Latest / The Mark Driscoll Show / Pastor Mark Answers Your Top Questions of the Week (May 15th, 2025)

Transcript

Pastor Mark Answers Your Top Questions of the Week (May 15th, 2025) · The Mark Driscoll Show

• 0:00
  All right, time for some questions.
• 0:02
  What should I do if my husband doesn't help financially at all?
• 0:07
  Well, here's a verse for him. The apostle Paul says any man
• 0:10
  who does not provide for the needs of his family has denied
• 0:14
  the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.
• 0:17
  So if you are an able bodied husband who refuses to work and
• 0:23
  generate revenue, you get cuts in the line to hell.
• 0:27
  You have officially made yourself worse than an
• 0:31
  unbeliever. Why?
• 0:32
  Because you know better and the the Bible says that God made
• 0:37
  Adam and put him in the garden to work.
• 0:40
  Why did God make men? Well, many reasons.
• 0:43
  But work before sin enters the world.
• 0:46
  Adam has a job and that is to be fruitful, multiply, create
• 0:51
  culture, fill the earth and subdue it.
• 0:54
  The father literally looks at Adam, his son.
• 0:57
  Here's a planet, please go tend to it and conquer it.
• 1:03
  Exercise dominion over it and bring me some cities.
• 1:07
  It's a big job description for one son.
• 1:10
  And So what we know from the Bible is God works in the
• 1:16
  beginning. God created.
• 1:17
  The Bible starts with God working.
• 1:20
  God creates a man, tells him it to go to work.
• 1:23
  The man sins. So now work is cursed because
• 1:27
  work is treating the man the way he is treated is God.
• 1:31
  And the result is then a man has two choices.
• 1:34
  I'm going to go to work and fight against the curse, or I'm
• 1:36
  not going to go to work and I'm going to curse myself.
• 1:40
  Curse my wife, curse my kids, curse my family, curse my
• 1:44
  legacy. If you have a husband who
• 1:47
  doesn't work, kick him out of the house.
• 1:49
  He has not earned the right to be there.
• 1:52
  In addition, if he isn't paying any bills, cut him off from the
• 1:56
  credit cards and cut him off from the bank accounts.
• 2:01
  If he won't work, take away the car keys because he is not
• 2:05
  helping to pay the bills. He can walk his sorry shrink to
• 2:09
  fits away from the house and go stay at his parents house or
• 2:13
  sleep on the bench at the park. There's it should be 0.
• 2:16
  Compassion for a man that is able to work but is unwilling to
• 2:22
  work. And.
• 2:24
  And my question is how did you end up with such a loser?
• 2:27
  If he started by moving into your apartment and sleeping with
• 2:31
  you and eating food out of your fridge and having you pay for
• 2:34
  his Internet account so he could download porn and watch video
• 2:38
  games. You saw this coming for you
• 2:40
  single gals who are right now carrying some deadbeat
• 2:43
  boyfriend. Heed the caution before it's too
• 2:46
  late. While he's dating you, he's on
• 2:48
  his best behavior and when you marry him, you're going to get
• 2:52
  the worst version of him. And so yeah, my admonition is
• 2:57
  change the locks on the door and either he repents or you
• 3:01
  probably are going to have a dissolution of your marriage
• 3:04
  because what you have is not a husband but a pet.
• 3:08
  Can a Here's the question. Can a follower of Christ go to
• 3:11
  non Christian music concerts? Yes, you can.
• 3:15
  You can get in a car, you can drive to the venue and then you
• 3:18
  can get out of the car and you can go into the venue.
• 3:21
  So yes, you can do this. I'm guessing the question is,
• 3:24
  should you do this? Well, it is not necessarily a
• 3:30
  sin, but is it wise and good for you?
• 3:33
  So there are there are matters of sin where we violate the
• 3:36
  Bible, and then there's matters of conscience where we violate
• 3:40
  the conscience that God has given us.
• 3:42
  So does the Bible say thou shalt not go to concerts?
• 3:45
  Doesn't say that. The Bible does say that bad
• 3:49
  company corrupts good character. And so you want to hang out with
• 3:52
  people who encourage you to be the best version of you.
• 3:56
  And depending upon the concert, let's say you're going to
• 3:58
  Slipknot. Probably not the place that
• 4:00
  you're going to become more like Jesus.
• 4:02
  But you know, I'm a guy. I'll be honest with you.
• 4:05
  I love live music. There's just something about
• 4:08
  live music because so much of music is just, you know, session
• 4:13
  musicians and auto tune vocals. When you actually get an artist,
• 4:17
  particularly a singer-songwriter who isn't just sort of karaoke
• 4:22
  ING their, you know, their songs from someone else, but they
• 4:25
  actually are singer-songwriter. I find those people to be
• 4:28
  uniquely gifted and quite amazing.
