How Greek and Deep Study Can Transform Your Faith and Your Pastor's Ministry with Tim Murray

In this episode of Exploring the Language of Scripture, Daniel Mikkelsen sits down with pastor-scholar Tim Murray to delve into the transformative impact of learning biblical languages—especially Greek—on both personal faith and ministry. Tim shares his journey of studying Greek and Hebrew and discusses how these languages deepen our engagement with Scripture, slow us down for richer understanding, and even affirm the reliability of our Bible translations. They explore the value of theological education and the unique role of pastor-scholars in bridging the worlds of academia and the church.

Whether you’re a pastor, a student of the Bible, or simply someone wanting to support your pastor’s growth, this episode offers practical insights for anyone seeking to engage more deeply with Scripture. Join us for an inspiring conversation about the life-changing power of studying Greek and the rewards of lifelong learning in faith.

Don't miss the next episode: with on Isaiah with specialist Andy Abernethy.

Chapters:
00:00 Introduction
01:58 Meet Tim Murray
03:04 Tim’s Journey with Greek and Hebrew
08:32 How Greek Enriches Scripture Understanding
12:23 The Role of Biblical Languages in Ministry
18:03 How Greek Affirms Our Translations' Reliability
20:08 Greek's Influence on Pastoral Life
23:51 Why Biblical Languages are Essential
26:05 What is a Pastor-Scholar?
29:47 Why Pastor-Scholars Matter
35:35 Rewards of Being a Pastor-Scholar
39:56 Practical Takeaways for Everyday Readers of Scripture

Music Credits: 
Music from #Uppbeat
https://uppbeat.io/t/all-good-folks/aspire

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Podcast Keywords:
biblical languages, New Testament, Old Testament, Christ, bible study,  Relationship with God, learn biblical languages, Biblical Theology, Christianity, Covenants, New covenant, old covenant, language acquisition, Biblical Greek, Biblical Hebrew.

Transcript

0:00

So how did you get into the study of language? So I started learning Greek myself, just on my own. So how did you find it, like trying to do languages on your own? I found it... I mean that, like, our engagement with scripture can't be just mining it for information. We encounter God in the text in lots of different ways. And I think learning biblical language it... where's your time to be formed in your own study? that's not about a deliverable at a church?... That had become my norm really to read through it really quickly because I sort of knew what was there. But what Greek did was it slowed me right down.... But you know about that more than me, I assume, know, teaching this all the time. But little and often it's better, right? Yes. A hobby of mine is that... you describe yourself as a pastor scholar. Yeah. And why is that? I'm passionate about that by vacation actually. Now it's normal that you're either a pastor for you are a scholar, but historically... Hey there and welcome back to another episode of Exploring the Language of Scripture. I'm your host Daniel Miklsen. If you don't know who I am, I'm the founder of NT Greek Tutoring, an online Greek tutoring company that helps people to read the New Testament in original language Greek. And that's also the company that hosts this podcast. Apart from that, I'm a PhD candidate in the New Testament at University of Edinburgh. as well as I've studied New Testament at the University of Cambridge and I've studied theology at the University of Copenhagen and the Fjellhaug International University College. And this podcast exists to make gems from biblical studies accessible to everyday Christians and show how the biblical languages can open up scriptures so that we can enrich our life and walk with God and our love for Him and His Word and for His mission and purposes for saving people. And today I'm joined by Tim Murray. Hi. Hey, welcome here. Thank you. Yeah. Tim Murray has a PhD in New Testament from Nottingham. That's right. Yeah. Yeah. He's a pastor in Amblecote Yeah. In a black country in the UK. Yeah. Those of you who are listening will know it. Yeah. Yeah. Amblecote Community Church. And then he's also a scholar. Yeah. He was reading a couple of books, one academic and a more popular. And then you also dabbled in apologetics. Well, they were there, the popular level books and apologetics one. