Worship and Leadership by LifePoint Creative
This podcast was intended to resource our Dream Teamers at LifePoint Church, with biblical fundamentals on worship, life and a variety of leadership principles.
Worship and Leadership by LifePoint Creative
SUNDAY REWIND: Life & Living As Christians (1 Timothy 2:1-15)
This discussion centers around the importance of prayer and unity within the Christian community, addressing current issues surrounding gender roles and the interpretation of Scripture. We challenge listeners to reflect on their understanding of grace and salvation, emphasizing that God’s love is for everyone, regardless of their past.
• Exploring the themes of unity, prayer, and inclusivity in faith
• Examining the significance of expository preaching
• Discussing the challenges of eisegesis versus exegesis
• Understanding God’s desire for all to be saved
• Addressing the role of women in ministry
• Reflecting on the importance of community and leadership
• Encouraging deeper engagement with Scripture and prayer
• Challenging cultural tensions and divisive issues in the church
Hey, what's up everybody, and welcome to a special episode of Sunday Rewind. And we're in the room right now, in the studio office, in the office really, and we're joined by it's a full house Pastor Willie.
Speaker 2:Come on, listen. I'm excited. Today we have some dignitaries and luminaries among us.
Speaker 3:There it is again More random titles. Here we go, come on. There it is again More random titles.
Speaker 2:Here we go. So I'm excited to announce the industrious and illustrious and effervescent leader, pastor Michael Burnett, and he is joined by the tenacious and tremendous Pastor Stephanie Burnett. Come on somebody, I like that one.
Speaker 1:Praise the Lord. Come on somebody I like that one Praise the Lord.
Speaker 3:And here, immediately adjacent to my dextral side we have pastors Jordan and Aaron.
Speaker 6:Smalley we need more like cantankerous, ostentatious, stupendous.
Speaker 3:What was the word he said? West coastiness.
Speaker 2:We have the regal, relegatious and revelatory.
Speaker 1:Jordan and Aaron.
Speaker 2:Smalley, our APSU young adult pastors Excited to be here?
Speaker 1:Yeah, and today we're going to be talking about. We're recapping this last Sunday sermon, which was incredible. First Timothy, chapter two.
Speaker 2:And.
Speaker 1:Pastor Mike said it was three sermons in one and you did a great job delivering it and just bringing it, and so let's go.
Speaker 3:Well, thanks, I listen to every sermon, every book and even Scripture at double speed. The problem is, I can't preach at double speed because this sermon was exceptionally long. Well, I mean, I've been known to preach longer, but I knew it was a lot of material and we're committed to getting through one chapter at a time for this series from now on.
Speaker 3:I mean, you and I split chapter one and now two through six will be one chapter a week, which Jordan and Aaron are going to be preaching one of those chapters. It's going to be a lot of fun.
Speaker 4:Y'all are going to be preaching together, which that's I think we've only ever done that once, Stephanie and I A couple times over the years.
Speaker 3:On a Sunday, have we?
Speaker 4:I thought it was once, but here and there, so it's going to be great to hear from the two of you.
Speaker 5:We're excited.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so today, yeah, I just thought there was so much left on the floor and left in the notes. I mean, normally I write an eight-page manuscript and I had, I think, 13 pages.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you almost doubled what you normally write.
Speaker 3:Yeah, which getting through that was a lot, but, praise God, I have had so much feedback already from the sermon itself and especially from men thanking me for what they learned in that last passage on the gender differences and especially highlighting women Wow, that brings a lot of clarity. That's really helpful. So that's been a lot of fun. We'll get there. But yeah, I think there's a lot to really dig in here. We're in a series that it's an expository sermon series, right. So if you're going to do expositional preaching, you have to be honest with the text. You have to stay in the text and one of the benefits of that is the focus right. So you're just in one place. We're not pulling from all over the.
Speaker 3:Bible to make a point, we're staying in one place and letting that passage make its own points. But the challenge of that is you want to read into it, you want to reinterpret it or say, well, this is what I always thought it means. And then, once you start doing the study, you want to reinterpret it or say, well, this is what I always thought it means. And then and then, once you, once you start doing the study, you go, wow, I, I didn't realize, I never understood that correctly, right? So this is one of those passages. In fact, multiple commentaries I read said that first, timothy two, especially the last part, is the some of the most debated scripture in the new Testament. So it was fun. Yeah, there's a lot of work.
Speaker 1:This last week.
Speaker 3:I mean Stephanie, and I don't normally talk about the text on preaching as much as we did this week.
Speaker 5:So Well, yeah, I just echo what you were saying, pastor Mike. Thank you for speaking to this, I think. I mean I was trying to think if I've ever sat in a church service and ever heard this specific passage taught on. So thank you, I mean, I think, on behalf of you, know a lot of other people that maybe you didn't hear feedback from or haven't spoken up. I think it was great and I think just the way that you taught through it and I thought it was great and very helpful for a lot of our people.
Speaker 4:I think that's the power of expositional preaching, you know. It forces you to look at the text instead of shying away from. Oh, I didn't like how that read or that made me feel uncomfortable, so we're just going to keep reading, what you can do on your own, but to bring it to the pulpit, you know was really helpful.
Speaker 1:It's like how do?
Speaker 4:we? How do we put that with the rest of scripture?
Speaker 3:How? How does it make sense for our everyday lives back then for all time and then for today? So yeah, we had to deal with it. So I thought it was helpful. Yeah, for sure, that's great.
Speaker 3:Well, the opposite of exegetical preaching is eisegetical preaching. So the exegete is to pull out, the eisegete is to put in right. So it's very easy to eisegete a text and read into it what you want it to say. And it's humbling to say well, I may have understood that incorrectly or I may not be right on that, and especially as a pastor of a church with a track record of preaching a certain way or with a certain theological orientation to come away with man, I had to adjust some things. And then to know that if I got adjusted as the preacher, I'm tracking that people in the room are going to have to make adjustments too. It's just a humbling way to preach. Eisegesis is a word maybe a lot of folks have never heard, but unfortunately that's the way a lot of us approach. Let's go even beyond Scripture. We approach the news that way we approach culture.
Speaker 3:We approach our families that way. I mean we want to read our narrative into stuff Correct, right, correct, but the Scripture is beyond us Go ahead.
Speaker 4:I'm just going to say it's been said that no matter what text we're reading, whether it's Scripture or beyond Scripture we all come to the table with our own filter Right.
Speaker 1:So the way we grew up.
Speaker 4:That's right In our home or in a church or not in church. However you grow up and whatever your experience on this planet earth has been for the years that you've been here, that's what you're going to come to the text with. So I think, seeing the historical background, the context of the situation, it's just so helpful because all of us really it's impossible to come to a text and not have a bias.
Speaker 1:We all have one.
Speaker 4:And so to take that filter off to the best of our ability and to say God, help me to see this scripture as you would want us to see. This, I think, is good. But, most of us don't realize that we come with a filter or a bias or eisegesis, like you're saying.
Speaker 2:Which is why I think you also did a great job in introducing a new term for most of our people hermeneutics. So one thing, and to your point, being an expository, preacher, you're always going to give us the context and historical background. But what you did Sunday, that I thought was really innovative and really just so healthy for our churches you actually taught us how to interpret Scripture. So you didn't just do hermeneutics, but you taught us how to do it. So you were saying, and again, because you talked hey, every week, you know, we gather together and most people can come away feeling, well, okay, exactly, how do you do that? He kept it very simple. You know, exegetical, theological, homiletical. So now you're not just showing us hey, this is what Pastor Mike does.
Speaker 2:I'm teaching you how to do it as well. So the win is I'm not only informed and transformed like I'm transformed by the word, but I'm equipped with this tool now to rightly divide the word of Scripture, I think, to your point. We bring these biases In the LifePoint Leadership Academy last month it was very gratifying. People were just blowing up my phone who were in the LA saying I know what he's talking about, I know those words, and so it's great to see people who are excited about this. But then people will be informed and to humble themselves and say, wow, there's a lot of passages in Scripture that I've taken for granted. I've principalized because I brought my own biases and presuppositions, and so that's what I loved about that sermon. It was really a perfect mix of being sermonic but also didactic.
