Why do I like Escape Rooms?

What if church felt less like a show and more like a team mission? We open with the thrill of escape rooms and use that energy to reimagine worship as a fully participatory space where love leads every word and action. Drawing from 1 Corinthians 14, we unpack why prophecy—defined as Spirit-led encouragement, exhortation, and comfort—does the most good in a gathered community. We contrast that with tongues as a deeply personal prayer language to God, helpful for private devotion and edifying when interpreted, but confusing when it dominates public moments without clarity.

Across the conversation, we keep circling one question: does this build people up? That question reframes everything from microphone time to hallway talk. We explore how clear speech brings courage to the weary, how order protects peace, and how boundaries actually make room for the Spirit to work through more voices, not fewer. We also tackle the tricky verses with cultural context and a simple principle—minimize distractions so people can learn, respond, and be strengthened.

By the end, you’ll have a grounded path for healthier gatherings: pursue love first, prize understanding, and practice organized freedom where multiple people can contribute without confusion. Expect practical takeaways you can try this week—asking God for a person to encourage, offering a simple word that builds, and letting your private devotion fuel public care. If this vision resonates, share the episode with a friend, hit follow, and leave a review with one insight you’ll put into practice. Your voice helps more people find a church that truly builds them up.

Transcript

Escape Rooms As A Metaphor

SPEAKER_00 0:26

Today's sermon is called Why Do I Like Escape Rooms? I love escape rooms. Raise your hand. Have you been to an escape room? Hey, we got quite a few in here. Well, my wife and I have been to more. Right? We're on 33 now. Yes. And I keep a note, a notebook of all our escape rooms. We've been all over the world. We've been in escape rooms from Florida to Pittsburgh to New York City to Denver to not California, but I think, yeah. Anyway, we've been to a lot. We've been to the best one. Oh my goodness. The best one's in Pittsburgh. If you ever can go to the Imaginarium, it is another level. It's like the entire size of a like a like a warehouse, like a Walmart or whatever. And it's it's incredible. So, but why do I like escape rooms? I'm sure you're just wondering why do you like the why are you so obsessed with the escape rooms? Because they are interactive. I participate in the story. One time we were police officers trying to catch drug dealers. One time we were spies trying to save the world from a nuclear submarine. And we made it out of that one with one second to go. One second I pushed the button. It was so epic. It was so epic. I remember that one, like, oh man. We were like, she's literally yelling the code from the other room, and I type it in, or she types it in and stops me. One second to go. Oh, legendary. I love participating in the story. Now that doesn't mean I don't love movies, because I love just sitting and getting fatter and vegging out. Because sometimes I watch a movie, and has this happened to you where you're just watching a movie and you're like start just like just crying, just like tearing up because it's so the dog is a person too. Dogs are people too, or when my wife and I have this thing when a movie impacts us emotionally, we say, you know, whatever it is, because robots are people too, or chickens are people too, or whatever the movie's about, we always are like, man, this this is impacting us, so we say blah blah blah is people too. Um but I love participating, and today we're gonna learn how the church church service is supposed to be participatory. There's your two dollar word for the day. Now, in America, we have adopted things that were brought to us from England, who in turn brought things that were adopted from Germany, who brought things that were adopted from Rome, who made up a whole bunch of wacko stuff. This is not how church was intended to be. The church was originally just they met in people's homes, they met in in other synagogues, they they met wherever they could, and they would gather together and they would they would share and they would talk. And and that was how it was designed. And so we're gonna talk about like what church looked like back then a lot today, and then how we can kind of apply it to what we do and what we're comfortable with and what our our um culture is today. Okay, so what does it look like to participate in church? Well, there's basically two ways that you can participate in church. You can participate spiritually, or you can participate practically, or both, or neither. I guess that's four. We'll just say two. And today we're gonna kind of see these lines drawn where there's a spiritual way that you can participate in church, and then there's a practical way that you can participate in church and be part of what's going on. And so what that looks like is we're gonna look at the gift of prophecy, which is actually the practical way, and then we're gonna look at the gift of tongues, which is the spiritual way. Now, right away, so many red flags. I saw all the red flags go up over all your heads. Like, well, we're gonna talk about the gift of tongues. Well, yeah, this chapter is like all about the