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And like you say, pastors. scholar try and keep both vacations but we'll talk about that later. Yeah sure yeah yeah anything else you want to to like add about yourself I'm married an we got five kids so yeah that takes up more of my time and energy than being a pastor or a scholar. Yeah sure understandable. congratulations on your more recent... Yeah thank you yeah yeah that's right I'll try to stay awake we have a new baby but I think I can still yeah I can hold it together. That's good. Yeah, but then let's just dive in. Yeah, let's go for it. Yeah. Yeah. So how did you get into the study of biblical languages? Okay. So I first studied the biblical language. So when I initially went to university, did music and then transitioned into doing theology. When I started thinking about doing a PhD, my supervisor was a guy called Professor Roland Deines. He was clear that he would not take me on as a PhD student unless my biblical languages were up to scratch. I started learning Greek myself, just on my own. from Elements of New Testament Greek was my textbook that I used. So I did a year or two of Greek on my own. And then I think by that time I was in a research master's program and did Hebrew and kind of intermediate, more advanced Greek before I started my PhD. So that was kind of how I started, just me, my textbook, my desk, half an hour a day, plodding through. Yeah, that was a starting point for me. how did you find it, like trying to do these languages on your own? Yeah, I actually, yeah, because I did do a bit of Hebrew on my own as well first. Yeah, I found it okay actually. I think the key was just making sure I had half an hour every day that I did it. when you're doing a new chapter, you'd maybe do longer, an hour or two to get your head around the content of the chapter, but half an hour a day, every day. that was so much, so important, much more realistic than I'm do three hours and then nothing for a week and then two hours. you didn't, that wouldn't work. But you would know about that more than me, I assume, know, teaching this all the time, you, little and often is better, right? Yes. Yeah, it's, Yeah, a hobby horse of mine is that we shouldn't compare learning of languages to studying a subject like church history, apologetics, you name it. But we should actually more think of it as like learning to play an instrument, or honing a skill, being a carpenter. Yeah, even like playing football, like getting better at dribbling and stuff like that. All that's like, it's a little bit... And obviously the more you do, the more, the better you will get. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But, but in, in order to become a like really good at music, you need to like practice. For example, if you're a singer, can obviously be naturally gifted to things like that. But then, but, you can actually always become better. And that only happens if you practice. And usually people are naturally gifted. That's can be because they've been singing from, they were like small children. Yeah, exactly. It's not, it's a bit. hidden sometimes the practice that's gone and that reminds me actually when I was learning that Greek as well as doing the half an hour a day from the textbook the other thing I did was when I was going to bed I'd have an interlinear yeah and I'd just read a bit of the New Testament and because I already knew the New Testament quite well you know, it might not have even been the best way to learn, it just was, again, that helpful, like 10 minutes at the end of the day, where you're seeing the Greek. And I found like, as the months went on, like more of the words were making sense as I go through it, like more of it was hanging together. So that felt like a, cause when you're doing it on your own, you haven't really got someone to say, you know, you're doing really well, you're making progress. You don't really know how well you're doing. But I think that was a little test for me is like, you know, as the months went on, there was more of that interlinear why I could like I understand that that makes sense and that gave me a sense of like this skill this skill is growing for me Normally I'm not keen on interlinears. No, several reasons. of pedagogical, you know, lot of Greek teachers say that, but I think, I mean, for me, it was, served that function really. Yeah. Yeah. It was helpful in that way. I made a terrible mistake. I would have got a lot better a lot quicker if I, I don't know. Possibly, yes. Don't tell me that now because I've already done it. At least you're here now. That's the thing, that you kept on going. That's the thing, it's like playing the instrument, you keep on going and then you'll get there eventually. Yeah, keep coming back, keep going. That little bit of Greek every day, Hebrew or whatever language you want to learn really, it's more helpful. Especially when we talk about dead languages, I think it's even more important because... you don't get that auto-correction that you would get if you were to like do a modern language. So me learning English, I could watch films where I was like, okay, this isn't wrong what I'm saying. