Latest / Ministry Minded / Navigating the Challenges of Studying the Old Testament with Eric Attinger

Transcript

Navigating the Challenges of Studying the Old Testament with Eric Attinger · Ministry Minded

0:16
SPEAKER_00: Hello and welcome to a brand new episode of the Ministry-Minded Podcast,
0:20
SPEAKER_00: a show that seeks to marvel at the mercy of God that meets us in our messy ministries.
0:24
SPEAKER_00: I'm, of course, your host, Pastor Brad Gray.
0:26
SPEAKER_00: I serve as the senior pastor of Stonington Baptist Church in Pexinus, Pennsylvania.
0:32
SPEAKER_00: And I'm here today with another conversation between Pastor Eric and myself.
0:36
SPEAKER_00: And this time we're getting into a topic that I just love to dive into.
0:41
SPEAKER_00: Again,
0:41
SPEAKER_00: it's focused on hermeneutics,
0:43
SPEAKER_00: studying the Bible,
0:44
SPEAKER_00: but specifically we spend a lot of time in this particular episode diving into Old
0:50
SPEAKER_00: Testament hermeneutics,
0:52
SPEAKER_00: how to study the 39 books of the Old Testament.
0:56
SPEAKER_00: You know,
0:57
SPEAKER_00: a very famous evangelical preacher once made the comment that we should unhitch the
1:02
SPEAKER_00: Old Testament from our faith,
1:05
SPEAKER_00: which of course is a
1:11
SPEAKER_00: And we unpack why.
1:12
SPEAKER_00: Eric and I unpack why that is such an unfounded statement,
1:16
SPEAKER_00: but also why if you are a Christian understanding the New Testament,
1:21
SPEAKER_00: much of your Old New Testament understanding is going to be informed by what occurs,
1:28
SPEAKER_00: what is revealed
1:30
SPEAKER_00: in the Old Testament.
1:31
SPEAKER_00: We cannot understand one without the other.
1:33
SPEAKER_00: And it's important for us to wrestle with, grapple with what the Old Testament tells us.
1:39
SPEAKER_00: And of course, that's not to say that the Old Testament is easy to read.
1:42
SPEAKER_00: It is definitely sometimes complicated,
1:46
SPEAKER_00: sometimes convoluted,
1:48
SPEAKER_00: sometimes very off-putting in terms of what it reveals,
1:53
SPEAKER_00: what it relays,
1:54
SPEAKER_00: the stories that it brings us to.
1:56
SPEAKER_00: It's
1:56
SPEAKER_00: It's not always an easy read by any stretch of the imagination.
2:00
SPEAKER_00: But yet, even still, all of it is tending towards Christ.
2:04
SPEAKER_00: With Christ alone as our foundational hermeneutic, the Old Testament comes alive.
2:12
SPEAKER_00: And I hope that that is the same blessing that you will receive from this
2:16
SPEAKER_00: particular episode as we dive into...
2:19
SPEAKER_00: approaching the Old Testament,
2:21
SPEAKER_00: studying it,
2:22
SPEAKER_00: wrestling with its stories,
2:24
SPEAKER_00: chewing on what it is supposed to convey to us as good students and disciples of God.
2:31
SPEAKER_00: So, hopefully you're in a comfy spot.
2:34
SPEAKER_00: You can
2:35
SPEAKER_00: sit back and relax as we dive into Old Testament hermeneutics and how to make sense
2:40
SPEAKER_00: of different biblical genres and why,
2:43
SPEAKER_00: once again,
2:44
SPEAKER_00: Christ is the key to unlocking all of this.
2:47
SPEAKER_00: So, I hope you enjoy this episode.
2:49
SPEAKER_00: I pray you're blessed by it.
2:51
SPEAKER_00: So, one of the things that you and I, I would say, are pretty passionate about and like pretty...
2:58
SPEAKER_00: agreed upon is the idea that the old Testament is a place where we should spend a lot more time.
3:05
SPEAKER_00: Um,
3:05
SPEAKER_00: and it is interesting how the old Testament is one of those places of the Bible
3:11
SPEAKER_00: that is sometimes not as frequented,
3:15
SPEAKER_00: frequented,
3:15
SPEAKER_00: sorry,
3:16
SPEAKER_00: uh,
3:16
SPEAKER_00: as it should be like we don't visit enough.
3:18
SPEAKER_00: We don't, or when we do, um,
3:21
SPEAKER_00: we don't interpret it properly, maybe.
3:25
SPEAKER_00: It seems like the Old Testament is rife for becoming this book of morals.
3:30
SPEAKER_00: So when you're approaching...
3:33
SPEAKER_00: to preach, study a Old Testament text.
3:37
SPEAKER_00: What are some of the things that come to your mind?
3:39
SPEAKER_00: What are the things that help you as you approach that challenge?
3:41
SPEAKER_02: Sure.
3:42
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's a really good point, especially because you're so right.
3:45
SPEAKER_02: You know,
3:45
SPEAKER_02: that's like one of the things you have to look out for people today is to steer
3:48
SPEAKER_02: away from the Old Testament because they're all about Jesus,
3:50
SPEAKER_02: which is true.
3:51
SPEAKER_02: But as we know from the New Testament, he's all throughout the Old Testament.
3:54
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
3:54
SPEAKER_02: And all the books point to him.
3:55
SPEAKER_02: So it's very, very helpful.
3:57
SPEAKER_02: But it is one that people stay away from.
3:59
SPEAKER_02: I dive right into it.
4:00
SPEAKER_02: Maybe I overcompensate because sometimes I have to say, I've got to get to the New Testament too.
4:03
SPEAKER_02: I've got to get back to that stuff.
4:04
SPEAKER_02: But I think it's because I had this realization that we're talking about here is
4:08
SPEAKER_02: that the Old Testament isn't studied enough.
4:10
SPEAKER_02: And probably for the reasons we're going to get to here is that it's just so hard
4:13
SPEAKER_02: to understand sometimes.
4:16
SPEAKER_02: For some reason,
4:16
SPEAKER_02: the New Testament,
4:17
SPEAKER_02: people always say,
4:18
SPEAKER_02: well,
4:18
SPEAKER_02: it's the nicer,
4:18
SPEAKER_02: lighter version,
4:19
SPEAKER_02: which once you get to Revelation,
4:21
SPEAKER_02: it's questionable.
4:21
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
4:23
SPEAKER_02: but people have this concept of,
4:25
SPEAKER_02: wow,
4:25
SPEAKER_02: that's so archaic,
4:26
SPEAKER_02: and that was biblical times,
4:28
SPEAKER_02: and I don't know,
4:29
SPEAKER_02: and I think the solution to that is,
4:30
SPEAKER_02: yeah,
4:32
SPEAKER_02: it was so different.
4:33
SPEAKER_02: Let's figure out what's different about it because this message is here for a reason,
4:37
SPEAKER_02: and God just didn't give the majority of the books to throw out,
4:41
SPEAKER_02: 39 books just to toss out then,
4:43
SPEAKER_02: you know what I mean?
4:44
SPEAKER_02: So I think it's really important.
4:45
SPEAKER_02: One of the things I always do is,
4:47
SPEAKER_02: is go back to the original context,
4:51
SPEAKER_02: you know,
4:51
SPEAKER_02: what's going on,
4:52
SPEAKER_02: because the nice thing about the Old Testament,
4:55
SPEAKER_02: there's a lot of narrative in there,
4:56
SPEAKER_02: although not always,
4:57
SPEAKER_02: there's definitely a lot of different genres in there,
4:59
SPEAKER_02: but there's a narrative,
5:00
SPEAKER_02: and using the narrative,
5:00
SPEAKER_02: you can figure out what time period you're in,
5:02
SPEAKER_02: because no matter where you're at in the Old Testament,
5:04
SPEAKER_02: it's very different if you go to Genesis,
5:06
SPEAKER_02: and you start talking about the first,
5:07
SPEAKER_02: you know,
5:08
SPEAKER_02: 11,
5:08
SPEAKER_02: 12 chapters,
5:09
SPEAKER_02: versus if you're now in the kingdom,
5:11
SPEAKER_02: you know,
5:11
SPEAKER_02: 1 Kings,
5:11
SPEAKER_02: 2 Kings,
5:12
SPEAKER_02: there's a lot that has changed,
5:13
SPEAKER_02: and even the context then changes,
5:15
SPEAKER_02: It's very different.
5:15
SPEAKER_02: If you understand Genesis,
5:16
SPEAKER_02: it doesn't mean that you don't necessarily understand the books of the Kings or the
5:20
SPEAKER_02: Chronicles as much until you understand what was going on in that time period and
5:24
SPEAKER_02: how things operated.
5:27
SPEAKER_02: So I think a lot of times people stay away from the Old Testament because they're
5:30
SPEAKER_02: afraid or maybe don't have the time to dive deep or never even thought about it.
5:35
SPEAKER_02: But that's why my big thing is going back.
5:38
SPEAKER_02: And I love it shocks people these days.
5:40
SPEAKER_02: But going from the ancient Israelite viewpoint, I call it.
5:43
SPEAKER_02: which is basically the ancient interpretation,
5:45
SPEAKER_02: which I've got to give a shout out to Dr.
5:47
SPEAKER_02: Michael Heiser,
5:47
SPEAKER_02: really put me onto a lot of this,
5:49
SPEAKER_02: which I was already kind of going down that path,
5:51
SPEAKER_02: and then said,
5:51
SPEAKER_02: hey,
5:52
SPEAKER_02: let's take a look at what they all really believed back then.
5:54
SPEAKER_02: And, man, I myself was shocked.
5:56
SPEAKER_02: Somebody who read the Bible for decades and then started to see how,
6:00
SPEAKER_02: you know,
6:00
SPEAKER_02: my interpretation alone of even the Old Testament was so inaccurate because I
6:04
SPEAKER_02: didn't know how they lived and everything.
6:05
SPEAKER_02: how they thought of the spirit world versus how we do now and how we have signs and
6:10
SPEAKER_02: might think about things differently and all kinds of stuff.
6:14
SPEAKER_02: And it started to really make me think we got to go back, find out the original meaning here.
6:18
SPEAKER_02: And then, you know, once you go from there, why did God include this?
6:22
SPEAKER_02: Because this is in there, especially the toughest one for a lot of people is the Song of Solomon.
6:25
SPEAKER_02: Like when you get to that book, why is it in here?
6:26
SPEAKER_02: Well,
6:26
SPEAKER_02: it's in here for a reason,
6:28
SPEAKER_02: and it points to Jesus,
6:29
SPEAKER_02: and now it becomes almost an assignment,
6:31
SPEAKER_02: which is kind of fun,
6:32
SPEAKER_02: like almost a project.
6:32
SPEAKER_02: Like, let's figure out what's going on here.
6:35
SPEAKER_02: What is this even talking about?
6:36
SPEAKER_02: What is it talking about?
6:37
SPEAKER_02: What was going on in the culture here?
6:38
SPEAKER_02: And then where's Jesus at?
6:40
SPEAKER_00: So that's kind of where I dive in.
6:42
SPEAKER_00: I think that's really key, is trying as best you can to get that original context in layout.
6:48
SPEAKER_00: And I think that's one of the things that makes the Old Testament so daunting.
6:52
SPEAKER_00: And as you said, that makes people somewhat afraid of it, is...
6:56
SPEAKER_00: that there's so much history happening all the time.
6:59
SPEAKER_00: And it's history that includes geography that's different,
7:03
SPEAKER_00: names that are different,
7:04
SPEAKER_00: customs that are different,
7:05
SPEAKER_00: traditions that are different.
7:07
SPEAKER_00: And there's all of these...
7:09
SPEAKER_00: you could call them ancient ways of doing things that make it appear even more
7:14
SPEAKER_00: ancient than it already is.
7:16
SPEAKER_00: And that it's like you're reading a foreign book,
7:18
SPEAKER_00: which of course you are,
7:19
SPEAKER_00: but what makes it so fascinating is that once you dive,
7:24
SPEAKER_00: once you get into the layout,
7:26
SPEAKER_00: then you understand why these details are included.
7:30
SPEAKER_00: Like a great example of this was,
7:34
SPEAKER_00: is the site of Bethel that appears throughout the book of Genesis and even in the books of Kings.
7:41
SPEAKER_00: And just realizing how much spirituality goes on there,
7:46
SPEAKER_00: how much theology goes on there,
7:48
SPEAKER_00: both good and bad,
7:50
SPEAKER_00: and why there's certain locations that seem to be hubs for God's movement or God's activity,
7:58
SPEAKER_00: but also why then,
8:00
SPEAKER_00: like in the case of
8:02
SPEAKER_00: of Jeroboam at the site of Bethel, that becomes the site of rebellion.
8:06
SPEAKER_00: And it goes on and on in the books of Kings.
8:09
SPEAKER_00: You could also apply the same thing to like a site like Shechem,
8:12
SPEAKER_00: where there's lots of stuff happening there,
8:15
SPEAKER_00: including the reaffirmation of the covenant by,
8:17
SPEAKER_00: by Joshua.