gift of tongues. So I want to just preface this with saying there's a whole lot of different views on what the gift of tongues is. Okay, so there's people who believe it died out right after the apostles, and nobody ever speaks in the gift of tongues, even though the Bible talks about it all the time. Nobody does it. So those are called cessationalists. I don't follow that, but I want to present that. Some people are that. I don't care. It's fine. You can believe that if you want. Some people believe that the gift of tongues is like so vitally important that every Christian should do it. And if you don't, you're not even saved and you're gonna go to hell. And again, that I don't think is scriptural, I don't think it's biblical, and so you can believe that if you want, but I'm gonna talk about what the Bible teaches today. And so that's what we're gonna go into today. You'll see what my view is as I teach it today. All right, so let's begin. It says in chapter 14 of 1 Corinthians, it says, pursue love and desire spiritual gifts, but especially that you may prophesy. Notice he doesn't say desire or pursue spiritual gifts. Uh, we're supposed to have one focus, and that is our love relationship with God. One thing that we strive for, one thing that we pursue. If we're gonna be a church that's known for anything, we should be known as the church that loves and has a love relationship with God. And that is what the gospel truly is all about: a love relationship with God. We can always discover more about his love for us. We're gonna study the Bible from now until the world blows up. And we're always gonna be talking about the love of God. We're gonna be experiencing the love of God, and it's gonna meet our needs, and it's gonna develop us and it's gonna transform us. It works. It is life, it is the only thing that matters in life. When he blesses us, we can give thanks and rejoice in the blessings he gives us. When we go through difficult times, when we're in need, we can bring our needs to the Lord, and he can meet our needs through his love. So, see, everything, whether it's good or bad, we're engaging with God on his love. Both good or bad can can help us grow in our love relationship with God. So love is supposed to be our focus, but we can desire the fruitfulness uh and uh of spiritual gifts. Like it's good. And we studied spiritual gifts, we had a list of all the spiritual gifts, you guys took your spiritual gifts test. So we should definitely understand spiritual gifts and we can know that we want them. Um, but if we focus on them, you're not gonna experience them. That's the principle that we've learned. If you focus, hey, I'm I really want to be fruitful for God, that's the one guarantee I can make that you're probably not gonna be fruitful for God. And this is what happens all the time with Christians is we're like, oh, I I oh, I'm just so excited about what God's doing in my life. So I'm gonna try super hard to be the best person I can be, to be the best Christian I can be. And then what happens the next day? We s we mess up, we screw up royally, and we're like, why did this happen? I really was trying hard this time. And God says, ah, it's because we departed from the path of receiving love and a love relationship with God, and we moved over to works. What are you gonna do to try to make a difference, to try to do better or be better? We have to rest in the gospel, rest in what Jesus has done, the finished work of Jesus. Yes, we should desire to be fruitful, we should desire the gifts of God, but we need to wait upon God to receive those. So our focus is again on waiting upon God. Uh in the last chapter, it said, wait eagerly. How do you wait eagerly by diving into your relationship with Jesus, putting your hope and trust in him with humility and faith? So when nothing makes sense, when it hurts, when you doubt, when your world is falling apart, when all seems lost, when when the tears are falling, when you feel abandoned, what do you do? You wait, delighting in his love, delighting in your relationship with him, receiving what he has freely given you. So we're but we're gonna learn today about two of the ways that we can interact with church and with you know how we can see God using us. And so the best gift for everyone we're gonna learn today is prophecy. Uh, it's very practical. Like I said, prophecy is the practical way to serve God. So, what is prophecy? When we say prophecy, do we mean someone stands up and says, Thus says the Lord, tomorrow there will be an earthquake in Colorado? Well, there was one yesterday, which never happens. But no, that's that that is a form of prophecy, okay? But that's not the kind of prophecy that we're actually talking about here. Prophecy is someone who speaks the word of God, God's words, God's heart, to people as the Spirit inspires you to speak, and they're practical words of how someone can be encouraged. Well, there's three ways. It encourages people, it calls people to trust in the Lord and in his promises, and it brings comfort to people. So that's it's kind of sounds like just speaking with God's heart of love towards people, right? Can you encourage people? Yes, you can prophesy. And he says, here, that's what we should desire is that we should desire to speak these words of encouragement, exhortation, and comfort. Desire that. Give God your mouth and say, God, I want to encourage people around me. It's