0:00
When you need to build up your team to handle the growing chaos at work, use Indeed sponsored
0:05
jobs.
0:06
It gives your job post the boost it needs to be seen and helps reach people with the
0:10
right skills, certifications, and more.
0:12
Spend less time searching and more time actually interviewing candidates who check all your
0:16
boxes.
0:17
Listeners of this show will get a $75 sponsor job credit at indeed.com/podcast.
0:23
That's indeed.com/podcast terms and conditions apply.
0:26
Need a hiring hero?
0:27
This is a job for Indeed sponsored jobs.
0:48
This is Undaunted Life, a man's podcast.
0:51
I'm your host Kyle Thompson.
0:53
Let's get into it.
0:54
All right, guys, welcome back to the Forging Table, the mission of Undaunted Life is equipping
0:57
men to push back darkness with content that forges spiritual, mental, and physical resilience.
1:02
So at the Forging Table, you'll see a group of regular guys forging spiritual resilience
1:06
by digging into God's Word and we're welcoming all of you to come along on that journey with
1:10
us.
1:11
That's Eric.
1:12
That's Ryan.
1:13
That's Matt.
1:14
All right, guys, let's dig into Galatians two.
1:15
So we didn't get into too many arguments on Galatians one.
1:18
So maybe in Galatians two, we can have some knockdown dragouts, but I just got to be honest
1:21
with you from the very, very beginning, Galatians two of all the chapters of Galatians for me,
1:26
personally, it is my favorite for stuff that kind of comes in on the latter half.
1:30
So, you know, when Paul opposes Peter and, you know, justified by faith, but really, I
1:34
don't want to give short shrift to versus one through 10.
1:38
So I just want to kind of tease it up to you guys to talk about the things from that that
1:41
you felt were important because I feel like we could spend basically the entire time talking
1:46
about Paul opposing Peter to his face and in person.
1:49
But again, I don't want to give short shrift to the very beginning.
1:50
So just toss it out to anybody that had something on that first part of Galatians two.
1:55
Yeah, I mean, I just had a couple of thoughts a little closer.
2:03
I just think a lot of times we want to do good things for God, but it's not necessarily
2:06
the best things.
2:07
So when I read like the very first couple of verses, and he's receiving revelation and
2:13
doing God's work, there have been a lot of times where I feel like I wanted to do good.
2:20
And so I extended myself as kind of almost like before I found my lane, one of the things
2:24
I really appreciate about Paul is he found his lane, you know, he's like going for the
2:28
Gentiles.
2:29
That's it.
2:30
So he didn't really let himself swerve right or left from that.
2:32
So just more of an encouragement as I read that for me to continually understand my lane
2:38
where God has me, purpose he has for me and to not sway from that too far.
2:43
Really at all to stay in it because that's the best that he has for me.
2:48
One thing I got from the first part, like you can see Paul's humanity in here a little
2:52
bit.
2:53
Like there's a little, there's almost a little hint of sarcasm when he's talking about people
2:56
who seem influential.
2:57
Like it's almost like taking a dig at him.
3:01
I don't know.
3:02
It's just kind of a funny, funny side note to just think about like Paul is still, he's
3:06
still a human, you know, writing and the inspired word of God, but like he's still kind of being,
3:11
he's still writing as Paul and I just think that's interesting to look at.
3:15
Yeah, I liked in verse six and from those who seem to be influential, what they were makes
3:22
no difference to me, God shows no partiality.
3:25
Those I say who seemed influential added nothing to me.
3:28
So a lot of stuff in verse six, I underline God shows no partiality.
3:32
So that takes us to James two.
3:34
So people that want to focus on race, people that want to focus on any other immutable characteristics.
3:39
God does not show any partiality, but then obviously towards the end, you know, who seemed
3:44
influential, but added nothing to me, man, that's a, that's a rough one to think about
3:49
for you personally because, you know, we live in a culture that we would, gosh, we worship
3:54
at the altar of so many people, you know, our favorite Instagram influencer, our favorite
3:57
podcast, our favorite athlete, our favorite pastor, and where we're constantly worshiping
4:02
at the feet of these, these people, like, or they're, they're more like things because
4:06
that's not who they really are on.
4:08
It's, you know, they're, that's just who they are on Instagram.
4:10
So it's more of a thing than it is a person.
4:12
It's like, man, God doesn't show any partiality.
4:15
So it's like, it doesn't matter how cute or not cute you look on stage while you're talking,
4:19
it doesn't matter how good or not could you seem whenever you're, you know, handing a
4:22
football to a kid as you're going back to the locker room, like, you know, God almost doesn't
4:27
see that.
4:28
It's almost like there's, there's no partiality here in man, like, how many of us, because
4:32
I certainly go to that, like, we're so concerned about the people that are adding nothing to
4:36
our lives.
4:37
I mean, you've heard pastors talk about before.
4:38
Like, you're, you're going into debt to buy a car that nobody, like nobody actually cares.
4:44
Like, these are people that you don't care about really that don't care about you that
4:48
you're trying to impress with something that they won't even acknowledge.
4:51
And so I thought that that was an interesting thing for me in the first part.
4:53
I really look at Matt and see how Tim Tebow really changed his life.
4:56
Right.
4:57
Hey, guys.
4:58
Yeah.
4:59
That's just going to be a thing.
5:00
I don't know if you listened to last week's episode, but apparently Matt Grasmer hates Tim
5:02
Tebow.
5:03
I mean, hates him, not dislikes him, not just isn't a fan hates him.
5:06
It's my cross to bear that brings me into the text of the false brothers secretly brought
5:11
in.
5:12
Yeah.
5:13
So it's getting hot in here.
5:18
I'm sweating now.
5:20
Um, no, I think, I think when we look at this, you know, we look at these false brothers
5:24
that are coming into, you know, Paul's showing that are coming into the church of, uh, Alicia.
5:29
And they're, they're Judaizers from, uh, James's church in Jerusalem.
5:35
And so they have some pull here, you know, they're like, we're, we're guys of James.
5:39
And so they're talking about circumcision, you know, and, and Paul goes, goes into no
5:44
partiality.
5:45
You don't have to be circumcised or not circumcised.
5:48
God's going to look at you the same way through grace and justification through Christ.
5:52
I think that, I mean, guys, obviously there's a lot there and, and again, just to kind of
5:55
do a little sidebar, um, every time that we end a forging table, there's certainly more
6:00
that can be said.
6:01
That's something that I remind myself and I remind all the guys before we get in here,
6:04
but there are, there are certain passages in here that hit all of us a little bit differently.
6:09
And, uh, you know, I remember back in the day, uh, Eric and I were, we're doing like
6:14
some coffees and things like that.
6:15
This was years ago.