Speaker 2:You taught us here's how you study the Word. And again, you started at the beginning. Hey, let me be your pastor and your teacher. So I'm not just going to teach you the word, I'm going to teach you how to rightly divide it as well. So I can apply that tool to any passage description that I read Well, and anything else that you read, right?
Speaker 3:yeah, the news, seriously. I mean, when you approach social media posts, you know, and somebody's just wailing on an issue on their social media, you go, man, something's going on in that that triggered that person for some reason. Right, and if you'll just pause and didn't just be empathetic for a second, it it may not cause you to spin off in a reaction so quickly, right?
Speaker 6:So, anyway, there's always a why behind the what.
Speaker 3:Yeah, exactly yes. So I was thinking this morning uh, I don't know, I get really reflective when I'm showering. It's one of my only private and quiet moments in my life, with four kids and a busy schedule but I was thinking about this discussion that I knew we were having today on the podcast. And God has one way and one will. He is not divided, yet the church is, and so I've wrestled with that since I was a young Christian.
Speaker 3:I remember having a discussion with a friend of mine who's a Calvinist and he was my roommate, actually in college, and I remember asking I said why are there so many denominational differences? And I had been a Christian like two years and he said well, you know, we believe this one way and other groups believe that way, and I'd come from a new faith of a Pentecostal tradition and he didn't ascribe to those doctrines, and then he had these views on eternal security and salvation as a Calvinist that I didn't see in Scripture, and so we would have these discussions, even as roommates, and I remember saying to him I said but God has one way, god's not divided on these things.
Speaker 1:Why are we?
Speaker 3:And I think a lot of people give just kind of these platitude statements of well you know, different backgrounds or different convictions, but our greatest conviction should be to seek the truth. That's good, because the truth sets people free.
Speaker 1:Not your truth or my truth.
Speaker 3:And division causes discord can definitely cause discord. Jesus prayed in John 17 that we would be one, as he and the Father are one. So that's not just in our eternity, but that's in our coexisting now discord. Jesus prayed in John 17 that we would be one, as he and the father are one. Yes, so that's not just in our eternity, but that's in our coexisting now. Yeah, and I think it. I think it matters in our beliefs. Yes, we'd be united in one. So I always think to divide over doctrine is an, it's an affront to the prayer of Jesus in John 17.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that we'd be united, as he and the father never have a dissonant will. They're always united. So I don't know. I've always wrestled with some of those thoughts, thinking if he's the prince of peace, why do we not have peace on these issues, right Like we wrestle with doctrinal issues and we divide over them? Well, that's not peace. Then we start new denominations over it. Yeah.
Speaker 1:That doesn't make any sense to me. I think to speak to that is like, just you know, I've been in church for a while there's a lot of pastors and ministers just around the world that, when it comes to education and their spiritual formation on how they read the Bible and how they study, they've only reached. They've reached like their lid and they don't want to continue to grow. And I love that. It's one of our values here at LifePoint that we grow intentionally and you model that greatly, both of y'all. And you know we're always telling our pastors and our staff continue to grow, learn. We're pouring into people through LLA and because there's always something to learn and there's pastors that are ministers that will, just you know, reach. This is how I read the Bible and they come up with their interpretation and they settle and that's it. And then they're faced with like a revelation that they hear and they're like, no, that's not what I believe, because I think sometimes it's lazy, like we just don't want to do the extra work to understand scripture.
Speaker 1:We think this is the truth that I'm okay with. But again, like everyone has said, I love that we're challenged in our church, as a staff and as a church, to go deeper and truly understand the truth that God's trying to communicate through his word.
Speaker 4:And I think, with all the tools we have today with digital access, we can. You gotta be careful when you start Googling, you know commentaries Google ain't inspired by the Holy Ghost.
Speaker 3:Yes, that's true.
Speaker 4:So I think, starting with scripture, listening to your local pastor, you know wrestling with these issues like being taught how to dig, look at context, look at historical, like we have tools at our fingertips that, as believers, let your pastor lead and guide and direct you, but then you also have the ability to learn for yourself. In today's day and age. You know, one of the things I tell in our growth track classes I have said before is don't take the word of God for granted. Like we all have a personal copy, you know, before the printing press was even invented, I mean, you could only go on what the priest or pastor would tell you, but we all have our own personal copies. And then tech. Today there's just so many opportunities to grow intentionally, like you said, pastor, Omar.
Speaker 4:So let's not be lazy in our desire to grow in the things of God. Let's not just take everything at face value. We're going to pray, we're going to seek God and then listen for that peace. You know, like you're saying, if God is the God of peace, we shouldn't feel a conflict in our spirit about these issues.
Speaker 6:Going off of that. Pastor Stephanie, what would you recommend for you know, those who are listening that are like I just don't know where to start when it comes to learning more, like about the Word of God, and studying, like. What study tools would you recommend?
Speaker 4:Most people love a study Bible. You can start there. We love the ESV study Bible. There's the life application study Bible, so that's great. It's not going to have comments on every single verse, but typically several verses per page, which is a great start. And then we were talking about there's a website you love, where it always has the Greek and the Hebrew Biblehubcom. Biblehubcom is good. There is some funky stuff out there. So if you Google, you really need to be mindful that you don't just read, and if you look up something on a website that you just take it at face value oh, it's on the web. So it must be true. Be very cautious. You know that you're rightly dividing the word of God.
Speaker 3:I think also Aaron the this is going to sound very self-serving because I'm the lead pastor of this church, but I think learning from your pastor is valuable. Everybody needs a pastor. I believe that. I'm so convicted of that Because I believe God wants everyone saved and I think God has given every Christian the church and God sets a pastor in a church. So I think you know unfortunately I don't know if church.
Speaker 3:So I think, unfortunately I don't know if it's fortunate or unfortunately but we kind of live in a context today where people shop pastors based on affinity, like if they're going to speak what I believe, if they're going to teach what I like, or set a service in a way that ministers to me. I just go, man, where does God want you to go and can you learn from the person God has put you under? Instead of shopping it like a vehicle, shop it in prayer and don't shop for long. I don't even believe in church shopping. I just think if there's a church close by, go there. And one of the things that you should discern and look for is is this a person that I have peace with? Is there a spirit of peace? Actually, paul would talk about it this way. Or maybe Jesus was saying when you go to a town, look for the person of peace and do life with that person. And so I. Just again, it feels self-serving to say it, but I've always been submitted to a pastor and I don't challenge my pastors Whether it was the first pastor.
Speaker 3:I remember as a brand new Christian. I don't know my pastors like whether it was the first pastor. I mean, I remember as a brand new Christian. I don't know why the Lord taught me this early, but, brand new Christian, I'm going to church. Everything they said, I just believed it and I would always evaluate through the fruit of the ministry, not their theology, because they knew theology and I didn't know. But I would watch the lives of people and go man, these people are changed, they're peaceful.
Speaker 1:It's not dramatic and spun up with.
Speaker 3:You know what I'm saying. You can see the fruit and the evidence of the Spirit's work in the people that that pastor's leading. So I would always just kind of watch the people. But I listened to my pastor Then the first pastor we worked for. I never told that guy no, I just believed what he taught and I listened to him and I just remember taking copious notes and learning and trusting, and it was more than trusting him. I trust that God put me under him. Yeah, and so anyway, I mean again, it sounds very self-serving, but I think there's great commentaries I think there's nothing more valuable than time in the Bible and prayer. That's first and foremost and that can't be understated actually, because all of church history is built on people reading the Bible and learning from the Spirit of God.
Speaker 1:I mean honestly.
Speaker 2:The.
Speaker 3:Protestant Reformation. Is Martin Luther going? We need to get people back to the Bible.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 3:In fact, starting the printing press was to print the Bible. That's correct To put it in people's hands. So back to your question. I think read your Bible more. Somebody was talking to me the other day about after the message. They said how do I learn what you learn? How do I think like you think? And I said you need to become a voracious Bible reader. How do you like that word?
Speaker 2:Come on now. That was anointment. Right there, brother voracious, I felt that in my chandelier it's quickening.
Speaker 3:I said become a voracious Bible reader and a prayerful Bible reader Number one, that's first because before I ever studied in seminary I mean, I read the Bible a lot, but then also, uh, there are great books and tools, resources, commentaries, like you're talking about. There's some online stuff. That's great. I like old school printed material. That's kind of how I'm wired, but I think also, like the young adults that are a part of the gathering, need to learn to listen to you and trust that God has placed them under your care.
