Latest / We Are More: Sisters Talk Faith & Feminism / Ep. 118: Jesus Says, "Yay Fraud"

Transcript

Ep. 118: Jesus Says, "Yay Fraud" · We Are More: Sisters Talk Faith & Feminism

• 0:12
  Speaker 1: To the We Are More Pod cast. My name is Alyssa. And my name is Bree. We're two sisters passionate about all things faith and feminism. We believe that Jesus trusted, respected, and encouraged women to teach and preach his word.
• 0:26
  And apparently, that's controversial. Get comfy. Hello. You may notice a different tone. More somber.
• 0:40
  A slight sadness. Grieving. Ow.
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: It's because we're back from Disney. If you all didn't catch on to that.
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: Anytime we get back from Disney, there's just there's a period of mourning. A period of mourning, a period of melancholy. Hey, do you remember did you ever read Because of Winn Dixie? In school, yeah. So in that book, there's these candies that they have that when you suck on them, they're like, it tastes like melancholy.
• 1:15
  Don't if that's depressing. And that's how I feel. Yeah. Yeah. That sounds about right.
• 1:21
  I'm sucking on a candy that makes me sad.
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: Well, spit it out, woman.
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: How embarrassing.
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: Just feel like every time we come back you know how you're leading up to a vacation? Anywhere you go. It doesn't have to be Disney. Anywhere you go, you lead up to a vacation, there's all the excitement. Even if it's just, hey, I get to not work for a
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: week. Mhmm.
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: And you're looking forward to it. You're you're packing. You're buying stuff from Target. You have 50 Amazon packages coming. And then you you're on the vacation.
• 1:55
  You have a good time. Everything's great. But then the vacation ends, and you're like, now what do I do with my life and my soul?
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: Yeah. And you're like, is this real life? Is this what I've been doing forever?
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: I know. And how do you do it again?
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: What's my normal routine? I don't understand it. Who am I? Where am I?
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: We did a Wednesday to Wednesday trip because it's cheaper to fly out on Wednesdays. And so, like, two weeks ago, all of us only worked Monday and Tuesday. And then this last week, all of us only worked Thursday and Friday. So we had two weeks of, like, not a lot of work. And now I'm thinking next week, I've gotta work five full days.
• 2:36
  I'm like, how do I function?
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: I think we should just quit.
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: Quit and and give up entirely?
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I think it's time we move to Florida. We sell pictures of our feet, and we just accept it. Alright. We'll get right on that.
• 2:52
  Yeah. Is that? I'm just done with real life.
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: I know. And it doesn't seem to be getting better. Is this all there is? Every time I see the news, I'm like, oof. So on that really happy note,
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: aren't you guys happy you tuned in? I I
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: don't know how to go up from here.
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: Today, we're talking about Jesus' parables.
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: Yeah. It's not like an upper or a downer. It's just That's just the facts. It's just how it goes. And you're along for the ride because you love us and our really bizarre brand of humor.
• 3:36
  It's bizarre. Oh, Brie so Brie just started a new job recently. I'm sure we've talked about that. But she has a coworker who told her that she feels drunk when she's around you.
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: Oh, yeah. Yeah.
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: She's like, I don't know what it is about you. You just make me feel drunk. And I feel like probably that's why people tune in. Because the two of us together are a wreck.
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah. We will intoxicate you. We're a great time. That could be good merch.
• 4:13
  Speaker 2: We have so many t shirts at this point.
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: We are more. We will intoxicate you.
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: Good. Yeah. That'll be great. Mhmm. We'll get sued, but that'll be great.
• 4:23
  Nah. Nah. That's fine.
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: It's metaphorical intoxication. Right.
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: We'll put that in an asterisk at the bottom. Yeah. And if
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: you get pulled over while you're listening to this podcast on the road and the officer's like, hey, I thought you were drunk driving, you can say, no, I'm just intoxicated by Alyssa and Brianna. Yeah. That'll go over really well. Do that. Do that.
• 4:46
  And then have the officer come sit inside your car with you and listen to this podcast, and maybe you'll make a new friend. Can you imagine you're driving down the road and
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: you just see that situation?
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: Actually Okay. This is a side note that will just make you happy before we start talking about Jesus' parables. My friend from college, her family was going on a road trip one time, and instead of listening to music or whatever, her mom was reading Harry Potter to her and her brother in the back. And they were getting really into it. They were at the part where, like, Harry and oh my gosh, I forgot his name.
• 5:28
  Ron are being, like, chased by Aragon. Aragog? Aragog. The big spider. Yeah.
• 5:36
  Yeah. Yeah. And they were getting really into it. And so the dad started speeding a little bit, and they got pulled over. Oh, no.
• 5:42
  And the officer's like, what's going on? And he's like, I'm sorry. We were reading Harry Potter, and I got really into it. And he let him go.
• 5:50
  Speaker 2: Because that's the best excuse I've ever I'm sorry
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: I was being chased by spiders. I had to get out of there.
• 5:58
  Speaker 2: I love that.
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Alright.
• 6:00
  Speaker 2: Well, from spider chasing, we're headed to Jesus.
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: It's so much the same. Yes. We I don't even think you need
• 6:08
  Speaker 2: to transition music us. Mhmm. Because this was such a flawless transition.
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: Yes. Flawless. My dear. Simply flawless. What is that from?
• 6:18
  Bridgerton. Yeah. Yeah. So,
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: anyway. So, if you read the
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: the gospels And you mark Luke
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: and John. You read the red text, which maybe is that still a thing that Yeah. Bible publishers do? I don't
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: know if all bible publishers do, but the app still does it.