6:16
And I remember us talking about Galatians two 11 through 14 and you brought up William
6:21
Farrell and you brought up some of these church fathers that aren't as popular, but they're
6:25
like, those were the guys that were like the in your face, dudes, like, what was it?
6:28
It was either St. Peter or St. Bart.
6:29
I think it was, uh, who was it was, uh, it was, uh, it may have been St. Nicholas who literally
6:33
like walked across this assembly and like choked a guy because he felt like, okay.
6:37
So like there, there were several guys that were kind of like that, but it really comes
6:40
back to this part.
6:41
So I actually want to read and we're again, we're not going to read every section every
6:43
time, but I actually want to read Galatians two 11 through 14 here because I think this
6:47
is such an important thing for so many things that are happening right now in our culture.
6:49
So this is Paul opposing Peter.
6:52
So but when see this, that's Peter came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face because
6:56
he stood condemned for before certain men came from James.
7:00
He was eating with the Gentiles, but when they came, he drew back and separated himself
7:04
fearing the circumcision party.
7:06
That's the Judaizers and the rest of the Jews acted hypocritically along with him so that
7:10
even Barnabas was led astray by their hypocrisy.
7:13
But when I saw that their conduct was not in step with the truth of the gospel, I said
7:17
to see if it's Peter before them all.
7:19
If you though a Jew live like a Gentile and not like a Jew, how can you force the Gentiles
7:25
to live like Jews?
7:27
So to kick off the discussion about this part is Paul, a follower of Christ rebuked Peter,
7:37
a follower of Christ to his face publicly in front of other people.
7:43
So obviously for a guy like me that's wired like me, I'm the forceful guy.
7:47
I'm like, I'm, you know, I'll look for a fight.
7:49
I'm not scared of a fight.
7:50
Like I want to challenge people, all those types of things.
7:53
And so what I get a lot from people is like, Kyle, that's not very Christ like that.
7:57
That's really mean and that's, that's really judgmental and you really shouldn't do stuff
8:01
like that.
8:02
You know, Jesus wouldn't have done something like that.
8:03
Like the apostles never would have done something like that.
8:05
And if you're not wired like that, if you're not wired, always looking for a fight, you
8:08
know, you feel really, really comfortable.
8:10
Like, Oh, I'll never challenge anybody.
8:11
You know, I'll just kind of live my life.
8:13
And you do this kind of weird late nineties, Baptist way of gospel where it's like, Hey,
8:18
you just lead a good life and listen to Christian music and then people will somehow come up
8:22
to you and say, Hey, you seem really different.
8:24
You know, how, how can I be different like you?
8:26
And I don't think that's ever happened in the history of humanity that somebody's gone
8:30
up.
8:31
Somebody says, you're really different.
8:32
I'd like to know why.
8:33
Oh, Jesus.
8:34
Like I don't know that that's actually a real thing.
8:35
It's just kind of a cute thing for people to throw out there.
8:37
But I feel like this was so unbelievably important because Paul, you know, we know that he traveled
8:43
to Antioch to to challenge Peter, see if it's to his face.
8:48
And so he kind of went out of his way a little bit again, we don't really know that.
8:52
I don't want to read something into the text that isn't there.
8:53
He went out of his way to rebuke him to his face.
8:57
And we see from the beginning, because he stood condemned.
9:00
That's the end of chapter 11, or sorry, a verse 11.
9:03
So to kind of tease it out to you guys, because I know I have way more to say on this, but
9:06
I want to hear from you guys.
9:09
One of his brothers, one of his brothers in Christ stood condemned and he did not see
9:13
it acceptable to stay silent, okay?
9:16
But he didn't just rebuke him quietly.
9:18
He rebuked him publicly into his face.
9:20
And we, we get the sense from the scripture and of course from the commentary is that
9:23
Peter did accept that rebuke.
9:25
And so like he didn't like fight back against and do all those different things because
9:28
Peter was clearly in the wrong, Paul knew it and Paul said something, but we live in
9:32
this current like pansy Christian culture where it's like, if you challenge anybody,
9:36
you're not being loving.
9:37
Yeah, you're being unloving towards your brother.
9:39
If you respond to somebody on Instagram that this, you know, Instagram preacher that says
9:43
something heretical, then you say, Hey, this is heretical, it's like, you're not being
9:46
loving.
9:47
It's like, how loving is it to let someone who is condemned to stay that way?
9:51
Like, again, I get so fired up about this because people just, they assume that saying
9:55
nothing means that you're nice and being Christ like when Christ constantly call people out
9:59
for their sin.
10:00
We obviously see a good example of here of Paul calling out Peter.
10:02
Yeah.
10:03
Well, I mean, friends are, if friends are really friends, they're going to want to make you
10:06
better.
10:07
Right.
10:08
I'm not just going to leave you the same.
10:09
I remember this is years ago, I went, uh, double dated with a friend of mine, John and
10:12
his wife and we were out walking, um, probably to a restaurant or something like that.
10:18
And well, wife said something I think it probably had already been a little bit annoyed.
10:22
Anyway, she said something while I immediately mocked her, just like, you know, whatever.
10:26
And, um, John was walking with me that women are walking right in front of me and he just
10:30
ribs me.
10:31
And he's like, dude, don't do that.
10:34
That's not nice.
10:35
And I, and that was years ago, I still remember that because then had an immediate impression.
10:40
Yeah.
10:41
He did not wait.
10:42
Uh, he wasn't.
10:43
He ain't about it, but he called me out in the moment and told me, you know, this is
10:47
not right.
10:48
And you know what?
10:49
I, I apologize.
10:50
Him got right.
10:51
And I didn't do that anymore.
10:52
And I, I think, um, I think a couple of things exist there.
10:55
I mean, we had a relationship.
10:57
So I think it was easier, um, for him to maybe do that and for me to receive it.
11:01
It wasn't just out of the blue, somebody didn't know, not saying that that's not right.
11:05
I mean, or that, or that's wrong.
11:07
Um, you know, and I look at this here in the, I assume that Peter and Paul had some, some
11:13
sort of relationship going into that.
11:16
Um, but I just think, I think it's absolutely necessary versus call out now at, at home with
11:22
my, with my kiddos, when they were not believers, I trained them, uh, with the truth, because
11:28
I wanted them to understand it.
11:30
But as, as they became or have become believers, I then hold them to that.
11:35
And so when they digress, then again, I've got relationships with them.
11:40
I see them every single day.
11:42
Um, if they digress away, I'm immediately calling them out in a, in a, in a loving way.
11:47
The idea is that, you know, we can call people out, but we're doing it and trying to steer
11:52
them back with it.
11:53
Second Timothy, three, 16, 17, am I, am I right?
11:56
I knew the word of truth, but then the, the, the word is, is, is there, uh, to rebuke,
12:01
to correct and to train and righteousness, to kind of steer us back in the right way.
12:05
And I think that's what we, we do with our rebuke.