8:19
SPEAKER_00: And so there's all these different locations that are important.
8:23
SPEAKER_00: And that's just one of the things that makes it so difficult to,
8:27
SPEAKER_00: is trying to keep all that in your head.
8:29
SPEAKER_00: Especially, as you've mentioned in our Bible studies, some of these places have two different names.
8:34
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, which is really tricky.
8:36
SPEAKER_02: And so, yeah, there might be multiple Bethels or something.
8:39
SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
8:40
SPEAKER_02: But, yeah, you find out, like, which one was Ziklag?
8:42
SPEAKER_02: Ziklag, this one here or this one here?
8:44
SPEAKER_02: And not to mention,
8:45
SPEAKER_02: like,
8:46
SPEAKER_02: that's why I always,
8:46
SPEAKER_02: in my Bible studies,
8:47
SPEAKER_02: I always try to have some kind of a visual.
8:49
SPEAKER_02: When I'm in the Old Testament, especially, a map.
8:51
SPEAKER_02: And that's why you'll see me a lot of times with maps because,
8:54
SPEAKER_02: like,
8:54
SPEAKER_02: sometimes what you said,
8:55
SPEAKER_02: the Bible already has names of people like,
8:57
SPEAKER_02: hey,
8:57
SPEAKER_02: I can't even say this stuff.
8:58
SPEAKER_02: Like, well, just pronounce it.
9:00
SPEAKER_02: That's not the important part.
9:01
SPEAKER_02: You know, just get past that part.
9:02
SPEAKER_02: But then it's like,
9:02
SPEAKER_02: well,
9:03
SPEAKER_02: then they pass through Error and crossed over into the caves of En Gedi and starts
9:07
SPEAKER_02: going off into the wilderness of Ziph.
9:09
SPEAKER_02: And it's like.
9:11
SPEAKER_02: I'm reading this, but I'm not following it.
9:12
SPEAKER_02: And you almost have to.
9:14
SPEAKER_02: What we're saying here is go back and say, well, let me look at a map.
9:18
SPEAKER_02: These towns are all renamed today, unless you're talking about Jerusalem or some of these places.
9:22
SPEAKER_02: But they're renamed.
9:22
SPEAKER_02: You have to figure out where they're at.
9:24
SPEAKER_02: And then once you do that, and just because it's so fresh in my head, 1 Samuel.
9:29
SPEAKER_02: been studying a lot of that and it's like once you start getting to first Samuel 24
9:32
SPEAKER_02: through the end of the book you start to realize you know well a lot of stuff was
9:36
SPEAKER_02: happening down the southwest when now he's asking he's going to a meet him at Endor
9:40
SPEAKER_02: why is he going to meet him at Endor well because that battle when they talked
9:43
SPEAKER_02: about all those places going it was moving north into the map and that was a
9:46
SPEAKER_02: northern so all these things you would miss unless you really take the time to dive
9:50
SPEAKER_02: in like you're saying is what's going on here what's the context where are we even
9:54
SPEAKER_02: at
9:54
SPEAKER_02: And it's a lot,
9:55
SPEAKER_02: and I get it's daunting,
9:56
SPEAKER_02: especially in a society where we're lucky enough that some people even put an audio
10:01
SPEAKER_02: recording on of us or somebody preaching,
10:03
SPEAKER_02: and now to ask them to,
10:04
SPEAKER_02: hey,
10:04
SPEAKER_02: let's get our hands dirty and look at maps.
10:07
SPEAKER_02: Man, it's really hard to sell people on it.
10:09
SPEAKER_02: But I think a true believer who really wants to get serious about their faith and
10:12
SPEAKER_02: dive in the word will get it.
10:14
SPEAKER_02: It excites me.
10:15
SPEAKER_02: I'm sure it excites you.
10:16
SPEAKER_02: And it almost like I said, becomes almost like a school, like a fun project, a research project.
10:20
SPEAKER_02: Every time I get to dive deeper and like it's really cool because even little things that like.
10:26
SPEAKER_02: You know,
10:26
SPEAKER_02: in the grand scheme,
10:26
SPEAKER_02: maybe quote unquote don't matter to your theology,
10:29
SPEAKER_02: but like even things like what David says,
10:31
SPEAKER_02: like you're just so out of touch when he's like,
10:33
SPEAKER_02: hey,
10:33
SPEAKER_02: it's like,
10:33
SPEAKER_02: you know,
10:33
SPEAKER_02: when you say something like it's hunting pheasants or peacocks in the mountains.
10:37
SPEAKER_02: And it's like, what is he talking about?
10:38
SPEAKER_02: Until you realize it was a common practice that then to exhaust the animal,
10:42
SPEAKER_02: you just let them fly around because they couldn't get away from you.
10:44
SPEAKER_02: Let them basically a war of attrition, let them exhaust themselves and get them.
10:47
SPEAKER_02: And he's trying to say,
10:48
SPEAKER_02: hey,
10:48
SPEAKER_02: you're just trying to exhaust me,
10:50
SPEAKER_02: just like we do to the peacocks or the pheasants or the partridge.
10:54
SPEAKER_02: And it's like,
10:54
SPEAKER_02: if you don't understand that,
10:55
SPEAKER_02: that whole piece is like,
10:56
SPEAKER_02: I have no idea what David's talking about.
10:58
SPEAKER_02: But once you understand the context and how people hunted back then, it's like, oh, wow, I see.
11:02
SPEAKER_02: He's saying, hey, Saul's trying to exhaust me until I die.
11:05
SPEAKER_02: And it adds more to the understanding of the story and a little bit where David's coming from.
11:10
SPEAKER_02: Again, it doesn't get you to heaven by knowing these things.
11:13
SPEAKER_02: But it definitely brings another layer.
11:15
SPEAKER_02: And it almost like every time I go through the Old Testament,
11:18
SPEAKER_02: slower let's slow down and deep deep and go to these things it's almost like a more
11:21
SPEAKER_02: refined movie and I can almost visualize and it helps me make more sense of the
11:25
SPEAKER_02: emotions these people would have been feeling and how they might have you know
11:29
SPEAKER_02: acted because we look at David and we look at it from the viewpoint of man he was
11:33
SPEAKER_02: the one of the greatest kings man after God's own heart and score so like sure he
11:36
SPEAKER_02: screwed up with Bathsheba but like we don't know all these other things and how he
11:40
SPEAKER_02: would have felt and why he might have felt the way he did until you start to really
11:42
SPEAKER_02: dive into these things and understand the layout and what was going on it's like
11:46
SPEAKER_02: man, it really clears things up for your mind, I think.
11:48
SPEAKER_00: Another good example of that,
11:50
SPEAKER_00: especially in terms of layout,
11:52
SPEAKER_00: I would say is 1 Kings 19,
11:54
SPEAKER_00: which I think we've alluded to before,
11:56
SPEAKER_00: but where Elijah goes on the run.
11:59
SPEAKER_00: You know, when he's running from Jezebel's fury...
12:02
SPEAKER_00: He runs,
12:03
SPEAKER_00: and then he stops,
12:04
SPEAKER_00: and then the angel of the Lord meets him and then tells him to keep going further.
12:08
SPEAKER_00: And then you realize where he's being brought to.
12:11
SPEAKER_00: He's going down into the Sinai Peninsula, but it's called something different in 1 Kings 19.
12:16
SPEAKER_00: But then you realize later that where he is is exactly where Moses was,
12:21
SPEAKER_00: where he saw the back of the Lord in the cleft of the rock in Exodus 32 or 33.
12:28
SPEAKER_00: Well, regardless.
12:29
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
12:31
SPEAKER_00: You realize he's in the same spot,
12:33
SPEAKER_00: and then it helps you understand what God is trying to do in that moment for this
12:40
SPEAKER_00: disconsolate man.
12:42
SPEAKER_00: prophet he's bringing him back to that side that that moment of revelation at sinai
12:49
SPEAKER_00: which appeared you know thousands of years before him with moses he's kind of
12:53
SPEAKER_00: redoing that again with with elijah and then then that kind of unlocks that i think
12:59
SPEAKER_00: that's that's really helpful for unlocking that whole entire passage oh yeah and i
13:03
SPEAKER_02: and i love like what you're alluding to here some of
13:06
SPEAKER_02: Some people call it sacred space of what you're kind of saying is like things that
13:10
SPEAKER_02: these spaces pop up like Shechem,
13:12
SPEAKER_02: you mentioned,
13:13
SPEAKER_02: or even the Oak at Manor.
13:14
SPEAKER_02: Like you can see these places that pop up even,
13:18
SPEAKER_02: you know,
13:19
SPEAKER_02: where they cross the Jordan River and where Jesus get baptized,
13:22
SPEAKER_02: probably the same spot.
13:23
SPEAKER_02: And there's.
13:23
SPEAKER_02: these deeper things that you can start to notice.
13:25
SPEAKER_02: And the more you dive into the Old Testament,
13:27
SPEAKER_02: like you said,
13:28
SPEAKER_02: now that you're aware of Exodus and where he met,
13:29
SPEAKER_02: and you can start to see things like,
13:31
SPEAKER_02: oh,
13:31
SPEAKER_02: wait,
13:32
SPEAKER_02: this is coming back.
13:32
SPEAKER_02: Wait a minute.
13:33
SPEAKER_02: And then you can start, you go to a layer deeper.
13:35
SPEAKER_02: Let me overlay these stories and see what's going on here.
13:38
SPEAKER_02: And it can get really,
13:39
SPEAKER_02: and I get why it can get really confusing because like you said,
13:41
SPEAKER_02: it could be called something different.
13:42
SPEAKER_02: And like,
13:43
SPEAKER_02: I point this out to people,
13:44
SPEAKER_02: a lot of people still don't understand that where Moses saw the burning bush while
13:47
SPEAKER_02: he was a shepherd was Mount Horeb,
13:49
SPEAKER_02: but that is Mount Sinai.
13:50
SPEAKER_02: That is the same place he gets commands, just uses two different
13:53
SPEAKER_02: names,
13:53
SPEAKER_02: so it's like,
13:54
SPEAKER_02: I can totally in my mind see somebody go,
13:56
SPEAKER_02: no,
13:56
SPEAKER_02: that was at Mount Horeb,
13:57
SPEAKER_02: no,
13:57
SPEAKER_02: that was at Mount Sinai,
13:58
SPEAKER_02: and it's like,
13:59
SPEAKER_02: guys,
13:59
SPEAKER_02: it's the same thing,
14:00
SPEAKER_02: but I know it gets really tricky here,
14:02
SPEAKER_02: but then to notice,
14:03
SPEAKER_02: because that's mind-blowing,
14:04
SPEAKER_02: it's like,
14:04
SPEAKER_02: wait a minute,
14:05
SPEAKER_02: he saw the burning bush where he got the Ten Commandments,
14:07
SPEAKER_02: wait a minute,
14:08
SPEAKER_02: there's something really special about this place,
14:10
SPEAKER_02: and until you do these studies,
14:12
SPEAKER_02: and
14:13
SPEAKER_02: really take into context.
14:14
SPEAKER_02: You don't, like you're saying, you don't, you don't see these, uh, parallels.
14:17
SPEAKER_02: Even I even love,
14:18
SPEAKER_02: um,
14:19
SPEAKER_02: this is past Sunday,
14:20
SPEAKER_02: how,
14:21
SPEAKER_02: uh,
14:22
SPEAKER_02: you were talking about Jacob and Esau and the reunion.
14:24
SPEAKER_02: And even like,
14:25
SPEAKER_02: if you don't understand the old Testament,
14:26
SPEAKER_02: you think the prodigal son is a brand new story,
14:29
SPEAKER_02: but because you study the old Testament and you're like,
14:31
SPEAKER_02: Oh wait,
14:32
SPEAKER_02: I see what Jesus is doing here.
14:34
SPEAKER_02: It's a reference.
14:34
SPEAKER_02: And if you understand the old Testament, you
14:36
SPEAKER_02: Jesus,
14:36
SPEAKER_02: for all we know,
14:37
SPEAKER_02: this parable,
14:38
SPEAKER_02: we can't read his mind,
14:39
SPEAKER_02: but was thinking of Esau spreading to Jacob in another way and being able to
14:43
SPEAKER_02: understand the Old Testament and pull that out really changes things.
14:46
SPEAKER_02: You don't see Esau and Jacob the same way anymore.
14:49
SPEAKER_02: You see Esau as like, he just loved to see his brother.
14:51
SPEAKER_02: And it changes things when you can say,
14:53
SPEAKER_02: here's the New Testament,
14:54
SPEAKER_02: but here's the Old Testament where it actually happened first.
14:56
SPEAKER_02: And then now you can like, oh, wow, now you can overlay them and say, wow.
15:00
SPEAKER_02: wow, it's such a deeper parable now because I know the Old Testament better.
15:05
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, because then it brings greater fulfillment to what Jesus was actually fulfilling.
15:11
SPEAKER_00: For anyone listening, that reference that Eric is alluding to is,
15:18
SPEAKER_00: Genesis 33, verse 4, Esau runs and sprints and embraces his brother.