Speaker 3:You know what I'm saying and trust that God's giving you revelation for them. You're not as a preacher, you're not gathering revelation for me. I mean, I joke. Sometime when I'm pastoring, I go. I've already read this sermon five times. I've read it, studied it, wrote it and preached it. I've actually heard it three times by the fourth service and I'm going is anybody else listening? Cause I've already heard this.
Speaker 3:And it's a kind of rhetorical joke to gather, you know, get their focus back. But the truth is the pastor teacher is a gift to the church and so we need to accept that. And again, this sounds very self-serving, but let me just encourage people to consider that God has given you a pastor for a reason and given you pastors. We have a stack of them here.
Speaker 4:Yeah, and the benefit to having a local pastor wherever you are in the world is that the local pastor lives in the same city as you, and knows the context and knows what's going on in the context of your city and the time in which we live and the pressures we're all facing. It could be weather elements. I mean, it could be anything happening in our society, and so they're seeking the Lord, and it's not that we only hear from the Lord through our pastor, but that is one of the primary ways, and it is a gift it is a gift.
Speaker 6:Yeah, I was going to say for those of you know, for those of you who are listening and you're not plugged into a local church, wherever you are, get plugged into a local church.
Speaker 3:It's part of God's design.
Speaker 6:That is God's design.
Speaker 4:Yeah, and you can listen online to other. There's so many wonderful podcasts and teachers and pastors and leaders. But if you are following somebody that is not local to your context, you know, I would encourage you to be under submitted to leadership. You know, even in small group, I mean, you can be submitted to the leadership of your small group you know, and and that person that shows care and concern for you and prayer and the word you know on a weekly basis which that takes humility, it does.
Speaker 6:All of this takes humility right For us to submit under authority and leadership. That takes humility and it takes going. Okay, it's not just my way, it's not just my opinion and what I think, because that doesn't get me very far. We have to humble ourselves and go. Okay, god, this is how you designed it to be. I'm going to first trust you, like you were talking, pastor Mike, and then I'm going to just submit myself.
Speaker 2:And honestly that harkens back to the opening sermon for this series. I mean you were really strong there in talking through like don't be pastored by the internet and TikTok, I mean again because of that. I mean it's sort of in tandem with there's a lot of crazy stuff out there. Online you can be encouraged and even be educated, like oh, that's kind of neat. But to be pastored, you know, like first and foremost it can happen from a distance, but then that person doesn't have a relationship with you and so why would you give credence to someone that has no connection with you, doesn't know you or anything like?
Speaker 3:that You're talking about the clip art, pastor, like the, not clip art, but the sermon clip. Pastor. The 32nd Right.
Speaker 2:Not that it's bad content or anything like that, because we do have a lot of listeners that are watching online because they're distant but they're faithfully connected here. But that's different than what you're talking about. Yeah, this is a person. They don't know who they are. There's no connection. That person doesn't know them. They're not invested in them. They're just sowing seed, basically, but for you to call them your pastor, your shepherd, that's just odd.
Speaker 3:Well, personal relationship is hard to gauge in a large church, but personal connection is still very quantifiable Because we've got folks in Germany, south Africa, we've got folks all over the world that connect here.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 3:And that's the key. Back to your point, Pastor Aaron. The shepherd-sheep motif is so recurrent through Scripture in the New Testament. In fact, the word pastor comes from the word pasture right, which is related to the shepherd sheep motif, and a sheep never, ever exists outside of a flock under a shepherd. If he does, or she does, she's a victim of the wolf.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:And so this whole idea I don't have to go to church be a Christian it's not God's design idea. I don't have to go to church to be a Christian. It's not God's design, right, I don't have to be under a pastor. I got it's me and the Lord, but God has gifted me Christians, shepherds, teachers and apostles and evangelists. So again, it is humbling to go man. I want to be under God's design, which means I learn to serve with men and women who they're different than me, but God has given them to me as a gift. I think about my pastor, or even my mentor, rod Loy, who's been a part of my life for 13 years now or so. My mentor, rod Loy, who's been a part of my life for 13 years now or so, and I just remember telling him I'm choosing to submit to you as a pastor in my life. And there have been times that I've said to him I'm not questioning what you tell me, because I trust you and your care for me.
Speaker 3:I mean, I'm a 45-year-old grown man with kids and a job, you know. But to say that, to be willing like you're saying, it's humbling to be willing to submit to that. But I believe it's part of God's design where he's the good shepherd and he gives under shepherds to shepherd his flock and any time a sheep's outside of a flock or a shepherd they're at risk. It's just not, and I don't think I've ever seen a sheep outside of a flock.
Speaker 5:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Have you ever been out like in the woods somewhere?
Speaker 6:No, what's that sheep doing through there, right, I mean, they will get quickly taken away.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 6:Yeah.
Speaker 3:So we have. Okay, I want to get into some of the discussion points of the text, so help, thank you guys for that opening talk. I think there's a lot there too. Yeah, that's Um the. You know, the call to God, to prayer, the call of God for everybody. He's saying I urge that people are praying and interceding, giving thanks and giving supplications for all people, kings, in all places, so that we may lead a peaceful life.
Speaker 3:I feel like that's such great reminder to all of us. I think you know as Christians we should be known more for that.
Speaker 3:But in a cancel culture, in a posting world sometimes I see even other pastors the stuff that we prefer to post and put out and the things that we're standing up for and standing against, and all of that. I just wonder, like I remember during COVID and all the rioting and the picketing, I would ask the question would Jesus stand at those picket lines? Would Jesus be in those riots? Would Jesus, you know, be shouting about all these vaccine and mask things? Would he be the one? And, as his servants, I think we should reflect. I have tons of opinions about those things, but is that where we want to give our public energy to? Or should we be known as people of peace and people of prayer? And I would say let those things come to you instead of inflaming those things?
Speaker 5:right, that's good, yeah, yeah. Well, I think too, like it's interesting that the result of being a prayerful person results in living a quiet, peaceful life. I mean, I think, that's interesting, you know, because I think prayer helps us. You know, I think if you're willing to talk to God about some things, you'll be less willing to gossip to others about some things.
Speaker 5:That's really good, and so I just think sometimes like I don't know. I've always found in my own personal life, when I go to God first about stuff, I'm less quick to dump on other people about stuff. So I just think there's a lot of tie-in with that just being a prayerful person, being a peaceful person.
Speaker 5:We talk about a lot about praying first, and I think that just helps you. There's just something relieving about it. I've already talked to God about this. I've already gotten this off my mind. I've already prayed about this. I don't need to go on and get all frustrated about it. I think that's just interesting.
Speaker 4:I think it sets the framework when you pray first.
Speaker 4:It helps us get in the right space, because when we're only on social media and see everything that's blowing up and all the crazy of the world, it's like, yeah, I should be you start feeling stirred too and it's like, but if we go to God's word first, first, I urge that supplications and we can talk about these four supplications prayers, intercessions and Thanksgiving be made for all people.
Speaker 4:So when we start to see something that feels like it's spinning us up, we can absolutely take that to God in prayer first. It doesn't even have to be external. It could be in your house, something that's stirring you up, or a conflict or something that's a difficult situation at work, where you're like, okay, lord, I could feel very unpeaceable about this, but I have to bring it to you. And then I feel like it allows us to walk in storms, it allows us to walk in conflict, it allows us to walk in difficulty, and we probably do have people that serve in government and other positions that are faced with very difficult situations. Does that mean you can never pick it? Does that mean you can never take a strong stance against something?
Speaker 4:Of course not, but you should absolutely come to the Lord in prayer first to get that framework set to give guidance to help us live a peaceable quiet life.
Speaker 3:So what would you picket about? You said. Does it mean you can never picket?
Speaker 4:Maybe, Is this in the house or out of the house? I don't know. I just want to know where.
Speaker 3:What issue is going to have me come getting you out of jail. That's what I want to know.
Speaker 5:I didn't say that Picketing for the gospel, you know what I'm saying. Out on the street. You know what I'm saying With the signs what do?
Speaker 2:you mean Popeye's is closed. Today Marching for the gospel. You know what I'm saying. What do you mean? Popeye's is closed. What the devil is a liar.
