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0:30
(Music)
0:50
This is Undaunted Life, a man's podcast.
0:53
I'm your host Kyle Thompson.
0:55
Let's get into it.
0:56
Welcome back to the forging table.
0:58
The mission of Undaunted Life is equipping men to push back darkness with
1:00
content that forges spiritual, mental, and physical resilience.
1:03
At the forging table, you'll see a group of regular guys forging spiritual resilience
1:06
by digging into God's Word.
1:07
Welcome back to the forging table.
1:15
The mission of Undaunted Life is equipping men to push back
1:18
darkness with content that forges spiritual, mental, and physical resilience.
1:21
At the forging table, you'll see a group of regular guys forging spiritual resilience
1:24
by digging into God's Word.
1:25
And we're welcoming all of you to come along on that journey with us.
1:27
We're going out of order.
1:28
That's Derek.
1:28
That's Adam.
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That's Russell.
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Just got to keep you guys on your toes.
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Guys, we're launching in here.
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We're going to get right into the Scripture because there's a lot to talk about in Acts 16.
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So Adam, how about you lead us off.
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Let's read the first five verses of Acts 16.
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Paul came also to Derby and to Lystra.
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And a disciple was there named Timothy, the son of a Jewish woman who was a believer.
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But his father was a Greek and he was well spoken of by the brethren who were there in Lystrom
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and Iconium.
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Paul wanted this man to go with them.
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And he took him and circumcised him because of the Jews who were in those parts.
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For they all knew that his father was a Greek.
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Now, while they were passing through the cities, they were delivering the decrees,
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which had been decided upon by the apostles and elders who were in Jerusalem for them to observe.
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So the churches were being strengthened in the faith and were increasing in number daily.
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So there's a lot here.
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So Timothy has introduced the scene.
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This is the same Timothy of First and Second Timothy.
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So this is going to be Paul's main pupil as we see it leads throughout scripture.
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This is the last two towns in Galatia that were visited on the first missionary journey.
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So Timothy and his mom were very likely converted when Paul previously had come
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through that city about five years prior to that.
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So that was one thing I found interesting is I was digging through the commentaries.
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But here's the biggest thing.
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So you got Timothy whose mom was Jewish, but his dad was Greek, which was an asset for
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the types of ministry that they were doing.
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But I had a lot of heartburn over this section because I was like, did we not just watch these
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people at the Jerusalem Council go crazy?
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And he hires Timothy.
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It's like, all right, man, got to cut off some of that skin, get over here.
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And I was like, wait a minute.
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What?
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So the stock commentary said this.
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Once the principal had been established, that circumcision was not necessary for salvation.
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He was ready to make concessions in policy.
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What was unnecessary for acceptance with God was advisable for acceptance by some human beings.
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I didn't find that to be a compelling enough argument for me here.
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And so I reached out directly to Joby Martin and Matt Chandler to be like, hey,
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I got a major problem here.
3:31
Like I've seen some of the commentaries and explanations, but none of these,
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it seemed like they were, they were going to be offending the Jews.
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And so they were very, very concerned about potentially offending the Jews.
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And so ultimately between the two of them, they helped me realize it's like,
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no, it's just about getting access to rooms.
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And so Timothy was not going to be given access to the synagogues to speak
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if he had not been circumcised.
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Like they would not have just accepted.
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Oh, well, my mom's Jewish.
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And so essentially it all boiled down.
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I mean, I was, I had heartburn over this for a couple of days as I was trying to like,
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figure it out, but they really just helped me see like this was about access.
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So it's like, they weren't saying, Hey, we're going back on.
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We literally just argued for the Jerusalem council.
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It just, Hey, we're doing this so that the gospel can be preached.
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It just kind of is what it is.
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Do you think this falls in lines with what Craig Rochelle life church says that
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they will do everything short of sin to bring believers to Christ?
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I think, yeah, I mean, I remember him saying that and being like a big advocate for that
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type of thing, the issue is, is where do they draw that line?
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Because there's someone directly on that staff, one of the higher ups as well,
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that would just cost like a sailor, like in the middle of church.
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And one day I kind of asked him about like, I mean, why are you doing that so much?
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And he's just like, yeah, I just talked this way so that non-Christians will be
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comfortable around me.
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So they don't think I'm just judging them.
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And it's like, do everything short of sin to make sure people can hear the gospel.
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And it's like, that, that is not short of sin there.
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Like I think you are purposely sinning because you think it's going to make people feel comfortable,
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but I think it might be having the opposite effect.
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He sort of seemed parallel though to me because it's like, obviously, circumcision is not needed
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for salvation, but they're deciding to do it so that he can, like you said, get in the door.
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Same thing we're going to do using life church's motto.
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We're going to do things that seem racy, that seem strange, that seem unusual, that seem uncomfortable,
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but it's not technically a sin.
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And we're doing it to, again, try to get people in our door that otherwise would not come in our door.
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I think the important distinction between the two of those though has to be the idea that
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the circumcision was more towards the vein of righteousness to these people
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than he was being asked to be unrighteous.
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Does that make sense?
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It does.
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So like the language or something like that could be considered like you were now leaning towards
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the world, whereas this time they were trying to lean towards the Old Testament to try to give
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him access.
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I do wonder what the door check was policy was.
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That's what I was thinking too.
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Like, yeah, I'm sorry if we're not, I mean, or did they just process work?
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Was Paul just like, hey man, I'm just not glory hole.
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That's on the outside of the church.
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Or what?
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It's one way.
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It's one way of doing it.
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I'm not saying that they did do that.
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That's that is one way.
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I'm just saying, you know, like the idea that Paul was so committed to is like,
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hey man, I know we could probably just tell people that we had this done,
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but and I really, I do not want to be guilty of committing a lie.
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You know, I'm that serious about this.
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So yeah, just go ahead and do it.
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Like, nobody will probably check, but later on at other places, you know,
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when you go over there, depending on where they were, there are certain areas that
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the men would have been completely nude in certain societal times.
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Now I don't know about the Jewish men if they would have
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per taken in some of those areas, but people would have known.
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Practically speaking, his father was Greek.
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So I was thinking through this and I was a bit, I bet he looked Greek.
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He probably had Greek features and they would have just presumed he's probably not
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circumcised because of the way he looks.
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Right.
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Yeah.
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So you think it's like TSA and they're like,
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I bet it's a bunch of Pharisees and they're going to be judgmental the second you walk in
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a synagogue and this Greek man comes in.
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They're going to immediately assume that dude's not us.
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Yeah.
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So and also at this time in history, there's not a lot of mingling of races in terms of
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relationships.
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And so it's like, if you're Ethiopian, you look Ethiopian, if you're like,
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there's not a whole lot of people like, I wonder, because, you know,
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I've got plenty of friends where it's like, you can't just pick that is,
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that is a Eastern European bubble.
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Or this is like somebody from South America, like it's,
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it's kind of hard to tell where people come from, especially now.
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It says, for they all knew that his father was a Greek and it could either be,
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they knew that because they personally knew him or I took it more of,
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they knew that because it was obvious the way he looked like ginger.
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Your skin doesn't tan, right?
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So I'm obviously Mexican.
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The funny story about that, actually, I was sitting at a restaurant and somebody,
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I was just playing around like, there's this, there's this gal that this,
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this family had kind of taken under their wing.
