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Ancient Mysteries: Old Testament Stories Decoded · Relish: a Christian podcast

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  Relish pleasing or zestful flavor a quantity
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  just sufficient to flavor to be pleased or gratified by enjoy we are hoping
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  that what we bring to your table today might add some spice to your life welcome
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  to another episode of relish i'm here with don patterson i'm rowan miller and,
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  yeah must have been somebody i had for breakfast i'm in that giddy kind of mood
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  oh boy we were like that last time too.
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  Yeah, I'm afraid so. It must be the biscuits and gravy.
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  How was your Easter? It was good. It was good. It was busy, but it was good.
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  It was a good time to be together.
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  And now we're getting into May and graduations and all that good stuff.
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  Yeah. You got a busy month coming up. I do. We do. We do. Yes.
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  All right. Well, we'll jump right into it. Today we got some Old Testament stories,
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  a little confusing stories and like, why would they happen?
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  Yeah. Some questions might be kind of. Sort of like your Nabal one last one
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  and old prophet, new prophet. Yeah. Wow.
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  Some of these. And I'm not quite as good in the Old Testament as I am the New
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  Testament. I just don't know it quite as well as I do the New.
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  So, and you know, the surprise factor on this is I come into this cold.
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  I don't know what Rowan's going to ask me ahead of time.
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  Yeah. And I haven't got any preparation ahead of time.
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  So let's see how close and very close last time you got to Stomping Don.
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  Yeah. He, we try to make it as difficult as possible for him,
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  but he still usually comes through. So Lord willing.
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  All right. The first one, why
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  would God kill Moses for not circumcising his son in Exodus 4, 24 to 26?
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  Oh, okay. Well, the threat is there. He doesn't actually kill Moses.
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  Yeah. But the thread is there and it's, it's what's the amazing piece of that
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  story is his wife, though she's not of Jewish background.
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  Gets it she gets it
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  and takes care of it is that deuteronomy or exodus 4
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  i think yeah 24 oh yeah it's just a it's a very short section it is in moses's
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  return to egypt and yeah many some of you might have even just read right over
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  it without even noticing and it is easy to read right over Yeah.
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  And Zephra takes, yeah, 25. Zephra took the flint knife and cut the foreskin. Yeah.
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  So why would the Lord says to Moses, when you return to Egypt,
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  see that you perform things before Pharaoh, all the wonders I've given you to
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  power to do, but I will harden his heart so that he will not let my people go.
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  Then he said to Pharaoh, this is what the Lord says. Israel is my firstborn
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  son, and I told you, let my son go so he may worship me. But he refused to let him go.
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  At the lodging place on the way, the Lord met Moses and was about to kill him.
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  Yeah, that's sort of like out of the blue. Yeah.
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  But Zephyra took a foot knife and did the circumcision. We won't go through all that.
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  Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me, she said, and so the Lord let him alone.
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  At that time, she said, bridegroom of blood, referring to circumcision.
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  Yeah. And it's sort of an interesting story because what happened to Moses?
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  Did he just sort of, whoops, forgot.
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  Yeah. My sons aren't circumcised and I forgot. And here I'm back and I'm doing
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  the Lord's battle and don't have my own stuff done.
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  I mean, basically that boils down to what's going on.
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  And somehow Zephra, which gives some indication that Zephra had at least some
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  knowledge of what needed to be done before the Lord to be within covenant with God.
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  And so she does the circumcision that Moses somehow forgot.
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  I think in the bottom, behind this story is saying, okay, before we go out as
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  Christians to proclaim gospel to people, we need to have our homework done.
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  We need to make sure our lives reflect who Jesus is.
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  Just like Moses before Pharaoh need to have his house in order before he came,
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  you know, on behalf of the covenant with God before Pharaoh.
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  That's the way I take this story.
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  And it's sort of God saying, Moses, get your act together before you go before Pharaoh again.
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  Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's God taking covenant very seriously,
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  that somehow Zephyr had it in her heart that, yeah.
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  The Lord met Moses and was about to kill him. That's pretty serious.
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  So it's essentially saying a lot of what the New Testament would say.