12:07
Also, I think there's a lot to unpack here in these, you know, verses here, but like he's,
12:13
this is something that he's, he's ready to die for like, he's ready to die on that hill.
12:17
This isn't Peter just slipping up somewhere.
12:19
This isn't Peter, like losing his temper, temper somewhere where it's like, Oh, you know
12:23
what, you know, I'll let this meal be over and then when the meal's over, maybe I'll
12:26
say something to him about him slipping up in anger.
12:29
Like this is, Paul is so on fire about this and like, like, like, be open with galate,
12:34
like relations one, like this is foundational stuff.
12:36
Like this is like, if you get this wrong, like you are, you are condemned.
12:42
And I, I, yeah, I think, I think live in a culture where that's just not acceptable to
12:46
do.
12:47
And as someone who's not like Kyle, like I tend to sit back, that's something that I
12:52
have to be intentional about and it is a, you have to pick your battle.
12:57
You know, sometimes like you're not going to get mad at somebody for thinking that infant
13:02
baptism is okay.
13:05
If you don't think like that's a, that's a different thing.
13:07
I mean, we could talk about that, but like that's not a, I don't believe that we're saved
13:13
by grace alone.
13:14
Like that's a different thing.
13:15
I think that's, I think that's an important thing to, to understand here is that like he's,
13:20
he's calling him to the map because he's doing some dangerous stuff for the church.
13:26
Right.
13:27
Yeah.
13:28
Well, Ryan, I had a quick question because I want you to go into what you say, but this
13:30
is like no sarcasm.
13:31
This is like a really important point.
13:32
So I've said this on the show before and obviously, you know, you and I've talked about this
13:35
individually, but it seems like a lot of people that are in that reformed Calvinist camp,
13:40
there's never a fight too small to have.
13:44
Right.
13:45
And so it's like there, there are those big things that Matt just kind of talked about,
13:47
like, okay, these are foundational things here.
13:49
These are core tenants of the Christian faith, but then it's like, hey, there's this one
13:52
obscure word in the Greek and now that it's translated into modernity, let's fight for
13:57
the next seven hours as we drink our IPAs and like figure, figure this thing out.
14:02
Yeah.
14:03
Yeah.
14:04
We don't drink it on this show, but yes, we are whiskey drinkers here, but like that's
14:06
just kind of the thing for me.
14:07
It's like, again, you, you're kind of more so in that camp and you, you love this.
14:11
You love to kind of get in there and get in the ring and kind of fight with people.
14:14
Now again, in this setting, kind of like what Matt just said, like we're fighting about
14:18
something that could literally condemn somebody, not something that's so unbelievably small,
14:22
but I want to kind of get your, your read on that as well because I know that you have
14:26
almost rebuked yourself at times where you're like, okay, I literally went way too far on
14:31
this one obscure topic and God, look at the amount of time I wasted, but like, you know,
14:35
but then at the same time, it's like, where do you draw that line of, hey, this is the
14:38
hill to die on versus, hey, this isn't that big a deal.
14:40
So can I quote Spurgeon?
14:41
Of course you can quote the Spurs, let's get him in here.
14:45
Hearted men are always called mean spirited by cowards.
14:48
Yeah, I love that.
14:49
I think that's a good quote.
14:50
Yeah.
14:51
And so when it comes down to it, I mean, there's, yes, I'm a reformed Baptist.
14:55
I'd probably Presbyterian if I didn't believe in believer baptism.
14:59
So I'd be like, that's something I'll argue about, you know, infant baptism, believer
15:04
baptism, which is all a tier three type tier two issue.
15:07
Okay.
15:08
And so you've got to look at, you got to look at the tiers, like, is this a salvation issue
15:12
or is this a, is this like a tier two tier three issue, you know, is it a non issue?
15:18
You know, we argue all the time about Calvinism and our, which we're going to laugh about
15:22
it when we're in heaven, because it's really not a salvation issue.
15:25
I believe that salvation comes from God.
15:27
You believe salvation comes from free will sometimes, you know what I'm saying?
15:30
And so, you know, we don't know.
15:33
I'm so depraved that God had opened my eyes, you know, so, you know, I like to argue things.
15:40
I like, you know, but when it comes to this, I mean, we're talking about the foundation
15:44
of the gospel.
15:45
The gospel is not by man, it is by God, and we are saved by the grace of God alone.
15:52
There is nothing I can do that, that can make God see me any differently or righteous.
15:59
The only thing that I can be seen righteous is through Christ himself.
16:03
And how does that happen?
16:04
Right.
16:05
That happens through belief and repentance.
16:06
Well, and to be clear, don't lose your turn of thought, just to be clear, like, I think
16:10
you made it seem kind of like I'm on the Armenian side, which I would not co-sign with that.
16:13
I'm like, you just slid that in there.
16:17
But I think, I think this is where most people that, that I'm around at least, that aren't
16:21
like full bore on the Calvinist side of things is, what do people normally say?
16:26
They're like, okay, it's, you know, the guy's drowning in the ocean and God's reaching out
16:30
his hand to save him.
16:31
And all the guy has to do is reach out, whereas the Calvinist would say, no, God snatched you
16:35
up, there's nothing you could do, you're going to drown regardless.
16:37
Whereas somebody who's not on that side, I won't say Armenian as if it's the opposite.
16:40
I'll say someone that's not in that camp is like, no, they at least had to reach up, like,
16:45
so that God could grab their hand.
16:47
And so that's the kind of, that's the free will thing that people really get into because
16:50
they're like, then you, you know, if you believe strictly like what you say you do, like you're
16:54
making God the author of evil, you're, you're making, you know, God very choosy in terms of
16:59
that.
17:00
And then again, it's going to open up a whole can of worms on sovereignty and those different
17:03
things. But I think that that's, I think the important point that you're making that
17:07
will maybe save us from an hour of just arguing about one thing is in this moment, this was
17:13
something that was so unbelievably important that it wasn't a secondary issue that people
17:17
like to call it or tertiary issue or something like that.
17:19
It's like, no, this is a core of everything like this is worth fighting about because
17:23
here's the other thing.
17:24
If you've been friends for a long time with somebody and you've had these, these, you
17:28
know, if you've quippled about very, very important things, it's okay to, to argue about the other
17:33
little things like that, that's all okay where I think a lot of people struggles when you
17:36
see these grandiose all encompassing statements like, you know, recently I had lunch with a
17:41
buddy of mine that's Catholic and basically every time he and I have a lunch, he tried
17:43
to convert me to Catholicism.