Speaker 4:I'm just saying we can't say that we're never allowed to's a good question. I can't imagine something that I would pick it for yeah, yeah.
Speaker 5:I think we just equate a lot of that stuff to anger and like you know, vengeance and, like what we've seen lately, hasn't been peaceful and quiet, correct?
Speaker 3:I don't imagine Cracking out windows, I think.
Speaker 4:I pick it by going to the Lord.
Speaker 3:That's how I pick it Well and Like God this frustrates me.
Speaker 4:I feel angry about this.
Speaker 3:I would protest culture through raising my kids according to the kingdom principles. I would protest culture through doing it God's way. But when I'm saying pick it, I can't imagine standing at a barricade just saber rattling and letting the cops arrest me for standing. I'd rather do it from a pulpit or you know be resolved.
Speaker 3:I was being a little facetious with you and you put me on the spot but I just can't imagine going out for anything that was especially that's cultural, because as Christians we're told over and over again like we submit to the kingdom of God, and that's the prevailing culture. Anyway, we got off on a total rabbit trail. Well, I do think it's interesting, I guess I would picket picketing. How's that Picket?
Speaker 1:picketing.
Speaker 6:Yeah, we could get a sign. Get a sign Picketing the picketers.
Speaker 3:Heck. No, we won't go over there to picket. Yes, we're going to pray.
Speaker 2:Hey, do you want to join me in demonstrating? No, I'm picketing you.
Speaker 6:Now we're picketing Pastor.
Speaker 4:Mike, we're picketing the picketers, the point of that is that prayer should be our.
Speaker 3:I think you said it in sermon prep. It's your first response, not a last resort.
Speaker 3:Yes sir, I pulled it into my sermon and it is true. I think it's part of how we stay in a place of peace, and when you have a confidence that the Lord's heard you, then you don't need everyone else to hear you. I mean, I'm kind of a verbal processor, so I like to have the conversations and Stephanie is good at reminding me. Like you don't have to always do that. Pastor Rod would say you can vent all you want to God and he can take it.
Speaker 3:He can take it as raw and as unfiltered as you want, but it's when we vent to others that we get into the risk of gossip or sin. And sometimes, when we're venting, we vent in a way that intentionally or unintentionally tears others down. Well, that doesn't live at peace with people, and so we have to be careful about those things. Come on, that's great.
Speaker 5:David, I mean think of David in the Psalms. He was very honest when he prayed to the Lord.
Speaker 3:He was more honest with God than I think I've been still.
Speaker 5:But I think that's a point to prayer. I think prayer is a place that you can be absolutely honest and you know before the Lord, because all of us have those friends that we've talked to before and we've felt like, okay, man, I just talked to you, I feel better, I feel like I've gotten some weight off my shoulders and I think that's a prayer, is a place to do that.
Speaker 4:Yeah, he didn't hold back. Yeah, no, he didn't, Cause you read sometimes the scripture. You're like why did he say that? You know so it felt angry towards people and wishing death on people and all kind of Come on, imprecatory.
Speaker 5:Yeah, imprecatory songs.
Speaker 4:That those lyrics appear and you're like, oh.
Speaker 3:You know that song Ask of Me I will give the nations as an inheritance for you.
Speaker 2:Remember that old James? Oh yeah.
Speaker 3:Well, then it goes, and I will crush them to their bones.
Speaker 4:I mean the rest of that song. That didn't make the lyric.
Speaker 3:Yeah, right, they cut the lyric quote, but that was part of the song Right that. That's actually one of Pastor Mike Campbell's, one of the verses that God spoke over him. As a kid His grandmother would pray that over him, that God would give him the nations, and that's where his heart for missions comes from. But the rest of that psalm is David going and we'll take him by crushing him. I can't remember the exact language.
Speaker 4:But the point is, we can be honest with the Lord in prayer.
Speaker 3:Well it's funny when I joke about and I said it Sunday I said sometimes you pray for people. God, take them out right now, take them to heaven. But that's actually the way David would pray.
Speaker 2:Whack them, god and then just take them out.
Speaker 3:So, coming back to that, how we pray for people, the reason we are prayerful is because God loves everybody.
Speaker 3:Yes, and the things that destroy you, the people that are frustrating you. The issues of the day are always with people. It's never with trees and plants or whatever, maybe cats, but the issues that we most often are the most stressed about is dealing with humans, and the fact is, humans can destroy you, they can hurt you, they can offend you, but the Lord loves them. So here's this tie-in of God saying be prayerful for everybody, and those four layers of prayer supplication, thanksgiving, prayer and intercessions. Why? Because he loves all of them. And if I mean, what does it do to us to know that I'm praying for these people? Because God loves them?
Speaker 1:I may not love them right now. I may not like them.
Speaker 3:I may not want to be around them, but the Lord's love for them has to trump my disdain for them, to at least the point that I pray for them. I may not do life with them, I may not go to Thanksgiving dinner with them.
Speaker 2:But I can at least pray something for them, which I think is the perfect tie-in for your second point, because God loves all people. He doesn't just love all people, but he has a desire for everyone to be saved. He desires all to be, desires all to come to a knowledge.
Speaker 3:Yes, that verse is so rich and yet so troubling in the Christian world. Yeah, you know who's not debating that. What? What does he mean by all there? What does he mean by who? You know he's not debating that.
Speaker 3:he lost people right there's nobody outside of the church going. Uh, you know, I hope god. Yeah, most of them just don't believe god cares, you know? Yeah, they're blind. The bible says they're blinded by the god of this world. That's right. They're deceived and and hopeless. They're not debating whether or not they're the chosen or not Nope, Like we. Just we have to believe. Of course they're chosen, Of course God loves them.
Speaker 5:Yep.
Speaker 3:Otherwise, our message is merciless.
Speaker 5:Yeah.
Speaker 3:It's not merciful.
Speaker 5:I think one of my favorite parts of the message Sunday was you're teaching TV.
Speaker 2:Hey, come on.
Speaker 5:Thank you, Pastor Elmer.
Speaker 5:But I just think, thinking back to that point, thinking back to that point, the amount of times which I think again, just going back to understanding the word better, I think just the way that you walk through and underlined and circled and highlighted, I think that's just a good Bible reading tool thing to do in general is to do that kind of stuff. But I think in that text the amount of times you circled, all just in that text alone, of times you circled, all you know just in that text, you know alone, and so I think you know anytime something like that when you're reading through Scripture is overemphasized and repeated.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 5:It's like okay, reader automatically pay attention you know, to what is being said.
Speaker 3:Absolutely, it's one of the tools of hermeneutics in Bible interpretation is when you see things repeated in written format, in ancient written formats when papyrus and ink were limited and the author would take time to repeat himself or herself, that's something to pay attention to. But in that chapter alone I think the phrase or the idea of all or exhaustive language happens seven or eight times. Correct, yeah, that he died as a ransom for all.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 3:And there is one God and one mediator between God and all men. It's the implied preposition for men is all men. Yep, I think it's eight times. Yeah, yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 5:Why do you think it's? If that's true in Scripture, why is that hard for us to believe that God died?
Speaker 3:for all, and he desires all. Why is that such a rub?
Speaker 5:Because I think, when we hear that, I think there's something in all of us, if we're all to be honest there's something in all of us that goes really. Even that person we're thinking about, I think. Why is that hard? I guess.
Speaker 3:Well, I have a theory on why it's difficult. Let me let you guys answer that first, because I'd love to know your thoughts.
Speaker 2:Well, I think part of it is grace is scandalous. Grace, by definition, is scandalous, or it's not grace. Wait a minute, are you telling me? I live this life, I've done these horrific, terrible things, I've said these horrific, terrible things, I can come to God and he'll wipe my slate clean, he will pay that debt and I don't have to earn it. Well, what do I have to give? No, this is a free gift. It's that simple. What about him or her? They can do this, they've done these things, and that person can come to God. Well, that person's hurt me. Yep, they can come to that same God, receive grace, receive mercy and forgiveness. So I think that's part of it is. We live in a world of equivalency and Colossus talks about this fairness, equity, justice. Hey, man, you do bad things, you receive that. You do good things, you receive good and now.
Speaker 3:justice is a virtue.
