, who was later called Paul,
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does anybody know if
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or when or why his name was changed. Or was
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it? Now listen here.
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I've got about 6 pages of notes and I can say everything I've got to
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say in about 11 minutes.
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Huh? Saul was his Hebrew name. Paul is
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his Greek name. And he was from
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Tarsus and he was a Roman citizen by birth. Acts 22:25-28
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tells us who he was by birth. And so being a Roman citizen
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and also a Jew, he would have had both names
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from birth. Mike, go ahead.
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Right, but there was no official change. There was just— right,
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because he was at that point, he was going to be going to more
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of the Greek people. And so,
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right, sure, that's right.
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But it's the same name, it's just Hebrew and Greek. That is, that is the
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difference. He also was a Pharisee by birth.
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Acts 23:6 tells us that. Um,
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his education, it was the best available. Um,
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he was born in Tarsus, but he was brought up in Jerusalem
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at the feet of Gamaliel, who was one of the most respected
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teachers and leaders of that time. We can flip over
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to Acts 5:35.
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And this is Gamaliel talking after they have beat—
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or after they have arrested Peter and some of them. And he
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said— this is Gamaliel— he said, men of Israel, take heed to yourselves
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what you intend to do regarding these men. For some time ago,
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Theudas rose up claiming to be somebody. A number of men, about 400,
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joined him. He was slain, and all who obeyed him were
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scattered and came to nothing. After this man, Judas of Galilee rose
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up in the days of the census, drew away many people after him. He also
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perished, and all who obeyed him were dispersed. And now I— this is Gamaliel—
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say to you, keep away from these men and let them alone. For if this
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plan or this work is of men, it will come to nothing.
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But if it is of God, you cannot overthrow it, lest you even
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be found to fight against God. And they agreed with him. That was
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in the council, the Sanhedrin council. So he was a very well-respected
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person that Paul had come up under. And so his education
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was second to none of that day.
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Flip over to Acts 18:1.
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And I doubt very seriously that I'm going to tell
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everybody on a Wednesday night anything that you don't know
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about Paul. But that's what
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I'm tasked with, so maybe we can do some refreshing if you'd forgot.
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Acts 18:1-3 says, after these things
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Paul departed from Athens and went to Corinth. And he found a certain Jew
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named Aquila, born in Pontus, who had recently come
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from Italy with his wife Priscilla, because Claudius had commanded all
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the Jews to depart from Rome. And he came to them, So because he
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was of the same trade, he stayed with them and worked for— by occupation,
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they were tentmakers. So that was Paul's trade.
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He was a tentmaker. We all know that.
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The next thing that we know about Paul is we
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find in Acts 7,
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the next phase of his life or part of his life.
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Acts 7:58.
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Through chapter 8, verse 1. Does somebody
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want to read that so y'all don't have to hear me read the whole time?
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There you go.
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He was, he was a great persecutor of the church early on.
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This, this highly educated man with
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a great background and a great pedigree, he He began
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as a persecutor of the church,
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and then he became one of the greatest missionary
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and church planters in church history shortly after that.
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And we all know when that takes place, on the road to Damascus.
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That conversion, that change of his life,
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may have been or may be one
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of the most dramatic changes anyone
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has ever made from what he'd done early to
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what he wound up doing later in his life.
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And we're going to learn— we're going to see if we can pull some lessons
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from that a little later on about how Paul— how
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he changed. Paul was also an apostle.
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1 Corinthians 1:1,
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it says, Paul, called to be an apostle of Jesus Christ through the will
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of God.
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1 Corinthians 9:12— 9:1-2,
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I'm sorry, goes a little bit further. He says,
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am I not an apostle? Am I not free? Have I not seen Jesus
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Christ our Lord? Are you not my work in the Lord?
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If I am not an apostle to others, yet doubtless I am to you,
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for you are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord.
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So there's no question that Paul counted
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himself as an apostle. He was, in fact, an apostle.