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And so she and I are just like having a, having a fun little interaction at lunch.
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And I tried to convince her that I was Mexican.
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And she was just like, and I could tell she was uncomfortable by the whole thing.
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Cause she's like looking at me and I'm like, what do you mean?
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I'm not Mexican.
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Like just because I look this way.
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And the people that were in the table next to us, like they started like laughing
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and when they got up to leave, this lady walks over to me.
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She goes, and they were Mexican.
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She goes, this is actually a picture of my brother.
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And her brother looks exactly like me.
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Like completely translucent skin, red beard, the whole thing.
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So he was a Mexican ginger.
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And then I talked about Canelo.
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I was like, you see little girl, you can't always assume things.
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But I didn't find it kind of interesting.
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So when Victor Marks was on the show a few months back, he was talking about how,
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you know, the government or different agencies and culturally, they're like,
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they're worried about men, you know, being dangerous.
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And we're just dangerous by virtue of being men, whether we train to be.
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And so it's like, hey, if the culture thinks we're dangerous, we might as well be dangerous.
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And so that's the one thing that I find interesting about this whole discussion about,
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you know, we're going to do anything short ascend to make sure people accept the gospel
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and things like that.
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It's like, but the way you're doing it is trying to seem as much as possible like the culture.
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You're producing music like the culture likes to absorb.
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You're doing talks that most people on culture are okay absorbing kind of this TED talk style.
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And it's like the churches that are really thriving today are not the ones that are going
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woke. Those ones are dying on the vine.
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It's the churches that are really weird.
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They sing, you know, hymns.
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They sing songs that you never hear on the radio, even positive encouraging,
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you know, Christian radio.
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And they're just going boringly verse by verse through the Bible trying to explain
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what the heck it means, exegeating it, not isegeating it.
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So again, I have concerns about people that they're, they're really concerned about the
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sneakers they're wearing while they're preaching.
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They're not as concerned about the content and whether or not they're giving a false gospel
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or a full-throated version of the real gospel.
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That makes sense.
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That's part of an issue for me.
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I don't know how you guys follow on that.
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I mean, thoughts, Derek, I'm pointing at you now because you were defaulting everybody else.
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I'm forcing you to talk, do it.
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What was the question again?
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No, no, you were hurting.
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But like, I mean, what are your thoughts on that?
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Because I, we go to a pretty traditional church.
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That's kind of down the center of that.
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If you take someone that's like straight up secular and an unchurched person,
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they're going to walk in and be like, this is kind of strange.
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It's like, yeah, it's strange.
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It's different.
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It's supposed to be.
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We see the same thing at crossings where the Sunday school ministry that I talked about
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last week or the week before.
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That is something that is old school that's like Sunday school.
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Do people still do that?
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Did you all just doing a little retro thing or whatever?
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But the idea that there is something about the teaching that people need to be fed.
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And there's other styles that I feel like have other reasons that do their purpose,
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but definitely for a lot of churches they're seeing,
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there's some real growth happening in the teaching of the word and that type of setting.
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Sunday school, discipleship, whatever you want, like a really in-depth.
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Doesn't have to always come from the pulpit.
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There are some places that do it differently, but the in-depth study,
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people seem to be hungry for it.
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You bailed you out temporarily, but now you have to talk, Derek.
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What is your opinion?
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I've got to agree.
11:22
Oh, you can't just say that.
11:24
You can't just say that.
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You have to agree and then reword it in your own way.
11:27
Give me the question again.
11:32
No, I was basically the overall thought is like when churches try to be like the culture,
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when they try to, you know, the music and the sermon style, it's just like,
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okay, I can see why you would do that, but that's coming more from like a growth mindset.
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You're thinking like a business owner, not necessarily pastor is what I was thinking.
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Yeah, that's more like a seeker friendly, get them in, not build the discipleship.
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Maybe is what we're looking at there.
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Yeah, I'm on the side of, maybe it is a little weird to go sit in a Sunday school class and meet
12:02
these people that you're going to go, but that's to build that relationship.
12:07
To build that, I don't know what you call it, just group that you're going to go through life
12:11
together. Well, is it weird to have a Sunday school class or is it weird to call it something
12:17
dumb like our church, which is adult Bible fellowship? I am going to keep beating this drum as long
12:23
as possible because I know people from our church listen to this. What exactly is an adult Bible
12:27
fellowship? Because then you start describing it and it sounds a whole heck of a lot like a
12:31
Sunday school class. Enough with this nonsense. It's not a ABF. It's a Sunday school class. Maybe
12:35
they didn't want to call it an SS or something like that, but that's just what it is. What's wrong
12:38
with these people? I don't know. Come on, help me. It's not me. We call it Sunday school.
12:42
It was weird when I first got there. I was like, all right, we'll give it a try. Now it's
12:46
by far my favorite piece of the church. I did want to say on the circumcision thing, I was reading
12:52
in the commentary that under the Jewish law, because his mom was Jewish. So his dad was Greek,
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his mom was Jewish, would have made him Jewish. That makes me wonder if part of this
13:06
was Paul just trying to overcome some damage that had already been done in the community,
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where Timothy was supposed to be Jewish, but had not already protected in this.
13:17
There's some little caveat there that says that by their law, he should have already been Jewish.
13:25
Why was a new circumcised? Maybe he just wanted Timothy to have some
13:30
skin in the game. Maybe anybody? Anybody? BAM, BAM got you. Maybe they had just adjudicated
13:36
this and he didn't want to go down that road again. He was like, you know what? I'm not going to
13:40
have this argument again. Just go chop it off. You'll be fine. He'll be up in two days. Wait,
13:44
wait, let's talk about the best thing on. He'll be good. Let's go. Or is it one of those hazing
13:48
deals that he was like, yeah, yeah, go do it. He turns around and starts having a conversation
13:52
with somebody else. He turns back around to me, is like, I did it. He was like, no, no, no.
13:55
I have not. I've heard of some bad hazing. That's a different level of hazing. It's like,
14:02
I don't want to be in this group. If this is required, like Barnabas, did you hear what I got
14:06
the new guy to do? You're not going to believe this. Maybe that's one of the things that are
14:10
going to be revealed to us in heaven is like, yeah, that was totally necessary. He totally got him.
14:15
All right. I'll read this next section here because you all give me crap for never reading
14:18
because this is just a little short section and I want to get into the conversion of Lydia. So,
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this is starting in verse six. And they went through the region of Pergia and Galatia, having
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been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia. And when they had come up to Mysia,
14:32
they attempted to go into Bithynia, but the spirit of Jesus did not allow them. So passing by Mysia,
14:39
they went down to Troas and the vision appeared to Paul in the night, a man of Macedonia was
14:44
standing there urging him and saying, come over to Macedonia and help us. And when Paul had seen
14:49
the vision immediately, we saw it to go on into Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to
14:54
preach the gospel to them. So this is across the Aegean Sea. This is about 150 miles by sea.
15:00
There's the only thing I wanted to kind of talk about here because I thought it was such an
15:04
interesting note and I had never heard this before. But going back to verse nine, this is the vision
15:07
and it was a man of Macedonia. There's conjecture that this man was actually Luke,
15:14
because again, he's kind of having this vision, but one of the man was Luke because Luke was from
15:18
Macedonia. And then I even saw someone said that this was actually Alexander the Great.
