Almost to the Promised Land | Episode 12

The Year Through the Bible podcast this week: "Almost to the Promised Land."

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

More people in the world have every answer they could possibly need in the form of information at their fingertips. And we can't possibly be less wise right now as a society, it seems like. I think we're made for discovery. That's part of reading through the entire Bible in a year, is you're you're discovering. You're unearthing things, you're dusting off things, you're you find a hieroglyphic here and a confusing thing there, and you just sit with it and you file it away and you just keep moving. All right. Welcome back, everybody, to the Year Through the Bible podcast. My name is Rodney Adams. I'm the executive director at Asbury Church in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

SPEAKER_01 0:41

And I'm with I'm Andrew Forrest. I'm the senior pastor here at Asbury, and it's the Year Through the Bible. We're reading through the Bible over the year, and each week we're trying to talk about something that someone finds helpful somewhere.

SPEAKER_02 0:51

Go to Year ThroughTheBible.com and ask questions. Submit your questions because that really helps us know what you want to know about, particularly questions about the Bible. We actually get a lot of really good questions. Um I don't know if you know this, but like we'll get good questions that are more pastoral in nature. No, I don't know. How should I think about this with my brother or something like that, which is great. Um, or um one of the questions, does the symbolism of the goat by satanic followers and the horror film industry stem from the Jewish use of goats as the sin offering? Um I don't know the answer to that. I'm sure that answer can be known. That's not necessarily a Bible question, but it's a it's like a thinking about it, maybe even like a cultural exegesis question or something.

SPEAKER_01 1:44

I just want people to read through the Bible and not quit.

SPEAKER_02 1:46

Yeah. It's easy to quit. Well, so back to year through the Bible.com. There's resources on there, but really it's a way for you to interact with us. So um read, keep reading your Bible, keep reading along with us, and then ask questions. Ask questions about things that were confusing to you. Or, and it seems like we're getting better as a group. Um, group mean me and you, and then our listeners at asking good questions about the Bible. It's been fun. Um, but it seems like we were all on spring break this last week. Um, there were not as many questions this week to sort of guide where we're gonna go.

SPEAKER_01 2:20

So is it worth also clarifying that we're we can't address every question? Yeah, there's just too many, unfortunately. I wish we could. We just can't.

SPEAKER_02 2:29

Yeah. So the way we try to do this is you send in your questions. We will ask the ones that we feel like um A, we have good answers to, and B, we'll help the most amount of people on this show. And then um, most likely the other questions you'll get some type of response um from a pastor or something like that. I will say that we didn't necessarily plan when we started this year for the volume of questions that we got. And so we've even had to back off some of those email responses because we'd have an entire writing team uh doing this and we've got other ministry stuff to do.

SPEAKER_01 3:03

So um and also I think this isn't this is an important point. It's not wrong to ask questions, and particularly if it really kind of messes up your comprehension, but the questions will never be exhausted. That's why we are willing to say our pastors are not just going to answer questions because that because the purpose is not intellectual knowledge only. And there's always another thing that you don't understand that we don't understand. And so I'm just saying that to people to to let them be comfortable with not having every not every itch is going to be scratched when you work through it.

SPEAKER_02 3:38

There's just some mysterious stuff here. So I bet this is like Jeopardy, where we already gave the answer, but now we go back and ask ask the question. Here's a question that we did get, and it just popped into my head as you're talking. So Logan asks, um, after reading Matthew and wrapping up Mark, why does Jesus come at his adversaries by asking them rhetorical questions? Why do you call me Lord? Whose face is on this coin, etc. Especially considering he could have won any argument since he was God in the flesh. Why is this the way Jesus chose to confront a sinful world to ask a rhetorical question that exposes their lies, is what Logan says. Is this the style of apologetics we need to use in the world today? Um I have some thoughts on that, but I I figured you would as well. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:27

Well, the short and simple Sunday school answer, and forgive me, Logan, is to say Jesus did it because it was the right way to do it. Which is not to say it's the right way for us, but everything he did was the right way. It had to happen that way. We we have to believe that. It couldn't have been that he could have chosen something else. He chose that. So I feel confident that he did it the right way. Now, why is it right? Well, one thing he wants to really do is he eschews anybody else's definitions of him. And so by asking the question, he's not trapped into their box. We've we use this example on here, you know, are you still are you still shoplifting? You know, that question presupposes things. So I think he's allowing he's not allowing them to define him. Maybe that's why. And then he wants them to think. And then maybe Logan, yeah, I think apologetics, if it's meant to just help people with a sticky faith point, can be helpful. But if it's meant to convince, the way you convince people is they convince themselves. So the asking the question is helpful.