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He spent One
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of the things that I've got wrote down here, and if
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I don't, if I don't follow my notes, I'll get kind of crossed up and
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I'll lose some stuff and I'll leave some stuff out. I tried to memorize,
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you know, because that's what Hiram and Neil do, and then I thought,
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it's just, you know, I'm just not that smart. I just can't do it.
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So I'll just have to read kind of what I've got.
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But, you know, Jesus when he was in
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his earthly ministry, he spent about 3 years
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with the apostles teaching, training, going around,
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working with them. And I found it pretty interesting that after Saul's
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conversion, it seems like, near as you can
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tell, that he spent about 3 years with Jesus in some way.
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Galatians 1, if you want to flip over there.
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Galatians 1:11-12,
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he said that in writing to the Galatians, he said, but I make known to
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you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached by me is not according to man.
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For I neither received it from a man, nor was I taught it,
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but it came through revelation of Jesus Christ. And then if you drop down to
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15, But when it pleased God, who separated me
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from my mother's womb and called me through his grace, to reveal his Son to
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me, that I might preach him among the Gentiles, I did not immediately confer
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with flesh and blood, nor did I go up to Jerusalem to those who were
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apostles before me, but I went to Arabia and returned to
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Damascus. Then after 3 years I went up to Jerusalem
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to see Peter and remained with him 15 days. That 3-year
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period, we don't have any real indication of what was going
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on, but Saul, in some way,
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he spent some time with Jesus. And I
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just find it interesting that the 3 years that all the other apostles
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had with Jesus on this earth, Paul likewise
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had, seems to be, 3 years in some way with
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Jesus, which would Maybe,
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I don't know,
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it would affirm his apostleship to everyone else.
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He was not— he didn't lack anything that the other guys had.
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If anything, he probably had something
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a little bit better, you know, one-on-one with Jesus.
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Um, let's see, 2 Corinthians 11:5,
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I think it is. He wants to
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go ahead and make sure that everybody knows
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that he was not inferior to them. So 2 Corinthians
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11:5, he's telling Corinthians, for I consider that
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I am not at all inferior to the most eminent apostles.
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So Paul was— he was sure of his apostleship,
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and he wanted to make sure that it was not discounted by anybody that
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he was talking to. And I don't think it was because he wanted
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to be boastful or to brag, but just to know— for
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people to know that, you know, this is— I
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am equally as well trained as they were.
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The next thing that we know about Paul is he was the author of 13
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books of the New Testament.
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And if you want to, you know, some people
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want to put Hebrews in there and make it 14.
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I'm not going to argue one way or the other. I will tell you that
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the argument that I've heard the most against that,
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that Paul was not the author of Hebrews has always
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been. Does anybody want to care to say what they've heard
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why Paul did not write Hebrews?
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Yes, he wrote it. He identified himself as the writer.
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Okay. And would you say,
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Roger, that that would fall
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in line with the styles don't match?
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Identifying yourself with Yeah,
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so they say that Paul's style doesn't match. And while that may
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be true, the one thing I'll say about that is
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that doesn't necessarily
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mean anything to me. And I'll tell you why. Because the
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same guy that wrote 1, 2, and 3 John,
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the Gospel of John, also wrote Revelation.
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Those are absolutely way different
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styles. So the style of writing doesn't really tell me much of anything that
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he could or couldn't. There is in Hebrews— flip over to Hebrews
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chapter 2.
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And we'll take a look at verses
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1 through 4.
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This is the Hebrew writer saying, therefore we
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must give the more earnest heed to the things we have heard, lest we
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drift away. For if the word spoken through angels proved steadfast,
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and every transgression and disobedience received a just
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reward, how shall we escape if we neglect so great
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a salvation, which at first began to be spoken
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by the Lord and was confirmed to us by
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those who heard him, God also bearing witness both
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signs, wonders, and various miracles and gifts of the Holy Spirit
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according to his own will. So if you, if you take a real good
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look at that, that wording in verse 3 where he says was confirmed
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to us by those who heard him.