15:23
And so that that was the vision because Alexander the Great from Macedonia, Alexander the Great
15:28
died like somewhere between 300 and 400 years before this is all going down in this area. So I
15:33
didn't know if y'all had seen anything else there, but some of the commentaries I read, I was like,
15:36
that is really interesting. Like what if somehow Alexander the Great is part of this whole story,
15:41
again, it's not explicitly put here. So we're just, you know, we're having fun playing conjecture
15:45
here, but didn't know if y'all had seen anything like that. Nope. No, what is the movie where they
15:51
put the put the lemon stuff on it? It leads them to treasure map. National treasure. I feel like
15:56
that's like a little. Does anyone have any living? Maybe we can put it on. Is that why I tried it?
16:01
Nope. Nope. I haven't heard anything about that. We did skip over the, you know, him,
16:08
them not preaching to the age, the, any of the Asian countries, which I stumbled over that a
16:12
couple of times. I was like, well, why, why didn't he go? That doesn't make sense. And most of what
16:16
I read said it was just more of a him being faithful to what God told him to do. And God knew that he
16:25
needed to go to Macedonia and Paul didn't know that yet. It was more of a test. Are you going to
16:29
be faithful and listen to me and continue on? Don't preach here. You're not, you're not called to
16:34
preach here. You're going to be called somewhere else, but Paul had to go out on faith, continue going,
16:38
continue going, then he got the vision and then he went. Well, and speaking of things like testing
16:43
and things that are appropriate, something that I noticed even recently about you, Adam, is that
16:48
I didn't think you were this type of guy, but you're apparently the type of guy that leaves his
16:53
stickers on his flat bill hats. So no, let's, let's just show that off for the camera. So that bill
17:00
has no bend in it whatsoever. And you left the sticker on it. Everyone knows that that's a type
17:05
of guy, the guy that leaves a sticker on. What exactly happened? I didn't know about that until
17:10
this very moment. Look, it's, it's the exact same color as the hat, but it's a stick. I don't own a
17:15
hat that has a sticker on it until now. Well, we can fix this. We can fix this. Sure. If you
17:21
want to take it off, I think you should just lean into it. Just be the guy that you want to wear it
17:24
kind of crooked a little bit too. See how that goes? No, there we go. We're going to put this on
17:28
your skin. All right. Very good. All right. And I'll keep it. I'll hang on to it for the rest of
17:31
this recording. You waited so long to bring that up. Well, I had forgotten about it. I completely
17:36
whiffed on it. And then I looked at Adam and I realized how dumb his head looked because he had
17:39
a hat with a sticker on it. It's like, I just couldn't let it go at that point. You're hilarious.
17:42
Are you ever going to let that happen again? No, I don't think we should either. At least it wasn't
17:47
a big gold one, like on the new era hats or something like that. That one would have been
17:50
impossible to ignore. So anything else in this section? No, well, Adam, actually, like in all
17:54
seriousness, to go back to your point, I think part of it is like, okay, well, why does God
17:58
hate the Asians or something like that? No, no, no, it's like timing. Timing is everything.
18:03
The right people and the right places at the right time. It goes back to what we were discussing
18:07
last week is like, okay, is this descriptive or prescriptive? Are these words being given to a
18:11
particular group at a particular time in history for a particular reason so that they can be a
18:15
particular outcome? And I think that this all kind of goes in here. But also, I think I may
18:19
mention it last week, it's like the ministry had moved out of Asia was moving into Europe
18:27
with eyes on Rome, like all roads are kind of leading to Rome for Paul here. And so I think
18:32
that that's important as well. And again, my ways are not your ways, like, okay, he didn't say,
18:38
don't go speak to the Asians because I hate them. Like it's like, no, it's kind of like,
18:42
not now, not you kind of a thing. All right, there's a lot of just to remind that this talks
18:48
about the so like we kind of glaze over the idea that it says the Holy Spirit instructed them and
18:52
things like that. Again, we're reading the acts of the Holy Spirit. If we really look closely and
18:57
this, they are doing some very crazy things on where they're going, how they're going,
19:02
who they're choosing to speak to. And again, we're reading over those little comments they're like,
19:07
and they consider the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit told them to do this. And that's just kind of
19:10
a segue into what they do next. That was that was an actual prayer time they were having there. There
19:17
was a lot going on with them to where they were in full communion with the Holy Spirit. And that's
19:22
just something neat to really look at in all these things is that we are still, we're watching these
19:27
two people, but we don't need to forget that we're really watching the Holy Spirit. And it has a plan
19:33
and has this stuff. And some of this, like you said, like almost a test, like sometimes pastors,
19:38
whoever it is, like they will get called to a specific ministry. And they think that that is
19:43
blanket forever to do on everybody versus staying in the same communion that called you to that
19:49
ministry to make sure that you're in the right place at the right time, doing what you should be
19:53
doing. And that's not a cop out to say, well, God didn't tell me specifically to share the gospel,
19:58
this person, so I don't have to do it. But also just be aware, again, that that idea of have margin
20:03
to make an adjustment or to be asking the spirit, am I still doing what you want me to be doing?
20:09
Well, and Russ, who are we to question what the Holy Spirit told someone 2000 years ago?
20:13
So this was kind of a point I made. There was a ministry I helped with,
20:16
helped launch, you know, years before and on, life was a thing. And they would just basically
20:20
repackage John Eldridge content and, you know, do these camps and things like that. And that's all
20:24
they ever wanted to do. And, you know, so we would hit play on these John Eldridge videos,
20:29
which makes sense. But one thing that they would also do is they would push play on John Eldridge
20:33
prayers. And I remember throwing it out there, I was like, okay, this is a video of John Eldridge
20:38
praying in front of a group of guys like 10 years ago. And he's, he's doing one of John Eldridge's,
20:43
he's a long poetic, flowery kind of prayer guy, right? He was going off what he was feeling in the
20:51
room and what the Holy Spirit was communicating to him. And I'm like, guys, we need to do that
20:54
live in our rooms. We got some prayer gangsters on our crew. We need those guys to be praying
21:00
live because like, we don't know what the Holy Spirit was communicating to John Eldridge in that
21:04
moment. And the only hints we get are the words he used in his own prayer. But that was a different
21:08
group, different time, different contexts, different part of the world. Like we, we're in this now,
21:14
like we have guys that are in the fight right now. And we need, we need frontline prayer warriors
21:19
praying for these people in this exact moment. And the same thing would apply now. Like, who,
21:23
if you were to question what the Holy Spirit was telling those prayer warriors a week from then,
21:28
you know, 10 days from then or 2000 years from then, it's like, okay, have fun with that. Like,
21:33
if you're trying to assume, you know, what the Holy Spirit was communicating and how you would
21:36
also do it better. They were reached. God had a plan. Peter wrote, wrote to the churches there.
21:41
So I mean, like, again, the idea that like, sometimes we think we're the big deal about the
21:46
whole thing and be like, well, if I don't do it, nobody's going to do it. Well, God has his ways
21:50
to use a lot of people and a lot of different ones. Wasn't Thomas wasn't he the, he was killed in
21:54
India, I believe. And so like, Thomas was one of those people that was like spreading the gospel.