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  Point in the same direction. Yeah. Nice crossover there.
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  So this reminded me of the story of Abel or Abigail and Nabal.
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  Because Abigail bailed Nabal out too temporarily.
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  Right. Like, is there other stories of wives bailing out their husbands?
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  Is there significance in that at all? It may not be recorded in the Bible,
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  but I know it's been happening for an awful long time. My wife has bailed me
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  out of a lot of different things.
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  I have to give Charlene credit for teaching me administration.
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  I mean, nobody looks at her and sees her as an administrator,
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  but those gifts that I use in administration, many of them I learned from Charlene.
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  So that, yeah, it may not get recorded, but I'm sure it's the backstory,
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  just like Abigail is the backstory to Nabal.
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  And see, oh, well, we can go Deborah.
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  Deborah basically took care of the situation. Judges chapter is at four and
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  where the Philistines were coming and she had been given the prophecy that the
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  battle would be given to Israel if they would move ahead.
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  And at that point, Barak would not do it without her along.
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  If you see that in Judges 4. Yeah, it is chapter 4. Imagine I was right.
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  We get that a lot. It gets you new here. So Barak said to her in verse 8,
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  if you go with me, I will go. But if you do not go with me, I will not go.
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  Very well, Deborah said, I will go with you. But because of the way you're going
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  about this, meaning hooking her in on it, the honor will not be yours for the
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  Lord will give Sesera over to a woman.
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  So Deborah went with Barak to Kadesh and where he was summoned.
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  And then we know the rest of the story. Then it's actually a woman who uses
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  a peg spike, Tent spike to kill the leader of the enemies.
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  And so that battle was given to a woman. So yeah, there's more, there's more.
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  That's the next one that came to my mind was that one
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  yeah of deborah but yeah that
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  yeah you the women play a
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  mighty good solid part of
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  god's story yeah i think it's interesting that there isn't i mean there's not
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  like women aren't recorded near as much as the men in the bible but when they
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  are it's extremely important stuff it really is yeah and and we see that even
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  in the New Testament, Aquila and Priscilla,
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  and their work with Apollos.
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  That was very important work they did there.
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  Yeah. Part of it is probably jaded by the fact it's written by men,
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  patriarchal, for the most part.
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  The other part is that men aren't supposed to lead.
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  What's interesting is we often don't take that leadership seriously.
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  And that's, yeah. And it's not lead, lead, lead and being led. It's much closer.
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  In fact, Jesus would actually reverse it because he said he who would be first
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  should be last and last first.
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  And then in John 13, he washes his disciples' feet. The guys who should be stepping
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  up and serving him, he ends up serving.
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  And so while we like to see things much more polarized than it is,
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  it's not that polarized in the New Testament writing that men are,
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  men are to do it all. We don't know.
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  That's not, no, no, that doesn't wash.
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  Yeah. I just, I just thought of another spot. Ruth, the book of Ruth is given
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  to us because of what God did with those women.
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  Mm-hmm and ruth actually even though she was a moabite was the grandmother of
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  david that's god playing out i knew that playing out the story time after time through the people.
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  Unlikely people if you will yeah i mean a moabite grandma to david yeah yeah
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  grandma great grandma It's right in there with a couple of generations.
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  So, yeah, it's a good story. Good stuff. What you got next?
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  Well, I wasn't sure what I was going to bring next, but when you mentioned the
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  Moabites, I think we'll go over to Sodom and Gomorrah here. Okay.
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  Yeah, we can do that. So, I mean, this is just an extremely questioned passage and a lot of...
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  I mean, non-believers are making YouTube videos of this, of like how,
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  why and how Sodom and Gomorrah was destroyed and stuff like that.
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  Oh, specific Sodom and Gomorrah, okay.
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  Yeah, I mean, you can find plenty of videos on them and all of their different takes on it.
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  Trying to see here, I don't actually have the passage written down,
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  but I was wondering, I think it is 20.
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  Is it 20? Oh, it might be 90. 19. There we go.
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  And so, which is the part that they have the biggest problem with?