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Or when I moved to the UK, I found out, okay, this is also wrong. Yeah, that's cheap. I didn't get any auto-correction until I started working with my supervisor more intensely and then there was constant correction. Yes, that was my way in, Daniel. It makes sense. Yeah, it makes sense. So and then sort of our next question will probably be, so how do you do you have any like examples of where you found Greek helpful in the way of opening up scripture or you found a nuance or...? Yeah, I think what I'd want to talk about really is probably less about like, I had this specific insight because I knew the Greek, but more how, you know, I'd been a Christian a long time before I was learning Greek. I knew my Bible well. I knew my New Testament really well. And so normally I'd read it quite quickly. And there's a real virtue in that, that sometimes reading through scripture quickly, it helps you get the scaffold of the whole thing. But that had become my norm really to read through it really quickly because I sort of knew what was there. But what Greek did was it slowed me right down because I couldn't read the Greek as quickly as I could read the English, nowhere near as quickly. Even though as I'm the Greek I'm remembering the English to some extent I couldn't do that perfectly. And you'd come across words or kind of forms of words that were more familiar. It slayed me down. And that... I think what it did is it made what was familiar, unfamiliar again. Like say for me, kind of reading the Bible in Greek, it made it unfamiliar again. And that was of real value. just having, you know, if I want to see half an hour reading the Bible in Greek, I might be only getting through like a chapter. Whereas in English, I might have got through like six or seven chapters. And it forced me to re-encounter it, I think. And that was really helpful and continues to be one of the main reasons I still try and read in Greek. And like I say, one of the challenges I was set in, I think the last Greek class I took before there were no more classes and you just had to read, keep reading. My teacher, my supervisor, said, he set us the task of memorizing the prologue to John's gospel in Greek. In the beginning was the word and the word, et cetera. And so I did that. Ἐν ἀρχῇ Ἐν ἀρχῇ ἦν ὁ λόγος, καὶ ὁ λόγος ἦν πρὸς τὸν, all that. I still remember some of it. And at the time my eldest child had just been born. she had colic and was awake a lot in the night. And so I would be walking around the Ream in the night with my John's prologue memorizing this in the Greek. she's got to become a theologian or something, having heard that over and But what it's like memorizing it, I realized I was receiving the prologue almost as a prayer. Yeah. Because the rhythm of it and the kind of almost the beauty of it. became accessible to me because I had to go through slow, had to memorize it. it becomes like a prayer almost in form and say, did it change my understanding of the prologue. No, like it still meant to me what it meant before cognitively, but it had a massive impact on my encounter with it. because I was able to dwell in it more. Yeah. Just through, is that making sense? Yeah, I think I understand that. That idea of like, when the Psalms talks about meditating upon scripture, scripture, example, someone meditated upon the law of God. That's what it sounds like to me that you've been... because you were trying to memorize this and you were reading it in a foreign language that you were not fluent in. No, absolutely. Then you got to think more about... I would say the word is ὁ λόγος (ho logos) Yeah.(kai) πρὸς τὸν (pros ton) Yeah, θεόν (theon) And it was with God. Yeah. And that would be true of lots of other parts of the New Testament as well. I remember in the introduction to the textbook that the author said, reading in Greek is like, you can watch TV in black and white and you can watch it in colour. I don't know if you've heard that comparison before. And I think that was true for me, but as well as it becoming in colour, was like, rather than watching it on fast forward, you watch it at a much slower pace, which gives you more time to be in it. That's the main impact, I think, far beyond any insight into meaning cognitively. Yeah. Yeah. So in a sense, do you pay more attention to the details because you're reading it more slowly? Yeah. Yeah. You are forced to. Yes. Yeah. That makes very good sense. And I've had that same experience before. I've mentioned it before on the podcast actually, that when I was reading through John as well, I was reading through chapter three. And in the end of chapter three talks about the son and the one who doesn't know the son, then the one who doesn't see the son doesn't know the son and the wrath stays over that person. And I just didn't get it that way. So it's obviously in the translation, it's like dawned on me like, okay, so the one who doesn't know and doesn't see, that is the person that the wrath of God stays upon. whereas it is the one who sees and knows, who is freed and who has life. And then I had not seen that link. as clearly as I did. Yeah. While I was, when as I was reading it through it, was when I was just like fresh off like my Greek course. Yeah. Yeah. Cause it slowed you down. Cause it made you a lot other passages like the Philippian hymn in Philippians 2 that it was in the form of God, like the Colossians stuff about through him, all things were created and these slightly more poetic parts, I think are like really, you know, they're prime examples of where I read them differently now because I had