21:58
We go from, you know, let's, let's go so that we may die with him to, no, I got to put my hands
22:02
in his wounds to like, Hey, I'm going to go to freaking India and I'm going to get torn to pieces
22:07
by savages down there because I'm, you know, giving out the gospel to these folks. All right,
22:10
let's keep this going. Derek, if you wouldn't mind hitting 11 through 15, well, even if you do mind,
22:15
you don't have a choice. So you have to read 11 through 15. I'll do it. Let's go. So setting sail
22:19
from a Troas, we made a direct voyage to Samoth race. You did it, I guess. The following day,
22:26
neopolis, and from there to Philippi, which is leading city of the district of Macedonia and a
22:32
Roman colony, we remained in the city some days. And on the Sabbath day, we went outside the gate
22:38
to a riverside where we supposed there was a place of prayer and we sat down and spoke to a woman
22:44
who had come together had come together. One who heard us was a woman named Lydia from the city of
22:52
Thyatira, a seller of purple goods who was a worshiper of God. The Lord opened her heart to
22:58
pay attention to what was said by Paul. And after she was baptized, her household as well,
23:03
she urged us saying, if you have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come to my house and stay.
23:08
And she prevailed upon us. So some interesting things here. So this, you know,
23:16
she's out there basically doing a women's study or women's like prayer group or something like that.
23:20
So even back then, they were all kind of doing the same thing. So that's pretty interesting.
23:24
But Thyatira, this was kind of the center of the purple dye trade. And this was another thing
23:28
Mark Hitchcock taught us recently when he was going through this section is apparently there was
23:32
this thing called urex mollusks. I think is how you pronounce it urex mollusks, which these were
23:38
mollocks that would give you at a time would give you one drop of purple dye. And so when people
23:44
talk about purple being the color of royalty, it's because like only royal people could afford
23:49
a garment that was completely dyed purple. Because just think about how much of that you're going to
23:54
need from these rare mollus that only give you a drop at a time to a to be able to die, you know,
23:59
a garment that someone's going to wear around and maintain its color. But the interesting thing
24:03
about this is that Lydia was very likely almost, you know, 100% guaranteed that she was a Gentile,
24:10
but she was a Gentile that embraced Judaism. And so the interesting thing about this is she was
24:17
a moral woman because she embraced Judaism that, you know, she was clearly successful just because
24:21
of the trade that she was in. And she was well meaning, but even with all that in mind, she was
24:25
still lost. And so that's the thing that I find important here. And this, this is, you know,
24:30
shout out to all the, the people that, you know, the Calvinist folks, but the Lord opened her heart,
24:36
right? She didn't open her heart like she didn't, you know, get there intellectually, but the Lord
24:39
opened her heart to be able to see this. But I think that this is an interesting thing, especially
24:43
for us in Oklahoma, is I think there are a lot of lost people that seem moral, successful in their
24:50
well meaning. These are people that will give you the shirt off their back. They make good money,
24:54
they give money away, they may even be more generous and more moral than some Christians that are next
25:00
to you in your Sunday school or a bf or something like that. But that's the thing that I that really
25:06
jumped out of me at this, this story is that she had embraced the tenants of a Judeo ethic, right?
25:12
But it wasn't until she got the Christian part of that ethic that she actually became saved.
25:16
It's like there's a lot of well meaning people that we're still going to end up in flames.
25:19
Thoughts? I also wondered if it was interesting because in most of the other stories that we've
25:25
looked at, a lot of the preaching has happened inside the synagogue. They've gone to the synagogue.
25:30
And here it starts off on the Sabbath day where it seems like typically they would have gone to the
25:35
synagogue. They went outside. They went outside to the river. They went somewhere completely different
25:39
that they haven't done in the rest of their ministry. And I started wondering, I wonder why
25:43
that is. I wonder if maybe there's not a synagogue in the city or if there is, they know they're not
25:48
going to be well received and that's not where they need to go first. They went to the river for a
25:52
reason, right? Well, obviously God knew they went to the river because that's where Lydia was,
25:56
right? Because they were preaching to her. And so it's interesting. I think we're going to get to
26:01
this later in the verses here, but they needed her to welcome them into her house. And then from
26:08
there, they started preaching and that's when they meet the girl where they're going to drive the
26:15
spirit out. Yeah, I mean, if I were to venture a guest, it's like in this one segment of scripture,
26:21
we get three very different people for very different backgrounds being converted. And so if
26:27
you take out the jailer who we're going to meet later on in Acts 16, if you just look at the young
26:32
possessed gal that we're going to see here in a second and Lydia, the dichotomy between these two
26:37
people just in terms of where they start is interesting. And it goes back there to what we were talking
26:41
about about, you know, these people that accept the gospel at the very end, or these people that,
26:45
you know, showed up at the 11th hour and still got paid a denarius, even though the other people
26:49
have been working all day. It's kind of one of those moments to where it's like, you have a
26:52
successful business woman that was, you know, following the Jewish laws and morality. She comes
26:58
to faith and then you have basically the this pagan devotee of, you know, this satanic ritualistic
27:05
occultism, oricalism type of deal. And it's just a very different setup for both of them.
27:09
I mean, it seems like they're trying to, the group of Christians that are in the city,
27:14
they're going out to the river to get outside of the city for a reason. And I'm guessing,
27:17
probably they're catching heat is my guess inside of the city. And so Lydia,
27:21
being successful, probably having some degree of wealth because she deals in these very highly
27:27
valuable purple garments, her welcoming them into her house was probably a big deal.
27:34
She probably was accepting that like, hey, this is probably not going to be looked well upon,
27:39
you know, everybody else. And think about the elites that she's probably selling these garments
27:43
to is no different than choosing to not put a rainbow on your Instagram page when everybody else
27:49
is, right? Yeah. You know, she could have been setting fire to her business by welcoming these
27:56
men at her house. Well, she was outside of the so excavation in that place says they found pagan
28:03
temple in a marketplace. So they found no synagogue. So there wasn't a synagogue. So obviously it wasn't
28:07
that popular where she was. And yet she is going out there. So they are going out there taking heat,
28:13
but she's already out there for kind of the same reason, probably. This is just not a place where
28:18
there's a synagogue Jewish people aren't there. And so they just go to wherever it's their same,
28:23
same storyline and every place they go, they find the Jewish people first. And they, they say,
28:28
okay, the easiest way to explain this is to grab them and tell them what's up and then see how
28:32
they react. And then we expand this to the Gentiles there. That was much harder to do. They found her
28:38
there. This is also I don't want to walk away from this without saying this. I believe this is the
28:43
first place that we see Luke who is thought to be the writer of acts where he uses the verbiage of
28:50
we went. So commentary kind of suggests that this would have been when Luke actually joined them.
28:58
Okay, yeah, this point on Luke is writing firsthand of his time with Paul and Timothy.
29:04
Okay. Yeah, because we see that on verse 11. So setting sail from Choraz, we made a direct
29:10
voyage. Okay. Yeah, very good. Let's go ahead and read Russell. If you'll hit 16 through 18,
29:15
so we're going to be introduced to the slave girl.
29:18
As we were going to the place of prayer, we were met by a slave girl who had a spirit of divination
29:26
and brought her owners much gained by fortune telling. She followed Paul and us crying out.
29:31
These men's are servants of the most high God who proclaimed to you the way of salvation.
29:36
And this kept going and she kept doing this for many days. Paul having become greatly
29:41
annoyed, turned and said to the spirit, I command you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her.