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  The prayer beforehand with the three visitors coming to Abraham prior?
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  I mean, there's a precursor to it. I don't know what.
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  Yeah. Well, what I find interesting is when we go to chapter 18 of Genesis,
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  we see the three visitors coming and Abraham has a soft spot for Sodom.
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  And I think you could take that a lot of different ways that he just had a heart for people.
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  They actually had been his adversaries at different times, but his nephew was
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  living there. And so part of it is familial.
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  He's pleading for his nephew's life among the visitors because they're headed that direction.
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  Because in And verse 20 says, the outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is so great
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  and their sin so grievous that I will go down and see if they have done as bad
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  an outcry as it has reached to me. If not, I will know.
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  The men turned away and went toward Sodom, but Abraham remained standing before the Lord.
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  Then Abraham approached him, meaning the Lord. What this is interesting,
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  will you sweep away the righteous with the wicked?
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  Because the devastation that was planned was total, total wipeout.
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  What if there's 50 righteous people in the city? Will you sweep away and not
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  spare the place for the sake of 50 righteous people in it?
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  Far be it from you, because it's talking about the nature of God.
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  Far be it from you to do such a thing, to kill the righteous with the wicked,
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  treating the righteous and the wicked alike. Far be it from you.
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  Will not the judge of all the earth do right?
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  So the Lord says, if I find 50 righteous people in the city of Sabanum,
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  I'll spare the whole place for their sake.
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  That's talking about God's heart. Yeah.
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  And so then Abraham spoke up again. Brave soul that he is.
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  Okay, went two pages. Now that I've been so bold to speak to you,
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  though I'm nothing but dust and ashes, what if the number of the righteous is five less than 50?
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  Will you destroy the whole city because of five people?
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  If I find 45 there, says God, I will not destroy it. So once again, he spoke to him.
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  What if there are only 40 found there?
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  And that would probably be about the size of Lot's family. and his servants all together.
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  He said, for the sake of 40, I will not do it. Then he said,
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  may the Lord not be angry.
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  Let me speak. What if there's only 30 that can be found there?
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  Will you, and the Lord answers, I won't do it if I find 30 there.
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  Now that I've been so bold to speak, now he goes down to 20.
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  And God says, for the sake of 20, I will not destroy it. And then he goes down
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  to 10. For the sake of 10, God will not destroy it.
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  The Lord had finished speaking, Abram left him, and Abraham returned home.
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  What we find then, the two angels go into the city, and they find it in a bad way.
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  A bad way. Yeah.
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  To the point that even the angels are about to be victimized,
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  if Lot hadn't opened his doors and brought them in.
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  But that speaks a great deal about the city and their intent,
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  their culture, what they've said is all right among them.
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  And they go for it. They try.
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  Lot even offers his daughters in place of the two visitors. And that might sound bad.
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  No, it does sound bad. There's no way that doesn't sound bad.
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  But he was trying to be hospitable. It was a reflection of his hospitality.
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  He wanted to care for the visitors.
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  Not that he would openly sacrifice his daughters. Because of this,
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  they are saved and are led out of the city before it's destroyed.
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  And then Lot's wife, of course, turns around and anything you're leaving,
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  you're going to have some wonder and hearing what was going on.
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  Then she turned her head back and turned to salt.
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  So what's the next question? Well, it was that one right there.
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  You brought it up. Because it, yet again, is the wife in the Bible with another important part there.
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  And it's like the movie explosion scenes you see now, you know,
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  it's not cool if you look back and she looked back.
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  So there's significance of that?
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  There's significance to that because, you know, it is our human tendency to do so.
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  Whether it's looking back because something's happening behind us and it's distracting.
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  If we're told not to look back, isn't that that little voice in the back of our head?
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  Well, why, you know, couldn't I just maybe?
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  And when it's actually an angel of God that says, don't look back,
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  maybe you shouldn't look back.
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  Yeah. When the angels show up, you probably ought to listen to them.
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  And so she, yeah, this is judgment.
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  In a sense, it's lesser punishment than what was going on in Sodom and Gomorrah.