to read them slowly. Yeah, and in Greek. Well, yeah, there's the Greek that made me read them slowly. Reading them in Greek made me read them slowly. And probably reading it in the Greek allows you to enjoy the more poetic feel of those texts. And then they get into you in a different kind of way. We can be guilty sometimes as scholars as being overly cognitive. Yeah, but like language learning actually cuts against that I think somehow. Yeah, it can do. What do you mean by that when you say that? I mean that like our engagement with scripture can't be just mining it for information. We encounter God in the text in lots of different ways and I think learning the biblical languages it enriches some of those ways of meeting God in the text that aren't just cognitive but are that somehow allow you to be confronted in a richer and a different way. Yeah, for me the best way I can articulate it is slow me down but there's probably more to be said by more articulate people. Yeah, I don't think that's pretty articulate. Yeah, but there's much nuance and I benefit a lot. I'm dyslexic, first of all. That's, yeah, that's known and I've managed to learn many foreign languages, although despite that and... And I read slowly in the first place, reading even slower. And I'm a very detailed person, I think that benefits from that as well. Yeah, that makes sense. So it's if it's an encouragement, also think that the reason why, I can make it, then surely other people can make it too. Yeah, your students shouldn't have that many excuses with you of like, but I just find this hard. You can be like, yeah, it can be, but like you say, if it's a skill, then like whatever our prior abilities coming into it, it's actually possible for a lot, most of us, isn't it? It is, it's definitely, it is possible and we already learn one language. Assuming watching this you know English already. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Then you learned English, which means you're capable of learning another language as well. Yeah, yeah. So some people learn a little bit slower than others. Yeah. Some people learn a little bit faster than others. Yeah. And that's okay. Yeah, yeah. It's part of the experience. Yeah. seeing the relations, but also especially when we read more poetic literature or those connections, sometimes word plays that we do in English as well, those comes up in the text as well. Yeah. Where it catches those things as well when you read it more slowly. Yeah, I think that's right. Yeah. Yeah. So you have any sort of like other examples you want to like bring out? I think that's the main thing I wanted to say really that's, you know, for the guys that would be watching this, for the people that watching this podcast, I think that's my kind of main encouragement. There's obviously more, Yeah, like there's a richness they're reading in the original language that you just can't get in translation. And then of course there are all sorts of like, so one of the other things actually, and this might be really simplistic, but reading the biblical languages made me really confident in our modern translations. You know, I think... There's a bit of a myth, isn't there, on a popular level that like when you know the Greek, you know what it really means. Whereas actually when you know the Greek, you know, this could be interpreted in nine different ways. And your translation will always choose for you a certain way of understanding that. I think the more I learn, the more, more I became aware of the scholarship that's gone into like preserving the text, transmitting the text, editing the text, the lexical work, the grammatical work that goes into all our translation, the more I was able to kind of become cognizant of that. just makes me so confident in the translations we've got today really of their like faithfulness, accuracy there. And even where translations differ like that's not disturbing thing to me. That all makes sense now knowing much more about how the biblical languages work. so that was really, I think, you as a pastor, that was a really, it's a sort of side benefit that I didn't necessarily expect. Yeah, but but it great. You know? Yeah. Sorry for interrupting the episode. you're enjoying it and want to keep it at free, please consider supporting us by joining our supporter program. This helps us grow and get more guests on and also gives you some great benefits in return. Do check it out in the description below. Thank you and now back to the episode So how does it benefit you in your own ministry as a pastor, knowing the biblical languages? So I think first of all, you really can work with the tools. Like you want to read a commentary while the commentary is going to engage with like discussions of the text. And when you know the biblical languages, you're actually able to much better follow what's going on in the commentary and engage with that. So I think, you know, even if you weren't going to be a New Testament scholar, like, you know, even if you're not going to work at that level to have enough Greek to use