15:24
SPEAKER_00: And that same reaction that Esau is described by is given to the father of the prodigal in Luke 15.
15:33
SPEAKER_00: sprinting, running, embracing, falling on the neck.
15:35
SPEAKER_00: I think those like really key details are so fascinating.
15:39
SPEAKER_00: And what's the big difference is,
15:41
SPEAKER_00: of course,
15:41
SPEAKER_00: is that in Genesis 33,
15:43
SPEAKER_00: this reconciliation appears to fall apart,
15:47
SPEAKER_00: perhaps by human depravity or just human nature.
15:51
SPEAKER_00: Whereas in Jesus' prodigal son parable,
15:55
SPEAKER_00: that reconciliation is true and final,
15:59
SPEAKER_00: which,
16:00
SPEAKER_00: again,
16:01
SPEAKER_00: if you understand that all of the Bible is pointed to Jesus,
16:05
SPEAKER_00: and then you also understand that
16:08
SPEAKER_00: in a way, Jesus is the true and better Israel, then you understand, wait, who's Israel?
16:14
SPEAKER_00: Well, Jacob's Israel.
16:15
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is fulfilling Israel's story in a really powerful way.
16:21
SPEAKER_00: Another great example of that from the New Testament is where it talks about how
16:27
SPEAKER_00: Mary and Joseph,
16:28
SPEAKER_00: they take Jesus to Egypt,
16:29
SPEAKER_00: and then out of Egypt,
16:31
SPEAKER_00: I brought my son,
16:32
SPEAKER_00: which is a fulfillment of Israel's exodus out of Egypt when Mary and Joseph are
16:37
SPEAKER_00: fleeing
16:38
SPEAKER_00: the decree of Herod.
16:39
SPEAKER_00: So all of these things just play into that,
16:41
SPEAKER_00: which is just to say we definitely cannot unhitch the Old Testament from our
16:48
SPEAKER_00: preaching or from our Bible study,
16:50
SPEAKER_00: as one infamous pastor is known for saying.
16:52
SPEAKER_02: That's funny.
16:54
SPEAKER_02: I actually just saw that come up again this week.
16:56
SPEAKER_02: Somebody brought that up,
16:57
SPEAKER_02: and I was like,
16:57
SPEAKER_02: oh,
16:57
SPEAKER_02: man,
16:58
SPEAKER_02: to unhitch from the Old Testament is just absolute insanity,
17:00
SPEAKER_02: especially because,
17:01
SPEAKER_02: like,
17:02
SPEAKER_02: one of the ironic things is all the people who are,
17:04
SPEAKER_02: you know,
17:05
SPEAKER_02: Maybe young in faith or new believers,
17:06
SPEAKER_02: they get really excited,
17:07
SPEAKER_02: even non-believers,
17:08
SPEAKER_02: about the book of Revelation.
17:09
SPEAKER_02: It's like, I just want to start in Revelation, which is maybe one of the worst spots to start, right?
17:13
SPEAKER_02: You're really trying to get to the nuts of how things work.
17:16
SPEAKER_02: But the irony is they want to know Revelation,
17:18
SPEAKER_02: and they're like,
17:18
SPEAKER_02: hey,
17:18
SPEAKER_02: this is so mysterious,
17:20
SPEAKER_02: and that's why I love it.
17:21
SPEAKER_02: It's almost like a sci-fi, and it's like, hey, guys.
17:23
SPEAKER_02: Hate to tell you, but if you read the Old Testament, all the references are in there.
17:27
SPEAKER_02: And when you go back, and that's beauty of Revelation, almost says, hey, you cannot understand me.
17:33
SPEAKER_02: If you do not understand the Old Testament,
17:34
SPEAKER_02: if you didn't read Genesis through Malachi,
17:37
SPEAKER_02: you will miss a great deal here.
17:39
SPEAKER_02: And that's always my encouragement to tell people,
17:40
SPEAKER_02: if you want to be a New Testament person,
17:42
SPEAKER_02: you have to be an Old Testament.
17:44
SPEAKER_02: Because Revelation is literally an Old Testament puzzle.
17:46
SPEAKER_02: I think Jesus is making a really great argument here.
17:49
SPEAKER_02: It's like, listen, I am in every book.
17:52
SPEAKER_02: You need to take every book seriously.
17:54
SPEAKER_02: You can't skip to the New Testament,
17:55
SPEAKER_02: because if you do,
17:56
SPEAKER_02: you're going to run into the Old Testament right at the end,
17:58
SPEAKER_02: all over again,
17:59
SPEAKER_02: which is ironic,
18:00
SPEAKER_02: I think,
18:01
SPEAKER_02: in itself.
18:01
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's the other thing, too.
18:03
SPEAKER_00: It shouldn't be...
18:05
SPEAKER_00: And I've talked about this in other places perhaps,
18:08
SPEAKER_00: and I know you and I have perhaps too,
18:09
SPEAKER_00: but it shouldn't be this novel revelation,
18:13
SPEAKER_00: but yet it is sometimes,
18:14
SPEAKER_00: just to realize the fact that when Paul is writing Romans,
18:20
SPEAKER_00: he doesn't have Romans written.
18:22
SPEAKER_00: to refer to.
18:23
SPEAKER_00: He doesn't even have Galatians to refer to, perhaps, in many ways.
18:27
SPEAKER_00: He doesn't even, he doesn't have the Gospels.
18:29
SPEAKER_00: He's referring to Isaiah.
18:31
SPEAKER_00: He's referring to Leviticus.
18:32
SPEAKER_00: He's referring to all of those Old Testament books that are filling his mind,
18:36
SPEAKER_00: the Psalms and so forth,
18:38
SPEAKER_00: which is just to say there is no,
18:41
SPEAKER_00: there is no New Testament
18:43
SPEAKER_00: understanding,
18:44
SPEAKER_00: like you said,
18:45
SPEAKER_00: without an Old Testament understanding that kind of not necessarily precursors it,
18:50
SPEAKER_00: but informs it.
18:52
SPEAKER_00: And that's the big thing that we can't unhitch any Old Testament sensibilities from
18:58
SPEAKER_00: our study of the New Testament because the New Testament is kind of hinging upon that.
19:02
SPEAKER_02: Yeah,
19:02
SPEAKER_02: and I think what you said was really,
19:04
SPEAKER_02: really important about how,
19:06
SPEAKER_02: you know,
19:06
SPEAKER_02: Jesus' parable is different in that it was the actual ultimate fulfillment of
19:09
SPEAKER_02: And the parable,
19:10
SPEAKER_02: and it's like,
19:10
SPEAKER_02: I see,
19:11
SPEAKER_02: and that's such a deeper thing to realize because why is the Old Testament here?
19:14
SPEAKER_02: To show the brokenness, to show all the problems.
19:17
SPEAKER_02: And that was a pattern of, wow, like, because could you imagine the parable?
19:21
SPEAKER_02: Like, we don't talk about it.
19:22
SPEAKER_02: Imagine if the son came back and they made the,
19:25
SPEAKER_02: got the fattened calf and they slaughtered it and he took off in the night after
19:28
SPEAKER_02: the party.
19:28
SPEAKER_02: Like, that's kind of what Jacob does.
19:30
SPEAKER_02: It's kind of like he just takes off, like, I'm going to live somewhere else now.
19:33
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
19:34
SPEAKER_02: And it's like, yeah, that was so unfulfilling.
19:36
SPEAKER_02: Whereas Christ is coming here and almost like sewing up the ends,
19:39
SPEAKER_02: restoring,
19:40
SPEAKER_02: which is the ultimate thing he's doing,
19:41
SPEAKER_02: restoring everything.
19:43
SPEAKER_02: You saw all the evil and all the chaos and the brokenness and the families of his
19:46
SPEAKER_02: people and how he's going to come in all that stuff.
19:49
SPEAKER_02: You know, he's almost retelling us how he is going to make it all better.
19:53
SPEAKER_02: And that's, again, why it's just so important when you have that connection.
19:57
SPEAKER_02: You can just more understand what Jesus is even coming from again.
20:00
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
20:01
SPEAKER_00: And I think it's helpful,
20:02
SPEAKER_00: too,
20:02
SPEAKER_00: because I think in this sense...
20:05
SPEAKER_00: Because we can...
20:06
SPEAKER_00: Any student of the Word,
20:08
SPEAKER_00: even myself,
20:09
SPEAKER_00: can sometimes get lost in this ocean of names and places and customs and stuff.
20:15
SPEAKER_00: And I think the biggest...
20:18
SPEAKER_00: insight,
20:19
SPEAKER_00: if you will,
20:19
SPEAKER_00: that I would give to someone studying the Old Testament is just to take a step back
20:23
SPEAKER_00: from the specifics and look at the movement of a narrative.
20:30
SPEAKER_00: Watch the actions.
20:33
SPEAKER_00: Because if you get lost in the mire of all the data, you can sometimes lose the sense of the story.
20:40
SPEAKER_00: That's why it's helpful to just take multiple chunks of
20:45
SPEAKER_00: of old Testament narrative,
20:47
SPEAKER_00: especially like we can talk about other genres,
20:48
SPEAKER_00: but especially old Testament narrative,
20:50
SPEAKER_00: take them and big chunks and just note like the big movements.
20:54
SPEAKER_00: And then you can kind of see,
20:55
SPEAKER_00: like you've referred to,
20:57
SPEAKER_00: you can see like patterns of like,
20:58
SPEAKER_00: Hey,
20:59
SPEAKER_00: look at how this guy did this and notice the same thing happens.
21:02
SPEAKER_00: And sometimes as we've alluded to in the same exact location.
21:05
SPEAKER_02: Oh yeah.
21:06
SPEAKER_02: And it's, and it's amazing that again, just to look at all this stuff and
21:09
SPEAKER_02: It comes back to,
21:10
SPEAKER_02: like,
21:10
SPEAKER_02: once I started doing these book-by-book Bible studies in the Old Testament straight
21:14
SPEAKER_02: through and we're in 1 Samuel now,
21:15
SPEAKER_02: it's just,
21:16
SPEAKER_02: again,
21:16
SPEAKER_02: so refreshing to me and other people because every time you study something,
21:19
SPEAKER_02: you're going to see something new.
21:20
SPEAKER_02: God's going to show you something.
21:21
SPEAKER_02: Not only that, like, I love what you're saying here.
21:23
SPEAKER_02: Tie it to the bigger picture because...
21:25
SPEAKER_02: Like,
21:25
SPEAKER_02: you understand that,
21:26
SPEAKER_02: you know,
21:27
SPEAKER_02: people know that David,
21:28
SPEAKER_02: you know,
21:28
SPEAKER_02: fights Goliath,
21:29
SPEAKER_02: but you usually read,
21:30
SPEAKER_02: you usually zoom in,
21:31
SPEAKER_02: read that,
21:31
SPEAKER_02: get out.
21:32
SPEAKER_02: Or that, you know, David cuts off the robe.
21:34
SPEAKER_02: You zoom in for that story and you zoom out, not realizing this whole narrative here.
21:38
SPEAKER_02: And even, like, when David, you know, joins the Philistines, until you...
21:43
SPEAKER_02: If you took that even as its own story and said,
21:44
SPEAKER_02: oh,
21:45
SPEAKER_02: in chapters 27,
21:46
SPEAKER_02: whatever,
21:47
SPEAKER_02: he decides he's going to go and help with the Philistines.
21:50
SPEAKER_02: But then you realize that was the battle that killed Saul.
21:53
SPEAKER_02: That was the one.
21:54
SPEAKER_02: And if you read it together like we're doing here, you can draw these connections.
21:58
SPEAKER_02: Or that he actually went to Akish and Gath and them beforehand.
22:01
SPEAKER_02: This is a second time coming back, and it's different than before.
22:05
SPEAKER_02: So that's what I love about doing this.
22:07
SPEAKER_02: It goes really well with hermeneutics, actually, to see things in the broader scope and how it all fits.
22:12
SPEAKER_02: And it's not bad to obviously zoom in because you have to do that, too.
22:15
SPEAKER_02: But it is so much better when you can kind of, even what you're doing with Jacob.
22:20
SPEAKER_02: Just seeing from beginning to end, see the behavior, see even the ups and the downs of the same person.
22:25
SPEAKER_02: And then more understanding why they were in the feelings that they were.
22:29
SPEAKER_02: And just, again, to understand the deeper story.
22:32
SPEAKER_02: And even I love in 1 Samuel, the amount of patterns in that book.
22:35
SPEAKER_02: I talk about Judges being a book of patterns, but even 1 Samuel.
22:39
SPEAKER_02: You see it over and over again.
22:40
SPEAKER_02: Like Saul and David, even David letting him go, it happens over and over again, these patterns.
22:45
SPEAKER_02: It's kind of enlightening to us.
22:47
SPEAKER_02: Like, wow, these patterns continue probably even today, and there are certain patterns in our life.
22:51
SPEAKER_02: And it shows that the more you learn,
22:53
SPEAKER_02: the more you learn about God's word,
22:54
SPEAKER_02: the more it's going to make sense to you.