29:46
And it came out of her that very hour. It's really funny when I read the first part of verse 18,
29:51
and this kept and she kept doing this for many days. I literally wrote in the margins. That's
29:56
annoying for sure. And then you finish and says, Paul having become greatly annoyed. I was like,
30:01
yeah, yeah, man, I feel you on that. But this gal, you know, it says she had a spirit of divination.
30:06
And so this is specifically the spirit of the Python. And one thing that I got from one of the
30:09
commentaries is that this related to the snake that we see in classical mythology, which, you know,
30:15
guarded the temple of Apollo and the Delphic Oracle, which was at a particular mountain during that
30:20
in that place. And I actually like I've been to the temple of Apollo and things like that. And so like
30:26
probably the best thing I'm not necessarily thinking you should watch this particular scene
30:30
because, you know, or movie because there's there's some graphic nudity in it. But in the movie,
30:33
300, and there are oracles that are depicted. And so these are drugged up girls for the most part.
30:39
And these oracle were being used as sex slaves for rich and royal men during this time period.
30:45
But also they would specifically listen to oracles to give them because these oracles and this gets
30:53
into a lot of different areas that I don't necessarily know that we should go into. But when you hear
30:57
people that get into like mushrooms or different places where these people feel like they've broken
31:02
the barrier between this world and the next world or necromancers or things like that,
31:06
where they are communicating with the next world and they're communicating with those spirits like
31:11
the person that, you know, invented the the, oh gosh, what's that personality test? I did a whole
31:17
episode on anyagram like things like that where they're doing automatic writing where they're
31:21
basically allowing demons or spirits to allow to give them messages. That's basically what's
31:26
happening. That's what this girl is. And these girls were incredibly popular and made tons of money,
31:32
essentially for their pimps. And so not only were these women sexually satisfying men,
31:37
these men would basically hang on their every world in every word when they were in these
31:41
kind of oracle trances or things like that. And so it's like, we just hear about Lydia,
31:46
who's just she's a successful boss babe. And then we've got this right on the other side.
31:52
Like it could not be more of a star contrast.
31:54
I mean, it was another parallel to where Paul and Kyle, both of you, I mean, same thing.
32:00
I'm trying to word picture this and my word picture in my brain was, here's Paul and for days,
32:05
this woman is just shipping and I could just see Kyle, I could see Kyle like the annoyance level,
32:10
just climbing, climbing, climbing. And then eventually Kyle's going to explode.
32:15
Well, Paul explodes. And I sort of, I'm wondering if this, if this wasn't almost just kind of like
32:20
a passionate thing. It's like, you know what, which shut up and get out. This is over done because,
32:26
you know, it definitely seems like it built up and he was greatly annoyed,
32:30
whips around and then does this almost like he didn't think through it. It was an intentional
32:34
boom. It just happened. Why couldn't he have blinded her? Like Peter, make that guy go blind.
32:38
It's like, at least make her suffer a little bit for annoying you. Like, because dude,
32:41
this is how I'm not like Paul, I would not let this have gone on many days, many days.
32:45
You're gonna bother me for many days. Like I'm going to address this a little bit sooner than that.
32:49
Like get away from me. The commentary was kind of soft on it because it said that maybe he did
32:53
this because she was speaking truth, but that he wanted to make sure that people didn't have the
32:58
misconception that she was a part of their ministry, which I thought, I kind of agree with you more
33:03
Adam. They're like, this seems much more just like, I'm done with you. It's like a gunslinger.
33:08
Like a gunslinger type moment. You know what, shut up. This is over. This has gone on long enough.
33:12
I'm over it. Adam, let's go ahead and do 19 through 24.
33:16
But when her master saw that their hope of profit was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and
33:22
dragged them into the marketplace before the authorities. And when they had brought them to
33:26
the chief magistrates, they said, these men are throwing our city into confusion, being Jews,
33:31
and our proclaiming customs, which it is not lawful for us to accept or to observe being Romans.
33:37
Through what? I just read through 24.
33:40
The crowd rose up together against them, and the chief magistrates tore the robes off of them
33:46
and proceeded to order them to be beaten with rods. When they had struck them with many blows,
33:50
they threw them into prison, commanding the jailer to guard them securely. And he, having
33:55
received such a command, threw them into the inner prison and fastened their feet in the stocks.
34:00
So as we saw earlier in Acts, when the cultural elites at the time, the Jewish elites started
34:05
losing their grip, they responded in jealousy and they responded violently. For these men,
34:11
they lost their cash cow. They lost their gal that they could exploit sexually and
34:19
basically exploit men for their money and extort them for their money. And that was just a bridge
34:26
too far. It was almost like, okay, yeah, preach, preach your gospel, spread your message.
34:30
Hey, now you're jacking with my business, and we just can't stand for that. So it's just so
34:35
interesting. Every time we see them get into these issues, it's not always just because of the
34:39
message that they're espousing. It's because they're kind of arresting control from some men
34:44
that just don't really like that very much. Don't find that's weird that in all these situations,
34:48
it wasn't just that. So like, if we're thinking about this, we're thinking maybe just the owners
34:53
of that girl would just take them out back, beat them and leave them from dead. There's something
34:59
weird that happens in all of this that, and maybe it's just evil itself trying to gather more unto
35:07
itself, but the idea that they go and they gather other people with them to make these big deals.
35:13
Every time something like this happens, it's not just the people that have been offended or whatever.
35:18
There is something where they go and they gather a bunch of people and they try to take the crowd
35:23
now and get everybody against them. If this happened, you brought up the whole PIMP situation,
35:29
something like that. This happened in a situation like that. I don't think the PIMP would be going
35:33
and gathering a bunch of people trying to explain how they're right. They would just go and try to
35:37
take care of business themselves. There's something weird happened spiritually here to where they
35:42
are being driven to try to gather as much support for their side versus these apostles.
35:49
And possibly undo the success that they've had. And also we have to see what happens in the next
35:55
section because we see, okay, well, in this section, they're thrown into jail and now the jailer that
36:01
has been given the task of keeping them safe, we're about to see some very interesting stuff that
36:07
happens with him. So I'll make the point preemptively, when people say, "Why do bad things happen to
36:12
good people?" When you say that, you are assuming the judgment seat of God and you're assuming the
36:19
position of omniscience that you can see outside of time and space how every single angle of this
36:26
is working out. And it's like, "Hey, brother, Christian or non-Christian, I don't think you want
36:30
that seat." The level of understanding you would have to have to be able to move even an inch
36:36
would be enough to crush you. So I don't think you want that because you might think if the story
36:41
stops here, it's like, "Well, that kind of sucks." They literally deliver this demon from the slave
36:46
girl and then the pimps get the rest of the crew together and they like beat these guys and have
36:50
them thrown into jail. Well, that kind of stinks. Well, let's go into the next section and we'll see
36:54
exactly where this goes. So, Derek, if you will hit, well, actually, let me read 25. I want to make a
36:58
quick point on verse 25. "About midnight, Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God and
37:04
the prisoners were listening to them. They had just been beaten severely and they are singing and
37:12
praying out loud well into the evening." This is midnight. They were thrown into jail before then.