17:44
It's just kind of a fun time. But if you listen to John MacArthur, who we all, I think at
17:48
this table are large fans and respecters of John MacArthur, John MacArthur thinks Catholicism
17:52
is a false gospel and every Catholic is going to hell like whoa, like that, that, that's
17:58
so bold and so far. And that's such a grandiose statement. And of course he's got entire commentaries
18:04
to back that up and, you know, he's had debates and he's done all those different things, but
18:07
it's just kind of like, wow, is that really what we're talking about here? But to, to
18:11
John MacArthur and to people that are of that ilk that's like, no, no, no, this is that,
18:15
you know, Galatians two 11 through 14 moment to where like, if you're going to the, if
18:20
you're going to mass and you're thinking that, that you're saved, like, no, you're not safe,
18:24
like you're, you're believing, you're believing in a false gospel. So I guess everybody's lines
18:27
a little bit different. Well, it just comes down to it, you know, I see where MacArthur's
18:31
coming from. I mean, that's pretty, you know, it's a bleak thing to look at. But if you
18:37
look at, if you look at Paul talking to the Galatians, he even calls him out. He's like,
18:41
you don't have true faith in the gospel when you go and get circumcised, you know, because
18:46
you feel like you need to get circumcised to, to be saved, you know, or to have grace,
18:52
you know, from God. And so, you know, it depends, you know, I don't want to get into the whole
18:57
Catholic thing. You know, I, I probably have the same things with prosperity gospel. You
19:00
know what I'm saying? Like, Hey, you know, if you come to God because you want a new car,
19:04
you know what I'm saying? Did I really come to, did I really come to Christ with knowing
19:08
that I'm a depraved human being in need of a savior? Because why did he die on the cross
19:13
for us? Yeah. You know, I mean, that's the thing that we have to think about it. I think
19:15
we'll get more into that in chapter three. But why did he die on the cross for us? Well,
19:20
you know, um, Paul will point it out. Like what was the justification for Christ anyways,
19:24
if you think that you need works point to get to him, you know, and so, um, I think I kind
19:32
of lost my train of thought from how the cabinism thing. Well, I think that's really good because
19:36
I, you know, as funny as it is, and we're going to poke fun. Like that's always going
19:39
to be kind of a three point for a lot of our discussions. And I think that that's healthy.
19:42
Like I think it's always healthy to kind of challenge people and challenge those different
19:45
points of view. What I would like to get from you on, Matt, you kind of brought this up a
19:48
little bit earlier is you're not wired to go at somebody and to just challenge them to
19:53
their face like immediately. That's not really your thing. But you know, again, in our friendship,
19:59
because we've been friends for, you know, close to 20 years at this point, like there
20:02
have been times when we have rebuked each other and neither one of us took that very
20:06
well. And I think it was because we're wired so differently to where again, this is kind
20:10
of like an inside baseball thing. So I want to make sure that we still bring the listeners
20:14
along. But I did, I rebuked you in my way of rebuking. It was almost like a love language
20:19
thing. Like, you know, you know, your wife's an acts of service person and maybe you're
20:22
a quality time person. So all she wants is acts of service and all you're doing is just
20:25
hanging around. It's like, no, no, no, like you need to fill her love tank in her way.
20:29
And so it wasn't until I got more used to Matt's style that I was able to rebuke you
20:35
in a more healthy way. And same was true in the opposite. It doesn't mean that you need
20:40
to come at me and like poke me in the chest. But like you knew that in order to get my
20:43
attention that you had to do things a little bit differently. And I feel like that's important
20:47
for Christians that want to rebuke their friends. Like if they know, you know, one of their
20:52
Christian friends is, you know, having an emotional fair at work that may turn physical,
20:56
or you know that they're cheating on their taxes, or you know that they're basically
20:59
name, neglecting their families and they're hiding at work or hiding on the golf course
21:02
or something like that, that that is a time to rebuke them in whatever way is necessary.
21:07
But I just, I'm curious what the rest of you, but even you specifically, Matt, like how
21:11
to come at somebody and rebuke them because we don't really see from the text how exactly
21:15
we, he did it. We just know it was done publicly and boldly.
21:18
Yeah. I think, I think there's, I think there's layers and there's categories like obviously
21:22
Peter is not a new believer. That's another layer too. Like he should know better. Right.
21:27
Yeah. And I think that was one of Paul's points too is like, you're, you're the rock
21:32
that Jesus like wants to build his church on. You should, you should not be even entertaining
21:37
this idea. Like how could you even get there? And so I think, you know, it goes kind of goes
21:41
to, you know, when he's talking to Timothy about being a pastor, like there are certain,
21:44
certain things that you got to consider. Like that's not something you just decide flippantly
21:48
to be a pastor because there's some, some things in eternity that they're pretty serious
21:53
that you should consider before you jump into that and you're held to a higher standard.
21:57
And I think that's part of it here too. And so like, if you're talking to a believer who,
22:01
who professes to know Christ and to serve Christ, like, then I think there's, there's a different,
22:08
there's a different approach where you can be more blunt and you can be more in your
22:12
face. And I've found that with my own life is like, if I know someone is professing that
22:17
this is true, but then they're not acting in that way, I feel more apt to come to the
22:23
mat in it. And I'm, I'm hesitant for a fight. But once I get in, man, I'm, I dig my heels
22:28
in and I'm, let's go. But for a, for an unbeliever or for a new believer, I think a lot of times
22:34
you have to be careful with how you bring that. Now you shouldn't still bring truth. Like Eric
22:38
was talking about with his kids, like you should always bring the truth. And like your word is truth.
22:43
The truth is a sword that cuts like you should always bring up. But I think there's different ways
22:47
to bring that to different people. And clearly here, Peter should know better. And Paul's like,
22:53
dude, how did you even get there? But friend, for a nonbeliever. And I think there,
22:58
I think there's a lot more like gentleness that needs to be prescribed to those situations.
23:04
So with Paul, you always see in his letters, how he always comes graciously, except for Galatians.
23:10
So but, you know, I may be Corinthians. Yeah, maybe. Yeah, I would say that too.
23:16
But if you see, I, you can see his anger, probably maybe turn to a more of a, you know,
23:23
it's always going to be angry, but it's like, or on fire, more of a fiery, righteous anger,
23:29
is when even his pal Barnabas is persuaded into this, you know, and yeah, I mean, like, you know,
23:36
like if I'm discipling somebody and I'm discipling them in truth and here comes this guy, and he's
23:42
discipling in non-truth. I mean, there's going to be some righteous anger there. You know what I'm
23:46
saying? And so I think he, I think he opposes Peter. I think he does it pretty graciously. But he calls
23:52
him out because he was out there with the Gentiles. He's eating Gentile food, you know. He's enjoying
23:57
the bacon, you know, and then now he's like, all right, well, you Gentiles need to be Jews,
24:01
but I can live as a Gentile, but you can't, you know what I'm saying?
24:05
You said something earlier about, you know, you know, someone professes to believe.