22:56
SPEAKER_02: In the end, again, just the goal of deepening your faith in Christ.
23:01
SPEAKER_02: And understanding the New Testament in such a new light that once you do,
23:06
SPEAKER_02: you just want to go back and find out more and more and more.
23:09
SPEAKER_02: And I do believe that the Bible is, like, you know, deeper and faster than the universe or the ocean.
23:12
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
23:13
SPEAKER_02: That you could literally camp out in a book and never get to the bottom of it your whole life.
23:17
SPEAKER_00: And there's 66 of them.
23:18
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's so true.
23:19
SPEAKER_00: It's crazy.
23:20
SPEAKER_00: Another good example of, like, patterns but also, like, taking –
23:25
SPEAKER_00: Big chunks and seeing them as like a fully fleshed out story,
23:29
SPEAKER_00: I would say,
23:29
SPEAKER_00: is what you referred to just a few minutes ago,
23:32
SPEAKER_00: which is when Saul goes to Endor to visit the medium.
23:37
SPEAKER_00: That's not just like an isolated event.
23:39
SPEAKER_00: That's like downstream of Saul's like.
23:42
SPEAKER_00: diminishing faith like because I think there's even a reference in there where it's
23:47
SPEAKER_00: almost like it's it's contrasting the fact that instead of going to a prophet or
23:52
SPEAKER_00: the Word of God he's going to this other source to get his wisdom which is kind of
23:58
SPEAKER_00: like
23:59
SPEAKER_00: You can almost think about it as like the climax of Saul's fall,
24:03
SPEAKER_00: which makes his eventual demise on the battlefield not very surprising.
24:08
SPEAKER_00: Because like this is like he it's a total like renunciation of his office as the
24:14
SPEAKER_00: king of Israel,
24:15
SPEAKER_00: like and all that was imbued into that office.
24:19
SPEAKER_00: with the law of God.
24:21
SPEAKER_00: You can refer back to the fact that the kings were supposed to be rewriting the law
24:26
SPEAKER_00: of God to remind themselves as they were representative of the nation of Israel,
24:31
SPEAKER_00: all that kind of stuff.
24:32
SPEAKER_00: But you can kind of see this as the final culmination of Saul's
24:40
SPEAKER_00: not veering away from from Yahweh from any trust in God at all yeah and it's really
24:45
SPEAKER_02: nice too because again when you zoom out like if you just read the witch of Endor
24:48
SPEAKER_02: there's a lot to that story you can read a lot and everything but then like you're
24:51
SPEAKER_02: saying to realize oh he went to the witch of Endor but then you follow it back it's
24:54
SPEAKER_02: like well he also banned them
24:56
SPEAKER_02: from being around so it's like oh wait a minute wait he banned he banned like
25:01
SPEAKER_02: mediums but then he went and saw one so now he's doing something that he even had
25:05
SPEAKER_02: an edict against exactly and it just goes to show you because in the bigger picture
25:09
SPEAKER_02: then you like zoom out more and it's like oh wait he promised David he'd never
25:12
SPEAKER_02: chase him and then he chased him and then he promised he wouldn't again and then he
25:16
SPEAKER_02: did it and it's like
25:18
SPEAKER_02: without if you just zoomed into the witch end dorm was like wow that was really
25:20
SPEAKER_02: cool that a spirit came up that was really neat to happen and then you zoom out of
25:23
SPEAKER_02: it it's like you lose a lot because what it's also showing you is how like Saul is
25:28
SPEAKER_02: his own authority and although he pretends to sometimes follow God and he you know
25:32
SPEAKER_02: we see people like that oh like everyone's rather godly but when push comes to
25:35
SPEAKER_02: shove I'm gonna go see the medium yeah I need help
25:38
SPEAKER_02: And I don't care what God said.
25:39
SPEAKER_02: And I know I was trying to be godly, but now I need my own thing.
25:42
SPEAKER_02: And it goes to show again why you're going to understand why the difference between
25:45
SPEAKER_02: David and Saul,
25:46
SPEAKER_02: even though they very much have sinful things all throughout their stories,
25:50
SPEAKER_02: the difference in how he goes about it and Saul's fickleness is just so much easier
25:54
SPEAKER_02: to see.
25:54
SPEAKER_02: Like what you're saying is when you zoom out in these bigger chunks here and see,
25:58
SPEAKER_02: because I think these narratives,
25:59
SPEAKER_02: and that's why character studies can be really good for people,
26:02
SPEAKER_02: is to follow through and to see they weren't always great.
26:05
SPEAKER_02: They weren't always bad.
26:07
SPEAKER_02: And there was these things that they all kind of go through.
26:09
SPEAKER_02: And then it's really helpful because then you look at yourself and say, wow.
26:12
SPEAKER_02: I thought I was a bad Christian feeling like this or having these thoughts sometimes.
26:16
SPEAKER_02: And here was Saul doing it, or here was David doing it at times, and he turned it around.
26:19
SPEAKER_02: And it gives you hope, but it also keeps you from being too prideful, too.
26:23
SPEAKER_02: It's a whole bundle that if you take it for what it is and you really ask God to
26:26
SPEAKER_02: show you,
26:27
SPEAKER_02: he can show you a lot of amazing things in the Old Testament that's going to help
26:29
SPEAKER_02: you as a believer and then,
26:30
SPEAKER_02: of course,
26:31
SPEAKER_02: help you understand Christ and what he was saying in the New Testament.
26:34
SPEAKER_00: Another...
26:35
SPEAKER_00: example of what we're talking about here,
26:38
SPEAKER_00: I think would be what I'm,
26:40
SPEAKER_00: by the time this releases,
26:41
SPEAKER_00: I'll have already preached it,
26:42
SPEAKER_00: but what I'm getting ready to preach is Genesis 34,
26:46
SPEAKER_00: which is one of the darkest chapters in the Bible where it talks about Jacob's
26:51
SPEAKER_00: daughter getting humiliated,
26:53
SPEAKER_00: defiled by the men of Shechem,
26:56
SPEAKER_00: or the prince of Shechem,
26:57
SPEAKER_00: which is Shechem,
26:58
SPEAKER_00: which that's another like
27:00
SPEAKER_00: Really interesting passage where the names can get really sticky.
27:05
SPEAKER_00: But also I think it's helpful from this standpoint,
27:09
SPEAKER_00: from what we're talking about,
27:10
SPEAKER_00: which is like to kind of zoom out and take bigger chunks and understand the movement.
27:16
SPEAKER_00: Because again...
27:18
SPEAKER_00: What happens in Genesis 34 is not an isolated incident.
27:22
SPEAKER_00: It's not just this random thing.
27:25
SPEAKER_00: What is definitely happening,
27:28
SPEAKER_00: so in Genesis 33,
27:29
SPEAKER_00: you have the supposed reconciliation of Jacob and Esau,
27:33
SPEAKER_00: and then Jacob goes his own way,
27:35
SPEAKER_00: which is just fitting,
27:37
SPEAKER_00: so fits his character.
27:39
SPEAKER_00: But then you realize he's settling near Shechem,
27:42
SPEAKER_00: and the question is,
27:43
SPEAKER_00: of course,
27:45
SPEAKER_00: is that where he's supposed to be?
27:47
SPEAKER_00: I would say clearly no.
27:49
SPEAKER_00: And this goes back to his vow in chapter 28,
27:53
SPEAKER_00: where he's visited by God and he makes the vow at a place called Bethel.
27:58
SPEAKER_00: And then in chapter 31,
27:59
SPEAKER_00: when God tells him to go back home,
28:01
SPEAKER_00: he introduces himself as I'm the God of Bethel.
28:06
SPEAKER_00: So here he is in a place where he probably shouldn't be and he's settling there
28:10
SPEAKER_00: maybe for reasons of just convenience of prosperity or what have you.
28:16
SPEAKER_00: And then you realize –
28:17
SPEAKER_00: God's not mentioned one time in all of chapter 34,
28:22
SPEAKER_00: and yet the last word of chapter 33 and the first word of chapter 35 are both names
28:29
SPEAKER_00: for God,
28:30
SPEAKER_00: which,
28:31
SPEAKER_00: again,
28:32
SPEAKER_00: enhance this glaring omission of God,
28:34
SPEAKER_00: which,
28:34
SPEAKER_00: again,
28:35
SPEAKER_00: helps us understand what's happening here.
28:37
SPEAKER_00: Jacob's kind of in this position of
28:40
SPEAKER_00: eh,
28:40
SPEAKER_00: that's good enough,
28:41
SPEAKER_00: I'm just going to camp here,
28:42
SPEAKER_00: and then all hell breaks loose,
28:45
SPEAKER_00: so to speak,
28:45
SPEAKER_00: in the rest of that narrative.
28:46
SPEAKER_00: But if you just were to isolate that, this story would just be so confusing to try and get around.
28:55
SPEAKER_02: Oh yeah, absolutely chaotic.
28:56
SPEAKER_02: And it's probably why we get the questions from people that are like,
29:00
SPEAKER_02: Eric,
29:00
SPEAKER_02: why do I need to read about a woman being defiled by men,
29:05
SPEAKER_02: and then people making sure the guys are sore so they can attack,
29:08
SPEAKER_02: and like...
29:09
SPEAKER_02: What is godly about this?
29:11
SPEAKER_02: And this is why we get these questions.
29:12
SPEAKER_02: It's because they jump in for a chapter.
29:15
SPEAKER_02: They have no idea what time period.
29:16
SPEAKER_02: They don't even know who's alive.
29:17
SPEAKER_02: Joshua, David, I don't know.
29:18
SPEAKER_02: Moses, I don't know.
29:19
SPEAKER_02: And they jump in here and they see this crazy stuff and they jump out.
29:22
SPEAKER_02: Well, the Bible is just so confusing.
29:24
SPEAKER_02: But in reality, it's not how they join your sermon series in part one all the way through.
29:29
SPEAKER_02: They'd be like, wow, I get it.
29:31
SPEAKER_02: And you hit the nail on the head, I think, is God's not mentioning that.
29:35
SPEAKER_02: Shechem does definitely not seem to be a good place because of everything that happens.
29:38
SPEAKER_02: Talk about being the God of Bethel.
29:40
SPEAKER_00: Again, what you've alluded to before is keep these names in mind.
29:46
SPEAKER_00: The people of Shechem are Canaanites.
29:47
SPEAKER_00: They're people that the people of God are not supposed to mingle with or like or intermarry with.
29:54
SPEAKER_00: So, again, that just raises it like one of the things as I've been studying, I couldn't help.
30:00
SPEAKER_00: But I don't think it's a direct illusion.
30:02
SPEAKER_00: But you can also draw this comparison to where.
30:06
SPEAKER_00: When Jacob is – I think it has a reference to the idea that he's pitching his tent
30:11
SPEAKER_00: toward the city of Shechem,
30:12
SPEAKER_00: which sounds so much like Lot pitching his tent towards the city of Sodom,
30:17
SPEAKER_00: which is,
30:18
SPEAKER_00: again,
30:19
SPEAKER_00: this notion of kind of –
30:22
SPEAKER_00: being a little bit too comfortable with people that you shouldn't be comfortable with.
30:27
SPEAKER_00: Right.
30:27
SPEAKER_00: Right.
30:27
SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
30:28
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
30:28
SPEAKER_00: Especially if you are the head of God's covenant family.
30:31
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
30:32
SPEAKER_02: And especially the guy that he names the entire nation after.
30:34
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
30:36
SPEAKER_02: And it's ironic because again, if we look at this and be like, why did God pick him to name?
30:39
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
30:39
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
30:39
SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
30:40
SPEAKER_02: You know,
30:40
SPEAKER_02: knowing that his whole family understand the Old Testament story that all came about,
30:44
SPEAKER_02: but it is just,
30:45
SPEAKER_02: it is just amazing to see how all,
30:47
SPEAKER_02: um,
30:48
SPEAKER_02: like you said,
30:49
SPEAKER_02: it goes to show you these stories are there because it shows you,
30:51
SPEAKER_02: Hey,
30:52
SPEAKER_02: Jacob had it good in certain spots, and he did well in certain spots, but there's times he didn't.
30:56
SPEAKER_02: Why did this all happen?
30:57
SPEAKER_02: Oh, well, he abandoned God, or he abandoned his cult, kind of like Lot gets into, he gets kidnapped.
31:01
SPEAKER_02: Abraham has to go save him and his family.
31:03
SPEAKER_02: Why?
31:04
SPEAKER_02: Because, you know, he stuck around this evil place, even though, yeah, he wasn't evil.
31:07
SPEAKER_02: And it almost goes to show you, like, hey, even godly people, Christian people,
31:11
SPEAKER_02: at times can you know not check in with god or get lost and and still have a faith
31:16
SPEAKER_02: in him because a lot was you know still the faith whatever but being not listening
31:20
SPEAKER_02: to god can put good people even the godly people the bible into bad situations oh
31:26
SPEAKER_02: yeah and you see that happening over and over again throughout the stories where
31:30
SPEAKER_02: good people have make some bad decisions even one of my favorites i might have
31:34
SPEAKER_02: brought it up here i bring up a lot because it's a good one is joshua chapter 9
31:38
SPEAKER_02: where the Gibeonites come in.