Speaker 2:And now, justice is a virtue, and so I think that's part of it is that grace is scandalous and we just cannot conceptualize that God will pour out his grace on us First of all. We don't deserve it, we can't earn it, we can't pay for it.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it feels like the great injustice. Well, I've been better my whole life. I'm gooder. Come on now. You know like I've done better things in my life, and so how could they live a certain way? Think of the thief on the cross Perfect example. He was crucified on the cross, clearly as a thief, and yet there was a space for him, for all people.
Speaker 2:So it says for all people, even him.
Speaker 4:And the rest of us Pharisees in scripture would be like. You know, there's not room for someone like him, so we have to wrestle with that inequity, Like wait, but I'm here and they should be here, which puts us in the seat of God ultimately.
Speaker 2:Come on now, and it's where we wrestle even from the garden.
Speaker 4:Yeah, when we fought that temptation to want to be the one to make the call.
Speaker 5:Yeah.
Speaker 4:And who are we? So when the scripture says, don't judge others, it's not looking at the outward appearance and the fruit I can't see. And that's what God sees.
Speaker 1:And so we have to submit and surrender that injustice.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I would say that, even as Christians, a lot of us have embraced forgiveness and we're willing even to forgive people that have done things to us, but we'll show no grace to them. It's like I'll forgive them but I'm not going to treat them any different. I'm going to treat them just as they deserve, right. And then obviously you can put several scenarios to that. But you know I I said it the week before that you know, we, we accept the finished work of the cross, but then we must step into God's grace to live a transformed life, and a lot of us haven't stepped into that. So then, we, we, if we were to witness Paul today, there'd be some people that might have seen him persecute Christians. They wouldn't be listening to what he's saying, they'd struggle, they might forgive him as a Christian, as a brother in Christ, but they'd have a hard time with grace. I agree, grace is scandalous. It's a hard thing to really understand. We want to receive it, but it's hard to live and to give it freely as well.
Speaker 4:Could you imagine if Paul Saul had killed one of your family members? Drug him out of the house took him down the road and on they went to execution for being a believer. And then he rolls back up and he's like, okay, let me preach this gospel. I mean we would all be backing away a little bit. But, point being, could that person ever get in their heart to where they said, wow, he is preaching the gospel. It is the truth. I have to accept that even he could be a recipient of this good grace.
Speaker 6:So does god really change lives?
Speaker 3:come on, man. So there was a meme I shared one time of it says um the apostle paul's. The apostle pa Paul enters heaven to the cheers of those he martyred yeah.
Speaker 4:That's the scale.
Speaker 3:Can you imagine the people that he killed in faith? Stephen, yeah, welcoming him into heaven. And so to your question why do we struggle with that? I think um, it's layered. I think one of the I think the primary is we don't really understand what God has done for us. I saw a video one time. It was basically this pseudo-judgment seat and it was kind of real mechanical. It was like this scale you end up getting on a scale. You come in and you tell your story of what you've done to go to heaven. Do you deserve to go to heaven? Then this person comes up and says I built wells in Africa and I did all these things. And then you get on the scale and it's bad, go to hell.
Speaker 3:And that's like three or four times. And then this guy comes up and he's got a huge file and it's all red pages and it's like he comes up going I'm terrible, I know that. And then this sidestep entrance of another guy who's Jesus. He comes in, he hands the judge another folder and it opens up and it says he's my son.
Speaker 3:And then the judge looks at the Jesus character and goes what do you want me to do with that? He goes oh yeah, I'll get on the scale for him. He doesn't even have to get on the scale.
Speaker 3:That's just so perplexing. So I think we don't understand the reality of what God's done for us, yeah, and I also don't think we have a full grasp of the meta-narrative of the kingdom play at work like that. God knew before it all fell apart that he was going to do this and God didn't send. This is one of the reasons why the terminology is troubling the Son of God. We have this idea that Jesus is God's boy, yeah, that he just went sent down there and said okay, go, I'm going to kill you for them. The son of God is a term that we use within the human construct, but the reality is he is God the son, and God the son chose to come and be the payment for all sins, for all people. He chose to pay his own ransom. So because God demands sin to be paid for, god the son said I'll have to pay it myself, and so it's scandalous to think that God would do that. And then it's complicated when everyone doesn't receive it. So then to your question, pastor Jordan.
Speaker 3:People say well, God didn't die for everyone because not everyone got saved. Hang on a second. When he died for everyone doesn't mean that he zapped their free will. When you bring a gift to your spouse doesn't mean they love it. It doesn't mean that they go, oh well, thanks. Sometimes I've gotten Stephanie things and she goes, thanks, can we just hang out? I'm like, here's this gift and she's like, okay, cool, the gift wasn't as exciting as the relationship. So this gift of grace, this gift of salvation was offered, is offered to Osama bin Laden, adolf Hitler, my next door neighbors I mean who I? I pejoratively talk about my neighbors like they're terrible people. We love our neighbors.
Speaker 4:Our neighbors are great.
Speaker 2:I was like I love believers, but it's an expression. Oh, okay, praise the.
Speaker 3:Lord, you know. The fact is, christ would save anyone who would believe in him and confess their sins and submit to and accept his free gift of salvation.
Speaker 4:Yeah, and if that's true, the second part of the message, god's desire for salvation for all people, that is what motivates us in the mission of God. Yes, then, to reach our city and beyond. Acts 1.8 says you'll be my disciples in Jerusalem, judea, samaria and to the ends of the world. That's why we have a heart for missions, that's why we have a heart from the ends of the earth all the way to our next door neighbor that we do love and we appreciate very much.
Speaker 3:We're Christians, yeah, yes. So I have said it from the pulpit many times, but it's a debated issue that people want to say. God didn't die for everyone. If he did, everyone will be saved.
Speaker 4:Well, and that therein lies the conversation about free will. He loves us so much he gave us free will. If he did not give us free will, he loves us so much he gave us free will. If he did not give us free will, we'd just be puppets on a string Right.
Speaker 2:What do they call them? The?
Speaker 1:marionettes or whatever. Marionettes yeah.
Speaker 4:You know, high on a hill.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 4:I always think of those little puppets.
Speaker 3:Sound of music.
Speaker 2:Sound of music reference.
Speaker 4:They're just wherever the puppeteer leads is where they go, and that's not our God.
Speaker 1:God loves us, he wants relationship and.
Speaker 4:He wants to be loved back, because if we didn't have free will and we were forced to love Him back, it wouldn't be love at all so several years ago we got our girls a dog, a puppy, which they love very much, and it's a mini golden doodle.
Speaker 4:and so my girls were asking can we get a second one? And I said no one is enough, you know. And so I said to Mike, for Christmas one year, let's get a stuffed animal that looks just like for our youngest, and then she can, you know, just have it at night, you know when she goes to sleep, and it looks just like the dog, and they were kind of close in size and it was so cute. She got the dog, but you know what? She held that little stuffed animal for a couple of days, but then she'd throw it on the ground and that that stuffed animal never, never went to the bathroom on the floor, never.
Speaker 4:you never had to buy food for it like you didn't have to care for it at all. It was just an inanimate object, and you know what she loves our dog, the living creature, even though she causes. You know she's a living animal that requires so much work from our family, it's like, but it's because the, the living dog, chooses to love her back and there's that relationship. You know that stuffed animal is just, and so if god didn't give us free will, we'd just be like the animal tossed to the side. That's just a stuffed animal. It doesn't have that same kind of connection and relationship. And so that's the beautiful part about God's love for us is that we get to love him back and we don't have to.
Speaker 2:It's so good. Wouldn't it be real love, right, yeah.
Speaker 6:And he desires relationship with us Correct. That's why he came.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 6:Right, so that we could have relationship with the father, which is mind blowing in itself.
Speaker 4:It's like why would he want relationship with little old me Right?
Speaker 6:And I think that's kind of hard to understand, like why it's hard for us to fully wrap our heads around the fact that you know Jesus would die for, you know Osama bin Laden or whoever, whatever we think is or whoever we think is worse off than we are. It's because we fully we know how bad we are. Yeah, and when we look at ourselves sometimes we're like man, I don't know if I even deserve this Right. How could they?