24:10
I wonder sometimes if we, like, I'm just thinking like all the people I know,
24:14
how many of them have I literally sat down with and just heard their testimony and then
24:20
gotten a good feel of what they actually believe? I mean, I mean, I think I've done that a lot,
24:26
but if I don't, I wonder if that leaves some ambiguity of like, well, I mean,
24:31
they say they're Christian. Maybe I should hold them to it, but maybe I just don't know how much,
24:34
you know, at what level, you know, whatever. So it kind of makes it harder.
24:37
I think that's a good point, you know. We bring in some assumptions like, like,
24:42
I was in a group in my industry where I assume that everyone thought that salvation came through
24:49
justification by faith alone, Christ alone, for the glory of God alone. And I made that
24:55
assumption and it was, was completely wrong. And that, that caused some like real strife for me.
25:03
And I had to make some decisions. And that's actually, I think, I think God used that as a way for
25:07
me to, you know, kind of put on some big boy pants and say some things that needed to be said
25:11
in a way that I wasn't comfortable with, but I knew that needs to be said.
25:16
Well, I'm not calling myself Paul, but like, it's a sal, if it's a salvation issue, like, man,
25:23
you've got to be ready to die on the hill. Well, I'm going to mess this up entirely. But
25:26
every time, every year, there's always, usually Albert Mueller talks about on his show,
25:30
but there's some sort of survey or research done about what Christians actually think.
25:35
And the percentages of Christians that don't believe the Bible is God's word is astonishingly
25:40
high. The percentage of Christians that think that you are good from birth and it's only
25:45
how you are raised that that is makes you deprived. Like it is an astonishing level of, I guess it's,
25:53
it's these a biblical ideals because we as Christians, and we talked about this on last week's episode,
25:58
it's like, a lot of Christians just don't, they don't read the Bible. And so they, they don't know
26:03
what's there. And so they build off their, their worldview, they build off their Christian worldview
26:08
off of a cultural understanding of Christianity and not a biblical understanding of Christianity.
26:12
Now, when you go towards a biblical understanding of Christianity, then you start digging into,
26:16
okay, well, is the ESV right? Or is it the King James version? That's right. Yeah. If you read
26:20
the message, do you go directly to hell when you die? Then the answer to that is yes, clearly.
26:24
But like, you know, that that's just kind of one of those things where it's like, we, we're so
26:28
biblically ignorant about so many different things that we do assume, we assume a lot of
26:34
things about people, because here's the other thing, you know, way back in the day, when I was
26:37
still listening to Andy Stanley, he had a really, really good sermon series about, you know, what
26:41
it means to be a Christian. And like, what does it mean to call yourself a Christian? And I have
26:45
group of 100 people in a room that all profess to be Christian. If they had to describe what that
26:49
meant, how many different answers are you going to get? Like, it's going to be a lot of different
26:53
answers about people that describe like how they are to be a Christian. But I really like
26:58
Matt, what you brought up and it really a link to what you said as well, Eric, which was
27:01
the rebuke of someone that purports to be a Christian should be different than a rebuke of
27:08
somebody that is outside of Christ. And that is such a huge thing that a lot of Christians,
27:13
and again, I'm not one of those people that's like, you should be known for what you're for,
27:16
not what you're against. No, I'm against baby murder. You should know that about me from the
27:21
very, very beginning. Let's shout that from the rooftops. But for whenever you have somebody that's
27:25
like, Hey, I'm not really a Christian. That's like me being invited to a Muslim's household for dinner
27:31
and being mad that they're not praying the same way that I would pray if I were to invite them
27:35
over to my house. That doesn't mean you don't spread the gospel. That doesn't mean that you
27:38
don't share Christ with those people. But it's judging them based based off of a criteria that
27:42
doesn't make sense in that moment. And so I think that that's an important thing about this part
27:47
here. And we should probably wrap this up, Ryan. Yeah, hop back in and wrap us up on this part of
27:50
Paul and Peter. I think this part of Paul and Peter that we should really look at too is
27:53
discernment within the church. So you brought up Andy Stanley. Yeah, you know what I'm saying?
27:57
It's like, we need to be able to call out our leaders lovingly, because this is what's happening.
28:01
We have two leaders. We have one leader within the church spreading a false gospel, you know,
28:06
or a works and. And so how are how are these people who don't dig into their Bible, who go to the
28:11
church to listen to the TED talk? And the TED talk is, you know, pick and choose each verse on how it
28:16
can really benefit you and your life. You know what I'm saying? And so we need to keep our leaders
28:20
accountable in a loving way and provide, you know, a discernment within the church, you know,
28:25
because not everybody's reading their Bible. And I've got friends that, you know, we've lost some
28:30
friends, you know, I was that cage stage Calvinist man, like you need to believe in
28:34
penal substitutionary toment, all this stuff. And I was talking to a guy and he's like,
28:40
you know, hey, man, you know, like if the church is just sending out at the end of the day, at the
28:44
end of the church service, if you leave a good person, isn't that all that matters? I'm like,
28:49
oh, what matters is you leave convicted knowing why you need Christ Jesus in life and how you can
28:55
better yourself through him, you know, not oh, I just heard that message in that TED talk. I
28:59
feel really good about myself. I did good things today. You know what I'm saying? Like,
29:03
that's what we have to get at. It's just works and we're seeing it a lot now. And
29:07
how do you want to say it in our church culture? So I think I just dropped a huge bomb.
29:13
Oh, no, I think that goes back to what what Kyle was saying about ice Jesus and like how people
29:18
like to read that you know, I want to I want to bring my point. And then I want to I want to find
29:22
the verse that matches up to my point. And I really like what Alistair Begg says about the need for
29:28
the gospel. Like we all come in and if somebody says we're gonna we're gonna learn about the
29:32
gospel today, most Christians would go, Oh my gosh, okay, again, yeah, I know this. I heard this,
29:36
but it's so foundational. It is so important that we should be preaching the gospel to ourselves
29:41
constantly because even our best day is a zero. Yeah, and like we have to constantly be preaching
29:50
the gospel to ourselves, let alone everybody else. So it's it's it's such a foundational thing
29:57
that you can't can't just let it slide or you shouldn't just let it slide. Right. And to maybe
30:02
put a little bit of a bow on this, I want to refer to something that you said as well, Ryan,
30:05
rebuking our pastors. So what I've said before and I've said this a lot on the show is, you know,
30:12
a lot of pastors are scared to talk about those those hard subject matters. So maybe that's abortion,
30:16
maybe that's a Black Lives Matter, maybe that's a little legal immigration, maybe it's
30:20
any number of things. And I've encouraged guys to if you want to see the change in your church,
30:24
you be the guy that starts it. So you and a bunch of guys that think like you set up meetings,
30:28
one right after the other with your pastor, you walk in, you tell the pastor, Hey, pastor,
30:32
if you start speaking out full-throatedly against the against the, you know, murder of the unborn,
30:37
I will stand in front of you and take some of those slings and arrows. And then you leave his office
30:41
and the next guy comes in and says the exact same thing. And then the next guy comes in and says
30:44
the exact same thing. And you're emboldening him to be able to do those things. Now he gets to
30:49
make a decision about what he talks about on Sunday, but at least he will know that the people of
30:54
this congregation will have my back if I decide to go that direction. But the same should be true
30:59
if you're rebuking a pastor. And that takes quite a bit of stones on your end because if they say
31:06
something that is a historical or a biblical or that is slightly heretical, the posture you should
31:12
probably have whenever you challenge that person should be individually and maybe asking questions.