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: Okay. Well, if you're not familiar with it, in a lot of printed bibles, and apparently the app, when Jesus speaks, so the actual words of Jesus himself are in red. And so you'll see that a lot. We talk about that a lot, and I don't know if we've ever explained it before. So if that's confusing, that's what we're talking about.
• 6:59
  But when you read the the red letters, Jesus is not the most clearly spoken person in the world.
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: I think if we stumbled upon him in real life, we would be a little confused and annoyed Mhmm. By him. You're like, can I just get a clear answer? Yeah. Please?
• 7:17
  I don't need a story.
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: It sometimes it feels like, you know those people that they're so smart that when you're talking to them, they're like, they're talking up here and you're down here. Yeah. And you're like, okay. Let's pull it back. They're not being a jerk.
• 7:33
  They're just really smart. Mhmm. And that's kinda how Jesus feels sometimes to us sitting here in 2026.
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: But I
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: don't think that's necessarily how it would have felt if you were sitting back with Jesus in year four AD. You know, whatever. Was that the year? Well, '0 is technically the birth of Jesus. Uh-huh.
• 7:57
  So probably not '4. Maybe. Maybe he was talking then.
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: He was very wise as a toddler.
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: But we're gonna talk a little bit about, like, why Jesus spoke like this, why he spoke in stories instead of just, alright, do this. And then we're gonna talk about some of the parables as well. So let's first talk about what a parable is. In case you're not familiar with that, in case that's a super churchy word. It is a churchy word.
• 8:24
  Yeah. So the Greek word for it is parabole.
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: I saw that in my research too. Was like, the Greek word is parable. Oh. No.
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: It's got an accent on the e. Although it's a straight across accent. I don't know. It sounds a bit like a pasta. P a r a b o l e with an accent.
• 8:45
  Yeah. And it literally means something placed alongside. So like a comparison, like a metaphor or a simile. Saying something in order to say something else. Mhmm.
• 8:59
  And so Jesus uses this a lot. Like, basically, every time he's talking to people. Instead of just saying what he means, he's telling a story. And he tells stories about seeds and farmers and bread baking and fishermen and merchants and vineyards and kids and shepherds and, like, all of these people. Right?
• 9:24
  Things that we don't necessarily relate to. I don't know a lot of shepherds.
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: Not me, personally. I feel like I like the name shepherd, though. Alright. It seems very Sue Thomas FBI.
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: It does. That is a reference they're gonna have to look up. I also there are a lot of people now that bake bread, but it's not my thing. I'm not baking bread. I do know a lot of fishermen, but I'm not a fisherman.
• 9:52
  And I don't really know anybody that does it for a living. So a lot of these references are outside of our normal day to day.
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah. He's not referring to the year of our Lord 2026. Right. Businessmen Right.
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: And people who work remotely. Or retail. Or yeah. Anything like that. And so for us, it's confusing.
• 10:14
  You know, when he has a metaphor about being fishers of men, I don't like to be outside.
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: No. And immediately, what comes to my head is, it's raining men. Hallelujah. I don't think that's what he meant.
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: So for us, it's confusing. But for the people back then, where there are only so many professions.
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: Okay? Yes. His stories are very relatable. Mhmm. They understand the bigger picture.
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah. There's a lot of bread baking going on. The wedding culture would have been the same as what they were experiencing every day. There were a lot of fishermen. There were a lot of shepherds.
• 10:52
  These were common occupations.
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: A lot of people traveling by foot.
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: Right. That's not something I'm doing ever. Literally not ever. Unless it's in the Disney Parks. And I think because you see these examples coming from ordinary life back then, that shows us who Jesus was trying to talk to.
• 11:14
  Because he doesn't have a lot of parables about or where the main character is the religious elite. Unless he's talking
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: about the dangers of that.
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: Right. Like, in the the story of the Good Samaritan, we do definitely see some religious people, but they're not the star. They're, like, in the background doing the bad thing. Mhmm. You know?
• 11:33
  So who is Jesus expecting to listen to him? Average everyday people. Mhmm. And that's part of, I think, why he does tell stories this way. Because if he sat and gave you a theology lesson, it does go above people's heads.
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: And he's bringing the Bible, the word of God, to the average everyday person in a way that they can understand it rather than being like, oh, let me give you the 10 commandments and hope that you remember them. No. Let me tell you something in a way about the 10 commandments that you're gonna understand and be able to relate to that and know what they mean. Mhmm.
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: It almost feels like did you guys ever do this in school? A really good memory technique is to make a song. I love that. So, like, when my daughter was trying to learn the states in their capitals, there's a song from the cartoon Animaniacs, and they do all the states and capitals. Right?
• 12:28
  Or my son knows just all the countries of the world because there is a channel on YouTube where they sing all the countries of the world. It's a great memorization technique.
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: Or the preamble from school of rock or schoolhouse rock, whatever School it of Yeah. School of rock.
• 12:44
  Speaker 2: That's different. It's Jack Black. But I wonder if maybe it's a similar principle. You know? Mhmm.
• 12:50
  Like, how much of the Bible do we necessarily have memorized? Even here today, as opposed to you probably know most of the parables, or at least a lot of them, because it's storytelling.
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: Or even if you do have a lot of the Bible memorized, that doesn't mean that you know what it's teaching. Mhmm. You might have memorized the words, but
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: being able to apply those teachings to your life, that's different. Right. And so I think that makes it really effective. It makes Jesus good at what he did. Now I think a lot of biblical scholars consistently ask, was Jesus trying to be confusing?