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Paul, Paul probably wouldn't have been
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in that group of those who heard
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Jesus. Now, I think
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there's no doubt that Paul— well,
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there could be. It's a pretty good
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chance that Paul had opportunity to see Jesus for
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sure. Growing up in Jerusalem.
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They were, near as I can tell and what everything I've read,
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they put Paul's birth at 1 to 5 AD.
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And so him and Jesus, they,
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they weren't probably far apart in age. And if Paul
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come up in Jerusalem, there's a chance that they could have encountered each other But
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he wouldn't have been confirmed by those who heard him.
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So that is really the only argument for me that kind of—
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yeah, there's a good chance that Paul probably didn't write that because he
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shouldn't have been able to say that.
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That's right. That is right.
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Good observation, Mike. Uh,
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let's see, another thing that we know about Paul is he had a
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thorn in the flesh, a physical impediment,
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if you will. There's a lot of debate over what this was.
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The truth is, is if it mattered, we'd know.
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So we don't know. But it's— I guess it
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makes for an interesting class if you need to kill some time and
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work through some things. So we'll talk about a little bit of it.
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What's everybody know
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or think that that Paul's thorn in the flesh was?
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Hmm? Eyes. Poor eyesight.
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Yeah.
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Yeah.
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Yeah,
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he definitely had an eyesight problem, it seems like.
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In Galatians, let's see here. Galatians 6,
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verse 11. So Galatians is
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the first book that
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Paul wrote, so we think. And so it
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would have been early on in his— or
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a little earlier in his life.
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This chart puts it at about 48
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AD. Is when he would have wrote that. In verse
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11, you know, Paul tells the Galatians, see with what large letters I
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have written to you with my own hand. And I suppose that's—
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everybody takes that and that's where they get that Paul
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had poor sight. And that might be right, or maybe he
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just liked to write big. You know, I don't know. None of these things
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probably really matter, But it's interesting to talk about.
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There's something else that I picked up on in 2 Corinthians
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chapter 11, if you want to flip back over there.
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And this is the first time that I had ever really done what
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I would call an in-depth study on just Paul and his life.
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So I was looking for things that
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maybe I had overlooked in the past, which is most likely what
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happened. I know I can read through time and time again,
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and I continue to, to pick up on things that I didn't
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catch the last time I read.
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But 2
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Corinthians chapter 11, verse 6, he says, even though
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I am untrained in speech, yet I am not in knowledge,
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but we have been thoroughly manifested among you
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in all things. And that
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wouldn't— might not really seem to be too much except
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for back over in
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Galatians when
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he is talking. I think it's in chapter 1. I don't think I wrote that
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The most important— huh?
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1:11.
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No, that's not the most important part of this whole point I did
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not write down. No.
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And I'll find it sometime. But when
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Paul is in
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the Spirit, when he's called up into the 3rd heaven— let
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me see if I can find that real quick. Huh?
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2 Corinthians 12.
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Yeah, right.
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So, okay, 2 Corinthians 12, that's where we want to be.
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In verse 5— well, let's just read starting in verse 1. It's doubtless not profitable
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for me to boast. I will come to to visions and revelations
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of the Lord. I know a man in Christ who 14 years
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ago, whether in body I do not know, or whether out of the body I
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do not know, God knows, such a one was caught up to the 3rd heaven.
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And I know such a man, whether in the body or out of the
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body I do not know, God knows, he was caught up into paradise
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and heard inexpressible words which is not lawful for man to utter.
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Of such one I will boast, yet of myself I will not boast except
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in my infirmities. Now,
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whether or not it was a speech problem, I don't know,
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but Paul did say that he had— he
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was slow of speech, and he heard
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things that were unexpressible, inexpressible to utter. Kim?