the commentries well is really helpful. think. And yeah, like most people in my congregation, most congregations won't know the biblical languages. But what they often do pick up is a laid of nonsense and myths about, know. So a typical one all the time is like, if the word here is agape, for example, and agape always means this self-sacrificial grace-like love. and therefore whenever we see agape we can and this is like rubbish you know words only mean what they mean in concept agape has a wide semantic range so knowing a bit can be helpful for actually just guarding against some of that really misleading stuff you you hear it says all the time but it's wrong so i think even that level of knowledge can be helpful that just to know it doesn't work like that yeah yeah like greek is a language just like any other yeah you can't pluck a word to say whenever this word occurs it means the same thing it doesn't. So I think defend like helping to protect your people against some of those bad ways of dealing with the Bible and then obviously I think like but but there's the incidental like the most important way it helps is well it deepens my engagement with scripture which changes me as a person and as I'm changed as a person like I'm a big believer that theological education of any kind, so learning biblical languages, the main benefit isn't functional. It's not what I can go and do with it. It's the way it shapes me as a human, as a Christian, as a disciple. And who I become in that learning and training is the biggest benefit in my ministry. Even if I never reference any Greek words in any of my preaching, the shaping of me is worth it for my church. Yeah, I'm passionate about that actually. I don't think we should engage in biblical language, studies, theological training to have a direct functional outcome that now I'll be able to do dot dot dot. Like that is true, but it's secondary. The primary thing is like, he does this allow me to become. Yeah. Yeah. So basically that you say that having your theological education is not, not just enable you to be a pastor, but it helped you to get closer to Christ. Yeah. It's primarily about your discipleship. Yeah. And it's only secondary about how that might be used vocationally. I think we understand that. I don't know where you want to go with the podcast next, but if we understand that, that really changes our view of, for example... whether we send our ministers for training and what it means to engage in theology for the pastor and I think a lot of what's gone wrong in all of that is due to losing this grasp that our study is crucial for our formation. And I agree very much actually, I think, can't remember the quote exactly, but Luther, one of the things that he emphasized by just also translating scripture into German and wanted it to be in the mother tongue of the people that he was pastoring. He also said that in order for the gospel to flourish, the academic languages had to be part of, be within the congregations. Yeah. Yeah. So, and I think that that is what you were saying, is that because it changes and helps us, like it brings us closer to Christ because we engage with the word more than if we just read it in English. Yeah. Or Danish or whatever language. Yeah. So even for me, like when I read in English, I'll read too fast sometimes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And you sometimes even can get like guilty of like almost skimming through. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because it's just kind of task to complete and I know what it says. Yeah, or you know the words so much of your brain is saying, that recognizes so quickly that you don't get to grip with like, what does it actually say? How does this actually relate to me? What did they first readers think of it? Yeah. How did they receive it? So all those questions, I forget to those questions sometimes if I read in translation. Whereas if I read in Greek, primarily in Greek, but also if you read Hebrew or Aramaic, then I get to ask those questions while I'm reading. And I was like, why is this participle here? Yeah, because it's related to this word. And that have this particular way that it frames the sentence. Yeah. And why does it do that? And then you go on from there. Yeah. Yeah. No, I'm nice. Yeah. Makes sense to me, Daniel Yeah. So you'll describe yourself as a pastor-scholar Yeah. And why is that? Yeah. Well, the short answer is because my sort of time is split between responsibilities, helping to lead a church. I'm part of a team, you know, there's a few of us. And I also have time released to spend. in academic work, know, writing, teaching, researching, etc. But I'm passionate about that bi-vacation, actually. You know, there was... Now, it's normal that you're either a pastor or you're a scholar. But historically that's not the norm. Historically, the norm has been that our theologians were pastors and our biblical scholars were pastors. like the location of theology and biblical studies has for most of its life been in the church. And it's only really