31:18
Hey, when you said this on Sunday, this is what I heard. Did I hear correctly? That may be a
31:23
great place to kind of start where this goes. And then again, the question I tell people all time
31:27
is to ask somebody, Hey, if you were wrong about this, would you want to know? And that's a great
31:32
place to be because you're going to get a really good insight as to whether or not your, your
31:35
pastor is going to accept that rebuke. I mean, go back to an episode from last year where we talk
31:39
to Joby Martin. And he talked about whenever he called me and rebuked me about and he did it
31:44
individually. It wasn't in person, you know, kind of like what we see here, but he did it, you know,
31:47
he's in Florida, I'm in Oklahoma. And he was very impressed with how I accepted that rebuke. And I
31:51
have no idea why I accepted so well, I guess I was just in a good mood that morning. But it was,
31:55
it was a thing was, I knew that in that exact moment that I was wrong. And so it would have been
31:59
just the worst thing possible for me to fight against what he said. And so you're going to be
32:03
able to get a sense of whether or not your pastor is going to be accepting of that type of a, of a
32:08
rebuke, or if they're going to kind of put up, Hey, hey, I got my MDiv. And I went to a seminary
32:13
and all these types of things. Go ahead, Ryan, you wanted to hop back? I do. I do. I think I've
32:17
been in both situations. Yeah. So I've had a pastor tell me, well, this just isn't the place for you.
32:22
And I had one pastor come to me and he's after I've come like, I don't understand this. It doesn't
32:27
seem biblical. He sat down with me with my Bible and showed me how this is biblical. Okay, you know,
32:33
this is where I'm coming from. This is biblical rather rather taking the time to disciple me,
32:37
taking the time to be a shepherd. And then I think that's what really comes down to is like,
32:42
who's shepherding their flock? And who's just, who's just sitting out there, you know, and just trying
32:47
to wait for you to give your tithe. And I think that goes, that goes back to chapter one, like,
32:52
who are you, who are you serving? Are you doing it for more congregants? Are you a pastor so you can
32:56
get on the main stage? Or are you the pastor so you can sit with somebody on their deathbed?
33:01
Right. Like that's, that's the mud in the muck is where, and that's a, that's a mud in the muck
33:06
situation right there. And that's where pastors should be. And I think we should, we should feel
33:10
like we can call pastors to them out. And I like what you said, you've got to come with some stones
33:15
and you've got to come ready to listen. Yeah, but if you come like a [inaudible], that's also a terrible
33:19
idea. Like, that's like, don't be that guy. But you've got to be, you've got to, you've got to,
33:23
if you're going to go and talk to a pastor who probably knows a heck of a lot more than you do.
33:27
Yeah. Come with some knowledge. Don't come like, I think this is wrong.
33:30
Yeah. You know what I'm saying? Like, come with some stones, come with that, but be ready to listen.
33:35
Right. Don't be ready to like sit there and fight. Be ready to listen. Right. I want to understand.
33:39
Yeah. Eric, you want to have any? Oh, yeah. One thing, I just think it is, you know, they always
33:43
say it's lonely at the top, you know, your pastor, your pastor can flop. I've always learned that
33:47
you want someone pouring into you. I want someone pouring into my pastor, you know, because it's
33:54
easy to kind of plateau. I mean, when you're just, it's just you, you know, at the top. So,
33:58
I think that's really, really important. I think that really applies to all of us, that we should
34:01
have some body or some group of people that are pouring into us, but also are able to provide that
34:08
check rain too. And we see that, you know, in some degree here, what's going on there,
34:12
even as we're kind of working as co laborers side by side. So,
34:15
Absolutely. A lot of good stuff there. Again, there's more to say on that, but I mean, really,
34:19
the last part of Galatians two, I mean, this is, I mean, it's hard to rank order things,
34:25
but this section of scripture, in my opinion, might be the most important thing that Paul's ever
34:30
written in my personal opinion. If you just read Galatians two, 15 through 21, and just focused on
34:39
that, the pitfalls that you would avoid would be substantial. And there's a lot here. I'll just
34:44
kind of throw out the very first thing. Well, you know what, I'll begin with the end in mind. So,
34:48
I'll go to verse 21, because this is perhaps the single verse that is the most important thing
34:53
that Paul ever wrote. And it's this, I do not nullify the grace of God for if righteousness
34:58
were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose. And I remember the first time I heard
35:05
someone else say that because I remember reading at the first time, you know, when I was first
35:08
reading my teen Bible or whatever, when I was in 10th grade or whatever. And it probably,
35:12
I was having my mind blown constantly. So that didn't really come and, you know, blow my mind
35:16
in any particular way. But verse 21 is the biggest stamp of the, like, again, if you go from 15
35:23
through 21, maybe we should just read the whole thing. But 21 is that that is the pounding on the
35:28
table at the end of a statement. Like, a lot of people, you know, I'll have people reach out to
35:32
me sometimes, you know, they'll be asking for help with how to present or how to do a podcast or
35:36
something like that. And how to, how to be good on in a Q and A and stuff like that. And I tell
35:39
these guys, like, you need to end with a thump, like you need in with a thump. Don't just end with
35:44
like whenever you're done with your, your answer, everyone should know it. And I feel like that
35:50
is just such a great way of summarizing this entire part of the scripture. And it does provide a
35:55
springboard into Galatians three, which we'll talk about next week. But again, I do not nullify
35:59
the grace of God for righteousness. We're through the law. Then Christ died for no purpose. This is
36:03
a direct repudiation of what the Judaizers are doing in Galatia at this time, because it was,
36:08
again, we talk about grace and gospel plus whatever the thing is. But I mean, I'm just curious,
36:13
because again, like that's one part, but even in verse 20, like that's, that's probably one of the
36:17
most oft quoted verses that you will see. And then, I mean, it really goes all the way back to verse 15.
36:21
So at risk of me just sitting here rambling about everything in this section, somebody saved me and
36:27
hop in here because I just, I absolutely love this section so much. So I was thinking about a,
36:31
we oftentimes, or what I'm reading into this is, is these guys became Christians, and then
36:38
they start trying to do. I remember this.