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  Yeah. It's still punishment, but part of it is the sovereignty of God.
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  I mean, how much do we believe that God is not only a righteous judge, but sovereign judge?
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  And what he says he will do, he's let us know that ahead of time.
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  That being said, it brings all the more importance to what Jesus did on the
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  cross, because all of us were under the judgment of the law. you,
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  All of us. And the cross is the place where grace came and freed us from the
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  judgment of the law at the cross.
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  Now we're under Christ and then we're in relationship rather than religion. That's the difference.
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  I sort of went a little ways past your question there, but. No, that's good.
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  It's significant to think that God is decisive.
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  I mean, he was even decisive when Abraham said, okay, is there 50 or 45, 30, you know, on down.
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  And he, okay, if there's, God knew there weren't more than Lot's family that
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  were righteous enough to come out of the city, but he was still going to judge
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  that city. Yeah. Yeah. Those cities.
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  Another part with this is getting into the Moab part, the Moabites,
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  like we talked about earlier. You're like, what about the, the cave scene?
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  I guess you could call it like, oh, you're getting into that part.
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  Yes. Okay. And that's how we ended up with Moabites folks.
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  Yeah. What do we take that for? Well, yeah, a lot.
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  The two daughters hatched this plan to get, you know, okay, there's no men around there.
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  You know, how are we going to continue the family line and all these things
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  that they were worried about? And, you know, we can get ourselves,
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  it's not like there were no other men on earth, right? Yeah.
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  But in their minds for that moment, there were no other men on earth.
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  It wasn't reality, but it was where they had gone with their minds.
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  And so they cook up this plan.
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  31, 32. Yeah. Let's get our father drunk and then lie with him and preserve
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  our family line through our father.
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  And so poor old Lot gets drunk and has sex with his daughters and they start
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  a whole new nation. Isn't that wonderful?
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  And the question is, should they have done that?
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  No, they shouldn't have done that. But that's, you know, a lot of histories
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  because people did what they thought they had to do to get by.
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  And in their minds, this is how they could keep the family line from being contaminated,
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  if you will, from outsiders.
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  Was it good? Was it right? No, no.
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  And in a way, it crafted a nation that was on the edge of culture because of how it started.
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  Yeah. No, I would not condone that today. I don't think that's the way we need
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  to do things. And actually, there are other men around.
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  There would have been other men around at that time.
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  But this is how they had reasoned things out.
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  And maybe that's the lesson we can take from it as much as anything else.
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  Sometimes we get into a spot where we reason
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  things out because of our hopelessness and
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  okay something that probably sin
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  no this was sin it was sin and they knew it was sin and i don't know of a culture
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  it's all right but they justified it yeah and sometimes i don't know whether
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  you get in those situations where this is a little seemy,
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  but I can justify it. Yep.
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  That's a great just. And then we move forth and yeah, and that's not always good.
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  So be careful how we justify things. Yep. We as humans can find a way to justify anything, so.
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  We're quite good at it. Yep. Yeah. But that also puts us in a spot where we
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  may not reflect Christ well. Yeah.
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  Because what he said and what we're doing contrast yeah
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  all right cool i didn't put the timer out and we might be about time i think
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  that's it for today okay thank you as always for answering the questions don
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  if you guys ever have questions you can let us know put them in the comments,
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  Alex will pull them out. Like that. Yeah.
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  Just get him to us somehow. If you know either of us, you can just reach out to us. Yeah.
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  Oh, don't give them to me. Otherwise I'll have an up. Oh yeah.
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  Give them to Rowan and then he'll take care of them and get them in the right spot.
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  Yeah. Cause I don't want to know him ahead of time or it spoils.
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  Got about that part. Well, we'll try a couple episodes here in the future where
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  we actually know and can research the question ahead of time.
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  Yeah. I think that might be a lot deeper dive there.
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  Thank you guys all for joining us and we will see you next time thank you for
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  joining us for this podcast feel free to become part of this ministry by sharing
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  it with others our goal is to help each other grow deeper in our understanding
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  of who God is and is calling to us in our daily lives thank you again for joining
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  us and may God bless your day.