not about just me today, it's about the person next to me that's going through this or going through that. And I want to have a mouth, I want to have words, but I'm not gonna speak until you encry you inspire me by your love. So I need to receive your love first so that I can be giving your love. That's the practical way you can participate in church, and it requires you to talk to people. Oh, that's where I draw the line. I'll go to church and I'll sit there and I'll even stand, and I might even sing a song. God is so wanting you to have a heart for people. He says, I would love to use you. I'd love to make you my instrument to prophesy. He's willing to do that through you. Why? Why is prophecy the best gift to use? Well, because it blesses other people. So when the church gets together, this would obviously be best for everyone if all of us were focused on everyone else and not ourselves. You know what churches are awesome to go to? Churches that are so self-focused they never come and talk to you. No. Right? That was sarcastic, just so you're aware. I use sarcasm a lot. No one wants to go to a church where it's completely self-focused. Where do all the church splits come from? Self-focused hearts. It's a blessing to other people. Now we're gonna contrast prophecy with the gift of tongues, which is basically we're gonna contrast two good things, one of them being practical and the other one being spiritual. So, first we're gonna learn the difference between the two is who are you speaking to? So when you come to church, you're speaking to somebody, who are you speaking to? He says, For he who speaks in a tongue does not speak to men, but to God. So, the gift of tongues, who are you talking to? To God. Okay, so no one understands him. However, in the spirit, he speaks mysteries, but he who prophesies speaks edification, exhortation, and comfort to men. Right. So who are you talking to? Tongues speaks to God, it's spiritual. So what I think is that tongues is actually a spiritual language that you can speak to God, maybe spoken, maybe just unspoken. Have you ever just like looked at your husband and just gone, that's probably somewhat similar to what we're talking about here. God understands all the groans, He understands the sighs, He understands the unspoken, broken-hearted prayers that we pray. No one understands out loud. It's an unknown language. So if you hear an interpretation, so we're gonna talk about people can you can interpret, God can give an interpretation for tongues, but if you hear someone speaking tongues, blah, blah, blah, blah, I'm not making fun of it. I just it sounds like that sometimes. Um, and then someone says, I have an interpretation for what that means. Like I really feel it in my heart, and they say, Thus says the Lord, right there, stop listening to him. Because the gift of tongues is never God speaking to us, it's us speaking to God. Who is speaking? We are speaking his praises, we're talking to him, maybe about him, maybe about something, big feelings you have going on. You that could be something that's going on. Well, that's what you can always know. It's not going to be thus, says the Lord. That's not the real gift of tongues. Tongues is without words, and and what's cool about it is it's disconnected from the limits of our mind and our language. Sometimes you need to express something to God that's bigger than all language. Sometimes it's it's just deeper than words of English, just would fail to communicate. And so there is a way, God can give you a way to communicate to him in that situation. You don't have to, but it's there if you need it. Um, prophecy, on the other hand, speaks to men. It's practical. Again, we saw it was ek edification, encouraging people, exhortation, building people up, or comfort. So edification actually means building people up. Isn't in Spanish edificio? Isn't that a building? Yeah, it is. In my first two years of Spanish, I know it. Um so it's a construction term, edification, that means building people up. And a word of prophecy would build someone up, not tear them down. I have a prophecy for you, you suck. I don't think that's from the Lord. Um exhortation is encouragement. It's like a the speech from a coach at a excuse me, as a at a uh half halftime in a locker room, rallying his team to go out there and do what they were trained to do, you know, and uh so prophecy can encourage people, not discourage them, you know what, you should just stay home. You're terrible. That's not doesn't work. All right, so coming alongside our our family to point them to follow Jesus, trust in him, live with humility. That that's the new covenant of grace that we can encourage people to live in. Oh thank you, you're so thoughtful. What's your number? That's right. Comfort is the third way prophecy works, which is um not only just consoling, but also strengthening uh people. It doesn't just cry when someone's hurting, putting your arms around them, but strengthening them to carry the load with them. That's another way you can be practically engaged with the service. You see people coming in and they are bearing a heavy load, bear that load with them. That's it can be you can do that with your words or practically, and it can be a ministry of prophecy. Um it says here, he who speaks in a tongue edifies himself, but he who prophesies edifies the church. Here's a clue to what tongues is and and what prophecy