37:17
So just think about that. You're beaten severely. I mean, I will go to some Jiu Jitsu classes and I
37:22
will leave feeling like I have been just thoroughly, physically violated. And by the time I get home,
37:27
it's like, "I want to drink a jocko hydrate and sit there and just not do anything and maybe fall
37:33
asleep wherever I sit down." But these guys immediately go into a praise and worship thing.
37:37
And so it's like how many of us, maybe our family doesn't go to church that week because it's
37:42
snowing outside or that it's raining too heavily. And these guys are in a pretty destitute situation
37:46
and they're turning it into a worship service. So, Derek, if you will go ahead and start up in,
37:50
you know, just go back to verse 25. Read 25 through the end of the chapter, please.
37:54
"About midnight, Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God and the prisoners were
38:01
listening to them. And suddenly there was a great earthquake so that the foundations of the prison
38:06
were shaken. And immediately all the doors were opened and everyone's bonds were unfastened.
38:11
When the jailer woke and saw all the prison doors were open, he drew his sword and was about to
38:15
kill himself, supposing that the prisoners had escaped. But Paul cried with the loud voice,
38:21
"Do not harm yourself, for we are all here." And the jailer called for lights and rushed in,
38:28
and trembling with fear, he fell down before Paul and Silas. Then he brought them out and said,
38:34
"Sirs, what must I do to be saved?" And they said, "Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved,
38:40
you and your household." And they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in this
38:45
house. And he took them the same hour of the night and washed their wounds, and he was baptized
38:52
at once. He and all his family. Then he brought them up into his house and set food before them,
38:58
and he rejoiced along with his entire household that he had believed in God.
39:04
But when it was day, the magistrates sent the police saying, "Let those men go." And the
39:10
jailer reported these words to Paul, saying, "The magistrates have sent to let you go. Therefore,
39:15
come out now and go in peace." But Paul said to them, "They have not beaten us publicly.
39:21
Uncondimed men who were Roman citizens and have thrown us into prison. And now do they
39:31
and do they now throw us out secretly? No. Let them come themselves and take us out."
39:36
The police reported these words to the magistrates, and they were afraid when they heard that they
39:41
were Roman citizens. So they came and apologized to them, and they took them out and asked them to
39:46
leave the city. So they went out of the prison and visited Lydia when they had seen the brothers.
39:53
They encouraged them and departed. So I don't know if this struck you guys as funny.
39:59
Maybe it just hit me as funny. But going back to when the jailer woke and saw that the prison
40:04
doors were open, he drew a sword and was about to kill himself, supposing that the prisoners had
40:07
escaped. But Paul cried out in a loud voice, "Do not harm yourself, for we are all here." In my head,
40:12
I almost have it like a dark humor thing where this guy, his entire world's melting, he's like,
40:17
"I'm going to get crucified for this. He's pulling out a sword." And then all of a sudden,
40:21
there's a break in the action. You just hear in the background, "Hey, no, no, don't do that. We're
40:26
all here, we're all here." So it's like, it's maybe a little bit dark humor. So I don't know if
40:30
that came, you guys. That was a great effect. I'm just impressed. That was good. I'm going to
40:35
start you. I didn't even plan that. But hey, if you're out here, I just thought that that was
40:38
actually funny. It did strike me as a little bit funny. But again, if you're real like a robot,
40:42
you don't see that. I'm not saying that it was funny. But maybe later on when they're having fun
40:47
with the jailer, it's like, "Hey, remember that one time you almost killed yourself?" And then I was
40:49
just somewhere off in the back, like just still sitting in my cell with the doors open?
40:54
Maybe just me. Maybe just me. But there's an interesting thing about this story is that
41:00
this is the third person. Well, first of all, when you go back and the jailer is like,
41:05
"So what must I do to be saved in a verse 31?" It's like, "Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will
41:09
be saved, you and your household." This goes back to a point we made months ago at this point,
41:14
which is when you have people that build their entire theology around one particular verse about
41:18
what it means to be saved. Because there are people that believe there are denominations like
41:21
Church Christs that believe if you are not baptized, you cannot go to heaven. So it's not just the
41:26
free gift of grace that comes through faith. You have to be baptized. So it's gospel plus,
41:30
there's one work that you have to do. But here, there's no mention of baptism, at least initially.
41:37
Now, he is baptized like a verse or two later. But that's just something that's interesting
41:41
for people. It's like you have to look at the totality of Scripture. You can't just cling on to
41:46
one verse where Peter says, "Believe and be baptized." You have to look at the entire thing
41:51
to know whether or not something is descriptive or prescriptive. And the reality is, is when you
41:55
look at the totality of Scripture, it is grace through faith. That is what saves us. It is a gift
42:00
from God. And baptism is just that first thing that you were commanded to do. And yes, you are
42:07
sinning if you refuse to give it baptized after coming to faith. So I thought that that was interesting.
42:12
But there's lots to talk about here. So y'all fire away with anything that jumped out of you.
42:17
Backing up to verse 20 and 21, this is where the chief magistrates are talking to Paul and Silas
42:22
and the people where they're trying to throw them in jail and says, "These men are throwing
42:26
our city into confusion, being Jews, talking about Paul and Silas, and our proclaiming customs,
42:31
which it is not lawful for us to observe being, we're Romans. We're the Romans."
42:36
Paul and Silas didn't pipe up then. They went ahead and remain silent. They're going to wait
42:43
and they're going to pull out their Ace of Spades at the end. At the end, once they decide to release
42:47
it, I'm like, "Oh, guess what? You did this to Romans." Yeah, we're Romans.
42:51
So the stock commentary had a really interesting note on that, Adam. So it was,
42:56
"For according to Lex Julia, the Roman citizen must not be beaten or bound by the magistrate
43:03
at versus Pravaca Tionim, or by any other person in any circumstances, let alone untried and
43:10
uncondimmed." The citizen had only to say, "Civis Romanis sum" and he would be immune
43:16
to punishment. Heavy penalties were prescribed for those who violates these citizenship privileges.
43:22
And so it is very interesting. They knew they were about to get a beating and they just held
43:27
their tongues. I think it maybe sort of helped the jailer and it probably definitely helped
43:31
Lydia because now Lydia is tied to these men and these men just got destroyed for no good reason.
43:37
They go back to Lydia's house and then they leave. So Lydia's going to be on her own now,
43:41
but she's somewhat under their protection because she's a part of all of the crap that
43:46
they just did to these men. Yeah, they kind of have something on them at this point to say you
43:50
better watch out. Yeah, I do think, what do y'all think about this idea? So whenever they were in
43:57
there and they were singing, singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them,
44:03
there's a couple of points that I just want to pull out here and see what y'all think. So all
44:08
the prisoners were listening to them. That tells us there were other prisoners in the prison, right,
44:12
when this happened. And so your first response is that when all this happened, it said that the
44:18
prison was shaken immediately. The doors were opened and everyone's bonds were unfastened.
44:23
So it's not just the two of them. Everyone's bonds were unfastened. For some reason, okay,
44:29
so the jailer, he thinks he thinks not just Paul and Timothy are gone. He thinks everybody's gone.
44:36
And then it leads me to believe that Paul cries out with a loud voice, says do not harm yourself,
44:41
for we are all here. Like the power of the spirit was working in that jail like you wouldn't believe.