SPEAKER_02 5:24

Yeah. So this is something that I've I've I heard a while ago. I've really sat with it, and I think this could be helpful for Logan or whoever. I think we're made for discovery. I think that's I think we're we are made to discover. I think that's what's behind um the when the psalmist says that uh blessed is the man or woman who uh meditates on the law day and night, like you, you, you gnaw on it, you chew on it, you wrestle with it. The in Psalm one. I think it's what might be behind why didn't God just fix everything right after Adam and Eve messed everything up? Why, why take so long? I think there's something, and this is the most hallmark answer ever. There actually is something about the journey and the and the discovery. Um, we actually believe that theologically at our church, like God always has more for us as long as we're alive. Like there's something about the sanctifying um act of living a life lived in Christ. Like there's there's something there. So if if the Lord just wanted us to have all the right answers, he would have made us differently. We could just, we should we could just get the facts and download the answers and then we move on. So is this the style of apologetics we need to use in the world today? I mean, I guess. Like I I don't see that as like a some type of spiritual jujitsu that we're supposed to pull on people, but more so just you gotta let people sit in these these tensions that they're dealing with.

SPEAKER_01 6:59

Also why why do we think that the that what people most need is is knowledge, is intellectual answers. I mean, it doesn't seem to be true. So when you ask people the question, they need to do the work to get to that answer rather than being told the thing.

SPEAKER_02 7:14

Aaron Powell Well, and that's as evidenced by our modern technological advances. We have every more people in the world have every answer they could possibly need in the form of information at their fingertips and their phones on the internet. And we're we we can't possibly be less wise right now as a as a society, it seems like. So anyway, um Good question. Yeah, good question. I will say that that's part of reading through the entire Bible in a year, is is you're you're discovering, you're you're unearthing things, you're dusting off things, you're you find a hieroglyphic here and a confusing thing there, and you just sit with it and you file it away and you just keep moving.

SPEAKER_01 7:53

So it might be ne I don't want to overpromise, but it might be that next week we talk about some of the places where they are supposed to destroy all the village that they take over and devote them the the technical term is they say they're devoted to destruction. I think we'd I'd like to talk about that if I can do some work on it. Um but at the very least, what one needs to do as one reads the Bible is keep making connections and see the thing as a unified whole. So when you get to a point of the Bible that really bothers you, you can't drop that and forget about it when you come to the place of the thing that really blesses you. You gotta hold them both in tension.

SPEAKER_02 8:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:31

So you got to kind of work through the whole thing all together, which is gonna be helpful. So that's not those are not really intellectual answers. There's more like a process to it.

SPEAKER_02 8:40

Okay, so now on to the actual scriptures themselves. You have some things you've been learning in Deuteronomy, which as a and on our reading plan, we're not quite there yet, but we will be there soon. I have to kind of confess, just to wrap up numbers, reading through it this time, I don't know why it seems like this, but it almost seems as though they're getting ready to go into the promised land, and it feels fast to me. Like, right? So, so going back to Abraham, go to a land that I will show you. And it seems like going making it to the promised land as this distant thing that's going to happen way up, way down the line. And it was for obviously the people of God, thousands, you know, hundreds of years have passed or whatever it is. Um, but for me as a reader, I was really struck by the the kind of the ending of Numbers of chapters 34, 35, where where God is kind of saying, like, okay, um, when you get there, which is right around the corner, this is how you set life up, and this is who's gonna get an inheritance, and this is where everybody's gonna be, and this is how you set your cities up, and he gives them some more laws about about murder and oaths and different things like that. And then Deuteronomy is is Moses is like, okay, here's my farewell speech, and now we're now we're there. It just feels like wow, like we're actually already about to enter the promised land. Yeah, but of course it is 40 years have elapsed. For them, it doesn't seem right.

SPEAKER_01 10:08

For us, it's pretty quick because numbers, I don't know where out of the top of my head right now, but numbers has a couple of places basically between chapters where 40 years goes or 38 years goes. Uh it and it doesn't, but you read along, you read it, and it's just you flip the page. You're just kind of going. It's like one week to the next, 38 years have passed. So this is now the next generation, I guess, at the end of Numbers, and they're pre-prepared, and it's like, okay, you have to do it. Here's what you need to do, and they're being set up to do it.