is. Tongues is an edifying prayer language that's spiritual. So it's like you're again, you are built up when you connect with God anytime spiritually, whether you use words or you just in the spirit, you're just connected with Jesus. That's cool, and you are built up. But in church, it's he says it's better if you are engaging not just invisibly, spiritually, yes, I'm here with Jesus, but practically I'm gonna pull someone aside and I'm gonna I'm gonna pray that God gives me a word to encourage them, edify them, or comfort them. He says, I wish you all spoke with tongues, but even more that you prophesied. For he who prophesies is greater than he who speaks in with tongues, unless indeed he interprets that the church may receive edification. So here we see both are good ways to participate in church. So if you come to church and you're just quiet and you're just connecting with Jesus, great. He says it's even better if you take that relationship with Jesus and make it practical and love on people in with practical words. That's even better in a church meeting. And that's a subject here is how we have our church meetings, how we operate in church. People are supposed to be able to speak and to participate, but and I do truly believe that, but how? Well, look at the last verse of this chapter. If you zoom down to the last verse, it says, Let all things be done decently and in order. Now, you may have seen churches that don't look at this verse and don't honor it, and their their service is just a wild free-for-all. Okay? I'm not judging, but I'm just this is an important verse we need to remember. This is how church is supposed to look. Why? Because it's loving. Boundaries are like hugs, you tell your kids, right? Boundaries are like hugs. Well, that's what church too. You know, don't be all crazy in church. Um, that's the goal. So back into our text, it says, but now, brethren, if I come to you speaking with tongues, what shall it profit you unless I speak to you either by revelation, by knowledge, by prophesying, or by teaching? So there's a lot of ways that I can uh spiritually lift you up. Okay? But tongues is not one of them. I I can't impact you when I'm just speaking in tongues to God. Um, because it's my focus is on me. Again, this isn't bad. Sometimes I need to focus on me. Sometimes my heart is broken, sometimes I'm really struggling, and I need to connect with Jesus and I need to receive from him. Uh, but everything has his time and its place, and God says, Hey, if you need to get alone with me, then come get alone with me. You don't need to do it out loud for everyone to see. The people don't need to see you shouting out tongues in church because they're gonna think you're weird, which is what he's gonna say here in a second. Even things without life, whether flute or harp, when they make a sound, unless they make it a distinction in the sounds, how will it be known what is piped or played? And I've seen some worship teams who need to read that. Uh for if the trumpet makes an uncertain sound, who will prepare for battle? So likewise you, unless you utter by a tongue uh the tongue words easy to understand, how will it be known what is spoken? For you will be speaking into the air. There are, it may be, so many kinds of languages in the world, and none of them is without significance. Therefore, if I do not know the meaning of the language, I shall be a foreigner to him who speaks, and he who speaks will be a foreigner to me. This is pretty easy to understand, right? If you say gobbly gook, it's not gonna mean anything to anybody, they're gonna think you're weird. So he says, again, tongues is not able to be understood unless God gives someone a special interpretation. So if God, if you like, man, I got this message in my heart and it's coming to me through the gift of tongues, but you know what? I'm not gonna say it until God gives me an interpretation. There you go. And then God tells you, okay, this is what is kind of in your heart. Then you could communicate that to people, and then it would help people out. That's how it works. Even you, so you, since you are zealous for spiritual gifts, let it be for the edification of the church that you seek to excel. Therefore, let him who speaks in a tongue pray that he may interpret. For if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays, but my understanding is unfruitful. So this church was acting, his church that he's dealing with was acting too spiritual and not actually loving people practically. Uh so again, if you know you can keep speaking tongues and you got a message from the Lord, keep it quiet and pray that God will reveal to you something that you're able to speak out loud in a in a way that can impact people. You don't have to speak it out loud, and you shouldn't in a group unless God gives you the interpretation. Um very simply, you shouldn't really hear the sound of tongues unless there's an interpretation in a meeting. Um, okay, so what is the conclusion then, he says? He says, I will pray with my spirit. There's a time for that, and I will also pray with understanding. I will sing in the spirit, I will sing with understanding. Um, what is tongues then? Why are we talking about this? Why is it important? Well, I want to just help you understand a little bit. Sometimes there needs to be this bypassing of understanding. Your brain gets in the way of your relationship with