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 6:And it's like no, god desires that relationship with us. He doesn't desire for us to just come and check off the box, come to church. No, he wants all of us and we get to have a relationship with the God who created the heavens and the earth. That is amazing to me. This isn't some religion that is man-made. There's a lot of religions out there where it says, okay, you have to do X, y and Z in order to get to God. It's like no, he paid it all and now we get to have relationship with him. So I love that analogy, pastor Stephanie, that you've given about your dog and then the stuffed animal, because that is so true, that is so true so true, that is so true, yeah yeah, we were counseling a couple once or a a a wife whose husband was pretty tough and, uh, it was a bad situation, abuse and all that stuff, and she would say, um, you know, I want to, I want to forgive him.
Speaker 3:I want to forgive him, but I also want him to pay for what he did. And I feel like that's the heart of man. Yeah, it's G. That's why Jesus told the parable of the 11th hour worker. Yes, right, so Jesus hires. Jesus talks about a master who hires people at nine in the morning, noon, three in the afternoon, and then at five, one hour before closing time, and he pays them all the exact same Right. And the workers at nine are like hold up.
Speaker 5:I've been here all day.
Speaker 3:Pay me, let's call it a hundred bucks a day, yeah, and the five o'clock guy gets a hundred dollars and the Lord says, isn't it my field?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Isn't it my job, isn't it mine, to pay? And you got your pay, which you that's right. You're duly owed. And so it's, it's an inequity, it's, it doesn't driven. And I was telling this wife. She said I want to forgive him, but I want him to pay for what he's done. And I said well, you know, scripture says vengeance is mine, I will repay, declares the Lord right, he will never escape the justice of God someday or another, whether it's in this life or the next.
Speaker 3:And I said, however, the greatest payment of his justice would be that Christ's blood would pay for what he's done to you. She looked at me like what I said what if he receives forgiveness and transformation and he never goes to jail? He never pays any punitive damages for what he's done to you. What if Jesus pays for all of that? She just kind of stared at me like I don't know that, I'm okay with that. I said well, that's what God's done for us. So it's really crazy to think that the ultimate justice would be not that we pay for it but that God paid for it.
Speaker 3:And that's where statements like God died for Hitler is such a rub, because you go no, no, no, no, no.
Speaker 4:he's an exception.
Speaker 3:He's not, it's such a rub because you go no, no, no, no, no, he's an exception, he's not, he's really not. God paid for his. We're collective bargainers, right? So it's kind of like a union. It's like if I sin one or two times, but if we sin, we need God to pay for all of our sins, and Hitler basically sinned enough for an entire civilization.
Speaker 1:Right, he was responsible.
Speaker 3:Yeah, he did way more than all of us combined in 10 lifetimes. And yet the cross, if it'll cover all of our sin over 10 lifetimes, it'll cover all of his sin in one lifetime. It's just as powerful, that's so good but we don't like that.
Speaker 3:We don't like that my abusive father or my husband who abandoned me, or my coworker who lied on me and stole my husband or whatever, like. We don't like that they get a pass. It's not that they get a pass, it's that it was paid for by him, not by them. That's the scandal of grace and mercy. It seems so unfair yeah.
Speaker 5:Well, I think, ultimately it's because I think we struggle with all people and when we do and I think the struggle with all people is it happens when we put ourselves in that place of being God Right and I think we qualify it, I think ultimately, yeah, we want. Like when we struggle to believe that salvation is for all people, we are then making ourselves God, yeah, Well, that's just not the case.
Speaker 3:And he said he desires all people to be saved and come to the knowledge of truth which is the next. I want to get to the last part of this, but I do think there's something about hey, I want you to go to heaven, but I don't know that I want to disciple you there. That's part of our call too. Is the body of Christ we're to make disciples, yeah which is the relationship part.
Speaker 1:And just going back to your, your story of the dog and the stuffed animal, I think there's a lot of Christians carrying stuffed animals and they're comfortable with it and they don't do the relationship side, the discipleship side, because it requires you to look at your character. It requires you to sit in a sermon and listen to your preacher and be like, oh man, I never saw it that way and so I'd rather hold a stuffed animal and be comfortable with this version of Christianity than do discipleship. So I'll accept salvation but not the discipleship. And that's the hard part and that's where we start understanding grace and all these things through discipleship and all that. But you want to jump into the next part.
Speaker 3:Yeah, especially because it's the most contested part of the new test of faith and we got these ladies in the room that I want to hear from you guys.
Speaker 3:I mean these. You know we're going to push on our guys and our men's night tonight, tuesday nights rather, is that we're recording this on a Tuesday. So on Tuesdays we're pushing our men to act like men, to grow as men of faith and to lead. But, ladies, you have quite a bit there in this text that if you don't do the homework can feel one way right, so same as any other thing put out there. If you just hear something at face value and believe it, a 30 second clip of something, you go, you know, you put an opinion together. But if you do a little homework, it actually is liberating and it's empowering and it's helpful. So just I'd love to hear from you guys especially Stephanie and Aaron, as you've come in, when we talk about the roles of men and women in the church context and what that looks like.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I think you're right. When you read something in scripture, our go-to is let's just look at it at face value.
Speaker 4:What does it say? You have to start there. Yes, read it. So read it. What does it say? And then, any time a scripture feels troubling, you know and you think, man, that doesn't feel like something I'm comfortable with. You know that women are quiet in church. Are they silent? Which only a few versions use the word silent, but a lot of them use quiet. And you have to really start digging Like. And then that's where I start you learn that you have to find other places in scripture that maybe speak to this topic as well, and then also expand your view, so kind of zoom out. So, yes, look at the text initially, look at the details of it, read it multiple times, read the whole book. I always think in a situation like this, especially a smaller book like 1 Timothy, read the whole book out loud.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's great.
Speaker 4:I don't know if you've ever done that before, but anyone listening, if you've never read a whole book now Leviticus might be hard to read out loud, or Jeremiah, but some of these New Testament epistles. This is why it's important, because when these letters were delivered they were read top to bottom, you know, start to finish, probably in one reading, and so it would be good. So we're very good at cherry picking, especially in a social media culture and world, and so. But I will say, for centuries this passage has been debated. So there's no question that we're and it's not that we're going to settle and make the final call here, but we do want to give encouragement on how to study, how to look at scripture.
Speaker 4:So start where it is, zoom out, look at other scriptures where it talks about women's involvement in church, and so when Paul in this passage and I believe it's in 1 Corinthians, another passage where he gives a prohibition, what feels like a prohibition for women, then you have to look at well, how did he actually function with women? Did he adhere to that himself? Because we see that he empowered women. And I think it's Romans chapter 16, where he gives 29 shout outs, shout outs to coworkers and co-laborers for the kingdom, and I think 10 of them are women. So you just look at that and go okay, so how do I quantify that? Does that mean I'm disqualified simply because I was born female, or how does that work? And so I also want to say I don't think this is a passage where, you know, just as a woman, this is my perspective. This is not like I'm here. Move over, I need a seat at the table. So this is not that either. This is just going. Hey, let's look at this from a healthy perspective and start looking at how were women engaged in Scripture? And I think this is Paul's writing.
Speaker 4:Paul wrote this letter to Timothy, I think, and even greater. They're both inspired. Paul's writings are inspired, but when we look at the life and teaching of Jesus, how he interacted with women, he really elevated women and I mentioned this in our sermon prep that the whole story with Mary and Martha. The beautiful part of that was when Mary was at the feet of Jesus and he said Mary, you've chosen the better part or the better portion. It's not that she shouldn't have been doing the tasks like Martha and that she was just sitting there learning, but the fact that she was learning at the feet of a rabbi. Women were not allowed to really learn in those contexts and the fact that he even said no, no, she can be here and she can learn is incredible. And I do love the fact that the first person to ever share the good news after the resurrection of Christ was a woman.
Speaker 4:Twice in scripture we see there is an instruction by Jesus and an angel I believe it is that says go tell the disciples and the disciples were primarily men, there were some females, and so to me that's exciting and that's not going again saying, hey, we're women, move over, sit down. But just that men and women are included. And I think that's the heart of this passage, that there's how did we say it? Gender roles in biblical order in church, that men and women get to be a part of this beautiful gospel that the Lord has given us.
Speaker 6:Yeah, it kind of goes back to all people right, yes.
Speaker 6:Like, and Jesus modeled that so well. So if we're going to look at this part of the text, um, in the beginning, when it says all people, what about this part right here, when you know God is well, paul is talking obviously to Timothy, but you know, with he's basically giving an order, you know, but he's bringing other people into it. He's bringing women into it.