SPEAKER_02 10:39

Deuteronomy begins like this these are the words that Moses spoke to all Israel beyond the Jordan in the wilderness, in the Arabah, opposite stuff between Peran, Tophel, Laban, Hezeroth, Dizerab. And then it goes on. But so is Deuteronomy actually is this Moses' farewell speech? Is that what is that kind of what this is? It is, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:02

And uh so in the Greek Bible they we use the in in English Bibles for the most part, we use the Greek uh translations of the names of the books of the Torah. Deuteronomy means second law because it's the second time Moses gives it. In Hebrew, the title of Deuteronomy is words. It's from the it's not literally the first word of the sentence each time, but it's like the primary idea from the sentence. So in Deuteronomy 1.1, these are the words that Moses spoke. So Deuteronomy is called words in Hebrew, which is kind of fun, kind of a fun name. Remember, we said Numbers is titled as in the wilderness. Exodus is names, which is fun. And uh Leviticus is and God spoke, and God said is the name of Leviticus. It's kind of weird. Yeah, so it's Moses' farewell speech. They've all gathered there. What's interesting is look at this. This is Deuteronomy 1.5. Beyond the Jordan in the land of Moab, Moses undertook to explain this law. So this is the first sermon in the Bible where Moses is interpreting and exhorting the people based on God's law. So it's the second law, but it's the second law given to the people the second time through the guy who was there the first time, right? Like there's interpretationary. That's why sometimes you go back and compare, there's slight differences because Moses is like, I need you to hear this part of it, and he's emphasizing different things. I think it's just kind of cool that Moses is under explaining God's revelation to the people. It's like a long sermon. At the very end when Moses dies, there's a little bit of narration, but for the most part, it's mainly Moses talking to the people.

SPEAKER_02 12:39

I guess you could I think about this sometimes in American history. We don't do we have we don't have any more World War I survivors, do we? The final You mean like servicemen? Like who are who are in World War I think? We wouldn't have that. Uh we do still have World War II. Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_01 13:02

Not many.

SPEAKER_02 13:03

Not many, but it's kind of like when you get to the final year, this is what this reminds me of. You get to the final years of these guys' lives, like you only have so much longer to hear it, to hear, to hear their accounts. And then everything you have after that is their journals or their kids or grandkids, the historical work they've done or whatever. I began to feel the the weight of that treasure when when these when I think I saw a news article one time that was like the last remaining survivor of World War I or something. This is a long time ago, of course. I imagine that must be what it what it must be like for the the heaviness of um Moses giving his farewell, being the one who who received the word from the Lord, and them knowing he's not going to be with them forever either. There must have been, I mean, there must have been a weightiness to this, to this, to this time for everybody.

SPEAKER_01 14:02

Well, at the end of Deuteronomy, it'll tell us that nobody's ever been like Moses. He's he is unique, he is a one-of-one category. So he's there talking to you. Yeah, you yeah. I mean, you'd you'd be afraid, I think. That's probably why Joshua hits so hard. Don't be because Joshua is Moses' successor. Can't be afraid. Now, Joshua's clearly in charge. No one ever questions Joshua's leadership, not really. He's not like one of these later kings where they're having rebellions, but he's no Moses. Yeah. It's not totally clear to me how old Joshua is. He's there when Moses goes up Mount Sinai the first time, but he could be like a young boy. He could be like a teenager. Yeah. Moses goes up the first time.

SPEAKER_02 14:39

I don't think it says it. It just seems like he's kind of a young guy. Yeah, right. For whatever reason.

SPEAKER_01 14:43

He definitely emphasizes that Caleb is an older guy. Caleb is the of the two faithful spies. Caleb is the older one. Well, the other thing that happens in Deuteronomy is Moses. So I'm I'm reading several weeks ahead in our one-year Bible, and you'll read this. Moses is constantly playing fast and loose with time frame and pronouns in Deuteronomy. So look at this. This is um Deuteronomy 119. Then we set out from Horeb. That's the other word, that's what Deuteronomy calls Mount Sinai and went through all that great and terrifying wilderness that you saw. Well, not everyone there would have seen that. Verse 20, and I said to you through this thing. Verse 22, then all of y'all came near to me and said this. So he's playing fast and loose. It's like the present, it's like this eternal present where they were there, which is kind of how we read the Bible today. We read ourselves back into it. It's like this constant story of God's people. I just think that's kind of fun. He's going back and forth all the time with the time frame.

SPEAKER_02 15:47

Is that a is that do you is that a Hebrew um? Because they often talk about the sins of the sins of the nation, the sins of of when maybe every literal person wasn't committing that particular sin, but but often it's the the sins of the entire people group that are being redeemed or being they're being punished for or whatever. Um you think there's some of that there where they see themselves as not just a collection of of thousands of individuals, but but but but as a unit. Part of the whole. I think so. So so if you're an Israelite and your grandfather saw something, you saw that thing because you're an Israelite, right? So I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 16:35

I just Well, certainly they Moses wants them to feel like that.