31:39
SPEAKER_02: And you zoom into that story, and you don't understand what's so bad.
31:42
SPEAKER_02: Like, well, Joshua was being nice.
31:43
SPEAKER_02: These people had tattered clothes, and they said they traveled a long while.
31:47
SPEAKER_02: He looked at you as being a good guy.
31:49
SPEAKER_02: I thought we're supposed to love your neighbors as yourself,
31:50
SPEAKER_02: you know,
31:51
SPEAKER_02: treat strangers as you could be an angel unaware,
31:53
SPEAKER_02: help them out.
31:53
SPEAKER_02: And it's like here, but you have to back up.
31:55
SPEAKER_02: The story said, nobody near you should be living with you.
31:59
SPEAKER_02: And Joshua's failed mistake was,
32:01
SPEAKER_02: it goes to show you,
32:02
SPEAKER_02: you can do good things for God and try or think you're doing good things for God
32:06
SPEAKER_02: and be doing the wrong things.
32:08
SPEAKER_02: Because Joshua's key error was not going into prayer to God and saying, God, should I help?
32:12
SPEAKER_02: Are these people from around here, are they lying?
32:14
SPEAKER_02: And God probably would have told him he was lying, but not.
32:16
SPEAKER_02: That turns into a whole issue that carries on for generations later on.
32:20
SPEAKER_02: The Gibeonites and how they're not allowed.
32:21
SPEAKER_02: Now there's a thing, you can't kill Gibeonites, but you're not supposed to.
32:24
SPEAKER_02: And it becomes this whole thing.
32:25
SPEAKER_02: And Joshua's mostly a good guy in the Bible until you realize, like,
32:29
SPEAKER_02: Man, even the good guys try to do the good things.
32:31
SPEAKER_02: It shows what happens when we try to do it in our own strength and say,
32:34
SPEAKER_02: well,
32:35
SPEAKER_02: I think I know what's right.
32:37
SPEAKER_02: And it shows you even when you think things can look right, but without God.
32:40
SPEAKER_02: I use Joshua because he's not even being a bad guy.
32:44
SPEAKER_02: He's not trying to bail on his brother Esau.
32:46
SPEAKER_02: He's not trying to do anything.
32:48
SPEAKER_02: I think Joshua probably thought he was doing the right thing and turns into such utter turmoil.
32:53
SPEAKER_02: All because, and you zoom out the story, and it's like, oh, I see, because...
32:57
SPEAKER_02: if you wouldn't have known the whole story of why this was such a bad thing to do
33:00
SPEAKER_02: there with the Gibeonites.
33:02
SPEAKER_00: Yeah,
33:03
SPEAKER_00: and then that helps you realize that,
33:08
SPEAKER_00: or this helps us with the hermeneutics of Jesus is the true and better Joshua.
33:15
SPEAKER_00: Or,
33:15
SPEAKER_00: you know,
33:15
SPEAKER_00: go ahead,
33:16
SPEAKER_00: insert whoever there,
33:17
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is the true and better Gideon,
33:19
SPEAKER_00: Jacob,
33:19
SPEAKER_00: Abraham,
33:20
SPEAKER_00: so on and so forth.
33:21
SPEAKER_00: But that helps with that hermeneutic because you realize that for all of Joshua's
33:26
SPEAKER_00: exploits that were amazing and remarkable,
33:29
SPEAKER_00: his victories are surely ones that we should hold in high regard.
33:35
SPEAKER_00: Yet despite that, he's not the best one that we should look to.
33:40
SPEAKER_00: He's not the true captain of our faith,
33:42
SPEAKER_00: if you will,
33:43
SPEAKER_00: which again leads us to this notion that we've hit home so many times that
33:48
SPEAKER_00: which is just the fact that,
33:49
SPEAKER_00: yeah,
33:49
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is the center of all this because he's going to fulfill what Joshua left unfulfilled,
33:55
SPEAKER_00: just as he does with every other story,
33:58
SPEAKER_00: every other character,
33:59
SPEAKER_00: every other person living or dead.
34:02
SPEAKER_00: He fulfills what they left unfulfilled.
34:04
SPEAKER_02: Right,
34:04
SPEAKER_02: and I think that's a great way,
34:06
SPEAKER_02: like when we run into people in the future that say,
34:08
SPEAKER_02: hey,
34:09
SPEAKER_02: why do I have to read this?
34:09
SPEAKER_02: Or what's the point of this story?
34:11
SPEAKER_02: Jesus is the answer.
34:12
SPEAKER_02: It's like, why don't get it?
34:14
SPEAKER_02: Well,
34:14
SPEAKER_02: it's like,
34:14
SPEAKER_02: well,
34:14
SPEAKER_02: then maybe you got to back up and read a couple more chapters here and there and
34:18
SPEAKER_02: really see what it is.
34:19
SPEAKER_02: But I mean, it really is...
34:20
SPEAKER_02: the truth that Jesus fulfills all these things.
34:23
SPEAKER_02: And that's why I love,
34:24
SPEAKER_02: again,
34:24
SPEAKER_02: doing character studies or just doing chapter-by-chapter expositories,
34:27
SPEAKER_02: really pulling out what is the Scripture really saying here and getting the full
34:30
SPEAKER_02: glow of it because what will happen is what happens to all of us,
34:34
SPEAKER_02: I think,
34:34
SPEAKER_02: when we're growing up as kids,
34:35
SPEAKER_02: you don't go to Genesis 34 and say,
34:37
SPEAKER_02: let's talk about Dinah,
34:38
SPEAKER_02: little kids,
34:39
SPEAKER_02: in Sunday school today.
34:41
SPEAKER_02: I couldn't imagine any Sunday school teaches it, and I understand why, right?
34:44
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
34:44
SPEAKER_02: But at some point in life, you've got to learn these things.
34:47
SPEAKER_02: But when you don't,
34:48
SPEAKER_02: and if you're an immature Christian that says,
34:49
SPEAKER_02: well,
34:49
SPEAKER_02: I got all my stuff from Sunday school,
34:51
SPEAKER_02: and then I get whatever's on the sermon.
34:53
SPEAKER_02: So now all you have is Noah's Ark,
34:54
SPEAKER_02: David and Goliath,
34:55
SPEAKER_02: Joshua beat Jericho,
34:57
SPEAKER_02: and everybody's a hero,
34:58
SPEAKER_02: and you're a loser.
34:59
SPEAKER_02: And you're like, why can't I be like the people in the Bible?
35:01
SPEAKER_02: Go out and be a Daniel.
35:02
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
35:03
SPEAKER_02: Go out and be a Daniel.
35:03
SPEAKER_02: Come on!
35:04
SPEAKER_02: Until you look at them and say,
35:05
SPEAKER_02: hey,
35:06
SPEAKER_02: listen,
35:06
SPEAKER_02: you are just like them because you didn't read the full story.
35:09
SPEAKER_02: They all failed.
35:10
SPEAKER_02: But that's why we have this such distorted view.
35:12
SPEAKER_02: And then the Christians say, well, all the biblical heroes did all these heroic things.
35:16
SPEAKER_02: And maybe I'm not saved because I should be doing it.
35:18
SPEAKER_02: And it just gets so out of whack because the Old Testament,
35:21
SPEAKER_02: in a nutshell,
35:22
SPEAKER_02: or in a broader sense,
35:24
SPEAKER_02: is saying...
35:25
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, they did good things.
35:26
SPEAKER_02: That was all because of God.
35:28
SPEAKER_02: So you can do good things with God.
35:29
SPEAKER_02: But you can also do bad things when you go off the rails with God.
35:32
SPEAKER_02: Just like, guess what?
35:33
SPEAKER_02: You go off the rails with God.
35:34
SPEAKER_02: And it becomes way more relatable.
35:36
SPEAKER_02: And then you're like, oh, I get sanctification.
35:37
SPEAKER_02: I'm not glorified.
35:38
SPEAKER_02: I don't have to be glorified.
35:39
SPEAKER_02: And it really starts to bring things in whack.
35:41
SPEAKER_02: And again, it comes all back to your hermeneutics and how much you know the Old Testament.
35:45
SPEAKER_02: Because I commonly will say this in my Bible studies.
35:48
SPEAKER_02: Nobody goes to the newest Avengers movie and shows up two hours in.
35:53
SPEAKER_02: Because all they're going to do is ask questions and everybody's going to say, shut up.
35:56
SPEAKER_02: Go back and watch somewhere else.
35:58
SPEAKER_02: I'm not saying you want to ask questions in church,
36:00
SPEAKER_02: but what I'm saying is there's so many people that just say,
36:01
SPEAKER_02: I just want to start at Matthew.
36:02
SPEAKER_02: And it's like, okay, start all your movies at one and a half hours in and see how well it goes.
36:07
SPEAKER_02: You might actually see the ending and you say, oh, I see what happened.
36:10
SPEAKER_02: But if you rewatch it, it'll say, oh, and it will make so much more sense.
36:13
SPEAKER_02: It'll be deeper, you'll have more of appreciation, and the Bible's no different.
36:17
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
36:18
SPEAKER_00: Starting at Matthew would be like starting Lord of the Rings when Frodo and Sam
36:23
SPEAKER_00: have already thrown the ring in,
36:24
SPEAKER_00: and they're on the slopes of Mount Doom waiting for the eagles to get them.
36:27
SPEAKER_00: It's like...
36:29
SPEAKER_00: Why is everyone sad?
36:31
SPEAKER_00: What's going on?
36:31
SPEAKER_00: What's this ring thing?
36:33
SPEAKER_00: Because as we've mentioned before, the Old Testament covers so much history.
36:39
SPEAKER_00: It covers swaths of ancient history that is important to keep in mind.
36:46
SPEAKER_00: And it's not there to overwhelm.
36:48
SPEAKER_00: It's there for you to realize, hey, God is actually doing something here.
36:52
SPEAKER_00: in specific people in specific places but it's also not just those specifics it's
36:59
SPEAKER_00: he's doing something in people that that trust in him absolutely rather as you as
37:05
SPEAKER_00: you mentioned which I think is so good which is
37:08
SPEAKER_00: Instead of trusting our own ways of doing things,
37:10
SPEAKER_00: we are taking God at his word and trusting that instead.
37:14
SPEAKER_00: And that's kind of the pattern of the Old Testament is reducing people to that
37:18
SPEAKER_00: point of like,
37:20
SPEAKER_00: hey,
37:20
SPEAKER_00: will you just trust me beyond anything else?
37:24
SPEAKER_00: Clearly, then we could say that there's these genres of the Old Testament that are difficult.
37:32
SPEAKER_00: I think you and I
37:34
SPEAKER_00: are somewhat comfortable with narrative.
37:36
SPEAKER_00: I love preaching narratives or studying narratives.
37:40
SPEAKER_00: So when we're approaching some other Old Testament genres,
37:43
SPEAKER_00: let's say,
37:44
SPEAKER_00: for instance,
37:45
SPEAKER_00: like wisdom,
37:46
SPEAKER_00: like the wisdom books or the prophetic books and so on and so forth,
37:52
SPEAKER_00: what are some keys for those?
37:54
SPEAKER_00: Here, let's try and unpack this.
37:58
SPEAKER_00: So if someone were to study the book of Proverbs,
38:01
SPEAKER_00: what are some ways in which you could give someone a leg up on how to study Proverbs?
38:08
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and that's a great question because it is so different.
38:11
SPEAKER_02: And that's when it's so much easier to talk about, oh, you know, Genesis and the flood came or whatever.
38:16
SPEAKER_02: Once you get to these things that are like, hey, what's the story here?
38:18
SPEAKER_02: It's like, oh, there is no story.
38:19
SPEAKER_02: I'm going to tell you how to live.
38:20
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
38:21
SPEAKER_02: Wait, what?
38:22
SPEAKER_02: So, first off, you approach them and realize this is for, obviously, it's for some spiritual application.
38:27
SPEAKER_02: That's probably one of the biggest books you could say Proverbs is how,
38:31
SPEAKER_02: and I know people that do this,
38:31
SPEAKER_02: it's not a bad practice,
38:32
SPEAKER_02: you know,
38:33
SPEAKER_02: read a proverb every day because it matches up with the calendar.
38:35
SPEAKER_02: If you read on the second, you read Proverbs 2, it can really benefit your life.
38:39
SPEAKER_02: However, again, we have to understand that this book is still pointing to Christ.
38:45
SPEAKER_02: That's why it's there.
38:46
SPEAKER_02: It would not be in there.
38:47
SPEAKER_02: God didn't just say, hey, for you guys, I'm going to put a book on how you can live a sweet life.
38:51
SPEAKER_00: Here's some biblical ethics.
38:53
SPEAKER_02: Here's some biblical ethics.
38:54
SPEAKER_02: Here's some do's and don'ts.