God sometimes for some people. Because maybe your brain doesn't work right, maybe your brain is just bothered by a lot of stuff. Maybe you get just have ADD, maybe you just ate a bad mushroom. Who knows? While we value our intellect and understanding, and that's a fine way to connect with God, and God's given you a wonderful brain and a wonderful mind. Sometimes uh you can need something that's limitless, and your connection with God is truly limitless. He understands you if you need to bypass that. So that's what it is. And I can tell you just personally, I do not always speak in tongues. I don't speak in tongues very often, but there have been times in my life where my heart was devastated. Where I was had no words for how much guilt and shame that I felt. And me and God had some conversations then that I cannot recount to you. But I shared things with God that were in my heart that He put there and I cannot give put words to them for you. And that's that's and I it helped me to process through those things, to get through those things. It edified me. It probably wouldn't edify you, but it edified me. And so I've have experienced that type of thing. All right. Um let me give you some warnings about tongues. It doesn't happen when you just open your mouth and God just takes over. Okay, that's not how it works. Um it doesn't happen as you begin to wiggle your tongue. Some people literally say that. Just wiggle your tongue, and that's what it means. And it doesn't happen as you just repeat nonsense words or phrase faster and faster until God takes over. That's not how it works. So it if you want to understand how it works, it it it's as you're praying, you may reach a point where you the words do not express all that you have in your heart, and so a word or a sound may occur to your mind, and you can just speak that word and and that would be God giving you something to meet your need in that moment. Um and then the last principle that we need to talk about with the gift of tongues is that uh the gift of tongues never makes you do weird stuff. Like bark like a dog or dance like a chicken or any of these other weird things that you see sometimes in churches. Um it says that this yeah no, a church would be a lot more exciting, wouldn't it? A lot more interesting anyway. Um in in verse 32 it says the spirit of the of the prophet is subject to the prophet, which means you're always in you should be in control if you have so you don't have to just go into a trance and speak bizarre things in the middle of church. Why is that? Because God's already speaking through the Holy Spirit through one person. Right now it's me, as I've studied and I've prayed and asked the Spirit to speak through me. He is doing this, so he's not gonna interrupt himself, right? That's that's the principle here. The spirit would never interrupt himself. But if you're in a meeting where it's open for everyone to speak at various times and you believe God has something for you to say, then that would be the appropriate time for something like that to happen. All right, going on, it says, Otherwise, if you bless with the spirit, how will he who occupies the place of the uninformed say amen? Which means totally cool. I understand what you're saying, at your giving of thanks, since he does not understand what you say. For you indeed give thanks well, but the other is not edified. So this verse tells us that is totally cool when people say amen in church. That was in the Bible. You guys are totally cool to say amen. I like it. Amen. Yeah. I love it when people just get it right when you preach it. People think you're uh people will think you're crazy though, if you start speaking nonsense in a public meeting. Uh, I think he says, I thank my God, I speak with tongues more than you all. So Paul says, I'm a really spiritual dude. Yet in the church, I would rather speak five words with my understanding that I may teach others also than 10,000 words in a tongue. So here's the thing is like people get like really weird about this, and they're like, I gotta, I I gotta speak what's inside me. No, you don't. You're cool. Just keep keep that between you and the Lord. And show me your connection with God, your spiritualness by how much you love weird people. And how and people that are difficult to love. Show it through your love, which would be what he's calling prophecy here. Um so Paul's use of tongues was focused focused on his devotional life, his private time with the Lord. And so he's focused on other people. That's how he participated in church was through the teaching gift, that part of prophecy. So then he says, Brethren, do not be children in understanding, however, in malice be babes, but in understanding be mature. In the law it is written, with men of other tongues and other lips, I will speak to this people, and yet for all that they will not hear me, says the Lord. Therefore, tongues is for a sign, not to those who believe, but to unbelievers. But prophesying is not for the unbelievers, but for those who believe. Therefore, if the whole church comes together in one place and all speak with tongues, and there come in those who are uninformed or unbelievers, will not they say that you're out of your mind? But if all prophesy and an unbeliever or an uninformed person comes in, he's convinced by all, and he and he's convicted by all, and thus the secrets of his heart are revealed, and so falling