36:41
Watchman knee has an illustration. It says, well, it was actually a story. He was at a lake
36:49
with a buddy and they saw a guy out in the lake. The guy was drowning. He could not swim. He was
36:54
going under and watchman knee knew that he was not a good swimmer. So he told us, but he's like,
36:58
man, go get that guy. The guy was like, okay. And he just stood there, right? And just waited.
37:03
And watchman, he was getting very nervous. This points guys like clearly, clearly yelling for help
37:08
and says, Hey man, go get that guy. And that guy just stands there. His friends kind of just waiting.
37:15
Finally, the guy is literally going under taking his last gulp of breath before he sinks. And his
37:23
friend jumps out there and goes and grabs him and brings him into safety. Watchman. He was
37:28
very upset about that. Obviously, of course, he was glad the guy was alive, but he said,
37:32
why in the world did you do that? And he said, if I'd gone out there any earlier,
37:36
that guy would have drowned both of us trying to save himself. And what he took from that story
37:43
is that God is, we are no good to God until we have fully given up. So we are drowning and we
37:50
finally give up and say, I can't do it. And then, you know, here, here comes the hand or
37:57
hand comes up. You know, we're going back there. I just got us away from it.
38:02
I like to say for God, that's going to dive in there and get me.
38:04
Before we go too far, that's good. So here he pulls us out and we're saying,
38:13
so many of us then, as we realize that God has done his work and we then start trying to do,
38:18
we start trying to do for God. And the reality is, as soon as we start trying to do for God,
38:24
we realize that in our flesh, we can't do it. And we see Paul saying, I don't do the things I
38:29
want to do and the things I do want to do. I don't do, you know, he has that tension point. And
38:33
I just think, as we become believers, instead of trying to do or to try, we should just continue
38:42
to trust in God and in Christ and in the spirit to guide us. Otherwise, every single time we start
38:50
trying to take up ourself to do something that's just going to end in failure.
38:53
So Eric, I have a question on that. So this kind of goes back. I do want to read verse 16 here.
38:57
Yeah, we know that a person is not justified by works of the law, but through faith in Jesus
39:01
Christ. So we also have believed in Christ Jesus in order to be justified by faith in Christ
39:06
and not by the works of the law, because by works of the law, no one will be justified.
39:11
So this goes into a discussion about fruit, I think, because, you know, I've made the statement
39:17
on my podcast for again, a huge fan of John MacArthur. But when I listen to John MacArthur,
39:21
I don't know if I'm saved or not. Every time I listen to him, every time I listen to him,
39:24
answer the question about how someone saved, I feel like I get more confused. And a lot of it becomes,
39:28
you know, he talks about fruit. And he talks about even, you know, last summer, he rebuked
39:34
Gavin Newsom, the governor of California. And he talked about, you know, when Gavin Newsom was
39:38
using scripture on billboards to basically encourage women to travel to the state of California to
39:42
kill their children, you know, that was something that that was really big last summer. But one
39:46
thing that John MacArthur did is in his open letter, in the last paragraph, his open letter,
39:50
there was a lot of action verbs he used of things that Christians should do, of things that Gavin
39:55
Newsom should do in order to, to make sure that he accepts Christ and all those different things.
39:59
And it's just when you get into fruit and you look at someone's life, if they're following the law,
40:04
there, there's fruit from that. Like, if they're doing good deeds, there is fruit from that.
40:09
And I literally wrote this in my notes section of when I was reading the section is like, what about
40:13
fruit? Because that's where I get confused is like, Hey, is my fruit sweet enough? Is there
40:18
enough variety of fruit? Is the fruit big enough? Is it appropriately sized or whatever the thing
40:23
that you want to look at it is? Because I feel like that's when I start making the gospel more
40:28
complicated. And the gospel should be easy to understand and easy to apply. And so I'm just
40:35
curious, y'all's thoughts on that about how fruit plays into this whole justification by faith
40:39
alone side. Yeah, I mean, I, as soon as you said that I was thinking Galatians 5, 22,
40:44
through 24 that the fruit of the spirit, you know, and that that's really where it all comes from.
40:51
Again, I don't, I don't know that I fully disagree. I understand like cause and effect you do this,
40:56
you get this from the fruit standpoint on the fleshly side. But I feel like, you know, when we
41:01
become believers, if we are trusting in, and we have died with, you know, Christ, then our fruit
41:09
then should be holy through the spirit and it should reflect, you know, the love, joy, peace,
41:13
long suffering, patience. I think one of the crux of the issues is that we're getting to a,
41:20
do I outwardly look like a Christian? And is it because I have been justified? And now I'm
41:26
bearing fruit because I'm being sanctified. But I think, I think that goes back to Paul opposing
41:33
Peter, a key new Peter. And I think having good godly relationships where people know
41:40
you and know where your heart is, is where the best rebuking and growth can come
41:50
because if I just look, if I just randomly met Eric on the street and he was doing things that
41:55
you could say are fruits of the spirit, like, how do I know? How do I know you're just not
42:00
doing those things so the world thinks you're a good person? And I think that's where that
42:06
relationship, that fellowship really comes into play where it's like, we're, I don't think we're,
42:11
we're not called to rebuke everybody in every situation. But if I'm in fellowship with you,
42:17
Eric, and you're not displaying fruits of the spirit, and we might need to have some conversation
42:22
and vice versa because, because like the Bible's pretty clear, like, if you're, if you're in Christ,
42:29
you should be displaying those things. And you should, it's not, it's not God changing you.
42:35
It's like literally gave you a new heart. So you should be displaying some of those things.
42:39
So it's kind of a weird, it's a weird place to be.
42:42
Yeah, but your fruit, the fruit that you're doing and displaying should be for an audience of one.
42:48
I think that's, that's probably a big distinction is, am I doing this again and going back to our
42:53
last week, you know, just doing it for other people to see us? Or are we doing it? Because
42:57
it's just the right thing to do. I ask, you know, my oldest son, I'm like, why do we do this? And he,
43:02
you know, he knows the answer. The answer is we do this because it's the right thing to do,
43:06
not for any other reason. You know, it's God glorifying.
43:08
I think one thing to look at is, how do we look at the law? There's, there's three,
43:12
there's three versions of the law, there's government law, there's moral law, there's
43:16
ceremonial law. And what Paul's talking about with these Judaizers is ceremonial law,
43:20
circumcision, what we eat, it's how our meats prepared or sacrificed. The sacrifice has been
43:26
done through Christ Jesus. You know, there's no longer a blood sacrifice needed. So ceremonial
43:31
law is gone, you know, and now they're under the Romans. So their own law, their own governmental
43:36
law is gone. But what we still have is the moral law of God and who God is and what that fruit
43:41
should look like. And so that's when it comes to the law of like, you know, hey, we're talking
43:45
about ceremonial law here. But when we're talking about fruits, we're talking about the moral law
43:49
of God, which we're still never going to hit the moral law of God, because that's what Christ did.