38:55
SPEAKER_02: And this is really what it's all about.
38:56
SPEAKER_02: And then we'll get back to the story.
38:58
SPEAKER_00: It's like, no, this is really here.
39:01
SPEAKER_00: Proverbs and Psalms are not like an interlude in the Jesus story.
39:04
SPEAKER_02: And it feels like, oh, now it's Psalm time, kids.
39:07
SPEAKER_00: Get your loots and liars out.
39:09
SPEAKER_02: And that's sometimes probably how people take it.
39:12
SPEAKER_02: My biggest thing that I realized,
39:14
SPEAKER_02: I've been writing a book,
39:15
SPEAKER_02: we're just finishing up now,
39:16
SPEAKER_02: on how to study the Bible.
39:18
SPEAKER_02: And when you get to these things, a big thing to emphasize is
39:21
SPEAKER_02: Yes, Psalms is the quote unquote hymn book for Israel.
39:25
SPEAKER_02: Yes, I get that.
39:27
SPEAKER_02: But so many people think it's just the hymn book for Israel and to sing about all the songs that happen.
39:32
SPEAKER_02: But yet there's so much prophecy in there.
39:34
SPEAKER_02: And what can happen again, even the Old Testament is like, oh, it's not a narrative.
39:38
SPEAKER_02: And I'm going to throw it.
39:39
SPEAKER_02: That's just a song.
39:40
SPEAKER_02: If I want to feel good or if I'm feeling bad, I'll go sing the song.
39:42
SPEAKER_02: It's like, whoa, go back to Psalm 22.
39:45
SPEAKER_02: There's actually prophecy in here, and you have to take it all.
39:47
SPEAKER_02: It all points to Christ.
39:48
SPEAKER_02: He's hiding in there.
39:49
SPEAKER_02: He's hiding in the psalm just like he's hiding in Isaiah.
39:52
SPEAKER_02: And you can't just take it all, you know, because it can unlock.
39:55
SPEAKER_02: So many things.
39:56
SPEAKER_02: When I did my thing on Good Friday to show people that Christ was always the plan,
40:00
SPEAKER_02: I actually went to Psalms,
40:01
SPEAKER_02: and it might have blown people's minds,
40:02
SPEAKER_02: but it's like,
40:03
SPEAKER_02: no,
40:04
SPEAKER_02: these were not just songs to sing songs.
40:06
SPEAKER_02: There is truth in them.
40:08
SPEAKER_02: And they tie in, obviously, you can obviously take these books and tie them into the other narratives.
40:13
SPEAKER_02: And see them lived out in one way or another.
40:16
SPEAKER_02: But again,
40:17
SPEAKER_02: you can find out that it's,
40:19
SPEAKER_02: while it's a songbook,
40:20
SPEAKER_02: I'm just using Psalms for an example,
40:21
SPEAKER_02: you can find Christ in there.
40:22
SPEAKER_02: Once you do it, it kind of changes things for you.
40:24
SPEAKER_00: Definitely.
40:26
SPEAKER_00: Like the Psalms are another one of those places that we often go to where we just kind of like...
40:34
SPEAKER_00: The Psalms and Proverbs are kind of like the daily nuggets of the Bible.
40:38
SPEAKER_00: They're often used for that.
40:39
SPEAKER_00: It's like, let me get my nugget for the day.
40:41
SPEAKER_00: And again, as we've kind of alluded to, I don't think that's really what they're there for, obviously.
40:48
SPEAKER_00: And clearly, like in the Psalms, you're seeing this...
40:53
SPEAKER_00: sense of longing for the Messiah throughout all of these hymns that Israel would sing.
41:01
SPEAKER_00: But also, as you mentioned, many of them are prophetic.
41:04
SPEAKER_00: And that's where,
41:05
SPEAKER_00: again,
41:05
SPEAKER_00: the New Testament is so helpful because that's where you get that amazing
41:10
SPEAKER_00: realization where Peter says,
41:12
SPEAKER_00: hey,
41:12
SPEAKER_00: David was a prophet.
41:13
SPEAKER_00: Did you know this?
41:14
SPEAKER_00: He says it in his sermon.
41:15
SPEAKER_00: Hey, the prophet David.
41:17
SPEAKER_00: And it's like, wait, whoa, whoa, he's a prophet?
41:18
SPEAKER_02: I thought he was a king.
41:20
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
41:21
SPEAKER_00: And then like for Proverbs is another one because like as we've alluded to,
41:27
SPEAKER_00: it feels just so ethical and pragmatic,
41:31
SPEAKER_00: which it is.
41:32
SPEAKER_00: But it's also – I think you've said it before.
41:37
SPEAKER_00: Like the Bible is sometimes viewed as just basic instructions before leaving earth.
41:42
SPEAKER_00: And Proverbs is like the prime example of that.
41:45
SPEAKER_00: Like here are some instructions on how to live.
41:47
SPEAKER_00: But actually –
41:49
SPEAKER_00: It's best understood, I think, through the paradigm of wisdom.
41:53
SPEAKER_00: This is like a big paradigm for the book,
41:55
SPEAKER_00: which is just the fact that there's the personification of wisdom in folly.
42:01
SPEAKER_00: And, of course, we know that the true wisdom of God is none other than the person of Jesus.
42:07
SPEAKER_00: It says that in 1 Corinthians 1.30, that he is our wisdom.
42:10
SPEAKER_00: He's the personification of wisdom throughout the book of Proverbs.
42:16
SPEAKER_00: So then you're seeing this.
42:18
SPEAKER_00: this comparison and contrast almost between Christ and evil or foolishness or sin.
42:26
SPEAKER_00: And then that, again, helps you understand kind of how this book relates to the tether of Christ alone.
42:35
SPEAKER_02: Right, yeah, and that's what's so beautiful about it when you go in there.
42:38
SPEAKER_02: Again,
42:39
SPEAKER_02: I think it really just says something about the believer's mentality has to always
42:43
SPEAKER_02: be going into the Bible.
42:44
SPEAKER_02: None of us ever start out this way.
42:45
SPEAKER_02: I'll just say that because we're younger.
42:47
SPEAKER_02: It takes growing and learning and maturing until you realize to look for Christ, but
42:52
SPEAKER_02: When you go to the Proverbs,
42:53
SPEAKER_02: and I'm not saying it's bad,
42:54
SPEAKER_02: because I said I have a lot of people,
42:55
SPEAKER_02: and I encourage you,
42:56
SPEAKER_02: if you read a Proverbs and you're going to learn how to live,
42:59
SPEAKER_02: it's going to help you live a wise life,
43:01
SPEAKER_02: but you've got to go in there asking yourself,
43:03
SPEAKER_02: where is Jesus?
43:04
SPEAKER_02: That's why I love to tell people,
43:05
SPEAKER_02: when I started doing my Old Testament study,
43:07
SPEAKER_02: I haven't said it for a while,
43:08
SPEAKER_02: but I always said,
43:09
SPEAKER_02: this is basically going to be a really big game of where's Waldo,
43:12
SPEAKER_02: but it's where is Jesus?
43:13
SPEAKER_02: And if you do it again,
43:13
SPEAKER_02: it makes it a lot more interesting,
43:15
SPEAKER_02: especially when you get to these kind of books,
43:17
SPEAKER_02: like the Proverbs or the Psalms,
43:19
SPEAKER_02: or Song of Solomon is really...
43:21
SPEAKER_02: An interesting one.
43:22
SPEAKER_02: And you can read this,
43:24
SPEAKER_02: you know,
43:24
SPEAKER_02: like when I was doing it,
43:25
SPEAKER_02: like you can read this and be like,
43:26
SPEAKER_02: what in the world is going on here?
43:28
SPEAKER_02: Should this even be in the Bible?
43:29
SPEAKER_02: I'm not sure.
43:30
SPEAKER_02: And so you start to realize, like, start to realize little nuggets.
43:32
SPEAKER_02: Like, oh, every time she'd go to find him, she couldn't find him in the city.
43:34
SPEAKER_02: She'd find him in the garden.
43:36
SPEAKER_02: Why does she always find him in the garden?
43:37
SPEAKER_02: Wait a minute.
43:38
SPEAKER_02: Jesus.
43:38
SPEAKER_02: Restoration.
43:40
SPEAKER_02: And it ties it back into these deeper themes of the Old Testament that runs all the way through.
43:44
SPEAKER_02: And it's like, wait a minute, I see.
43:46
SPEAKER_02: It's not just some weird story for adults to read when they're lonely or something.
43:50
SPEAKER_02: It's like, wait a minute, this is really about Jesus.
43:53
SPEAKER_02: Because it can be baffling.
43:54
SPEAKER_02: Why are these things in there?
43:55
SPEAKER_02: But when you approach it that way, things will start to unlock.
43:58
SPEAKER_02: Whereas if you're like, what am I going to take from this story for myself?
44:01
SPEAKER_02: And it's like, what are you reading the Bible for?
44:03
SPEAKER_02: For yourself or self-help?
44:05
SPEAKER_02: Or are you reading it to find more about Jesus and his character, which you get through these books?
44:09
SPEAKER_00: And that's where you get to the problem with an overemphasis on the historical,
44:17
SPEAKER_00: grammatical,
44:18
SPEAKER_00: literal interpretation of Scripture.
44:20
SPEAKER_00: When that's emphasized instead of,
44:23
SPEAKER_00: as we've talked about,
44:25
SPEAKER_00: where there is that,
44:27
SPEAKER_00: but there's also redemptive...
44:29
SPEAKER_00: interpretation that's happening at the same time when one of those is like so when
44:34
SPEAKER_00: like a historical grammatical literal approach is over emphasized then you get to
44:39
SPEAKER_00: hey what like yeah what's the what's the morality here what's the ethics here how
44:44
SPEAKER_00: does that what's the self-help lesson being taught here
44:47
SPEAKER_00: when really there should be a redemptive element that points us to Jesus.
44:51
SPEAKER_00: But also sometimes,
44:52
SPEAKER_00: too,
44:52
SPEAKER_00: I would say if we just focus on the redemptive element,
44:56
SPEAKER_00: then we start to allegorize everything into Jesus.
44:59
SPEAKER_00: Right.
44:59
SPEAKER_00: Which I think is its own...
45:02
SPEAKER_00: presents its own problems.
45:04
SPEAKER_00: He's there.
45:05
SPEAKER_00: He's always there, but it's, we don't have to like allegorize everything.
45:08
SPEAKER_00: Like, Hey, see that tree back there?
45:10
SPEAKER_00: That's, that's, that's the cross.
45:11
SPEAKER_00: Well, maybe it's just a tree, right?
45:14
SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
45:14
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
45:14
SPEAKER_02: We have to let, and it's almost like the same problem.
45:17
SPEAKER_02: I always say over spiritualizing thing.
45:19
SPEAKER_02: Cause I love the supernatural and I believe it's out there, but I definitely don't believe.
45:23
SPEAKER_02: And I, it's funny cause I literally just saw it today.
45:25
SPEAKER_02: Somebody who was a non-believer was the kind of mocking Chris said, why is everything demons?
45:28
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
45:29
SPEAKER_02: And it's funny,
45:30
SPEAKER_02: like,
45:30
SPEAKER_02: I didn't want to,
45:31
SPEAKER_02: but I almost want to be like,
45:32
SPEAKER_02: yeah,
45:32
SPEAKER_02: like,
45:32
SPEAKER_02: why is everything,
45:33
SPEAKER_02: like,
45:34
SPEAKER_02: I'm actually with you.
45:35
SPEAKER_02: Why is everything demons?
45:36
SPEAKER_02: Demons are real, though.
45:37
SPEAKER_02: But why are they, like, and the same thing can get happened.
45:39
SPEAKER_02: You can get so caught up into, like you said, why did it, you know, why did it have 400 men there?
45:44
SPEAKER_02: Well, maybe 400 was like, Jesus, whatever.
45:47
SPEAKER_02: And this is how many years until he was going in.
45:49
SPEAKER_02: This is where you get all this crazy stuff where people are going to send you
45:52
SPEAKER_02: things and say,
45:52
SPEAKER_02: this is what it means.
45:53
SPEAKER_02: And because everything's about Jesus and we got to figure out why the,
45:58
SPEAKER_02: the Terebinth was here because it mentioned,
46:00
SPEAKER_02: like you said,
46:00
SPEAKER_02: you can read all kinds of ways into it again,
46:03
SPEAKER_02: just to go to that,
46:04
SPEAKER_02: that you need to approach the Bible as a whole.
46:07
SPEAKER_02: And when you do that, it will eliminate all these things.
46:10
SPEAKER_00: It's both.
46:11
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
46:11
SPEAKER_00: It's both historical and redemptive.
46:15
SPEAKER_00: And when you keep both of those intention, that just makes the Bible come alive.
46:19
SPEAKER_00: Like when we're talking about hermeneutics,
46:22
SPEAKER_00: regardless of genre,
46:23
SPEAKER_00: regardless of what type of narrative you're in,
46:26
SPEAKER_00: what type of whether you're in a wisdom book,
46:28
SPEAKER_00: whether you're in a prophetic book or whether you're in like an epistle,
46:31
SPEAKER_00: that's really just like a polemic,
46:35
SPEAKER_00: a polemical book.