Speaker 6:I like how you mentioned, pastor Mike, how women learning. He wasn't saying they can't learn, and that was a big deal for Paul to even probably say yeah, you know, because in that culture, like they couldn't learn at all, that wasn't something that they could do, and so the fact that they even get to learn Something kind of stood out to me. And I was thinking about this last night looking over some of our notes and in Paul's writing to Timothy right, this is a mentoring epistle, so he's teaching him how to pastor this church. And, pastor Mike, you've kind of mentioned this a little bit with Ephesus, right, ephesus was crazy in a lot of senses, like it was like today, and we get all up in arms Like it was Vegas and spring break all combined, yeah, and maybe Portland, portland, oregon mixed in with that.
Speaker 3:You know a little bit west coast, you know a little wild.
Speaker 6:It was wild, and yet he's telling them no, you're gonna have a church here church is gonna be here in the middle of the backyard of hell.
Speaker 6:Essentially, I mean, that's what he was saying and he and he's not saying the women can't be a part of this, but he's needing to bring order and structure to how things are done, but he's not taking them out of the mix, he's not going. Okay, it's better actually, because you women probably were involved in all of this pagan worship. We're going to move you out of Ephesus. No, he's saying they get to stay in Ephesus, but how are you going to live in Ephesus? How are you going to respond to being in Ephesus? And we all have to look at that.
Speaker 6:I think you know missionaries, they have to adapt to the culture that's around them. They probably wouldn't be able to do things that they would do here. We have to do the same thing. And so Paul is essentially telling Timothy like hey, this is how order needs to happen, this is how leadership needs to take place, because of the context, and so I think context is everything. Um, but I had that thought, you know, last night, like no, he could have easily told him okay, get them out of here, it's too close to home, Move to the suburbs move out, you know, move to the suburbs.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it really was caring of him. It was very caring To say okay, let's bring some structure and order, and that's really where you went with it, because the end of that passage is very troubling about salvation through childbearing yes, Well, you've been saved four times now.
Speaker 6:Come on, If that's a literal text, right Darn it. I'm not saved Right.
Speaker 3:So that's the challenge. Like what about a woman who hasn't had kids yet or can't?
Speaker 6:have children.
Speaker 3:It's referring to Eve. It's her seed that would bring salvation. So, talking about the Pauline corpus, right, what Paul writes in general. Jesus said, first of all, you are in this world, but not of it, right? So we are to stay in the world. We're not to leave the whole idea of going to the suburbs, as I was joking before, but the idea that Paul would plant a church in Ephesus and go okay, let's go start a village on the edge of town and that'll be our holy conclave. I mean, honestly, that's what Mormons have tried to do with finding Independence, missouri, and then reestablishing a state in Utah and going this is our holy conclave. That going this is our holy conclave.
Speaker 3:That's what other religious groups have tried to do for years, even the whacked out Christian cults like the Jim Jones group, like they wanted to go down to South America. They ended up all suiciding out of ridiculous craziness, but anyway, so don't Google that. So Jesus would say you're in this world, you are to stay in this world. He would pray for us as we remain in this world. Then Paul would say the Apostle Paul in Romans 12, do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. So the word renew there. I learned this from my dad, who loves Paul's writings the word renew is the same word where we get renovate, renovation right so my dad is having his kitchen renovated right now because he had a flood, like a pipe burst and flooded his kitchen.
Speaker 3:So every day he's living in his house while they gutted his kitchen and put in all new stuff. And that's what a renovation is. It's not even just a new set of dishes.
Speaker 3:I mean they took everything down to the drywall and the flooring out and everything else, and that's what a church established in Ephesus is. Their lives had to be renovated. However, they didn't just set up a new temple and try to just invite people to this new temple to go. This is our new expression of worship. Instead of Artemis or Diana, they're saying no, you are new, you are renovated, and what was in you before as men of power or emasculation or effemination, which was a huge deal there, we didn't even talk about that. The homosexual expressions of men was very prolific.
Speaker 3:He's going no, no, no, we're going to renovate that we're going to gut you from who you were and we're going to lead you to be now men of prayer. Hands up, not quarreling in anger. Women were known for promiscuity and sexual immorality on a high level and used as objects of worship and sexualization and then dominated by Rome. And God is saying no, I'm going to renovate you from the inside out and it'll show up on the outside. You don't wear this stuff anymore because internally you've been renovated. So I'm not pulling you out of Ephesus, I'm pulling Ephesus out of you, which takes us all the way back to what God did with Exodus right.
Speaker 2:That's right, yeah.
Speaker 3:I'll save you out of Exodus and then I'll deliver you from Exodus, so he doesn't pull us out of a place. This is why local churches are still so valuable, because really, every place is Ephesus. It doesn't matter if you're in Salt Lake City, if you're in Washington, turkey, every place is Ephesus because it's that inverted kingdom.
Speaker 3:And the work of God is to take people that are in a kingdom and rather than pull them out and just take them to heaven I mean, that would just be so much easier. Right, god could just alien abduct us all to heaven. But what he does is he leaves us in Ephesus as evangelists, because he loves all people.
Speaker 3:It's so good Because he desires all people to be saved and come to the knowledge, and he uses the ones of us that are just a couple steps ahead, like hey, I've just heard some scripture, let me teach it to you.
Speaker 1:I remember as a new.
Speaker 3:Christian. I was trying to tell people the stuff I'm reading for the very first time in my life and people would ask me like what else I was like? I don't know I hadn you know, they'd ask me all these defining and they'd want to debate stuff. I'm like I don't have an answer to that debate. I've just been reading the Bible for six months, man, I'm brand new.
Speaker 3:But, that's what God does, is he renovates you and then leaves you in your place. My dad has not left his house. He didn't move out. He didn't go buy another house. His kitchen got completely changed and I was asking last night I was looking at it and he's got new flooring in his kitchen. It's real nice. I said are you going to do that all across the whole house? Let it spread through the house? And that's what missions does, right? That's what an evangelistic heart of God loves all people does is he leaves you in a place, but you're different. And that's what he was really doing with the men and women of the culture.
Speaker 3:He was renovating them that's so good, and leaving them there because he still loves all of Ephesus.
Speaker 1:Jesus was a master of that.
Speaker 3:I mean when the people would come at him demanding his kingdom to invade. He would say no, no, no. My kingdom is not a palace and horses and chariots, it's in you and it then leaks out of you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, which speaks to the transformative power of the gospel and again going back, how it transformed Saul to Paul, his transformation. Now you're seeing it preached and happening in cities.
Speaker 3:It's so easy to just condemn a city, though People that talk that way about places like Vegas or Salt Lake City or Daytona and I've heard Christians man, I wouldn't step foot in there by God, it's like, but the Lord would, yes.
Speaker 5:Yep, the Lord would Come on God will go to Ephesus all the time.
Speaker 3:He always wants to go to Ephesus. Yes, In fact, the whole world after Genesis 3 was Ephesus right, it was hell on earth, literally, where the beast ruled, the woman ruled, the man ruled God. And the Lord says I'm going to send my son to that, and so that actually you're asking like why don't people accept? Because we don't have a big picture of what God's doing Right, and he needs all players on the field, men and women.
Speaker 5:Yes, I think that's great. I think I was thinking about this on the way in pertaining to what you just said about needing all players on the field, men and women. I've heard it said this might be kind of an extreme example, but I've heard people say before that Christians are notorious and famous for killing their own kind, meaning like we attack our own kind.
Speaker 3:That's what Elmer said earlier we're not merciful and just gracious towards each other.
Speaker 5:And I just think it's so crazy to me that, going back to again the start of the message God's heart for all people to be saved We've been commissioned as Christians with the greatest news of all time, the gospel, yet we would want to remove a whole group of people from our belief system to be able to get that gospel out to as many. It doesn't make sense to me from our belief system to be able to get that gospel out to as many. I mean, it's just. It's just. It doesn't make sense to me.
Speaker 6:Well, it doesn't match up with the character. No, it doesn't, no, and I think too like my gosh you were talking through.
Speaker 5:You know different people that God used all throughout script or in the gospels. You know Jesus had a heart for women. I just read this in my one year Bible, matthew 26, where Jesus is anointed at the home of Simon the leper with the very expensive jar of perfume.