down on his face, he will worship God and report that God is truly among you. What does all that mean? It means it's immature or childish to put yourself above other people. And then he quotes this passage in Isaiah that says that when the people of Israel were going to be taken into captivity, they would hear people speaking other known languages, and it was a it was a sign of judgment upon them. So they didn't know God, they were rebelling against God, and then they would hear tongues and they would realize we're really missing out on something. It was a picture to them that they were missing out on a connection with God because they were going into this foreign country. And so here it seems like Paul is saying the opposite of everything else he says in the chapter. Did anyone else catch that? It's like, wait a second, you just said that tongues was for just Christians to use like individually and privately, and then now you're saying it's a sign for unbelievers. And so I I'm not gonna lie. A difficult verse to understand, but I think if we connect it to that Isaiah chapter 28, like connection that he makes, what we can understand is this that it's not the primary purpose of tongues, but they can be assigned to unbelievers that people can connect with God in church, and that can be a good part of the gift of tongues. So when people are like, What why is this happening? And and they hear tongues and then they hear an interpretation and they they're like, What are they seeing there? They're seeing spirituality. And just that there is a spirit, that every human being has a spirit, can cause people to say, Wow, is that a sign that I am not that? Because my life is about me, and I don't have a connection with God, and I certainly don't have a connection with God that can be expressed in a supernatural language. So maybe I need to listen to what they're saying with their actual words of prophecy, and then I can repent and say, God, I repent of my life. I need what Jesus has done for me. I'm gonna, I'm gonna fall on my knees and I'm gonna say, God, save me. I need you, Jesus, because of the words that were actually said. So that's what I think is going on there. If you don't believe, we can fight in the parking lot. We're down with that. Just kidding. I'm not gonna fight you. Okay, so how is any of this applicable to our church meetings today? Well, it says this How is it then, brethren, when you come together, each of you has a psalm, has a teaching, has a tongue, has a revelation, has an interpretation. He says, Let all things be done for edification. So what was happening in this church is they had a free-for-all church. Anybody could come and do the teaching, have a psalm, have a prayer, and it didn't work. Okay? That's all that's going on here. They needed organization. So Paul is using a very simple logic to give them some ideas on how they can be orderly and loving in their church service. Because it was taking like 10 hours to do a church service, and you don't want that. Nobody wants that. We got football to watch. This is not gonna be all day. All right, he says, if anyone speaks in a tongue, let there be two or at the most three. Okay, is this something that's like a hard and fast law? Obviously not, because he's like two or maybe three. It's like not. He he's just helping them think through the logic of how they're doing things. He says, each one in turn and let one interpret. But if there's no interpret, let him keep silent in church and let him speak himself to God. Is it could it be any more clear than that? Okay, so that's how it's supposed to work. You know, this is like in our time of worship, okay, when we're singing and you know, Nate and Sarah are singing, and we're just we're really connecting with God, and it's great. He says, Don't distract people. Like let them connect with God. That's all you got to worry about. Um, don't get carried a riot. It's organized freedom, is what he's saying. It's like when we would take our six kids shopping at Walmart. They we would have, we would get one of those big carts, and they would all hang on different parts of it, and they were free to do whatever they wanted as long as they hung onto the cart. Organized chaos. Then he says, Let two or three prophets speak and let others judge. So this was the this was the time of teaching. So they would have two or three. They didn't have just one pastor, they had they didn't have any pastor usually, they just had people who were studying the Bible and were leaders in the church, and so that's what he's talking about. They didn't even have the Bible like we do, they just had the Old Testament. So they relied heavily on the Spirit to give them the words to say each week. And uh again, we have kind of have a little bit more established church and church leaderships now. Um but if anything is revealed to another who sits by, let the first keep silent, for you can all prophesy one by one that all may learn and all may be encouraged. And the spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets, for God is not the author of confusion, but of peace, as it is in all the churches of the saints. So what he's saying here is don't interrupt anybody. There's no interrupting of the one speaker. That's confusing because you're like, who should I listen to? This person talking about God or that person talking about God, and they're both talking about the God, oh, it's