SPEAKER_02 16:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:40

And the Psalms do that all the time. We remember on the day that you did this and you brought us out of Egypt. And they the psalmist wasn't there when that's happening. Yeah. He's he's he's we're living. We did this with the where we did this is with the the Holy Communion liturgy, right? On the night in which Jesus gave himself up for us, he took bread, blessed it, broke it. We're reenacting the story. That's totally what they're doing in the Old Testament. Which brings us to Deuteronomy 6, which is that's the big thing. Deuteronomy 6, 4. Hero Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one, or the Lord alone, or there is none but the Lord, something like that. Uh you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your might, and these words that I command to be to be on your heart, teach them to your kids, talk of them, write them on your hands, let them be between your eyes, write them on the doorposts. It's like you can't forget this. You've got to remember this. You've got to do everything that you can. I didn't talk about this when I preached on this passage, but I think this is part of what's going on with the mark of the beast in Revelation 13. It's like a it's a demonic version of Deuteronomy 6. Like the be like because in a way, Deuteronomy 6 is where your loyalty is. God doesn't have a picture. So God's words you're holding tight on your hand. Whereas it's the beast's mark that's on your hand in Revelation 13. It's like the opposite of it, you know. Uh okay. I think that's what's going on there. Or or I don't think that's a bad connection to make. Let's put it like that.

SPEAKER_02 18:12

Yeah. Yeah. And the implication there is that you have agency. Yeah. You've allowed the mark. 100%. Or put it there yourself. That's absolutely the case in Revelation. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 18:22

Because the the the stuff.

SPEAKER_02 18:24

You weren't just walking around and and the beast stamped you like you like you've allowed this.

SPEAKER_01 18:29

Correct. And you could be the opposite. You could be diligently holding on to the words of the Lord in in the Shema in Deuteronomy 6. You could, if you wanted to be. It's up to you. Which one you want to go?

SPEAKER_02 18:45

Yeah. I want to hear some other thoughts that you have on Deuteronomy as you've been sort of studying ahead of us. I like this, I like uh in chapter six, verses ten through twelve, let's say. Um, and when the Lord your God brings you into the land that he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give you with great and good cities that you did not build, yeah, and houses full of all good things that you did not fill, and cisterns that you did not dig, and vineyards and olive trees that you did not plant, and when you eat and are full, then take care lest you forget the Lord who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. I love that it's just such a sobering, yeah, a sobering reminder that that all of us, none of us, you know, in the business world you hear a lot of these like self-made men or whatever, which is totally, just totally garbage. And I know that some people had hard upbringings and they really had to work hard and and kind of commit to themselves, like, hey, I'm not gonna go this way, I'm gonna go that way. I totally get all that. But oh my gosh, is it foolish to think that a self-made right person is even a thing? Um everything, everything is a derivative of of those who worked hard before us or were faithful before us or something like that. I just like that little reminder.

SPEAKER_01 20:07

Yeah, it's beautiful there. I uh to me, what I thought you were gonna say, what's sobering is verse 12 take care lest you forget the Lord. To me, and we're gonna see this when we get to judges and further on, and we see it in America. I literally think there is no way to avoid the trap of success breeds arrogance and complacency. I don't I don't think there's any way to avoid that trap. Uh uh cultural success, I mean social prosperity. We are so prosperous and so foolish now. And it was really, I wasn't alive, but it was really terrible in the depression. It was bad, like bad, bad, bad. But it produced good things in in people's hearts. And so what's gonna happen here is they go into this awesome land and they they screw it up, and then they cry out to God to save them and judges, and he'll do it, and then they screw it up again. It's like that's why we need Jesus to save us, which is what Moses ultimately goes to when he talks about having a new heart in Deuteronomy 30. That to me is this terrible part there. God's blessing them and they're gonna take it for granted. As they've already done in the Exodus. They've already complained about that, which is just remarkable.

SPEAKER_02 21:13

Well, and maybe this going back to something I mentioned a minute ago, you know, that kind of apologetic gotcha question, you know, why does God why didn't God just fix everything after Adam and Eve? Well, that wasn't his plan. Why is God then taking so long? Like, why is Jesus taking so long to come back? Well, there's something that God is doing, and he's he's been giving his covenant people the answers to the test since the beginning of time, and they've continued to to rebel. And then he's told them, You're rebelling because your hearts are hard, don't do that. I'm doing this. He's very explicit with them. And then we, to now lump us all in in the same the same boat, we continue to turn away. Right. So um, on one hand, you want to pray because of the state of the world. Come, Lord Jesus, like come quickly. But on the other hand, like it's a gift that we have tomorrow. Right. We have it's a gift should we have the day after tomorrow. Yeah, totally.