• 13:28
  Because it is confusing for us. So was Jesus ever confusing? And the answer is yes. In fact, in you can read it in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, the disciples ask Jesus basically, why do you speak to them in parables? Why do you
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: keep doing this? Jesus, you're actually annoying us. Can you stop?
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: And Jesus says he's not even clear here. Okay? I wonder what a normal conversation with him was like. Because he says, whoever has will be given more. And then he quotes Isaiah to them about people who hear but don't understand.
• 14:09
  And so some scholars have said Jesus intentionally was making the truth hard to find. So you kind of have to dig through his stories. And I think that's fair to some degree. I don't think Jesus was, like, trying to be a pain. But I also think Jesus wanted us to engage with his words on a deeper level.
• 14:30
  And I also think that different parts of the story relate differently to different people. Mhmm.
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: So you and I could hear the same parable, but get two different messages And from I think that's important.
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: Well, and that's what the Holy Spirit is for. Mhmm. When Jesus died and rose again, he said, I leave you with my spirit to guide you. Not necessarily I leave you with these holy books to guide you, but, like, here's my spirit. And now when I do read the words of Jesus, because I have his spirit in me, it's gonna guide me into what that story means for
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: me. Mhmm.
• 15:10
  Speaker 2: And I think that's a big part of why the Bible can mean different things to different people. And that's okay. Mhmm. But we don't like that.
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: Well, it's not clear.
• 15:18
  Speaker 2: It's not
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: black and white and easy. Unfortunately, you'll find in your old age,
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: your faith is not easy. What? No. It seems very simple. So some possible options also alongside of that.
• 15:36
  Some people do see it as only revealing the truth to people who want to wrestle with it, people who wanna take time with it. Some people also kind of think that these stories expose the people who already hardened themselves.
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: What a what a sentence. Let me reword it.
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: It exposes the people who have already kind of turned away from Jesus.
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: Mhmm.
• 16:05
  Speaker 2: They won't get it. It's not black and white, so they're going to say, ah, that's too difficult for me, and just sort of keep turning away.
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: You have to want to learn more. You have to when you're reading these passages, you have to want to understand the character of Jesus and want to understand his stories. You can just listen blindly. You can memorize the text blindly. Mhmm.
• 16:29
  But do you really wanna understand it? Mhmm.
• 16:31
  Speaker 2: When I was a kid, remember hearing faith is easy. Faith is simple. You wanna have faith like a child. Exactly. But I don't think that a mature faith is necessarily simple because simplicity would be a checkbox list of do this, don't do this, do this, don't do this.
• 16:51
  But Jesus doesn't give us that. He gives us something kinda complicated that we have to wrestle with consistently. Like, not even just once. You can come back to that same story and hear something different and learn something different based on where you are in your faith.
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: Mhmm.
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: Because Jesus makes you think. He makes you think,
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: but he also, I think, a lot of ways, is just like, be a good person. Mhmm. Here's a parable where this person was trying to follow all of the rules, And this person was just doing the right thing and being a good person. Which one was doing better? Be a good human.
• 17:29
  Mhmm.
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah. We really miss that bit. I can't tell you how many times Christians like us, and I don't just mean me and Brie, I mean us as in all of you listening, are told we're too loving, that we're too accepting. And Jesus wouldn't do that. But Jesus absolutely did that.
• 17:48
  And not only in the way that he lived,
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: but in every story he told. Radical love. And you'll hear that from a lot of people like us. Like, who did Jesus surround himself with? It wasn't the religious elite.
• 18:03
  It was the prostitutes and the tax collectors and the people who were on the outside. But that's true. Mhmm. And I'm not saying go and surround yourself with who you think are bad people. I'm saying go and show people love.
• 18:20
  Speaker 2: Mhmm. Now back to the question of would this have been confusing for people. The basic concepts wouldn't have been. You've got farming. You've got fishing.
• 18:29
  You've got sheep herding. I don't know. Exactly. Whatever you do with sheep. And so those were familiar concepts.
• 18:38
  They knew those okay. Jesus set a scene. He's telling a story. I'm at a lovely play. The weird bit came with the way that Jesus told those stories because there were twists in them that didn't fit with culture.
• 18:53
  Like in the story of the Good Samaritan, a Samaritan man is the hero. And we don't quite relate to that because we're far removed from it.
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: If you don't understand that, but the Jewish people Mhmm. Didn't get along with the Samaritans. Mhmm. They were people that stereotypically they did not like Mhmm. And they thought were below them.
• 19:18
  Like, in
• 19:18
  Speaker 2: an extreme way. Like, you are so much worse than me.
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: Think about like
• 19:24
  Speaker 2: So much below me.
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: The propaganda during any war Yeah. Against the enemy that you don't like. Right. That's how they saw the Samaritans. And so
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: for Jesus, even to mention a Samaritan person in his story, I think would have been surprising for them to hear. But to hear that man told as as the really good moral person, as the person that Jesus is saying Be more like them. That would have been shocking. Mhmm. That was like like you reading a horror book and someone dies.
• 19:58
  No. That's not shocking. Someone lives? What happens in horror books? What?
• 20:03
  I don't read them.
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: It's kind of like how Wicked turns around the story of The Wizard of Oz.
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: Right? You and your parables.
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: Thank you. Look at me and my parables. And Elphaba turns out to be not the evil villain that we thought she was. Right.