Speaker 1:And it says truly.
Speaker 5:I tell you, wherever the gospel is preached throughout the world, what she has done will also be told in memory of her.
Speaker 3:I mean, that's wild. He was anointed. Yes, that's a unique word. Yeah, he wasn't bathed Right, he wasn't just blessed with a fragrance.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he was anointed, that's right.
Speaker 3:Which is about spirit empowerment.
Speaker 1:That's right Preparation.
Speaker 3:In a leper's house.
Speaker 5:I mean there's double, triple whammy here yeah, what doesn't make sense in the religious space. But if we wanted to remove women from everything, jesus would have not said. He would have said hey, let's keep this here we ain't going to tell nobody about this. But he says, we're going to go proclaim what she did.
Speaker 4:And the woman at the. Well, I don't know.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that story's amazing.
Speaker 4:I mean, some of those amazing things Jesus did was through women and preach the gospel and preach the gospel Can't this be the Christ.
Speaker 2:Y'all come see a man.
Speaker 3:This man told me everything about me.
Speaker 2:And y'all come see him. And they did, they did, they all got saved, they believed.
Speaker 4:I think, a great takeaway and even as we wrap up here. But just let's all operate in our gifts. So sometimes we get so worried about like if a woman can do this or a man can do that. Let's just operate in our gifting. So all of us have different gifts, and not just gifts but spiritual gifts that.
Speaker 4:God has given us and if we just follow in the leading of the Holy Spirit, we won't be stressed out about titles and all these things. Am I equipped to do this or that? We're just going to be obedient to what God's calling you to do. So some of you are listening right now and you feel like I need to host a small group. I haven't taken a step, but I'm thinking about it. You need to step out in that gift of and our skill sets.
Speaker 3:That's the most important thing I think here, Remembering that the pace of where you're at in your walk with God, right. So Ephesus, the men and women were all being transformed and I think I said at the end of the message I said this text is not to give a prohibition to women leading in the church globally, forever, but it was definitely a prohibition for the women to lead in the church at this time at Ephesus.
Speaker 3:And there would be a day when their leadership would shift and change and they would speak and whatever. The other place you mentioned earlier was in Corinth where Paul gave that seeming prohibition to the Corinthian women. That whole letter is an instruction against crazy in Corinth. I mean that whole letter. I'm always amazed, especially about Pentecostals who want to use Corinthians as their model and go well, the Bible said in 1 Corinthians this is what we're doing. I'm like you realize, corinthians was mostly a correction. That's exactly right, correct. It was mostly a rebuke on Christians Sharp rebuke Doing it the wrong way.
Speaker 2:That's right.
Speaker 3:But you know, and I'm talking to my own tribe here as a Pentecostal Anyway so there are some of us that you know, and he goes on to say in the next chapter we're going to talk about it like the qualifications for elders, deacons, and you should not promote people who are maybe zealous for God but just don't know what they're talking about yet. That's right. And so there is a maturity. That's important. And so if you're feeling stirred to lead men and women, like, do it appropriately, do it in the context of your local church, Don't be outside of that. Don't be outside of that, yes, and do it at the pace of your maturity, Right, which is again remember I said I had like six extra pages of notes. I mean, there's so much more to talk about from this text.
Speaker 3:But I would just give this final challenge to anyone who's reading this text and maybe you're antagonistic against some of the talking points, Because I knew preaching this. It was dealing with a heart for people, a heart for prayer, a posture of prayer for men and women, and then this idea I stuck my nose in the Calvin-Armenian debate, if you're familiar with that, and on the gender issue, and if you're still antagonistic against those kind of the resolutions that we landed on in the message, then I wouldn't, before you want to come and like debate me or our team, just do some honest work of prayer and say Lord, why is this bothering me so much? Why is this frustrating me? Because, if it is like, chew on that first, Don't find resolve in you by changing my views, Because I've actually spent and I'm not qualifying myself here by any means, but I've spent a ton of time, especially on the Calvinism-Arminianism debate, and I've made some determined resolve on those issues.
Speaker 3:If it's still frustrating you, then pray on that. Yeah, I want to see prayers and intercessions and supplications and Thanksgiving Like start there. If you're still wrestling with women in leadership and women preaching, before you jump into a debate, like you were saying earlier, Jordan, let's just pray through that God. Why is that so frustrating to?
Speaker 1:me.
Speaker 3:And if it's history, if it's what you've just been taught your whole life, you know Jesus would say over and over again. You've always heard it said what I say. And I think there's nothing that I've heard my whole life that I don't want. To let Jesus rewrite.
Speaker 2:You know what I'm saying? That's so good.
Speaker 3:So anyway, I know we're probably over time. This is turning into a Joe Rogan podcast once we get to an hour and a half.
Speaker 1:I'm down for that, but we got other things to do. No, I love that. And just going back to your point, Pastor, like in chapter one, Paul's saying like don't get caught up with meaningless discussions, and sometimes these topics can lead us down rabbit trails and it leads us away from just actually going to God in prayer. And so I think that's the simplicity of how this chapter starts Just start with prayer, and so I think that's the foundation of all this Go to the Lord for direction and then have the conversations if you still need to have the conversations, yeah, and we, as Christians, debate a lot on secondary and tertiary issues, so we're not debating Christ and Him crucified.
Speaker 1:His resurrection.
Speaker 5:He's the Bible truth.
Speaker 3:We're debating secondary and third level issues, which are important, but they're not going to keep you out of heaven if you don't believe exactly right. But we divide fellowship, which takes me back to Jesus going. I pray for them to be united just like we are and we've decided to divide fellowship and relationship over non-salvation issues. And again, non-Christians aren't even debating whether or not a woman can tell me the gospel or not.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:They're just lost. Man come on so we get so—that's why he warns don't chase those myths. And what's the outcome of it? He said people have left the faith over this Over these secondary and third-level issues they've left the faith.
Speaker 3:Are you kidding me? Yeah, so here's where I've landed. On some of these things people want to, I I will always discuss. I will rarely debate, um, because the debate is always meant to move a person instead of move yourself. But a discussion I want to learn to move myself. You know grow. So I'll rarely debate anybody unless it's just purely sparring for fun and whatever.
Speaker 3:Stephanie makes fun of me because debating is one of my love languages. But anyway, on matters like this, I'm never going to debate somebody that's getting hot and bothered and angry about it. I just go well, hey, listen, we're brothers and sisters in Christ. The last thing I'm going to do is break fellowship or question your love for Jesus because you may not understand or we may not have congruence on an issue like this, same with speaking in tongues, or how old is the earth, or how does it all tribulate in the end, right, right, I wasn't there at creation, so I actually can't say definitively Right, and I haven't been there for the end. Yet I'm pretty confident I'm going to make it come on where the other.
Speaker 2:But you know, that's about all I know.
Speaker 3:So let's chase. I mean I'm not trying to be dismissive yeah yeah, let's just drop it. I'm not. I want us to know christ and come to a knowledge of the truth, which is in the text. Yeah, and so I think there's truth there.
Speaker 1:Well, when you think again, salvation, discipleship, when you think of discipleship, there's some things you won't understand yet. So, like when you're beginning, when you're developing a relationship, when you're like if you're in a trade and you're just starting, you don't understand how everything works. You have to start at the beginning and a lot of that comes to the fundamentals and that starts with the relationship, reading your word, prayer, and until you develop. And then that's why, going back to Pastor Willie's point on how you taught, you went to that whole theology, how to study the scripture. That matters, and because this is such a rich text, I think it wasn't just like here's how you pray.
Speaker 1:No, it required a lot more, and so it got deep real quick, but it was awesome.
Speaker 3:It was awesome.
Speaker 1:It was awesome. And here we go. Next week, chapter three. Oh, it's going to be great, and so we're excited Qualifications of elders.
Speaker 3:There's this really beautiful text at the end of this chapter where Paul just talks about Christ in such magnificent ways. He was anointed of the spirit, he was called. You know, all this stuff he just lists, rattles off this whole stack of statements about Jesus that I think it's really important for us to remember about him and sometimes we think he's just God's son. No, he's God the son and he's all these other things for you, like for us which is great.
Speaker 1:Sweet Well, thanks again, everyone for joining us. Thank you, everyone at the table, for being part of today's discussion and until next time, peace out.