SPEAKER_01 22:10

Yeah, it's a huge gift. Yeah. Yeah, I guess, and I talked about this when I preached on this passage, but the thing that I think Christians should remember, and we can turn there now, Deuteronomy 30. Moses says, Deuteronomy 36, the Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your offspring, so that you will love the Lord your God with all your heart. So God will make it possible for you to love him, which is ultimately what the Holy Spirit does for those who are in Christ. I do think it's important for Christians to understand. So I said I don't know how to escape the trap socially of a prosperous nation, basically ruining its prosperity. But I do know how to avoid that personally, and that's by having the heart of the Spirit change your heart so that you can receive good blessings. So we we both know people who are successful financially, and they haven't been ruined by it because they're Christian people and God has given them the heart to know how to use it well. And I uh and so you don't want your kids to screw it up, but you also don't want them to take their blessings for granted. So we got to pray that God gives them the heart, that they can handle God's blessings well, right?

SPEAKER_02 23:15

Moses is kind of giving the second law or the law of the second time, or he's he is imparting his wisdom and what he knows from the Lord on this generation who would have been children or didn't exist yet when the first law was given. So we've already said on the on this episode that what a gift that is for this generation who is about to who is about to go into the land that um God said he would show Abraham. Yeah. He would show that he would show the people of Israel. And now and and they have this gift of Moses, who is there on Mount Sinai with the Lord, who is prepping them to go, but Moses is not going to make it with them. He's not. Is there anything else in Deuteronomy that sticks out to you that just that that is interesting? But really, how should we prepare to leave Deuteronomy and move into Joshua and the rest of the Bible? How should what should we be getting out of Deuteronomy as readers?

SPEAKER_01 24:14

I think it's really important to think of it being the second generation to hear it. I think that's really helpful as a reader. To that that helps me go, well, that's why they're repeating it, because these people didn't hear it the first time, or they were too young to get it. So that gives me more patience for what Moses is doing. And then to keep in mind the end of Deuteronomy when Moses dies also helps me understand, oh, that's why he's telling them all these things is he's not going to be with them ever again. He's given them his last will and testament. So if you turn, so there's some blessings at the end. I think I talked about this in a previous episode how the blessings of Jacob at the end of Genesis are mirrored by the blessings of Moses over the 12 tribes at the end of Deuteronomy. But Deuteronomy 34 is the final chapter, and it's just beautiful. Uh in fact, let's read it. 34.1. Moses went up from the plains of Moab to Mount Nebo to the top of Piscah, which is opposite Jericho, this mountain there. It's a real place you can go there. The Lord showed him all the land. The Lord said, verse 4, This is the land that I swore. I have let you see it with your eyes, but you shall not go over there. So Moses died in the land of Moab, and he was buried. Nobody knows where he was buried. Verse 7. He was 120 years old when he died. His eye was undimmed and his vigor unabated. And the people of Israel wept for Moses in the plains thirty days. And Joshua, the son of Nun, was full of the wisdom. Spirit of wisdom for Moses has laid his hands on him, so the people of Israel obeyed him and did they as they commanded. Here's the part I like. Verse 10. And there is not arisen a prophet since in Israel, like Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face. None like him for all the signs and wonders the Lord sent him to do in the land of Egypt, to Pharaoh and all his servants and to all the land, and for all the mighty power and all the great deeds of terror that Moses did in the sight of all Israel. So Israel, in its scripture, is still waiting at the time of Jesus for another one like Moses, which Jesus obviously steps into. That's what he is. But it also means, by the way, well, who wrote this? When was that written? Obviously, verse 11 is written from a much later period because it's from he's familiar, the writer, with all the future prophets and says there's not another prophet. So it can't have verse 11 cannot have been written the day Moses died, because you wouldn't know that there wouldn't be a prophet like Moses that would come. Yeah. Right? It's obviously a later reflection on this incredible guy.

SPEAKER_02 26:38

That's interesting. Is there any um is this one of the is this like a Bible nerd mystery? Like, do we not have any idea whatsoever where that would have been added? Correct. We don't well, we have ideas.

SPEAKER_01 26:51

Maybe somebody knows, or somebody has strong ideas. Yeah, nobody knows. Yeah. Our best guess is that the Bible, the way that we have it, takes place first during the exile and then when they return to the land with Ezra and those guys.