• 20:20
  Speaker 2: You can also see this where the the story of the two sons, if you're familiar with that one. There is there's a father. He has two sons. The oldest son is the good kid. You know, he's working the land and whatever.
• 20:37
  Typical oldest child. The younger son doesn't wanna do any of that, so he asks his father for his part of the inheritance. And he goes off and spends it all and sleeps with pigs and stuff. And then comes back, and he's welcomed back. And again, this is a story that we're sitting there like, well, of course, you'd welcome your child back.
• 20:55
  Like, okay. Whatever. Not that impactful, Jesus. But at this time, this is a totally different culture. You leave your birthright, you not coming back.
• 21:07
  Mhmm. And so for Jesus to say, no, like, full forgiveness and love, Nothing less and nothing else is acceptable. These are big deals.
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: Mhmm.
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: And so that would have been the part that was a little bit confusing for people. So for us, we have to kind of understand the setting. We have to understand the culture. We have to understand the story. For them, they understood the setting and the culture.
• 21:32
  But the stories still had meat to them that they had to dig
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: into. But if you were vegan, maybe not.
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: I don't think there were a lot of vegans. Probably not. Probably not.
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: Maybe quite a few unintentional vegans just eating bread. Poverty vegans? Nope. Vegans? Vegans?
• 21:50
  Speaker 2: Poverty vegans? Yes. Now, stories also work in a really interesting way because they teach lessons in a way that just telling someone something doesn't do. And you can see this happen earlier in the Bible too. So in second Samuel, Nathan tells David a story.
• 22:13
  Now I know this story primarily as the rubber ducky story from VeggieTales. But basically, Nathan is talking to David about Bathsheba. And we've we've done a whole series on Bathsheba. I recommend going back and listening to it. I think it was, like, a four part series or something.
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: I think we call
• 22:32
  Speaker 2: her Babs. Yeah. We do. But Nathan is telling David this theoretical story about basically what he did in stealing another man's wife and then, you know, killing him. And David hears this story and gets so mad.
• 22:52
  He's furiously angry. Right? And he's like, well, that man should be put to death. Or if you're the VeggieTales, duckeys have been stolen. And how dare they?
• 23:05
  And basically, the idea is you have everything. Why do you need more? And so when David hears a story and says this man should be put to death, and Nathan now says, well, that man is you.
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Joke's on you.
• 23:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah. David has to confront that reality in a much different way than if someone came up to him and said You're wrong. You suck.
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Because then that person would be put on the defense. Right. And they'll do anything to defend their character. But if they've already decided that that other person in the story is wrong, and now they're suddenly that person, that's a little bit more
• 23:45
  Speaker 2: of an eye opener. Right. Imagine hearing these live too. Like, hearing Jesus speak them. Because for us, sometimes the meaning gets a little bit lost when you've heard the same thing preached 4,000 times.
• 24:01
  And I don't know. Like, okay, the good Samaritan, that's even into normal culture. You don't even need to be in church to hear that story. But imagine sitting there hearing it and not knowing what was going to happen. Mhmm.
• 24:16
  Making judgments the whole way through. Well, clearly this religious leader is going to help. Well, clearly that religious leader is going to help. Well, clearly everything's gonna be like, you know, coming to a conclusion as you go in the way that David did in that story. That's what Jesus was doing.
• 24:35
  And we can still do that to some degree. But, of course, we do know the outcome of most of them if you grew up in church the way that we did. So I think that's why Jesus talked like this, even though, frankly, I do think it would have been kind of a pain.
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: I do. And it wasn't just the parables, like, the stories. There were little things that he said in comparison Mhmm. Instead of just saying things how they were. So, like, a tree is known by its fruit.
• 25:08
  Mhmm. We understand that now because we you and I grew up in it. Right. But, like, that is Jesus, come on. Mhmm.
• 25:17
  Come on. Yeah. Or a speck in a plank. A speck in your eye versus a a plank in speck in their eye versus a plank in your own. Or a camel going through the eye of a needle.
• 25:28
  Like, Jesus, what?
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: I that's why I wanna know. What was it like to have just a real, normal conversation with
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: because none of that's normal. I mean, I don't know. It doesn't seem normal to me. It doesn't seem normal, but it is like a fantastic visual. Mhmm.
• 25:46
  Like, no. Of course a camel cannot make it through the eye of a needle. What a ridiculous statement. I do the speck versus the log in
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: your eye, I visualize that every time. Every time somebody says that, I think of someone with a literal log sticking out of their eyeball and having to have
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: a cart go along with them. It's a little graphic. Yeah. It is. Oh, the the lamp being hid under the bowl.
• 26:10
  Mhmm. Or, like, the the song This Little Light of
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: Mine Mhmm. That makes sense to me. Right. But it makes sense to us because we grew up in church. It's harder for someone that isn't a natural church person to just figure all that out.
• 26:28
  Yeah. And it's hard for us to sit there and be like, oh, well, I understand this. So I'm gonna tell
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: this story assuming you understand it. Don't you understand that you shouldn't put your light in a bushel? Exactly. Like, don't you know? Who talks like that?
• 26:42
  Speaker 2: So it is complicated. It is difficult. And I think it's okay to acknowledge that it's not the easiest thing in the world. Sometimes it would have been easier for us if Jesus had given us a list of things to do, but that's not what he wanted. When God created the world, he could have created people who could not sin.
• 27:03
  He could have created a world without sin.
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: Oh, he
• 27:06
  Speaker 2: could have free will. Yeah. He didn't want that. And so Jesus, in these stories, gives us free will. Gives us free will to decipher what they mean, to interpret and share what they mean.