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Oh, I was going to talk about verse 15 where it talks
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about the Yeah,
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it very well could be. There's several
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possibilities. It could have been just like Bill was talking about, a messenger of Satan
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to buffet him. It might have been his pride.
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Could have been his eyes. It could have been he had speech
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trouble. But whatever it was, if it was— if we
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need to know, than we would know. And so
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while that's not all-encompassing and all-inclusive of who
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Paul was as a man, that's, uh, that's what I wrote down.
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And the next thing that I— little section that
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I want to cover is some parallels to one of,
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um, one of the Old Testament characters.
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Anybody Nicole? I just wondered if 3
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days might have had something to do with it or something.
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Yeah. Yeah. Well, and it could be. It says that,
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you know, something fell like scales off his eyes and his vision was restored,
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maybe partially, maybe not. So yeah, it very well
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could be. While thinking about Paul
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and his life and the things that he had done,
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I thought there's a, there's a really close parallel to
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someone in the Old Testament, and that's Moses.
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And so I've got, I think, 3 or 4 parallels of how
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their lives were kind of similar.
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Moses, you know, he was raised in Pharaoh's house.
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That gave him access to the best education available.
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It gave him familiarity with the leaders of Egypt.
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Paul, which we have already talked about, he come up at the feet
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of Gamaliel, and that was the best education available,
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especially for a Jew at that time. Being a Jew
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with Roman citizenship, that gave him the knowledge and access
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to places that perhaps he was the only one in the country that had that.
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And so when it comes time for him to go about doing
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his work, he had something that few
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for sure and maybe no one else had, and that's Jewish background and
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Roman citizenship. Those 2 things were, I think, key to
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Paul's life. Moses, he had a
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direct encounter with God at the burning bush.
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Paul, he had a direct encounter with Jesus on the road to Damascus.
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Very similar. Moses,
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he invested in Joshua,
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and Joshua ultimately led the people to the Promised Land. Flip over to Exodus
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chapter 24.
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Exodus chapter 24 and verse 13.
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This is when Moses is going up on Mount Sinai.
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Verse 13 says, so Moses with his assistant Joshua—
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Moses arose with his assistant Joshua, and Moses
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went up on the mountain of God. And Moses told all the elders to wait
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here for us, as if him and
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Joshua were going together. So Moses had
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someone that he saw You know, he didn't take Aaron
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with him. I don't think God specified who
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you could bring or who you couldn't bring. Moses probably saw
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some value in Joshua, and ultimately
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it turned out to be later in life that Joshua is who led the people
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into the Promised Land. Who did Paul invest
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in? Timothy.
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Yeah, Paul invested a lot of time in Timothy.
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He took him on a missionary journey when Timothy was
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just a very young man. He saw something in
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him that he valued
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and he worked to develop that.
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And Timothy continued on work that Paul had started after
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Paul lost his life.
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Moses died an untimely death. According to Deuteronomy 34,
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his eyes wasn't dim nor his natural vigor diminished when
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God took him up on the mountain to show him the Promised Land. But I'm
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not really sure what— how that happened or,
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or what happened, but he didn't come off there and the Lord buried
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him. So according to that, he wasn't necessarily at
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an age where he was ready to die. He was 120 years old, but there
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was nothing wrong with him. Paul, he experienced an untimely
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death at the hands of Nero,
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as it was likely that he was beheaded.
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Anybody got any questions or comments? Mostly comments.
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If you have some questions, we'll see what we can do with them.
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Yeah. One of the things I know sometimes
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some of the writings might all be spirits, you know that? Yeah.
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Yeah. It might have been written by someone
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other than Paul, but it still is the words of the Spirit.
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So we've got a few lessons from Paul's life.
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I think I only come up with maybe 5 for now. We'll see.
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One of the things, the first thing that struck me is when
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you think back about Paul and him persecuting the church,
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being zealous for something doesn't mean it's correct. There was
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nobody that was more eager to do what he thought was
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to be the Lord's will than Paul was when he was persecuting the church.