SPEAKER_02 27:04

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 27:04

And that makes complete sense. So the use of the World War II example. You didn't ask for Grandpa Joe's testimony of Omaha Beach in 1953. Nobody cared because there's those guys were all around. You asked for it in 1983 when they started dying. Yeah. So it's only when they leave the exile comes, which makes them reevaluate everything, and then they go back to the land, that's when you start going, oh, we got to get it all together. Yeah, we got to get this stuff down. So verse 11, 34, 11 is clearly a c a later uh editorial addition to whatever we have here. No, it's just cool. By the way, you know, remember back in Genesis, people want to know about uh the ages of the of the antediluvian patriarchs. This is why I think those ages are supposed to be strange because notice what it goes out of the way to say here, verse 7, 34. Moses is 120, but his eye was sharp, then he was strong. In other words, they were expecting a 120-year-old man to have poor vision and be uh infirm. So there's something Moses' age is more like our normal ages now. It's where we kind of are.

SPEAKER_02 28:04

Man, but even just reading that, I have not made it this far because I'm not reading that far ahead. Um, when you go back to everything that seems to have happened in Moses' lifetime, it's incredible. 120 years just does not seem like a very long time at all. Yeah, I know. For for everything that happened, going all the way back to the basket arc that he was in in the river, to Pharaoh, the burning bush, to the Red Sea, to the wilderness, the 40 years of I mean, just all of that is just absolutely staggering, the amount of stuff he did and that he sort of presided over and was in what a life.

SPEAKER_01 28:40

Yeah, and I I st I'm not comfortable with why he gets busted and he can't go to the Promised Land. It's still strange to me. This is in uh in earlier numbers. But in a way, it's appropriate that he dies here. It's like his, his, his, his length with the baton is done and he has to hand it off.

SPEAKER_02 28:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 28:57

He did all this, brought him right to the edge, and then he dies. It seems unfair, but you have to die sometime, and that's Moses's part piece. I think it's cool when it says we don't know where he was buried. Because clearly people must have walked around trying to find it, and God has hidden it. Because you know why? Because they don't want it to be a place where you're like like worshiping Moses. Yeah. Like right.

SPEAKER_02 29:19

And I guess it seems like these great patriarchs, they are kind of in charge up until their very end. For sure, Moses is, right? Um I mean I I shouldn't open this can, but it just seems like the next generation takes over after the generation before them has passed on, or whatever. Um we see we saw with Jacob and his boys there was a lot of jockeying for position and stuff like that. But really, at least as the as it's written, the new the new era begins when the when the patriarch passes or whatever. And so the queen.

SPEAKER_01 29:59

She has to die before Charles becomes king.

SPEAKER_02 30:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:02

Deuteronomy 18, 15 is maybe worth wrapping up on. Okay. Uh the Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from among your brothers. It is to him you shall listen, just as you desire to the Lord your God at Horeb on the day of the assembly, when you said, Let me not hear the voice of the Lord lest I die. So we're still the Old Testament is still waiting for the prophet like Moses to arise. So again, going back to Jesus, that's why he gives the sermon on the mountain. Moses Matthew wants us to see Jesus as the new Moses, the new and better Moses, giving the law on the mountain to the people gathered around him. That it's you're waiting until Jesus comes that in Deuteronomy 18 15 is fulfilled. Because nope, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Isaiah, nobody even implies that they're like, oh, this is like the new Moses. Yeah. David has some moments, but not really. David doesn't really give law, as I as that I can think of, off the top of my head.

SPEAKER_02 31:02

And even among the people, they would they would kind of know, like, well, this guy's not like Moses. No.

SPEAKER_01 31:06

Who's like Moses?

SPEAKER_02 31:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 31:08

I really I think this time reading through it, I've really come to love Moses. I really like him. I think he's just a cool guy. I like he makes comments and he gets gets frustrated and all. That's why my heart grieves for him that he didn't get to see the Promised Land, but it's not his thing. I feel like I'm always quoting the Narnia books because over the past 15 years I've read them a couple of times with different generations of children. And Caspian, did you guys you guys finish the Dawn Treader? Remember, Caspian wants to No. We're in we're in the middle of it. Remember, spoil it? No. Yeah, you can spoil it. We've read it before, but I don't know. So Caspian wants to sail to the end of the world. He wants to see the basically God's country. Because in their in their cosmology, you can sail far enough and get there. And he kind of becomes tyrannical about it. And the lion speaks to Aslan and I mean speaks the lion speaks to Caspian and kind of shames him. And he repents. And he's like, I'm not supposed to go. I'm doing the wrong thing by trying to get to God's country. And that's a little bit what's going on with Moses. Like, Moses is not for you. This, you know what this reminds me of? This is Peter and John in John 21. And in Peter, he says, John's not gonna, he's gonna live a long time. Well, what about him? What's his story? Yeah. Right? And Jesus says, It's not your not your job, Peter. Don't worry about it. Yeah, yeah. It's not your thing.