all confusing. You don't want that. He says, You're in control of what you speak politely if your message is from the Holy Spirit. Okay? All right, now we get to the exciting verse. You guys ready? Let was that was funny because of what's coming. I don't know if you know what's coming. Okay, let women keep silent in the churches, for they are not permitted to speak, but they are to be submissive as the law also says. And if they want to learn something, let them ask their own husbands at home, for it is shameful for a woman to speak, which means the word in Greek is yell or argue, in church. Or did the word of God come urgently from you, or was it from only was it you only that it reached? Okay, what does this mean? Before you get up and stamp your way out, calm down. It's actually not that difficult. In that culture, they did not mix and match men and women in church. They had a row of chairs here and a row of chairs over there, and men sat over there, and women sat over here. You did not sit with your wife. There was none of this funny business going on we got right here. None of no arms around, okay. And then I've heard, I've seen she she we she gives you a little whisper, whisper sweet nothings into your ear during church. Not happening over there, okay. So, what was happening is teachers saying, Oh, and God said this and blah, blah, blah. And the wife is like, hey, honey, what do you think he means, bro? Are you listening? And Paul's like, don't do that, okay? Ask at home, discuss it at home. Okay, this does a couple great things. First, it keeps distractions to a minimum during church, okay, so that people can focus on the message that's being said. That's the main thing. He's not just picking on women, okay. What was going on here is that women actually loved their husbands and wanted the input of their husbands. And so what they would do is they would ask questions as a way of saying, let's talk about what was talked about in church. Let's talk about how it applies to our life. And so they would ask these questions. And so that's really healthy for relationship was when you talk about those things. Thirdly, the other thing it does is when you ask your, let's say you go home and ask your husband, hey, what do you think about this gift of tongues and the spirituality? And your husband's like, I have no idea what you're even talking about. I was sleeping or thinking about football during church. You know what it does? Makes him want to pay attention because he wants, in his spirit, he wants to lead you. He's called to be your leader. He wants to be that guy that says, This is what the Lord, the word of the Lord means, and this is how we can apply it in our life. So let's go, let's do it together. It encourages him. And guess what? If he doesn't, if he's the biggest goober in the world and he doesn't know anything, you know what he'll do? He'll say, I don't know. And then the wife will say, Well, maybe you should go talk to the pastor about it. And he'll say, You really think he'll talk to me? Yeah, you should go try. And then he calls up pastor, and then he says, Hey, I was I I need to talk to my wife about this, but I don't know how. I don't know the truth. I don't know how it all works. Can you teach me? And he learns, and then he comes home and he's like, Hey honey, guess what I learned? I learned all this stuff. And she's like, Awesome, I already knew all that, but I asked you so that you could learn it. Now we're on the same page. Because husbands want to learn, but they generally want to learn from a dude. All right. Does that make sense? No apples being thrown at me. I think we got through it. It's gonna be okay. Alright. So if anyone thinks himself to be a prophet or spiritual, now I told you at the beginning, this is dividing prophecy and tongues. He he gives us the this is the truth. This is where the the lesson is spelled out for us, right here. I was excited when I saw this because I was studying it like this, and then I was like, oh, he actually says it right here. This is the difference between prophecy practical engagement versus spiritual, just being spiritual. If anyone thinks himself to be a prophet or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things which I write to you are the commandments of the Lord, but if anyone is ignorant, let him be ignorant. Means you don't have to participate in church, you can be dumb. All right, moving on. If you are wanting to participate in God's family, you will need to do it his way, he says. That way is love. Yeah. You can you can love, you can spiritually love people or you can practically love people. It's better to practically love people so then they can receive it. Love is the commandment, he says. He mentions commandment. Acknowledge that the things I write to you, love is the commandment, right? Consider others, be thoughtful, not selfish. In the way the church runs, this is how it's supposed to work. Therefore, he says, Therefore, brethren, earnestly desire to prophesy. And don't forbid to speak with tongues. Let all things be done decently and in order. Okay, so there's our study of 1 Corinthians chapter 14. It was a long chapter, right? Okay. Chapter 15 is like twice as long. So we probably won't be able to do that all in one week. But we're getting close to the end of 1 Corinthians, and it's been quite the adventure. I'm excited about it. Would you guys all stand up with me?