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He was the premier leader in the
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Jews, or he was heading to be a premier leader in the Jews,
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and he worked really hard to try and snuff out the church early.
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Galatians 1:13-14, Paul will recount that for himself.
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Acts 9:1-2 will tell some of
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the things that Paul was trying to do to the early church.
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So You know, we all can
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encounter people that really,
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really are working hard for something that
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they believe in, but they can also be— we can be
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wrong. I mean, even us doing something else. You know, you can't count
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zeal as being correct. Just because we're
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excited about something or someone is on fire for something Nobody was
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on fire more than Paul was at that time in his life.
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The next thing that I
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can pull from that is when we look at Paul and his life,
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when he was confronted with the truth, he was reasonable
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enough to change. Now, nobody,
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nobody's ever going to have the encounter that Paul had.
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You know, we're not going to get blinded by a light and Jesus
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talk to us. So those kind of things is not going to happen. But when
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someone is confronted with what is the
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truth, then you can learn from Paul's life to be reasonable enough
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to accept it and make the change that's needed.
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I've heard it said and been told several
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times studying with different people that you
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don't know what it's like to change everything
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that you've ever been taught or believed. And that's true.
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I don't know what that's like. My parents,
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they were not raised in the church. They grew up in Indianapolis.
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Which, you know, don't hold that against me.
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I didn't come from there. But anyway,
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they weren't brought up in church really at all. When they moved down here,
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they met some folks that invited them to church, and that's
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kind of where it started. So I don't know what it's like to have to
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change what I've been taught my whole life,
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but Paul does. And we can look to
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Paul's life and how he handled it. And we can point people that we're
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working with and that we're teaching, you know, Paul knows exactly what that's
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like to turn away from everything
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he had been taught his whole life and worked really hard at doing.
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Kim? I wonder if he
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was so drastic,
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big thing. Well, yeah, that may be true.
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And also I mean, God knew Paul and
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he knew that nobody is going to work harder for him than Paul
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would. When he
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was Saul? It doesn't say.
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I would think no because it
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says that a messenger of Satan was sent to
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buffet me. And so, I would take by that, you know,
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Satan wasn't needing to buffet him when he was going around persecuting the
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Christians. So I would tend to think, no, he did not.
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Third thing, Paul didn't let his circumstances or his
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situation hinder or stop him from spreading the gospel.
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You know, some people Some people might see it
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as a hindrance to be single.
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You know, Paul was single.
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Peter was married. Peter might have, you know,
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I don't know how they viewed each other, but Peter wouldn't
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have been able to do the things probably that Paul did.
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You know, Paul, he traveled most of his life when he wasn't
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in prison. And so being single was not a hindrance to Paul.
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Um, being in prison didn't
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seem to be a hindrance to Paul. He continued to do everything
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that the Lord required of him no matter
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where he was at. And I
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know it's, it's easy to get caught up in, you know, whatever situation
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we're in and look for reasons that we can't
31:37
do things that we need to be doing. But we
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can learn from Paul that no matter what our situation is, where we find ourselves,
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what we're doing— I can tell you right now,
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I've never been in prison or jail,
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but I don't know that I'd be the happy spreader
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of the good news in prison. That's just, that's just me.
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But Paul, Paul didn't stop no matter what he was doing.
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And so, I admire the fact that wherever Paul
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found himself, whatever situation he was in,
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he continued to do God's work.
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Anybody got any questions?
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I've got a couple more. We're going to get out a little bit early.
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Yeah. Bill.
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Right. Yeah. Yeah. I don't
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know if I've ever been on fire for anything like that.
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You know, that is a dedication that
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first of all I admire and second of all that I aspire to be
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like is in wherever I find myself
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to be able to do what Paul was doing.
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And that takes some mental fortitude to be able to work through those
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difficult situations. Flip over
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to Philippians 1.