in recent times that those places have become much more divided. And I think this is really bad news for the church because the church then become a well, not every. denomination and congregations of the same extent, but the church becomes much more impoverished intellectually, philosophically, theologically, biblically. But the academy also becomes detached and abstracted from what the content they're studying is all about. And there's something really weird in that that's now normalized. And then say when that becomes normalized, you then get a whole set of attitudes develop that are really unhelpful. Say in the church you get attitudes that like academic theology is now a threat or a danger or, you know, alien to us. And in the academy you get the view that like only the academy does proper theology and pastors have nothing to contribute. And all of this is... I'm not really caricaturing like that's there. You experienced some of this? Yes, depends a little bit on which spheres you move in but yeah there's definitely that idea of... yeah sometimes and it sometimes is real because you do get it. Yeah. You do get these things that there is like strands of theology that... is proper heresy. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. There's always been. There's always been. There's always been. Throughout the ages, not nothing new really under the sun in that regard. But it's just become that in order to be an accredited university in certain parts of the world... One of the reasons why I came to the UK, so I feel like in the UK there's room for both. Yeah, At least I experienced that in the UK. Maybe not directly the reason, or maybe it was actually a little bit as well. And I found really coming to the UK that in the high end of the academy, like in Cambridge and Edinburgh, you find people who are very committed to... to scripture and having scripture as an authority. Whereas that's not necessarily the case in government institutions in Scandinavia. And in certain other higher education institutions throughout the world where you've almost got a pride that any biblical or theological study is encased in a secular religious studies, ideological location. So you are right that there are realities. But I think that it's paramount that we recapture this vision of past the theologians, where we place theology back in the church. But the theologians who are church-orientated are not some sort of second rung. They read the work the real theologians do and just sort of filter it down, but are actually doing kind of real valuable research study teaching as well. they're... they're orientated towards the church. I think that's crucial. Probably what pushes me to see the violin more is having spent much of my life in church traditions that are really theologically thin. you know, they're perhaps newer traditions coming out of the charismatic renewal, you know, they're probably the whole movements are less than a hundred years old. they just, without an intentional embracing of the tradition and a real commitment to theology, they're so vulnerable, really. Yeah, anyway, so that's part of like the context I've come from and the need that I see. Yeah. But yeah, know, so I think that's a really important work. Yeah. And I think it's correct. Like example, like Jonathan Edwards was at Yale. Yeah Yale was like established as a pastor training place. So it's far from it today. And you know, Jonathan Edwards, spent three years studying. And then he had an opportunity to move into the pastorate and he chose not to, he chose to do another three years. and he, he sort of said, considered that his three years of training, like wasn't enough to be able to adequately handle the word of truth. So he kind of had this real high view of the role of a pastor in being able to like lead theologically, biblically. And Jonathan Edwards was smarter than, than, than any, like a whole bunch of us put together. He was, he was brilliant. And if he's recognizing that need in his own. ministry, I think we should all massively reflect on, you know... like maybe I read I really need this means of discipleship and formation and to be as a sort of who I should be in ministry. know. Yeah. And yeah. And that makes really good sense. A very, very good point, actually. I came to think of the fact that so that when I It's been very fortunate to study at an institution for my undergraduate. Yeah. Who that was very... Copenhagen. Yeah, in Fjellhaug, Copenhagen. And that was formative in the way that that place was all about... staying faithful to scripture, but also equipping us to think so that I felt very prepared to go out in a more secular environment after that. So Cambridge wasn't a total shock to you, you were well prepared. it was actually a shock because I found out how many evangelical people were running around in Cambridge. Yeah, well that's true. Yeah. Which surprised me a lot because... That's not the world of state universities, high-end universities in Scandinavia. Okay, okay. So that was a positive for me. Well, it's actually if