• 27:19
  And I think that's beautiful in a confusing, complicated sort of way.
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: And that's Jesus.
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: And that's Jesus. So let's talk about a few of the parables themselves. I wanna talk about ones that aren't, like, the first thing you hear in a sermon. I'm sure you probably know all of these too, but they're not the top of the list. The first one you can find in Mark four, and it's about a farmer who plants a seed.
• 27:46
  And then he goes to bed. And he gets up. And he plants a seed. And he gets up. And he goes to bed.
• 27:50
  Blah blah blah. Right? Day after day, he's just living life. And then one day, he gets up and the seed has grown. When?
• 28:00
  And Jesus says he doesn't know how. He doesn't know how it grew. He just knows that it did. So eventually, it grows and it's ready for harvest through very little that that man did. Like, yes, he waters it.
• 28:18
  Yes, he does things to help it along. But he can't make it grow. He can't look at it and say,
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: grow. No. That's not how it works.
• 28:27
  Speaker 2: I mean, I'm not a gardener, but I don't think that's how it works. Mom, would you like to chime in here? So what this story is trying to say is that God's kingdom doesn't depend on our effort.
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: Oh. What a way to preach that. Exactly. So you
• 28:48
  Speaker 2: should do the thing. Maybe that's being kind to someone. Maybe that's paying for someone's dinner. Maybe that's inviting someone over or having coffee with somebody or sitting with them through their pain or whatever it is. Do the initial thing.
• 29:05
  But at the end of the day, you can't look someone in the eye and shout, go.
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: Be a Christian.
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: That's not how it works. That's God's job. Your job is to do what you can do. To plant the seed. Yeah.
• 29:23
  The farmer plants the seed. The farmer waters harvests the seed, etcetera, etcetera. But he doesn't make it grow. Do what you can do, and let God do what God can do. Let go and let God.
• 29:37
  As they say. And I think this one's really cool because you hear that all the time. Plant a seed.
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: Just plant the seed.
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: But I wasn't as familiar with this actual parable and where that came from. I'm sure many of you were, but it wasn't one that I heard a lot, I guess. Mhmm. And what an amazing way for Jesus to tell us this, to say, don't worry about it. Do the things that you can do, but God's kingdom grows because God wants it to grow.
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: We kinda talk about that a lot. Like, when you're asking God for something Mhmm. Do what you can do. Yeah. Take a step.
• 30:15
  Do what you can. But at the end of the day, that's faith Mhmm.
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: Is letting go and letting God. And that's kind of a major gift because there's not the same kind of pressure there. If I have to control the growth of God's kingdom or even my growth day today or my children's growth day today or whatever, that's so much pressure.
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: I can't. Or you'll notice that, like, things start to go not so hot if you try to manhandle your life.
• 30:52
  Speaker 2: That was a lovely way to word that. Thanks. And that's the great thing. And it's so much more difficult than that. But to say, no matter what I do, God's job is to grow all the little seeds in my life.
• 31:09
  Not just to grow his kingdom, but to take care of all of the things. To take care of me. I'll do the things that I can do, but I don't have to have all the pressure.
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: We'll water things. Mhmm. We'll plant things. But we won't shout grow. Another t shirt.
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: Okay. So then the next one is in Matthew 13, and it's the yeast story. So it starts off, the kingdom of heaven is like yeast.
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: And we know about that because of the pandemic when everybody went nuts, and they went and bought all the yeast. And they discovered, what am I gonna do with this yeast? Why did I buy so much of it? I don't know how to bake bread. Yeah.
• 31:54
  We did. We did do that.
• 31:56
  Speaker 2: Yeah. So for us, yeast often means bread, which is like a comforting thing. Right? Mhmm. Like a
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: Except for the celiac people.
• 32:11
  Speaker 2: Okay. For many of us, you think, oh, a big warm slice of bread. It's just comforting. It's nice. Right?
• 32:21
  But for the ancient Jewish people, it meant something different. So for them, yeast often symbolized corruption or impurity in Jewish tradition. Why? It says, for example, leaven removed during Passover. So they would take out this symbolic impurity during Passover.
• 32:42
  So unleavened bread, flatbread, because it didn't have any yeast. And so Jesus picked an image that would have been confusing. They're saying yeast means impurity, and he's saying the kingdom of heaven is like yeast.
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: And you took it out of your bread.
• 33:02
  Speaker 2: So I'm trying to think of a good example for today like this that we would have complicated associations with. Cigarettes. Okay. Sure. The kingdom of heaven is like cigarettes.
• 33:15
  That's not so good.
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: That's not so good. Why would you
• 33:19
  Speaker 2: say that, she says?
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: We've cut those out of our lives.
• 33:23
  Speaker 2: The FDA said they're bad for me. And then Jesus makes it weirder. Because yeast is small, and it's hidden, and it's invisible. But what he's saying is that eventually it changes everything.
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: Oh, so not cigarettes.
• 33:40
  Speaker 2: Not cigarettes. Okay. It worked for a second.
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: We're gonna need a different comparison. I don't know the comparison. Hang on. I'm getting there. It's like yeast.
• 33:51
  Good job. Thank you. Yes. That was it. Thank you.
• 33:56
  Speaker 2: So yeast is something that seems insignificant, that seems small, until suddenly it's not. Until suddenly it's everything. Because without it, you have flatbread. Right? Still delicious, but a very different thing.