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Now I know Neil and Hiram have covered this extensively.
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But we're going to pull out one little thing here that we
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can learn from Paul. And I may—
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I've got time, I think, to read this. This was written by
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a really smart guy that most of y'all know.
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But let's read Philippians chapter 1, verses 12 through 18.
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It says, now I say this, that each of you says, I am of Paul,
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or I am of Apollos, or I am of Cephas, or I am of Christ.
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If Christ is divided, was Paul crucified for you?
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Or were you baptized in the name of Paul? I thank God that
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I baptized none of you except Crispus and Gaius, lest anyone should say
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that I had baptized in my own name. Yes, I also baptized—
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I am reading Corinthians. Y'all thought I was
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crazy, didn't you? Now I've got— I'm like,
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that is not right. All right, let's try this again.
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That's a way to kill a little time right there, right?
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Philippians 1:12-18. But I want you to know,
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brethren, that the things which happened to me have actually turned out
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for the furtherance of the gospel. So that it has become evident to the whole
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palace guard and to all the rest that my chains are in Christ.
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And most of the brethren in the Lord, becoming confident
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by my chains, are much more bold to speak the word without
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fear. Some indeed preach Christ even from envy and
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strife, and some also from goodwill.
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The former preach Christ from selfish ambition,
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not sincerely supposing to add affliction to my chains.
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But the latter out of love, knowing that I am appointed for the defense
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of the gospel. What then? Only that in every way,
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whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is preached, and in
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this I rejoice. Yes, I will rejoice.
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That is very— that is very interesting to me that
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Paul was humble enough at
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that point in his life to no matter what someone's motive
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was behind preaching the gospel,
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that they were preaching the gospel.
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You know, he says that some of them were doing it to try and
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harm him, and I don't really know what, what that means
35:55
or what that looks like, but they were still— nonetheless,
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they were still preaching the truth according to what Paul said. So they weren't,
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they weren't changing anything up. They were just doing it out
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of ill will towards Paul. But Paul was so thankful
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that the gospel was being preached, he didn't care what the motive was as
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long as the truth was being preached.
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And there's some application to our lives today.
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There's some things that, you know, we may not necessarily
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like this that goes on or that that
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goes on, different programs or different things
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that the church provides and offers,
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and that's fine. But if the ultimate thing
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is that God's will is being preached, God's Word
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is being preached, and nothing untruthful or nothing wrong
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is being done with that, we don't necessarily have to be happy about
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it. Paul wasn't happy that people were doing things that was causing
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him persecution, but he was happy that
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God's Word was being preached. And so if we
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can stay on the idea of let's don't vary
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from the truth at all, we don't have to like
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every little thing that is done as long
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as it's truthful and honest.
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Questions to that? And I mean,
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I'm not— I don't want to wait. I know there's people that don't
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like certain things. There's people all across the brotherhood that don't
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like Last Leaders. There's people that love it.
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There's those kind of things all around, but the goal of Last
37:45
Leaders is to further the gospel of Christ.
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And it's not— they're not teaching anything that's wrong or untruthful.
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And so for the folks that are not overwhelmed
37:58
with it or carried away with it, you know, that's okay.
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Paul teaches us that if what's
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being done is truthful and to further the gospel,
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then it's okay. We don't have to like it. Now, if we
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vary off truth, Any at all. Don't y'all tell the
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elders, you know, that I said we can do anything we want to. That's not
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what I'm saying. I'm saying if we've
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got to stay— there is a line and we've got to toe that line.
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But everybody doesn't necessarily love everything that
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happens that goes towards furthering the gospel.
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And that's just— that's going to be in anything, any realm of life
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that we're in. And this is no different, but we just can't
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vary from the truth. And Paul, you know, I'm sure that
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he didn't like really being bound up extra because what
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someone was saying, but he was all right with it because they were preaching
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the truth and it was to continue on and spread the
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gospel. So thanks guys for a good class.