you look around like the British New Testament Conference, if you look around... an environment like that, you've got a really quite high proportion of evangelical scholars and students in the room know, so yeah, that's not necessarily replicated in other countries, is it? No, it's, it's, yeah, it's, seems to be a strong tradition, at least at some of the, yeah, especially like on some of the You could say that the highest ranking universities in the UK like Cambridge, the other place: Oxford. Yeah, Oxford, Durham, Aberdeen, St. Andrews, Edinburgh. Maybe Glasgow back in the day now it's not so much anymore, it's falling a little bit. It's become something a little bit different now. Maybe it's coming back now, but it had a few years where it was a little bit behind because it lost some of their big scholars. Yeah. Yeah. But there's been a very strong tradition in that to be part of where it was okay to have different views. They will debate each other. Yeah. Yeah. And they will. But then at least they will allow as long as you could argue that was okay. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You weren't spared critical kind of questioning, but it wasn't. It wasn't kind of ideologically driven that there were no place for those presuppositions of use. Yeah. Yeah. So it's not that it's not impossible, I just found it sometimes a little bit more difficult in that regard. It is changing now, I think possibly. Okay. But yeah. So it's, yeah, it's, yeah. what will happen the next 10, 15 years, I don't know. So only God knows. That's the most important bit. Just have to stay faithful to Him. So what benefit does it bring to you to be a pastor scholar? I think as a scholar you're always in the position of learning and being aware of all the stuff you don't know and being pushed to think and learn and develop and read. I think that brings a certain, if you let it, it can bring a certain posture then to your activity as a pastor and who you are as a pastor that... you can kind of encourage that, hopefully that same posture in your congregation of being confident in the truths that we hold to, but also confident to read people we disagree with, confidence to face difficult questions, confident to engage critically. we, as a pastor scholar, I get to model that. because I'm constantly being formed in that way. And I think can save us from sort of triumphalism that, you know, like we've nailed what the Bible means on everything and we know the way and, and it can save us from a kind of defensive posture of like. or where we can't ask that question and we can't allow that view and we can't read those books because we're kind of scared. And that's not an uncommon problem. Actually, in evangelical circles, that's not an uncommon problem sometimes. But as pastors scholars, I think we can model sort of what I'm engaging and I'm okay. And I'm having to learn and I'm okay. Obviously there's other sort of benefits as well. You you hope that your teaching and your preaching will be fed into all the time by what you're learning and as you grow in your gospel scripture and early Christianity. All of that leads through. You know, obviously you're not going to deliver at a conference what you deliver on a Sunday. But of course it helps. I think the most important thing is, Yes, is that we get to shape our congregations in some of the ways that we ourselves are shaped as pastor scholars. And that shaping is hopefully by being faithful to the word of God. Yeah. So that we, when we are shaped by the word of God, then we get to shape, God gets to shape us through our congregation, through us. And that's what I mean about the confidence, also the humility of constantly also saying, you know, but I may have not understood the word of God right in these ways and I'm always open to being shown a better way of understanding and therefore being faithful and that's the posture I want us all to embody. I'm like confident humility, always open to being wrong but that not leading to some sort of insecurity of don't really know what anything means I don't know what. No, I'm confident. And that might sound like a paradox but I think it's how we're called to live. And pastor-scholarship gives you not a unique but gives you a particular chance to be formed in that way and to embody that. I it's also really helpful, this is tangential, but it is really helpful for your congregation to know that you know stuff. Like sometimes you get things in the media, don't you, of like, there was more than four gospels, there are these other gospels and therefore we shouldn't, and it's really helpful sometimes just to be able to say, yeah, like I've read them, they're on my bookshelf. And I like all of that stuff goes a long way actually with part of your responsibility as a pastor to oversee and guard and guide and you know just there's a confidence in just knowing that you've you've engaged with with things. That makes sense. Yeah that makes sense. Yeah and then also having nuances as well, I Yeah. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. So, but as it's a tradition on the podcast, right? At the end here is that, so what is an application of all this? Okay. For an everyday Christians? Yeah. For the listener, for our listeners and viewers here? Okay. Okay, an application, everyday application. So here's a few. They might be a bit left field, a bit different, but say here's the first one I would say is if God is true, then he's true all the way down. And that means we don't have to be scared of any question. any critical question, any sort of problem, any... we don't have to be afraid to face it and investigate it and think it through because if he's true, he's true all the way down and if he's not true then the game's up anyway but if he's true, he's true all the way down and so I think the first thing I'd want to say in what, you know, with that confident humility stuff is don't run away. from any kind of question that's raised for you on any level, whether that's a kind of spiritual existential question, whether that's theological, whether that's biblical, like you don't have to be scared that you'll stumble across something that will prove God wrong. Like he's true all the way down. And so that's the first thing I say is like, don't run away from stuff and engage your pastor. in helping you to face the question, not helping you to escape the question. The second thing I'd say is, you know, all these people listening to this podcast, you will have a degree of influence in the church you're in. It might be big, it might be small, but you will have a degree of influence, and through your life, you will have different degrees of influence in the churches you're in. I say use that influence to give your pastors the chance and the means and the encouragement to study and to keep studying. Advocate for your pastors to have a day a week of their time set aside for reading and study and learning that's not just connected to what they're going to preach on Sunday. Advocate for that. Ask the question, what have we got in the church budget? to let our pastor go to conferences, to let them, you know, if they've never studied, what are we, what can we pay for them to do their BA? You know, if they have studied and trained, like can we, can we pay for them to buy books, to have time, retreat time, like... You can use your influence to advocate for that and to protect it and to require it of your pastor almost. Like it's not a good thing if your pastor hasn't been doing stuff that's not connected to your local church. That's not a good thing for you or your pastor. You know, you need to like, that's a good question to ask your pastors. Like what do you do that is totally unrelated to your ministry in a functional way? you know, where's your time to be formed in your own study that's not about a deliverable for the church? So that's, that might be a bit different, but that's a real practical thing that everyone can lean into, I think, in some way. And it makes sense. Because we to allow our pastors to grow. Yeah. To grow in the relationship with God and Jesus. as well as So in order for them to be able to feed us the word of God, they need to live of it as well. They do. And they need the release for that, like the disconnection between what you do on Friday and what you do on Sunday. Like the long-term view of that time invested in study. I can't draw a straight line to exactly where that pays out in the local church, but I have a bigger vision that says, of course it does because of the formation of my pastor. And I trust an element of trust in that release. Yeah. Yeah. That makes sense. Good. I hope I'm passionate about this. I hope I've got that across. That's helpful, I think. Thank you very much. Does that do the job? Does that fulfil the criteria? Yeah, I think so. That was good. Yeah, have a vision for our pastors, of our pastors. So now I'm not a pastor myself. Well, not at the moment. Yeah, not at moment. Yeah, maybe that will happen. God willing, we don't know. So definitely filling that, like allowing our pastors to dive deep into scripture. Yeah. As well as, hopefully that's what... NT Greek Tutoring and this podcast is doing is that it's invigorating and make you as a listener or a viewer capable of like diving deeper. That's our vision here. Yeah. And like don't be put off if... If you're like, well, I struggled to see how my learning of this language is directly impacting me today in my life, don't be put off by that. You've got to trust that all we've talked about about you will be formed by your learning of the language. like it will have significant impact on your discipleship if you let it. And you don't need to draw those straight lines. No. Yeah, that's helpful. Thank you so much for joining me. My pleasure, Dan. Pleasure. Thank you very much. God bless you in your ministry. Thank you. But before you go, if you enjoyed this podcast and you want more people to see it, please subscribe and leave a like. It really helps us create more episodes like this one. I really appreciate it. Thank you. Have a great day and I'll see you in the next one