• 34:15
  If you want bread, you need yeast to make it grow and rise and become something important. And so the hero of the story here is this woman who's baking bread and using yeast in a way that the Jewish people would have been like
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: One more time. Okay. Ready? And
• 34:45
  Speaker 2: and that would have been complicated for them. And we don't appreciate it that way. Because to us, yeast doesn't mean that. The kingdom of heaven is like yeast. Okay.
• 34:53
  Whatever. And move on. But it would have been complicated for them, and they would have had to dig into that and ask about that. And another important thing here is that, again, like, the hero of the story is a woman. The hero of the story is a woman.
• 35:08
  Just, like, sit with that for a second. She's baking bread, and we talk a lot about how you don't hear the pronouns she and her from the pulpit, like, ever.
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: Occasionally, When they absolutely must. On Mother's Day. On Mother's Day, or sometimes they talk about Mary during Christmas.
• 35:29
  Speaker 2: But almost never. So imagine back in this very patriarchal society, not that we're not in one now, but in Jesus' time where patriarchy is literal law, Jesus is changing the way that these stories are being told, the way that theology is being taught. Jesus, this high religious leader
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: Mhmm. Is giving us a story that's important that we have to learn from. And what we have to learn is from a woman. Mhmm. That's significant.
• 36:04
  Speaker 2: Jesus is using a woman to teach theological truths. So then that tells us that women can teach theological truths. Bizarre. It's so strange how
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: that happens. Wait. Ow. I fell off my chair.
• 36:20
  Speaker 2: So the next one is in Luke 11. And this isn't one that I I've probably heard it, like, once. But it's not one that I hear a lot. And so here's what happens. There's a traveler.
• 36:32
  He shows up into a town unexpectedly, and he has no bread. So he goes and he pounds on somebody's door.
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: We have no bread. No bread. Do you know what that's from? No. Into the woods.
• 36:46
  Speaker 2: So he pounds on somebody's door. And it's like the middle of the night. Okay? And I mean, think of what would happen you've got your Ring doorbell up. Right?
• 36:56
  And the middle of the night, somebody comes booking it across your front yard, pounding on your door saying, bed, bed. Well, I
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: would call 911. Yeah. What do you do? You don't answer the door. I would seek shelter.
• 37:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah. And he insists on being let in and fed. Right? So the person in the house says, no. I I'm sleeping.
• 37:20
  Kids are sleeping.
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: Bye. This is my house, you freaking weirdo.
• 37:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah. But eventually, he gets up, and he goes to the door, and he feeds the man. And this, Jesus is saying, is, like, the best thing to do. Now, I am not advocating that you do this.
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: No. Don't answer the door. Call 911. Well, listen. If someone is running to your house and screaming in the middle of the night for food, they're probably high on drugs.
• 37:49
  But if someone is yelling for Jesus,
• 37:52
  Speaker 2: then you can help them. Maybe maybe shout out the 2nd Floor window, though.
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Have you heard about our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ?
• 38:01
  Speaker 2: So usually, people are using this story to say, pray and pray and pray and pray, kind of
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: until God does what you want. Pray without ceasing.
• 38:15
  Speaker 2: Yes. But the message here, if that's what it is, if it's pray without ceasing, it's you can eventually annoy God enough to do
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: what you want. I have heard that preached about from the pulpit that's just like, hey, aggravate God.
• 38:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah. That's not what I'm saying here. That's not what Jesus is saying here. God is not some grumpy neighbor. The comparison here is saying, if even this person who is so irritated with you, who wants you to just leave them alone, will help you, then how much more will God be willing to help you?
• 38:53
  God loves you so much. Continue to communicate with him. It's not annoy the crap out of God. It's look how much God loves you. If even people will help you this much, how much more will God be there for you?
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: Mhmm.
• 39:07
  Speaker 2: But not annoy the crap out of God.
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: Although, if you need to, you need to.
• 39:11
  Speaker 2: I mean, live your best life. But don't expect that at the end, God is automatically gonna do what you want him to do.
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: That's true. But me and God are tight. So
• 39:20
  Speaker 2: I think if you use that story in this way, I think of it very much as that transactional transactional faith. Faith.
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah. For For sure. Sure.
• 39:27
  Speaker 2: Where you say, God, I will do this if you do this. And Jesus never shows us that. That's not what Jesus is ever saying. And we learned from Judith. We did learn from Judith.
• 39:38
  Oh, I love Judith. We didn't give her a good nickname, though.
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: Judy, our neighbor. Did we say that? Judy from down the block.
• 39:49
  Speaker 2: Is kind of a weird parable. You ready for it? It's a little confusing. It's in Luke 16. So there's a rich man.
• 39:59
  You can't marry him. He's dead. Long dead. And fictional.
• 40:02
  Speaker 1: I was gonna sing a song, but fine.
• 40:07
  Speaker 2: And he discovers that his manager I think the man managing his money Mhmm. Has been wasting money. And so he fires him. Makes sense. Now before leaving, the money manager looks at everybody who owes his boss and says, alright.
• 40:28
  You used to owe 10,000. Now you owe 5,000. You used to owe 15,000. Now you owe 7,000. You used to owe 2,000, now you don't owe anything.
• 40:36
  So he reduced everybody's debts to his manager. And it kinda looks like, like, everybody now that owed the boss, owed the rich man, now loves the manager. Yeah. They're all his best friend. Right?
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: Well,
• 40:51
  Speaker 2: yeah. And it kinda seems like Jesus is like, yay, fraud.
• 40:59
  Speaker 1: It's kinda weird.