44:48
Like basically they were singing hymns and praying and guys that were in the jail when the jail opened
44:55
up said I ain't going nowhere. I'm staying in this moment right here with these guys singing and
45:01
praying. I don't know what's going on. The jail's opened up. They're not moving. I don't move till
45:05
they move. And that is just such a powerful thing to think about that like, I don't think their
45:10
singing was that good that these guys are like, I'm not leaving this concert, you know, like what
45:16
Grasmire is slinging on. That's right. You don't have some slinging on. They're not staying there
45:22
because of the vocals. They have seen something is happening inside that jail and it makes people
45:27
pause and to wait for the Lord to move. And the idea that the other idea on this is that
45:33
the jailer didn't have to ask after that point, what do I have to do to find out about what you're
45:41
talking about? He had been listening to and the spirit was moving and when this happened and he
45:45
found out that he was he was not going to die because they were there. He asked the right question.
45:51
He immediately knew to ask, how can I be saved? Which is just a powerful thing to say to like the
45:57
spirit again, the spirit of the Lord was working in all this. And it was doing so much that people
46:04
were so ready for the harvest that as soon as these things were happening, they were just falling
46:09
into place. When I think it's really important as well, I remember when I was getting ready to go
46:14
speak at Lewisburg prison in Pennsylvania and you know, I couldn't have really prepared myself,
46:18
but you know, whatever I got there, here I am walking around the block. And I mean, there's
46:21
murderers, rapists, pedophiles, and I'm just walking around the block, like the cell block.
46:26
And you know, I've got a stab vest on, but it's kind of one of those things. It's like, well,
46:29
they shoot me in the face. So it was one of those moments to where it's just like, I'm I'm pretty
46:32
exposed here. Yeah, but like, I wasn't, I wasn't worried at all. Because literally, you know,
46:38
even with having a son and all that in my head, I was like, so if I get stabbed to death, trying
46:42
to share the gospel with prisoners, it's like, that's a hell of a way to go out. That's a good
46:46
story for my sons, as opposed to like dad was texting and driving and then like flipped his truck,
46:50
you know, it'd be a lot, a lot, a lot different, you know, ending to that story. But before I went
46:54
out there, and I've talked about this on the show before, I had a phone conversation with Phil
46:59
Robertson. And so Phil Robertson is a guy, you know, duck dynasty fame, he's a patriarch of the
47:03
Robertson family. He just, the Bible, you can tell there are guys that you can tell that they
47:09
memorize scripture because it comes off really clean. He just has spent so much time in scripture,
47:14
it just comes out of him. It's like it's coming out of the pores of his skin almost. It's just so
47:18
natural. But I know he had spoken to Angola prison and some other prisons and I had seen some of the
47:23
things that he had said there and I just wanted to have a quick discussion with him. And it's like,
47:26
you know, hey, what would be your word for these men? And you know, what would you do? And because
47:30
again, he's just kind of in a matter of fact country guy and I'm like a, you know, try to be
47:34
high energy. And here's my points and I'm going to take people on a journey and you know, try to be
47:38
almost like a presenter. And he was just like, look here, man, ultimately, these men are under lock and
47:44
key. But what they don't realize yet is that you can be under lock and key, but you can still be
47:49
free. That's what I think is happening here, Russ, with these men is they have been under lock and
47:55
key. And that's all they can think about is what life will look at look like when they are no longer
48:00
under lock and key. And when the lock and key have been shook loose, they realize in that moment
48:06
that that wasn't actually what I was missing. I wasn't missing my freedom on this planet. I was
48:12
missing something so beyond that that once I got wrapped up in it, I could not take myself away
48:17
because imagine the shock of being in prison and then all of a sudden all the doors are open and
48:22
all the shackles have fallen off. Like that had to have been a complete trip. These guys didn't
48:27
even notice because the spirit was moving in such an extreme way. And so yeah, I think that's that's
48:32
a great thing about the story that some people miss out on is it wasn't just, it wasn't just,
48:37
you know, Paul and Barnabas hanging or Paul and Silas hanging out. It was the whole crew. That's
48:41
a great point. One thing that I didn't want to talk about as well, and I set this up a little
48:45
while ago, is the types of people just described in this one chapter. You have you have Lydia,
48:50
you have the slave girl, and then you have the jailer. So we don't know the name of the slave
48:53
girl, the jailer. But Lydia was very likely asiatic. The slave girl was very likely Greek and the
48:59
jailer was clearly Roman. Lydia was very wealthy, very successful. The slave girl was essentially
49:05
destitute. She was being, you know, basically given enough food and water to survive long enough
49:09
for her pimps to keep making money off of her. And the jailer is probably somewhere in between.
49:12
He would probably be considered like lower middle class in terms of modern standards.
49:16
But Lydia had like an intellectual need that that God fulfilled. The slave girl had like
49:22
a psychological need because she had the spirit of divination. But the jailer just had like a
49:27
literal time bound need, which is the one job that I had, dude, you had one job. And that's to make
49:33
sure you don't lose your prisoners. And he's about to run himself through with a sword. But in that
49:36
moment, it's like, no, no, no, no, nope. We're all still here. But remember the things that you've
49:41
been hearing up to this point, the things we've been singing about. And then as you pointed out,
49:45
Russ, like at that point, there was no there were no more questions. There was no more. Oh, I need
49:49
to figure out how I feel about this. Oh, I need to make sure that I'm clean enough before I come
49:52
to the father's just like, man, how can I be saved? Just tell me the way like it's just it's an
49:56
important thing looking at these three people think about his family. So like we never really just
50:00
look into the idea of the family that was affected. Like, yeah, he had a whole family. And they
50:06
were obviously close. And they were probably close by because people had jobs like this.
50:10
They were always there. The whole story comes into the timeline. So how did all the family get
50:15
there before they went back to their house? Well, this earthquake, some people knew what was going
50:20
on. The jail cells opened, people would have been running around saying, hey, hey, your dad's
50:24
over there. The jail cell just opened, probably families coming in there trying to help out,
50:27
figure out what's going on. They were this close. And for those of you that aren't watching this on
50:32
YouTube, I'm holding my fingers very close together. They were this close to that whole family walking
50:38
up and seeing that the head of their household dead on the floor. And the idea that like they
50:44
didn't only just save that man Christ Christ didn't save him alone, but the plan for his family to
50:52
not have to go through that and to be merciful in that time and to be able to bring them into the
50:56
kingdom. I've always just thought this story was just like, I would love to have met this guy
51:00
afterwards and be like, what did he do after this? The unknown impact of him, that family,
51:05
and Lydia, and what they did in that city. Boy, that would be pretty impactful. What about the
51:09
slave girl? Does she get married? Does she have kids? Does she raise them in the nurturing admonition
51:14
of the Lord? Like, because we lose the threat on her story for history, but there is still a story.
51:19
Well, same thing with the other like this, this follows Paul. And I'm always, I'm always reminded
51:25
that there were other apostles doing, you know, Barnabas, like what if, what if whenever we get
51:29
to heaven, we realize, yeah, the Lord says, yeah, the story I wanted to tell was Paul's. But let me
51:34
tell you now about what Barnabas did. You know, let me tell you now about what Timothy was doing
51:38
outside of this after the story stopped. And so like all these things, there's so many stories
51:43
that we just don't get to find out how they all went. But we know God had a plan for them.