46:37
SPEAKER_00: It's always the same in the sense that there's some sort of history happening,
46:41
SPEAKER_00: but there's also a redemptive element to it.
46:44
SPEAKER_00: And those things are sometimes hard to keep in tension because it's easier just to do one or the other.
46:50
SPEAKER_02: Right, right.
46:51
SPEAKER_02: And that's the trick with the Bible.
46:52
SPEAKER_02: I think people get into...
46:54
SPEAKER_02: so many debates that are maybe unjust,
46:56
SPEAKER_02: not,
46:56
SPEAKER_02: not really needed because,
46:58
SPEAKER_02: you know,
46:59
SPEAKER_02: I've been talking about it before.
47:00
SPEAKER_02: It's like, you know, arguing is the, you know, the elephant rough or sharp based on what you're touching.
47:05
SPEAKER_02: And it's the same kind of thing here.
47:08
SPEAKER_02: And it can be both ways.
47:09
SPEAKER_02: What you're saying is there has to be that balance.
47:11
SPEAKER_02: And I mean, I found that the more and more, it's probably like the theme of my year is,
47:15
SPEAKER_02: is keeping everything in balance in the Bible.
47:17
SPEAKER_02: Everything has a balance.
47:18
SPEAKER_02: You can't go one way or the other.
47:19
SPEAKER_02: I was talking to people about this.
47:21
SPEAKER_02: You can't even take good things to the nth degree because when you start going into,
47:27
SPEAKER_02: I need to be around godly people,
47:29
SPEAKER_02: which is very true,
47:29
SPEAKER_02: and I need to spend more time with my Christian family,
47:31
SPEAKER_02: and then you're doing that every day,
47:32
SPEAKER_02: and now you're like,
47:33
SPEAKER_02: I can't even go to the secular world.
47:34
SPEAKER_02: I can't even talk with them because I want to be only godly.
47:37
SPEAKER_02: Well, now you've eliminated these people that have no other way to the gospel.
47:41
SPEAKER_02: But then you got the other people on the side that's like,
47:42
SPEAKER_02: hey,
47:42
SPEAKER_02: to be a good Christian,
47:43
SPEAKER_02: the church people are saved.
47:45
SPEAKER_02: I'm going to go hang out with all the sinners.
47:47
SPEAKER_02: And then that's how you slip into sin.
47:49
SPEAKER_02: And you're going to lose your spirituality.
47:50
SPEAKER_02: You're going to be affected.
47:51
SPEAKER_02: And it's that,
47:52
SPEAKER_02: well,
47:52
SPEAKER_02: how do I not abandon the secular world and give them a chance,
47:55
SPEAKER_02: but not abandon and still live in and be a family,
47:59
SPEAKER_02: but also help?
48:00
SPEAKER_02: And it's like...
48:02
SPEAKER_02: It sometimes seems like there's no concrete answer of like,
48:04
SPEAKER_02: well,
48:05
SPEAKER_02: it should be done this way or this way.
48:06
SPEAKER_02: It's just God's got to give you the wisdom and how to balance it out.
48:09
SPEAKER_02: And even that's why it's so important to pray before preaching because it's like,
48:13
SPEAKER_02: how do I keep this in balance where I don't make it all about this where they miss
48:16
SPEAKER_02: the narrative,
48:16
SPEAKER_02: but all about the narrative where they say,
48:18
SPEAKER_02: why did I just read the Old Testament when there's nothing about my salvation in there?
48:21
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, exactly.
48:22
SPEAKER_00: And I think that that's kind of the point is that
48:25
SPEAKER_00: I think God wants us wrestling with these passages.
48:28
SPEAKER_00: Or my favorite allusion is I think God wants us to chew on his word.
48:33
SPEAKER_00: I love that passage in Jeremiah 15 where the prophet Jeremiah says,
48:39
SPEAKER_00: basically,
48:40
SPEAKER_00: I ate the words of God and they became a delight to me.
48:43
SPEAKER_00: It's this really like graphic image of
48:48
SPEAKER_00: And yet I think that that's what we are called to do,
48:51
SPEAKER_00: not only as preachers,
48:53
SPEAKER_00: but also just as disciples,
48:54
SPEAKER_00: as students of the Word,
48:56
SPEAKER_00: whatever your vocation,
48:57
SPEAKER_00: whatever that capacity looks like for you,
49:01
SPEAKER_00: is this constant wrestling,
49:04
SPEAKER_00: chewing on the Word until we can really clarify in our own minds what's going on
49:12
SPEAKER_00: and what it's teaching us.
49:14
SPEAKER_00: And I think the beautiful part is like,
49:18
SPEAKER_00: And very often,
49:20
SPEAKER_00: the words of God have multiple meanings to them,
49:23
SPEAKER_00: like to where you can chew on it,
49:25
SPEAKER_00: study it,
49:26
SPEAKER_00: and preach it,
49:27
SPEAKER_00: and declare its sense in one way,
49:29
SPEAKER_00: and then I can do the same thing,
49:31
SPEAKER_00: and it can have...
49:32
SPEAKER_00: perhaps a different application,
49:34
SPEAKER_00: which is kind of like the great thing is that the Holy Spirit applies the word in
49:39
SPEAKER_00: different ways to different people.
49:43
SPEAKER_00: Obviously, there's one main meaning.
49:44
SPEAKER_00: I'm not saying there's multiple meanings, but there's multiple applications.
49:47
SPEAKER_00: I guess that's a better way of saying it.
49:49
SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
49:49
SPEAKER_02: And, I mean, that's what everything gets back to is how do we find that balance?
49:56
SPEAKER_02: And what I like to think about what you were talking about is Israel.
50:00
SPEAKER_02: Um, Jacob's renamed Israel as he's wrestling with God and Israel literally means to struggle with God.
50:05
SPEAKER_02: And it's like crazy.
50:06
SPEAKER_02: The more you meditate on that and you're like, well, that's the whole nation's named after.
50:10
SPEAKER_02: That's why Israel's today is struggling with God.
50:13
SPEAKER_02: And almost you go to,
50:15
SPEAKER_02: you know,
50:15
SPEAKER_02: you realize things aren't as black and white as I thought when I was in Sunday school.
50:19
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
50:20
SPEAKER_02: So it's so easy to know you got to do this or it's so easy.
50:22
SPEAKER_02: This is about that.
50:24
SPEAKER_02: And then as you get older and you get more mature and God starts to show you things like,
50:27
SPEAKER_02: oh,
50:27
SPEAKER_02: wow,
50:28
SPEAKER_02: I know why we need prayer and meditation,
50:30
SPEAKER_02: because it's not so clear.
50:31
SPEAKER_02: It's gray in certain areas.
50:32
SPEAKER_02: It depends even on you.
50:34
SPEAKER_02: It depends on your audience, who you're talking to and how you're doing.
50:37
SPEAKER_02: But it's very important to keep this all and to constantly be struggling with.
50:42
SPEAKER_02: I can't just say, oh, that's an easy answer.
50:44
SPEAKER_02: I know how to do that, and I'll get to that next week.
50:45
SPEAKER_02: It's like, no, you've got to be struggling and wrestling with it each day.
50:47
SPEAKER_02: Like, God, what do you want me to say to this audience?
50:50
SPEAKER_02: What message do you want me to get out of this?
50:52
SPEAKER_02: Because I know there's a bunch of different ways I can take this.
50:54
SPEAKER_02: And to keep it in almost like I think forever in our lives through our
50:58
SPEAKER_02: sanctification and even through getting Noah's word,
51:01
SPEAKER_02: we are just like Israel.
51:02
SPEAKER_02: We are struggling and wrestling with God because it's not so cut and dry as we would like to make it.
51:08
SPEAKER_02: It's black and white.
51:09
SPEAKER_02: And I think that's part of it.
51:10
SPEAKER_00: Yeah,
51:11
SPEAKER_00: and I think that when you realize there's a lot of gray areas or there's a lot of
51:15
SPEAKER_00: places where we need to do that wrestling,
51:18
SPEAKER_00: I think that helps us become a little bit more sympathetic to people in the Bible.
51:23
SPEAKER_00: I'm thinking especially of New Testament people with the ways in which they just totally missed
51:29
SPEAKER_00: like who Jesus was and what he was supposed to do.
51:33
SPEAKER_00: Because they, again, wanted everything to be like really clear and cut and dry.
51:38
SPEAKER_00: And in a way,
51:40
SPEAKER_00: they kind of missed what the Bible was really teaching,
51:45
SPEAKER_00: what the Old Testament was really showing them.
51:49
SPEAKER_00: Not that we would get it right.
51:51
SPEAKER_00: I think we would be right with them.
51:53
SPEAKER_00: I think we would be wrong right alongside them.
51:57
SPEAKER_02: Peter is one of the best examples when he doesn't want to let Jesus die.
52:00
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
52:00
SPEAKER_02: And that's the whole plan.
52:02
SPEAKER_02: And us, you know, from our lofty towers, like, I can't believe you didn't even read Isaiah 53.
52:06
SPEAKER_02: You know what I mean?
52:09
SPEAKER_02: We'd all be like that, but we would all miss it too.
52:11
SPEAKER_02: And then you can say, well...
52:13
SPEAKER_02: In a way, Peter got it wrong because he wanted it to be black and white.
52:16
SPEAKER_02: And he knew the scriptures are true.
52:19
SPEAKER_02: And he knew they said that the Messiah would come and reign and make everything right.
52:23
SPEAKER_02: And he said, that's the truth.
52:26
SPEAKER_02: And that's it.
52:26
SPEAKER_02: And that's what's happening right now.
52:28
SPEAKER_02: And he made it black and white.
52:29
SPEAKER_02: It's like, well, that is true.
52:31
SPEAKER_02: Overall, but now application-wise, it's a little bit different than that.
52:36
SPEAKER_02: He is restoring through death.
52:39
SPEAKER_02: I know it sounds tricky and confusing,
52:41
SPEAKER_02: but that's why I actually love,
52:42
SPEAKER_02: again,
52:42
SPEAKER_02: why God puts these things in there.
52:43
SPEAKER_02: It's because if Peter can miss it, so can we.
52:46
SPEAKER_02: If we're not slowing down and saying,
52:48
SPEAKER_02: God,
52:48
SPEAKER_02: because Peter could have said,
52:50
SPEAKER_02: hey,
52:50
SPEAKER_02: Jesus is saying he's dying.
52:51
SPEAKER_02: Lord, what am I supposed to do here?
52:53
SPEAKER_02: I'm sure the Lord would have said, hey, let him.
52:55
SPEAKER_02: This is part of the plan.
52:56
SPEAKER_02: Instead, it's like, no, I know what this means.
52:58
SPEAKER_02: You're going to stay here and you're going to conquer him.
52:59
SPEAKER_02: I'll be with my sword.
53:01
SPEAKER_02: And it's really cool to see how Peter,
53:03
SPEAKER_02: we can't be any better than Peter and scoff at him because we do the same things
53:08
SPEAKER_02: even today in our own way.
53:09
SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
53:09
SPEAKER_00: We would be right alongside of him being confused and
53:13
SPEAKER_00: and missing some of the parts of the scriptures that were supposed to tell us one
53:18
SPEAKER_00: thing and when we thought it was telling us another thing.
53:21
SPEAKER_00: Right.
53:22
SPEAKER_00: Because that happens all the time even now.
53:23
SPEAKER_00: We've talked about it.
53:24
SPEAKER_00: We've alluded to it.
53:25
SPEAKER_00: There's so much moralism that happens with Old Testament stories.
53:28
SPEAKER_00: There's so much like, hey, you want to be just a better leader?
53:33
SPEAKER_00: Well, what do we often think?
53:34
SPEAKER_00: Oh, just read Nehemiah.
53:35
SPEAKER_00: Well, Nehemiah is not just about leadership.
53:37
SPEAKER_00: Right.
53:38
SPEAKER_00: What's going on there?
53:40
SPEAKER_00: And I think we get into these –
53:42
SPEAKER_00: Like caricatures almost.
53:44
SPEAKER_00: Like the Old Testament is so caricatured.
53:46
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
53:48
SPEAKER_00: And I think that that's where we often mess up.
53:50
SPEAKER_00: Where these are not just archetypes.
53:52
SPEAKER_00: These are not just caricatures of this, that, or the other virtue.
53:57
SPEAKER_00: These are real people that were struggling with real events in their lives.
54:02
SPEAKER_00: And we are getting...
54:03
SPEAKER_00: The other facet I think is helpful is we're getting, like, infinitesimal snippets of their lives.
54:08
SPEAKER_00: We're not even getting their full lives all the time.
54:10
SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
54:12
SPEAKER_00: And so we... I think we make that mistake, too.
54:15
SPEAKER_00: Like,
54:15
SPEAKER_00: we're just getting a little window into their...