• 41:02
  Speaker 2: But what he's saying here, Jesus says that the manager acted shrewdly. Not morally, shrewdly. And it's interesting because we think of Jesus as only the morality police. But what what he's saying is this was a smart move.
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: Not a kind move or a good move, but a smart move.
• 41:33
  Speaker 2: So there's a lot of chat about this one. And you can come to your own conclusions. It's an interesting one. There's a lot of hard parts of the bible that don't make clear sense.
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: Yay. Fraud. Yay. Fraud. That can go on another t shirt.
• 41:48
  Speaker 2: Some people will think that basically the manager took his own commission and used that to pay off the debts. But that seems a little convenient. I think Jesus would have said that. Some people think the manager illegally reduced the debts, and now that has to be fixed. Some people think that the point wasn't accounting.
• 42:09
  The point was thinking ahead and preparing for the future. So that's where that shrewdness comes in. So the manager is thinking, well, I'm screwed. Not only did I get fired, I got fired in a small community and for a pretty bad reason. Mhmm.
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: So I'm not gonna
• 42:26
  Speaker 2: get any more jobs. So instead, I'm gonna make sure everybody loves me. That I am the hero of the town. I won't have to pay for
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: a drink anywhere I go. If I'm gonna go down, I might as well do some good.
• 42:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Lift everybody So else then Jesus kind of pivots and says, if people are this strategic about their temporary wealth, then shouldn't people be as thoughtful about eternal things? So if you're thinking ahead for your own good, for your own wealth, you should be thinking ahead for the good of God's kingdom too. Not just what can I do today with what's presented in front of me, but what can I do next week? Can I educate myself in a better way so that I will be able to communicate with people?
• 43:19
  Can I create relationships now that might long term help me grow God's kingdom? Plant those seeds. Plant those seeds, man. Plant those seeds, man. We're going full circle.
• 43:30
  Grow. So it's it's a kind of a weird parable because fraud. But also, Jesus is saying, be smart and prepare. And sometime with this one, I wonder a little bit if, like, Jesus started a story not really knowing where it was going. You know how sometimes you'd start a sentence, and by the end, you're like, I don't
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: know how he got here. But I think
• 43:56
  Speaker 2: I gotta wrap it up.
• 43:57
  Speaker 1: Listen, this is generally the message, and I was trying to give you a parable,
• 44:03
  Speaker 2: and this is the one you get. I love thinking about any Bible characters this way, but especially Jesus as just being a real person. Because obviously Jesus is God, but Jesus was also human And would have messed up sentences. And would have started a sentence and not know where it was going. Much like Alyssa and I.
• 44:25
  Often. I like
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: Like Alyssa when she was trying to figure out the horror books.
• 44:31
  Speaker 2: Yeah. That one went strange
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: places. I should really
• 44:34
  Speaker 2: stick to things I've actually done.
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: Can you imagine if a person died in a horror book? How weird would that be? So strange.
• 44:42
  Speaker 2: I don't know how many people die in an average horror book. I have two more. I'm not sure if we'll get to both of them. But the next one is from Luke 18, and it's about the persistent widow. Now this is another one where it's just like, annoy people until they do what you want.
• 44:58
  Mhmm. Because basically there's a widow. She goes to court. She's demanding justice for herself. And the judge sucks.
• 45:05
  He's not a God fearing person. He doesn't care about people. And she just refuses to quit. This isn't a now courtroom where you have to schedule time and whatever. No.
• 45:15
  She just keeps going up to the guy and be like, come on. Come on. Come on. I'm gonna keep annoying you. I'm gonna sing the song that never ends.
• 45:23
  And he eventually gives her justice simply because she annoys the living crap out of him. And so Jesus is basically showing her, this powerless woman she's a woman. She's a widow. So she has next to no social status here. She's also been harmed and is looking for justice in a community that doesn't care about her.
• 45:49
  And now suddenly, she's the hero. She changes, oh, she changes her fate, like Brave. Did you guys see that movie?
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah. What would you do if you could change your fate?
• 46:03
  Speaker 2: Wow. Well, that was a sad accent.
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: I don't even think that's the right quote. I don't think it is.
• 46:08
  Speaker 2: And so she changes her outcome not because she's powerful or strong to begin with, but because she keeps pushing. And it's an important lesson for life. Keep walking. So many of us are not in positions of power. I'm sure some people are born into positions of power, but I think most of us sitting here today are not in positions of power.
• 46:36
  And yet even if you are born into nothing or find yourself with nothing, Jesus is saying you can do something. You can change the way the world functions. Because not only would she have changed her world, but now she's set a precedent. She's changed the world of others. She's impacted the world for good.
• 47:04
  Potentially generations from now, a precedent will be set that like, hey, we have to listen to people. We have to pay attention and give them justice because otherwise they're gonna annoy us for a really long time. And that's great for us to hear, I think, for faith and for life. Don't give up. Keep pushing.
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: Do ever watch oh my gosh. What was that show? Wipeout from way back in the day. And it was like an obstacle course, and it was supposed to be funny because people would wipe out. Wipeout.
• 47:41
  Yeah. There was this woman who went on there, and she just kept shouting, never give up. Never surrender.
• 47:48
  Speaker 2: And then she bounced off one of those big balls. Yes.
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: And I quote that a lot. As all of you should.
• 47:58
  Speaker 2: Keep going, and be careful of the the bouncy balls as you go.
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah. You may fall into the water, but just get back up. Keep going. Keep jumping. Keep wiping out.
• 48:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah. That can't be the message.
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: You'll never
• 48:16
  Speaker 2: know that you're my hero.