• 4:31
  And when the band is good and they can sing without the auto
• 4:34
  tune and it's live music, there's just something about
• 4:37
  being in the room. So I I'm a big fan of live music
• 4:39
  is why I love worship and I'm a full charismatic.
• 4:42
  I don't sing well, but I know between me and Jesus is auto
• 4:45
  tune. So by the time it gets to him,
• 4:46
  it probably sounds pretty good. Many years ago, when I was
• 4:50
  young, I actually actually oversaw an all ages concert
• 4:55
  venue for punk rock kids who may not have known that this was up
• 4:58
  in the People's Republic of Seattle in the 90s.
• 5:02
  And it was during the grunge era.
• 5:04
  And we opened an all ages venue for kids.
• 5:06
  And so we had punk rock shows and we just wanted to build
• 5:10
  relationships with the kids and give them a safe environment.
• 5:13
  And those kids in those bands were not Christian, but we were
• 5:16
  hosting them and many of them did meet Jesus.
• 5:20
  And through those relationships, we, we earned the right because
• 5:23
  we said, Hey, you can come and play your show here, but we are
• 5:26
  Christians and we're going to talk to you about Jesus.
• 5:29
  As far as just going to a show, it depends.
• 5:31
  There's positive, negative and neutral.
• 5:33
  There's certain artists, even though they're not Christian
• 5:36
  artists, they're they're pro, they're positive, they're for
• 5:41
  our God. You know, this would be like
• 5:45
  lately guy like Jelly Roll talking about meeting Jesus.
• 5:49
  He's not a Christian artist, but he's a, he's an artist who's a
• 5:52
  Christian. He's positive.
• 5:54
  Then there's neutral artists who aren't for or against or God or
• 5:57
  our values. They may not know our God, but
• 6:01
  they're just neutral. And then there are those that
• 6:03
  are just overtly negative that they, they hate our God.
• 6:07
  And the themes of their music are sensual, seductive,
• 6:10
  rebellious. And so, you know, should you be
• 6:14
  in an environment that is negative to your God?
• 6:16
  No neutral, maybe positive. OK, but I would say check your
• 6:23
  conscience. You, you don't want to break
• 6:25
  your conscience because you're going to need it.
• 6:28
  And people that don't have a functioning conscience, we call
• 6:30
  them sociopaths. So whatever you do, keep your
• 6:32
  conscience. So in addition to the Bible, God
• 6:36
  gives us a conscience. And what we don't want to do is
• 6:39
  violate our conscience. Now legalism happens when you
• 6:41
  take your conscience and you impose it on somebody else.
• 6:46
  Christian maturity is operating according to your own
• 6:50
  conscience. I'll give you an example.
• 6:52
  I can't watch any film that is like a horror theme.
• 6:58
  I've dealt with enough demons in my life.
• 7:00
  I I can't watch a horror film. I can't do it.
• 7:04
  I can't watch any television show or movie where a woman is
• 7:09
  getting hurt or children are getting hurt.
• 7:11
  I can't handle it. I'm a defender protector.
• 7:15
  I've seen too many women and children harmed by bad men and
• 7:19
  so for me, conscience wise, I'm not watching horror genres and
• 7:23
  if a woman or a child is being hurt, I'm probably out.
• 7:27
  I can't handle it now. It would be a sin for me to say.
• 7:30
  Therefore everything that violates my conscience now binds
• 7:35
  your conscience. So legalism is what happens when
• 7:38
  we take our conscience and we bind others by it.
• 7:42
  A holiness is when we live according to our conscience and
• 7:46
  we don't violate our conscience. And so the answer that I would
• 7:50
  give here is, is it a sin? Is it a sin?
• 7:55
  Well, the Bible doesn't overtly expressly state that it is a
• 7:59
  sin. Some would say, well, there's a
• 8:02
  bunch of godless people there. Would they?
• 8:04
  They accused Jesus of being a friend of gluttons, A drunkard,
• 8:07
  A glutton, and a friend of sinners, and he's hanging out
• 8:08
  with the wrong people. So, you know, I don't want to be
• 8:11
  like that. But at the end of the day, if
• 8:13
  you're asking this question, it may be because you are violating
• 8:18
  your conscience and you're wanting me to give you
• 8:21
  permission to live according to your conscience.