51:49
And that's an important evangelistic thing that when you share the gospel with somebody,
51:54
sometimes you get that tear-filled immediate conversion experience and it's like, you know,
51:58
your heart rate flies up and all that stuff, like sometimes those things happen. But sometimes
52:02
your job is just to put a rock in their shoe, you know, a la Greg Cocle to where it's like,
52:06
you're not getting the conversion, you're just doing what, what I told you to do. Like, I remember
52:10
when I was getting tattoo work done like 10 years ago, I heard a clear as day that I needed to get
52:14
my tattoo artist a Bible with his name on it. Okay, so that's kind of weird because the tattoo
52:19
world can be pretty dark. There's, there's not a whole lot of, you know, Christ following tattoo
52:24
artists and things like that. And so I just did what was required to me. And so I, I went and got a
52:28
Bible and I put the name Twan Lee on it. And I took it to him and, you know, he didn't like,
52:32
have a big, great reaction. He reacted very, very awkwardly. But that's what was required to me
52:37
when, whenever I talk about this at restaurants like, Oh, hey, that bring my food out. Hey, is there
52:41
anything else I can get for you guys? And they're expecting you to say ranch because we live in
52:44
Oklahoma. And I instead say, uh, yeah, we're about to bless our meals or anything that we can pray
52:49
for you about, right? I always have that little bit of anxiety before I ask that. But you get
52:54
answers like an answer I got this week is like, my aunt died last week. And it's really weighing,
53:00
weighing down on our family. Would you just pray for us? And then it gives me a chance. Hey, you
53:04
know, what's, what's your aunt's name? Like, you know, I'm so sorry to hear that. Would you like
53:07
to stick around while we pray for again? In that moment, he didn't drop to his knees in the pizza
53:12
place and, you know, say, you know, tell me how to become a Christ follower, how I can be saved.
53:17
It was just like, Hey, that's what's required of me in this moment. And that's our only job.
53:21
So anything else on acts 16 before we wrap up, Derek, hit it. Let's go. Yeah, I'll just say,
53:28
for me, like reading this, man, how awesome is all this? Like, this is how it worked back in the day.
53:34
We still have the Holy Spirit going in front of us leading the way. I'm super, I'll say,
53:41
fearful, I guess, you know, going out and sharing the gospel with just random people.
53:44
But if you're going to do it, the Holy Spirit's there. So, I mean, it's a challenge to myself and
53:50
challenge everybody else, I guess, you know, go out there and share, even if it is just to put a rock
53:57
in the shoe, the Holy Spirit's working. So I don't know, that's kind of what I got out of the whole,
54:02
like chapter 16 there, what a picture of even missionary type work today.
54:08
And that's what that's what, you know, other guys that are doing forging tables, Bible studies,
54:13
that is the purpose of this stuff because gathering together, getting into the word like this,
54:20
like, you just don't think of these things when you're not reading these things. And then when
54:25
you're reading these things, it's like, why haven't I been thinking about this? Why haven't I been
54:30
thinking about what does the Spirit want to do? I guess you're not reading about it. You're not
54:35
focused on it. So gathering together and just having a couple of guys be able to say, let's read
54:39
this and talk about it. And then we all walk away and go, we need to be doing that more. I guess,
54:44
you know, we need to be thinking about that. Well, into the high trait conscientious people,
54:47
I get a lot of questions from those guys that are like, Hey, I'm ready to start my own forging table.
54:52
I'm ready to develop fox. I'm ready to do those types of things. What do we do? It's like,
54:56
pick a book of the Bible. And I told someone the other day, I said, the contents of what you do
55:04
are not nearly as important as how often you do it. So like, if you're getting together once a
55:09
month to do a Bible study, well, if a guy misses one month, that means he's gone two months. It's like,
55:13
this is a weekly thing. If you need me to tell you a book of the Bible, Matthew, go just like
55:18
frickin do Matthew and then figure it out from there. Oh, you do all want to do the Matthew and then
55:22
do wild at heart next month and then do, you know, Nehemiah and then do, I don't know, tactics by
55:27
Greg Coco the month that I don't care, like be together with these men developing each other in
55:33
those moments. Like that's ultimately the point. Guys, before we let you go, I'm appreciative that
55:38
you spend all this time with us. But, you know, at the beginning of our time, whenever we were
55:42
filming this, this would be, you know, to our audience listening to this on time, this would
55:47
have been a month ago now. We started, and, you know, begin with the end in mind, I'm a big primacy
55:53
and recency guy. So you remember the first thing that you experienced in the last thing that you
55:56
experienced. And so with that in mind, for those of you that have been a solid one in the bathroom,
56:02
Adam looks so disappointed. So for people that maybe didn't watch, what would that have been?
56:07
Acts 13. I bought the world's strongest smelling salts from Juji Mufu. And this is called that's
56:13
literally the name. So Google, ah, it's world's strongest smelling salts. You're not supposed to
56:18
put it under your nose. You're not supposed to do any of those things. And so the first hit that I
56:23
took a month ago was way too hard. So I'm going to take a proper wafting hit. But what do you
56:28
guys say before we get out of here before we wrap? Let's just do one more time as we get up.
56:33
Oh, okay. Here we go. I'm just hitting the waft. Oh, no. Okay. Man, that wasn't even strong either.
56:41
Okay. Adam, you did it first last time. So you're doing it last. I can already. Oh, man. My eyes
56:46
rope. Okay. Oh, it's still here. I know what's happening. It wasn't even a strong one. It's even
56:53
a horse, right? Yeah. Do you have a seizure? Do you short circuit there for a second? I have a seizure.
57:03
Are you okay? All right. So I love sushi. And whenever I get a lot of wasabi and until it
57:11
gets to a place, if I eat enough wasabi, I get a pain right in the top of my skull right there.
57:17
And I can feel that's where that's trying to hit. Okay. Keep your eyes closed. I had my eyes open.
57:22
That was not a good idea. Oh, okay. Yeah. It hit second. It was a secondary hit.
57:28
All right. Adam, you immediately have to drive after this. So just be
57:31
with too much. It was too much. Well, while he's dying, guys, come back here next week,
57:38
we're going to be digging into act 17, whether you have smelling salt or not. That is not my
57:43
problem. But guys, make sure you're read through the end of act 17. Because that's what we were
57:46
going to be hitting. But before that, you know, we are going to do a quick resilience boost.
57:49
Add on to life, our mission is equipping men to push back darkness with content that forges,
57:52
spiritual, mental and physical resilience. Yes, I have tears in my eyes at the moment.
57:56
But guys, we are a donation based ministry. So if you want to help donate to keep things like
58:00
the forging table going, you can do that there. And then also we've got links to where you can get
58:04
your own forging table starter set. So if you are starting a forging table and maybe you want
58:08
to devotional and a few other books, there is a tremendous discount that we get from crossway
58:12
that you can check out in the show notes. And also as always, we support the Logos Bible software.
58:17
And they are allowing us to give you guys access to the best Bible software on the planet,
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and add a very good discount. So you can check all that out in the show notes.
58:47
As always, we want to thank the band Holy Name for allowing us to use their music for our content.
58:50
The music on this podcast is our song Perpetua, which is off their self-titled debut album on
58:55
Face Down Records. The links are in the description. I'm your host, Kyle Thompson. Remember, keep pushing
59:01
back darkness, keep forging spiritual, mental and physical resilience, keep seeking the lion of Judah.
59:17
[Music]