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: You miss all of the opportunities that you don't risk. What? You know what they say? Real quick, let's do the
• 48:29
  Speaker 2: last one. This one is also from Luke 18. Apparently, in Luke 18, Jesus was, like, having a great time telling stories. So Jesus is setting a scene. Right?
• 48:39
  There's two men entering the temple. I'm not starting a joke.
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: Oh. This is a parable. Okay.
• 48:45
  Speaker 2: One is a pharisee, and the other is a tax collector. Both major winners. Now, we know, because we just talked about the pharisees. For us today, these both sound like they suck. Right?
• 48:57
  Mhmm. But for them, the pharisees were the good guys. They're not just the religious leaders. They're well liked. They're the popular guys.
• 49:06
  Yes. The tax collectors are the bad guys.
• 49:10
  Speaker 1: Mhmm.
• 49:10
  Speaker 2: They are the antagonists of the story. No redeeming qualities. Right? So Jesus has set up a good guy and a bad guy scenario for the listeners. And the Pharisee says a prayer.
• 49:24
  And I'm sure you've all heard a prayer much like this. He says, I thank you that I'm not like all of them.
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: Oh. And
• 49:33
  Speaker 2: then he lists his accomplishments. Them. Here's all the great things that I do. And then he fasts and he tithes. And that's what he was supposed to do.
• 49:44
  Okay? The people listening wouldn't have been like, ugh, ick. They would have been like, okay,
• 49:48
  Speaker 1: cool. Mhmm.
• 49:49
  Speaker 2: That's the good thing. Right? The tax collector, on the other hand, can't even lift his eyes up. And he prays, God have mercy on me. I'm a sinner.
• 50:02
  And Jesus says that the tax collector goes home justified, forgiven, but not the religious leader. And to us, we're like, okay. Yeah. Yeah. That makes sense.
• 50:17
  That would have made no sense to the original audience. They would have been like, but that's someone I respect. That's someone who should be listing off his accomplishments because he's amazing. And the tax collector is awful. Why is he the one that goes home with God's favor?
• 50:39
  But Jesus is basically he's not saying that being religious in and of itself is bad, but he's saying that humility is what allows us to come to God and have a relationship with God. And also, what a bold statement,
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: listing off all of your accomplishments to the creator of the universe.
• 50:57
  Speaker 2: But isn't that what we do? Of course we do that.
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: Like, look how good I am. Look at thinking that we can earn Mhmm. God's favor. And nothing you can do is gonna do that. Just being you is enough.
• 51:11
  We all have a Christian resume. Mhmm.
• 51:13
  Speaker 2: I volunteer at this. I donated money to this. I attend church every Sunday. Blah blah blah.
• 51:19
  Speaker 1: I got saved when I was the young age of four years old. And then again, several other times.
• 51:25
  Speaker 2: We all have that going in our heads. So it's easy to judge, but it's also very real.
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: And so Jesus is saying, set all
• 51:35
  Speaker 2: of that aside. Not that we're not gonna do that sometimes. We're humans. But set that aside and come to God saying, God, I need you.
• 51:45
  Speaker 1: I'm a piss pot.
• 51:46
  Speaker 2: I don't think God wants that. But I need you. I'm not amazing without you. So come to me where I am. And that's kind of a theme that Jesus has across all of these stories is switching up the hero, showing humility, showing love, showing people to love those that they wouldn't otherwise.
• 52:16
  And it's kind of amazing the way that he does it, how he leads people to the end message. That's pretty cool.
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: That was a good one to end on.
• 52:24
  Speaker 2: Thank you. Not so depressing?
• 52:26
  Speaker 1: Not so depressing.
• 52:27
  Speaker 2: Good. Good. Good.
• 52:28
  Speaker 1: So next week, I have what we're gonna talk about.
• 52:31
  Speaker 2: Alright. I'm ready. I haven't heard this yet.
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: Surprise. We are gonna be talking about another biblical woman. We love that. We love women. We like to hear she, her from our pulpit.
• 52:42
  And we will be talking about a woman named Jehosheba. I've never heard that name. That's how I'm gonna pronounce her name. Alright. She's gonna
• 52:51
  Speaker 2: need a nickname.
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: You all have some homework. You're gonna go read her story. You're gonna find it in second Kings eleven one through three and second Chronicles twenty two ten through 12. And she's kind of, she's she's tough. She doesn't follow the rules.
• 53:10
  She breaks them, and her name is written down in the bible. But we can't pronounce it. And it might be Jehosheba. And it might be Jehosheba.
• 53:23
  Speaker 2: Find out next week. We'll come up with a better nickname for next week.
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: Don't you worry. Alright. Well, join us for that. I'm excited to read about her.
• 53:31
  Speaker 2: I have no idea who that is.
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: So Get ready. Because I just read a few little snippets, and I'm like, oh, fun.
• 53:38
  Speaker 2: Alright. Well, we'll research, and we'll get back to you. In the meantime, have a lovely week. Do something ridiculous. Something utterly ridiculous this week.
• 53:49
  That's my advice to you.
• 53:52
  Speaker 1: Yeah. That was a good contribution. Thank you. What are we gonna do?
• 53:57
  Speaker 2: We do something ridiculous every day.
• 53:59
  Speaker 1: Oh, true. Tomorrow, I'm just gonna go try a bunch of food with a friend. Maybe get high tea. I hate you. I know.
• 54:08
  Speaker 2: Okay. We'll talk to you guys next week. Bye.
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: Love you. Bye.