• 8:23
  And, and in closing, what I would say is this, if there is a
• 8:26
  line and, and your conscience is here, I would encourage you back
• 8:33
  up a few steps. Don't dance vigorously on the
• 8:36
  line and don't cross over the line.
• 8:39
  Instead, just say, you know what?
• 8:41
  For some reason, my conscience doesn't allow me to go there.
• 8:46
  So I'm going to take a few steps back.
• 8:49
  I did this, for example, with alcohol as a brand new
• 8:53
  Christian. I've, I've never had an alcohol
• 8:54
  problem. I, I never drank.
• 8:57
  And for me, I just felt as a new Christian, like alcohol is just
• 9:02
  for me. The Bible doesn't forbid it, but
• 9:04
  it's a conscience issue. So my wife Grace and I would get
• 9:07
  married. She'd have a glass of wine with
• 9:08
  dinner or whatever. And she'd be like, is that OK?
• 9:10
  I'm like, yeah, 'cause it just doesn't tempt me.
• 9:12
  I'm, I'm not tempted by it. I've never consumed alcohol, so
• 9:14
  it doesn't bother me. And then around the age of 30,
• 9:17
  my conscience shifted and I felt like, OK, now it's OK for me to
• 9:22
  once in a while have a drink. And so for me, though, it was
• 9:25
  just for those eleven years from my conversion to around the age
• 9:29
  of 30, that if the conscience line is here, then I want to
• 9:32
  live here. And if my conscience moves to
• 9:34
  here, then I can go to there. Now, if I cross the line and
• 9:37
  become drunk, well, the Bible says that's a sin.
• 9:39
  So that's over God's line. But sometimes in addition to
• 9:42
  God's line, your conscience sets your own line.
• 9:45
  And I would say abide by it. So if it comes to a concert and
• 9:49
  you're like, I'm not sure one of you are on the side of caution,
• 9:52
  I would just say the answer is no.
• 9:53
  And maybe later I'll mature and my conscience will draw the line
• 9:57
  in a different place. All right, time for a question.
• 10:00
  What Bible translation do you use and which one is best for
• 10:04
  new believers? So there are 4 categories of
• 10:08
  Bible translations. There are total corruptions.
• 10:12
  These are not translations and the Bible just, you know, was
• 10:15
  originally read in primarily in Hebrew, Greek, and a little bit
• 10:20
  in Aramaic. So those 3 languages and then
• 10:22
  they're translated into English so that we can read them.
• 10:26
  The corruptions are intentional deceptions.
• 10:30
  These are not trying to say what the Bible says, but twist what
• 10:34
  the Bible says. This would include, for example,
• 10:37
  the New World Translation, which is used by the Jehovah's
• 10:41
  Witnesses. It was translated by those who
• 10:43
  are not academics or scholars in the original languages.
• 10:46
  Furthermore, it it intentionally omits as often as possible any
• 10:51
  reference to Jesus Christ as eternally God and Creator.
• 10:56
  OK, so that's garbage. In addition, there's a
• 10:59
  translation called the New Revised Standard Version.
• 11:03
  The original revised standard version was good.
• 11:06
  The new Revised is not. It is an attempt at a gender
• 11:10
  neutral translation. So it doesn't like God the
• 11:13
  Father and we are the sons of God.
• 11:16
  And so rather than saying what the scriptures say and what the
• 11:19
  Lord Jesus says, they make modifications to be politically
• 11:23
  correct. So those would be corruptions.
• 11:26
  And then there are paraphrases. Paraphrases are somewhere
• 11:31
  between a translation and a commentary.
• 11:34
  And so they are trying to help you get the cadence and nuance.
• 11:40
  And so this would include like the Living Bible, the new Living
• 11:43
  Bible. There is a translation called
• 11:46
  the Message that doesn't even have the verses because it is
• 11:50
  more of a paraphrase in the commentary than an actual
• 11:54
  translation. I'm actually not a big fan of
• 11:56
  the Message. And if you preach out of the
• 11:58
  Message, you need to find another job.
• 12:02
  And so anyways, what these paraphrases are, treat them like
• 12:06
  commentaries, not like Bible translations, but more like
• 12:09
  commentaries. So they're taking the text, but
• 12:12
  then they're having a little bit of liberty trying to, to add
• 12:16
  some, some words and, and such to try to communicate the
• 12:21
  general meaning. And, and those are not all bad
• 12:24
  and you can use one, but I wouldn't use it as your primary
• 12:27
  study tool. And if you're a teacher, I would
• 12:29
  not use that as your teaching. Translation corruptions, bad
• 12:35
  paraphrases, OK, if rightly understood.
• 12:40
  And then there is thought for thought translations.