SPEAKER_02 32:28

Yeah. Okay. Um, Old Testament. For me, so this this we probably will not. Will we talk about Deuteronomy again on on this podcast? Well, I think I want to no, no.

SPEAKER_01 32:42

We probably won't do that. Probably not, because we have Easter in there and some weird dates. We will right after Easter, this is gonna be fun. The week of Easter, we begin Joshua, which is a perfect thing to begin with new people coming coming to Easter. So it's possible we might talk a little bit about Deuteronomy, but the way Easter falls and the other things we want to talk about, we may not really hit it.

SPEAKER_02 33:04

Probably not in depth. So what that means for for our dear listener and those who are following along is that's the Torah.

SPEAKER_00 33:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 33:12

That's that's it. That's the that's the Torah. We've we have finished um the law, and now we're moving on to another sort of era or another another section of the Bible.

SPEAKER_01 33:23

And it'll be obviously different. As soon as you get to Joshua, it's obviously different. You can just tell. So the Torah is a unified work. It's obvious. Like I think we talked about this. How the Genesis begins within the next four books begin with the word and. It's clearly a sequel. It's Star Wars episode one, two, three, four, five. It's obviously that. Moses is the main character of from Exodus chapter two in the bull rushes. Moses is the main character other than the Lord, all the way through to the end. It's a relatively short historical period. It's a couple generations worth. They don't move that far. They move, Genesis ends in Egypt with Joseph being a mummy. And now we are not that far away, uh, about to go into the promised land.

SPEAKER_02 34:07

Yeah. Well, and even in like Leviticus, like they're they're in like one spot. They don't move at all the whole time. Right. Yeah. Okay. Let's finish here. Let's let's finish with a question. Um, I mentioned this when we were before we had started recording. I think this is a pretty good question. Remember, um, we're reading the one-year Bible format, which means there's an Old Testament, a New Testament, a Psalm, and a Proverb every day. Um I have tended to kind of, I wouldn't say gloss over the Psalms. I read the literal words, but I don't put a lot of reflection into them. Part of it's because my mind had been in the Old Testament. We're trying to do this thing, you know, whatever. But Corey asks, as I've been reading through the Psalms this time, what has really stood out to me is how much the psalmists are asking God to see what the wicked are doing and to act. I know about the imprecatory psalms, but cursing psalms. Mm-hmm. But there are so many more that, quote, reference the wicked and the need for God's intervention, she says. How do we balance this with Jesus' teaching to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us, along with Paul's admonition to bless and not curse those who persecute us? We also have the parable of the persistent widow, which teaches believers to cry out for justice and to not give up. Given all this, what should our prayers for our enemies look like? Is it wrong to pray that God would, quote, break the arms of the wicked? So, okay, very simply, A, how do we pray? What's what does right prayer look like? Maybe would be a way to think about this. And then also, there seems to be a conflict between the Psalms, if this is the prayer book of God's people, and then how Jesus says to pray.

SPEAKER_01 36:13

Yeah. Well, it raises the question: what is prayer? What's its purpose? So I don't want mean to sound um supercilious towards people when I say what I'm about to say, but I I've often felt this more with men than women. But sometimes guys say, Do you pray for the I just pray for God's will to be done. I just pray for God's will. When they say that, what they mean is they have no living relationship with the Lord. They are not yielded to God when they say that. God, nevertheless, but my will, thy not my will, but thy will be done. What they're saying is, I don't actually think about God and I don't care when you say that. Relationship requires you to share what's on your heart. So even Jesus, by the way, he says, Let the cup pass from me, but nevertheless, not my will, but thy will be done, right? So he's praying what's on his heart. So the most important thing, prayer is honest relationship between you and the Lord. Prayer is this constant relationship between you and the Lord. And you cannot have an relationship based on dishonesty, which means you have to pray what's actually top of mind on uh or at the top of your heart. You can't do anything else. So the Psalms are there to give us the direction how to pray our emotions. They're teaching us to pray through our emotions because emotions will kill you if you keep them in. So in the old cowboy shows and you get bitten by a rattlesnake, your partner comes along and he takes his buoy knife out and he cuts out the thing and sucks out the venom. That's the purpose of the psalm. So, and this is not the attitude of Corey's question at all, but sometimes modern American Christians, we can clutch our pearls and we're all aghast, they pray about enemies. That's because we don't know what it's actually like. You know who know what this psalm is like are the people in northern Nigeria, where the um Boko Haram guys come in and rape all the schoolgirls and kill the boys and cut off their heads and burn your church. And then to sit down and act like the oh kumbaya, whatever. It's so, it's so ignorant and immature. So the Psalms are a way to pray what's actually on your heart. And what happens is when you pray what's on your heart, you open yourself up to the grace of God. So if I'm praying constantly, I want a Lexus, I want a Lexus, I want a Lexus, I want a Lexus, after a while, I'll hear myself going, all I ever pray is for a luxury car. Oh my gosh, what's the state of my heart? What can happen is for me to go, when I'm thinking about a car all the time, oh God, whatever you want, because that's actually setting up a barrier between me and the Lord. So the Psalms give us an honest way to pray. Now, Jesus says in the Sermon on the Mount, um, you've heard it said, uh, you know, love your neighbor, love your friends, and hate your enemy. But I say to you, love your enemy, because then you will be like your father in heaven who sends the rain on the just and the unjust. So Jesus says, God's trying to work for the good of everyone, to love is to will the good of the other, and God is trying to work for the good even of his enemies. So you can't love your enemy while he's currently torturing or abusing you unless you've gained a lot of spiritual maturity. So the psalms give me a way to get the hatred out of my heart, because if it stays in my heart, my heart goes gangrenous and I die. I get it out, and then I can come to the place where I say, God, I hope you can try to bring him to a good thing. That's that's how I would answer the question. It's a great question. And that's why the Psalms are so important to us, I think.