54:17
SPEAKER_00: A great example of this to me is just the story of Abraham and Sarah,
54:23
SPEAKER_00: which,
54:23
SPEAKER_00: of course,
54:23
SPEAKER_00: has been referred to a lot,
54:25
SPEAKER_00: but just...
54:27
SPEAKER_00: The promise is made when he's 75 and he doesn't have a kid till he's 100.
54:32
SPEAKER_00: So there's 25 years where we get just little glimpses of in between.
54:36
SPEAKER_00: But that's 25 years of just waiting around for this promise to come true, which.
54:42
SPEAKER_00: when it's put into that context, you can understand his frustration.
54:46
SPEAKER_00: And perhaps you can be sympathetic, even if you're not, like, accepting or approving.
54:50
SPEAKER_00: You can be sympathetic to, like, well, I guess I got to do something else.
54:54
SPEAKER_00: I got to guess I better do this myself.
54:56
SPEAKER_02: Right, and again, it goes to show, like, again, you need to zoom out.
54:59
SPEAKER_02: You need to have context because we've all read that story of, you know, why do they laugh?
55:04
SPEAKER_02: I think it was so crazy.
55:05
SPEAKER_02: Or why were they so frustrated?
55:06
SPEAKER_02: It's like, well, you have to understand –
55:07
SPEAKER_02: The concept, they were so much older, and they didn't have anything for 25 years.
55:11
SPEAKER_02: And you can't get a true,
55:13
SPEAKER_02: accurate description of how tough that must have been after year two,
55:18
SPEAKER_02: after year three.
55:20
SPEAKER_02: You'd love to hear what was going on in the tent,
55:22
SPEAKER_02: what conversations were happening in the tent between Abram and Sarah when they
55:25
SPEAKER_02: were talking about it.
55:27
SPEAKER_02: Was that really a promise?
55:30
SPEAKER_02: I'm sure those things happen because they would with anybody.
55:33
SPEAKER_02: And it's a really good thing to think that we are getting,
55:35
SPEAKER_02: I tell people,
55:35
SPEAKER_02: it's kind of like sports center highlights.
55:37
SPEAKER_02: That's why even when you get to the New Testament,
55:39
SPEAKER_02: the demon possession,
55:40
SPEAKER_02: or some of these crazy miracles in the Old Testament,
55:42
SPEAKER_02: those are like the dunks on the NBA stuff.
55:45
SPEAKER_02: There was not a dunk every single play, by the way.
55:47
SPEAKER_02: And some games had like one or none.
55:50
SPEAKER_02: And it's like, yeah, we got the highlight reel.
55:52
SPEAKER_02: I think that's a good point.
55:53
SPEAKER_02: You didn't get to see the same guy that dunked it dribbled off his foot out of
55:56
SPEAKER_02: bounds to lose the game at the end.
55:57
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
55:58
SPEAKER_02: They didn't put that up as a highlight.
55:59
SPEAKER_02: That was not the highlight, right?
56:00
SPEAKER_02: Because we're doing the highlights.
56:02
SPEAKER_02: It's very similar.
56:03
SPEAKER_02: And then you start to look at, like, I'm going to spin around on somebody.
56:06
SPEAKER_02: And you say, hey, I want somebody to really know everything they need to know about you and your life.
56:09
SPEAKER_02: But you have one chapter to do it.
56:11
SPEAKER_02: And also that chapter can only have 16 verses.
56:13
SPEAKER_02: It's like, well, how do you even begin?
56:15
SPEAKER_02: You're only going to put the big chunks in.
56:16
SPEAKER_02: And then somebody will take that and analyze your life maybe in a different way.
56:19
SPEAKER_02: Unless they sit down and say, oh, well, that happened here and then there.
56:22
SPEAKER_02: And I could...
56:23
SPEAKER_02: And when you start to realize,
56:24
SPEAKER_02: like you said,
56:25
SPEAKER_02: there's so much more in there,
56:26
SPEAKER_02: it really adds a lot of depth to it.
56:29
SPEAKER_00: You just brought up a really good point, too, because...
56:33
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we focus on these highlight reels that appear.
56:37
SPEAKER_00: I think another great example of this is just Elijah and the fact that we love all his miracles.
56:43
SPEAKER_00: We love – and I think there's a song.
56:45
SPEAKER_00: Isn't there like a CCM song that's like, I want to go back to the days of Elijah?
56:48
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, the days of Elijah.
56:50
SPEAKER_00: We often romanticize that where it's like –
56:53
SPEAKER_00: You want to go back to the time when these prophets were being killed?
56:57
SPEAKER_00: Jezebel was encouraging her husband to be ungodly.
57:00
SPEAKER_00: There's like this despotism that's happening.
57:03
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
57:04
SPEAKER_00: What are you really asking there?
57:07
SPEAKER_00: And yet we focus on the highlight reels, which...
57:10
SPEAKER_00: This then brings up the New Testament reality where Jesus is like,
57:14
SPEAKER_00: hey,
57:15
SPEAKER_00: it's to your advantage that I'm going away.
57:18
SPEAKER_00: It's going to be better off when I'm gone because then the Holy Spirit is going to come.
57:25
SPEAKER_00: I just think that's a funny reality, too.
57:27
SPEAKER_00: Like when it comes to Old Testament, we're like, man, I wish we could be back then.
57:31
SPEAKER_00: It's like, no.
57:32
SPEAKER_00: I don't think you do.
57:32
SPEAKER_02: Not really.
57:33
SPEAKER_02: If you think about it, and it's funny because, again, Elijah is so cool.
57:36
SPEAKER_02: Like, oh, wow, I got to do this and that.
57:38
SPEAKER_02: And he got to be taken away in a chariot of fire.
57:40
SPEAKER_02: It's like, you do know the guy asked to die, right?
57:45
SPEAKER_02: Like, could you imagine?
57:46
SPEAKER_02: You hear somebody wants to kill themselves and God just kill me.
57:49
SPEAKER_02: I hate doing this.
57:49
SPEAKER_02: Like, I'd love to go back to his day.
57:52
SPEAKER_02: It's like, again, obviously, we're not taking this into full spectrum here.
57:56
SPEAKER_02: And it was actually way worse.
57:57
SPEAKER_02: You know,
57:58
SPEAKER_02: I mean,
57:58
SPEAKER_02: it's funny because American Christians will argue about who's in leadership in our country.
58:02
SPEAKER_02: Oh, man, could you imagine living back in the time of Jezebel or Athaliah?
58:06
SPEAKER_02: Queen Athaliah, it's insane when you realize the turmoil.
58:10
SPEAKER_02: It's like, you don't know what you're asking.
58:12
SPEAKER_00: No, no.
58:15
SPEAKER_00: All of this helps us, though, understand the Old Testament in context.
58:18
SPEAKER_00: And again,
58:19
SPEAKER_00: this episode has been really focused on that,
58:22
SPEAKER_00: but I think it's so helpful because clearly most of your Bible is Old Testament,
58:27
SPEAKER_00: so you can't avoid it,
58:28
SPEAKER_00: nor should you.
58:30
SPEAKER_00: There is confusion sometimes with all of the data,
58:34
SPEAKER_00: all of the details,
58:35
SPEAKER_00: but hopefully what you can do...
58:38
SPEAKER_00: I guess the big takeaway for me,
58:40
SPEAKER_00: and maybe you can share a takeaway,
58:42
SPEAKER_00: is just...
58:43
SPEAKER_00: Step back and look at big chunks of Old Testament story.
58:48
SPEAKER_00: Don't get mired in the minutia.
58:52
SPEAKER_00: Look at the big movements because that will help you understand what's happening.
58:58
SPEAKER_00: And of course, maybe I'm stealing your thunder, but the other big takeaway is just
59:03
SPEAKER_00: Look for Christ because you're going to find him.
59:06
SPEAKER_00: Like you said, where's Waldo?
59:07
SPEAKER_00: And I recorded a couple episodes ago.
59:11
SPEAKER_00: I did a podcast with Chad Bird.
59:13
SPEAKER_00: And I used that analogy like, you know, when you buy a new car, you see that car everywhere.
59:18
SPEAKER_00: And it's not like...
59:20
SPEAKER_00: Maybe they had like a gangbusters deal, so everyone now has it.
59:23
SPEAKER_00: But more often than not, it's just like you're aware of it.
59:26
SPEAKER_00: There's a psychological phenomenon there.
59:28
SPEAKER_00: But if you go into the Old Testament saying, where can I find Christ?
59:33
SPEAKER_00: You're going to see him.
59:34
SPEAKER_00: You're going to find it.
59:35
SPEAKER_00: It's not like...
59:38
SPEAKER_00: It's not like the Da Vinci Code where you have to do all kinds of crazy stuff.
59:43
SPEAKER_00: Find some ancient artifacts and measure them up here to figure out where God's located.
59:48
SPEAKER_00: That's not how Jesus reveals himself.
59:51
SPEAKER_00: If you go into it with the mindset of, this is going to talk to me about Jesus.
59:56
SPEAKER_00: Where can I see them?
59:57
SPEAKER_00: It's going to be revealed to you.
59:58
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and one of my other things, everything you said is great and really the dominant point, I think.
1:00:03
SPEAKER_02: Another thing I always encourage people to do,
1:00:05
SPEAKER_02: and I challenged myself years ago and have been sticking to it,
1:00:08
SPEAKER_02: it's not easy all the time,
1:00:09
SPEAKER_02: is don't skip any verses even when you're reading them.
1:00:11
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
1:00:12
SPEAKER_02: Because it's so easy to be like, well, I don't know that.
1:00:14
SPEAKER_02: Moving on,
1:00:15
SPEAKER_02: it's like,
1:00:15
SPEAKER_02: hey,
1:00:15
SPEAKER_02: just actually pretend that you have to tell,
1:00:17
SPEAKER_02: and I actually exercise this myself,
1:00:18
SPEAKER_02: pretend that somebody says,
1:00:19
SPEAKER_02: hey,
1:00:19
SPEAKER_02: what does verse two mean?
1:00:20
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
1:00:21
SPEAKER_02: And you can't skip it.
1:00:22
SPEAKER_02: You have to answer it.
1:00:23
SPEAKER_02: So ask yourself,
1:00:23
SPEAKER_02: go through,
1:00:24
SPEAKER_02: and it's like,
1:00:24
SPEAKER_02: when you do that,
1:00:25
SPEAKER_02: you'll start to see these little nuggets that you would have just glazed over until
1:00:28
SPEAKER_02: you stopped down.
1:00:30
SPEAKER_02: But like,
1:00:30
SPEAKER_02: yeah,
1:00:31
SPEAKER_02: reading things in overall detail,
1:00:32
SPEAKER_02: whether it's verse by verse or whatever,
1:00:34
SPEAKER_02: but just seeing the grander scheme.
1:00:36
SPEAKER_02: And like you said, seeing, you know, you buy the red Corvette or whatever.
1:00:39
SPEAKER_02: Now red Corvettes are all over town.
1:00:41
SPEAKER_02: They're not really.
1:00:42
SPEAKER_02: It's probably just like you said, noticing it.
1:00:44
SPEAKER_02: And that's a great thing for us to know that if you want to find Jesus, he loves to reveal himself.
1:00:49
SPEAKER_02: And all you have to do is pray and ask and go back, read the Old Testament.
1:00:53
SPEAKER_02: I guarantee in a short amount of time, you're going to find things you never saw before.
1:00:57
SPEAKER_02: And you're going to say, that's the gospel message right there.
1:01:00
SPEAKER_02: And I can't believe I never saw it.
1:01:01
SPEAKER_00: Once again, as it says in the New Testament, all of scripture is profitable.
1:01:06
SPEAKER_00: So clearly it's referring to the Old Testament.
1:01:09
SPEAKER_00: They didn't have the New Testament written at that time.
1:01:11
SPEAKER_00: So that's what he's referring to.
1:01:13
SPEAKER_00: But all of scripture we know is profitable for us.
1:01:17
SPEAKER_00: So as good students of the word, let's read all of the word.
1:01:21
SPEAKER_00: Thanks so much for listening.
1:01:22
SPEAKER_00: I hope you've been blessed by this episode of the Ministry Minded Podcast.
1:01:25
SPEAKER_00: If you're not already,
1:01:26
SPEAKER_00: please be sure to subscribe on Apple,
1:01:28
SPEAKER_00: Spotify,
1:01:29
SPEAKER_00: or on Substack,
1:01:30
SPEAKER_00: wherever you get your podcasts.
1:01:31
SPEAKER_00: All of that is just immensely encouraging to me.
1:01:35
SPEAKER_00: And also it helps to bless others.
1:01:37
SPEAKER_00: If you've been encouraged by this episode, be sure to share it with someone.
1:01:40
SPEAKER_00: Be sure to share it on your social media or wherever you can share it with your friends.
1:01:46
SPEAKER_00: But thank you so much for listening.
1:01:47
SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much for all your encouragement and your support.
1:01:50
SPEAKER_00: And I can't wait to see you on the next episode, which hopefully will be really soon.
1:01:54
SPEAKER_00: God bless you.