• 12:43
  Thought for thought translations are trying to take the original
• 12:47
  language and meaning and communicate it not just in a
• 12:51
  wooden literal style, but in a way that we get the original,
• 12:55
  what I would call the authorial intent.
• 12:58
  And so let's say for example, you're in the Song of songs or
• 13:01
  in the book of Psalms, which are they're literally songs.
• 13:05
  So you're taking songs that were originally probably put to music
• 13:09
  and and sung. He's saying, OK, well, if I was
• 13:13
  to take a song and put it into a Google translator, if I didn't
• 13:17
  consider the emotional trajectory, the authorial
• 13:20
  intent, who is writing it and who they're writing it to.
• 13:23
  So like Song of Songs, I believe is Solomon writing love songs
• 13:28
  back and forth with his first wife, Abby Shock.
• 13:31
  Well, if you know it's a husband and wife writing love songs to
• 13:34
  each other. Now we've got like the Tim
• 13:35
  McGraw, Faith Hill, you know, duet love songs.
• 13:39
  Well, then the way you translate that wouldn't be the same way
• 13:42
  you would translate an IRS document, right?
• 13:45
  You're trying to get the poetry in the symmetry in the harmony.
• 13:49
  And that is more thought for thought.
• 13:51
  This would include like the New International version.
• 13:55
  This would include some would say that the new Living
• 13:59
  Translation and it and it and those could be very, very
• 14:03
  helpful in addition. So there's corruption
• 14:06
  paraphrase, thought for thought. And then there's word for word
• 14:11
  where they're trying to take the original Greek, Hebrew, Aramaic
• 14:15
  word and do an equivalent absolute consistent translation.
• 14:22
  Jesus talks about every job and every, every total.
• 14:24
  He's down to the details. And so this would include like
• 14:28
  the English standard version, this would include the new King
• 14:32
  James Version, this would include the new American
• 14:35
  standard Bible. This would include the Holman
• 14:39
  Christian standard Bible. Those would be more the thought
• 14:42
  for thought, the, excuse me, the word for word.
• 14:45
  So the word for word translations are going to work
• 14:47
  really well in like Galatians and also Ephesians and Romans
• 14:53
  where you're dealing with precise theological words and
• 14:56
  concepts. The thought for thought is going
• 14:59
  to be helpful in places that are like the Book of Revelation,
• 15:04
  where there's more poetry and symmetry and imagery.
• 15:08
  It's also going to be helpful when you get into the Old
• 15:11
  Testament, especially the wisdom literature, Song of Solomon,
• 15:14
  Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Job. And then the paraphrases, they
• 15:19
  can be helpful more like commentaries to give you a
• 15:22
  little hue. And so I preach out of the
• 15:26
  English standard version of the Bible because it is a word for
• 15:30
  word, and I find that most accurate and helpful.
• 15:34
  The new King James can also be good for that.
• 15:36
  As I said, the Home and Christian Standard Bible can be
• 15:40
  good for that, and the New American Standard Bible can be
• 15:42
  good for that, as well as the older translation, the Revised
• 15:46
  Standard Version. When it comes to thought for
• 15:49
  thought, I got saved and taught the first decade out of the New
• 15:52
  International Version, and I really like the New Living
• 15:55
  Translation. It's actually my wife's favorite
• 15:57
  translation. And so at our church, it's the
• 15:59
  English Standard Version and the New Living Translation that tend
• 16:02
  to be the most popular among the the paraphrases.
• 16:07
  I like the Living Bible and the New Living Bible, and as far as
• 16:11
  corruptions go, avoid them. So what would my encouragement
• 16:14
  be? Find a word for word and find a
• 16:18
  thought for thought and enjoy them both.
• 16:22
  Get a couple of translations of the Bible, and sometimes when
• 16:25
  you read the Bible in one translation and then another,
• 16:27
  sometimes you get a little fresh inside in perspective and it can
• 16:31
  be good for you. Whatever you do, start with
• 16:34
  prayer and inviting the Holy Spirit to help you learn the
• 16:37
  Scriptures because the same Holy Spirit who inspired the
• 16:41
  scriptures to be written will illuminate them to you.
• 16:43
  And if you're humble and prayerful, the Bible is this
• 16:47
  supernatural book. It's the only book that when you
• 16:49
  read it, the author shows up to teach you exactly what he
• 16:54
  intended to be said. And so above all else, have an
• 16:58
  attitude of humility and expectancy and prayerfulness.
• 17:02
  Thank you very much for watching.
• 17:04
  And if you do me a solid, go ahead and subscribe and we'll
• 17:07
  get you lots more Bible teaching content.