SPEAKER_02 39:21

Yeah, I mean, I would say, I would say in my own prayer life, the times where I have probably seen the most um breakthrough is probably an overused word for what I'm about to say, but but um I'll literally just say, Lord, I don't want to do this thing. Yeah, I don't like it. I know your word says I'm supposed to have this posture toward this person, but quite frankly, Lord, I just don't.

SPEAKER_01 39:51

I hate them.

SPEAKER_02 39:51

I can't, I don't want it. I'm sorry for that, Lord, but it is what it is right now. Like those are the times my prayer life has been at its best, I would say.

SPEAKER_01 40:02

You're being honest before the Lord.

SPEAKER_02 40:04

I'm not trying to um, I mean, think about the this is definitely not what Corey is saying, but it just think about the foolishness of trying to like fake it with the Lord. Right. Like to to say, oh Lord, bless this person. When you have this, just this black hatred. Maybe there's even a time where you're just as a discipline, just say just forcing yourself to say, Lord, please bless this person. The next day, you're Lord, Lord, please bless this person. Maybe there's some spiritual discipline in that. I know for me, um, I think back to Jesus when Jesus said, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? If, or um, if it be your will, pass or pass, let this cut pass from me, nevertheless, your will be done. Like even God in the flesh um was praying earnestly and and honestly with the Father. Like, Lord, I don't want to do this thing.

SPEAKER_01 40:58

Um because their relationship is based on honesty. So imagine tell me about your friends. Well, I don't really talk about what I really think about with my friends. What? Yeah, we we don't talk about that. Everybody would know it's not a real friendship. Tell me about your marriage. Well, I actually don't really share what I'm really thinking with my spouse because blah, blah, blah. So the idea that then prayer could be anything but complete honesty. So the Psalms are there to be honest. And either you have a very blessed, sheltered life, or you're not old enough to have encountered actual enemies, but you will. And part of it is we're so wealthy as Americans, uh, Christians around the world have no problem knowing who their enemies are.

SPEAKER_02 41:36

And they pray it. And we and we know from before the Psalms would have been written that God was looking for someone after his own heart. And and and somehow David had that, despite his his ups and downs and his um difficult choices and all the things that he did to screw everything up. Somehow he was a man after God's own heart, and it has a, I think it has a lot to do with how he prayed, probably.

SPEAKER_01 41:59

It does. And okay, let's close with this. This is a thing I don't know a whole lot about. I've learned a little bit about. There are 150 Psalms. They have obviously been arranged in the order they've been arranged. It's not random. There are five books in the Psalter. There are five books in the Torah. Psalms one and two. Psalm one is about an individual man's prayer. Psalm two is about the geopolitics rebelling against God, set the whole tone. So my point would also say you also, just like you can't take one verse and it meet speak for the whole Bible, you can't take one Psalm. So the other thing I'd say to Corey is you've got to read all the psalms together, which will also lead you to a different place. So the point of this, and the moral of the story is keep reading your Bible. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 42:46

Amen to that. Well, that's been uh this time's episode. I think we've covered what we wanted to cover. Again, uh, go to year through the Bible.com. Please, please, please ask your questions. Send us things that are interesting to you. Um, we've even gotten a few non-questions that are just like, hey, you know, love what you guys are doing. I found this interesting, thought you would too. That's great too. Interact with us uh on our website. We want to know what you're thinking as you're reading through the Bible. Uh, and then until next time, my name is Rodney. I'm Andrew, and we'll see you soon. We'll see you again.