43:54
He did, he did it all. You know, but still that's a good footprint to look at of like,
43:59
how is a believer I should behave and how I should show fruit.
44:02
I think that's a good distinction for sure. And Paul was an expert in the ceremonial law.
44:06
Yeah, like he knew that like the back of his hand to use a cliche. But yeah, I think that's a really
44:11
good point. Well, so this maybe this ties in with verse 20 or a dozen. I remember having this
44:16
discussion with people. We were having in the context of kids and whether or not kids,
44:19
how kids are saved and, you know, when when is that age where it's like, okay, you know,
44:24
they're kind of on their own now because it's like, you know, I've, you know, very,
44:29
very young kids. And so it's like, if something were to happen to them, like, I don't, I don't see
44:32
from scripture what, you know, what I can surmise as, you know, them being covered or, you know,
44:36
anyway, it gets into a lot of different areas. But I wonder with, so let's say somebody really
44:43
is leading a very, very good moral life. Now they don't know why, but they're, they're not
44:48
lying. They're not stealing. They're helping people. They're, they're living a moral life.
44:51
And everybody Christian or non Christian would say, yeah, they're leading a moral life.
44:55
And then they become a Christian. And they're just continuing that same life.
45:00
There's an argument to be made that, Hey, we're not seeing the fruit because normally people
45:04
talk about, Hey, you were depraved. You're doing all these wrong things. Then you become a Christian,
45:08
and then we see this difference. And that that does kind of go back into what happens with kids,
45:12
because it's like, if a seven year olds, the first born, dutiful, good kid, and then they, you know,
45:17
raise their hand at church camp or whatever the thing is that that is kind of good for whatever
45:21
your listener, wherever you're kind of hearing this, like, and then they just keep leading that
45:25
same life. They're still doing their homework. They're still sitting in the front of class,
45:27
or still raising their hand and being like, that's where I think it kind of trips a lot of people up.
45:31
And I can already tell all three of you have something to say. So I'm going to shut up and let
45:35
y'all go. I think like outward, outward appearance is great. I think it's the heart. Like Luther is
45:39
a good example to look at at this. He was chastised in the Roman Catholic church for like, confessing
45:46
too much. Like it, priests would get mad at him because they're like, why are you like, come back
45:50
when you've actually sinned. And so I think when you're a regenerate Christian, like, if you're doing
45:55
all the right things and then you become a Christian, like, you're going to look at all of those
45:58
things differently. You're going to go, Oh my gosh, I am a terrible sinner. I need to repent. I need
46:04
to bring this to God. Whereas if you're not, you're probably just, okay, I'm being, I'm doing all
46:10
the right things. But like, you don't look at, you look at yourself differently. You look at yourself
46:14
through the lens of God and need of someone to intervene on your behalf because you cannot help
46:21
but sin. And so I think, I think Luther offers a really good example of what it's like to like,
46:27
look at his life. He gave up his whole life to be a monk. And he was following the law, you would,
46:34
you could say. But then he had, he had this moment where he's like, Oh my gosh, I am just, I'm
46:41
filth. And he got even in his own church got like trouble for you. Yeah, I did on your wife. Yeah.
46:48
No, I think one thing that we have to look at is we got to look at the heart. So, I mean, Jesus
46:54
takes it all a step further, like with adultery, you know, right? I say that even if you don't even
46:59
have to go in the act with the woman just lusting after her, right, is something. And so God looks
47:03
at the heart of man. And so, you know, I hate that guy maybe doing good things, but we don't know
47:08
what's going on in his heart. We also don't know like, you know, let's say there's somebody who's
47:14
totally depraved and they have like, it's a drug addiction, you know, and they're trying to fight
47:20
every day on not taking that drug, you know, taking that drug. Well, they're fighting harder
47:25
and relying on God harder than the guy that could be talking about over here. Doesn't mean that this
47:30
guy's more safe. Another guy, you know, even though we can see it's outwardly, you know,
47:34
trying to change. So I think, I think it really comes down to the heart. I mean, we can,
47:39
our heart's always going to come out into our actions, you know, within life. And so
47:44
people are going to judge that. But people can't judge my salvation. I mean,
47:48
you're talking to the Calvinists here. I can't judge anybody's salvation, you know, as much as
47:51
I'd love to be like, man, I'm a car to this one. And but like, you just don't have the fruit,
47:56
you know, but it's just like, I can't really judge that. That's God to judge. That's the
48:01
Christian freedom in this all, you know, of this all is that God's going to judge, you know,
48:06
what our actions are, what our hearts are, you know, but I have the trust and faith
48:10
that Christ died on the cross for me because I am to pray. And I'll stand righteous before God,
48:16
not because of my works. Yeah. Not because of the actions that I did even as a believer,
48:21
but as I am justified through price to loan through righteousness.
48:25
That's so freeing and like not because like, if, if I run into Kyle after I become a Christian
48:31
and I'm doing all the things and I'm, you know, I'm chasing after, after God's heart and I'm like,
48:36
trying to do all these things, but he catches me on a day where I lose my temper on, on my kid.
48:39
Like he could, he could go back and argue, man, that is not showing the free spirit.
48:44
Right. That's my fear. Like that's a, that's a, that's a snapshot of my life. I think,
48:48
and I think that's where Christians are, one of the places Christians get really caught up is like,
48:53
Oh man, if somebody sees me lose my temper, like, it's not even if somebody sees me,
48:57
because I remember when I hear John MacArthur talk about the, these types of things again,
49:00
it seems like I'm picking on John MacArthur. It's not, it's just that I'm confused whenever
49:02
you hear John MacArthur. Yeah. Okay. So, and you love him and him, but yeah, I hate John MacArthur,
49:08
but like the thing about that, that's, it's, it's hard for me is if you still struggle with the same
49:15
sins, pre faith in Christ, and because some people when they get saved, like they were a drug addict,
49:23
they were, you know, a sex addict, they were, they were whatever. And then, you know, Christ,
49:27
they just changed it. Like all of a sudden, like they didn't have to go 12 steps, like they were just,
49:31
you know, redeemed from, from alcoholism or redeemed from all those things. And like, it was like,
49:35
God, you know, just snatch that. But then you have people that are like, maybe they struggle
49:38
with porn and masturbation, then they get saved and they still struggle with porn and masturbation.
49:41
It's the same flesh that they're fighting against. It's just that they have, you know,
49:45
they have salvation, like they have, you know, they have future.
49:48
They have conviction. It's like when, let's say they give into the flesh and they watch the
49:53
porn and they masturbate, they're going to feel the conviction after the fact like, man,
49:58
why did I do that? I feel like this is wrong. But beforehand, before Christ, they were probably
50:02
like, Hey, man, this is just what guys do. What do they, and then maybe this is a discussion about
50:07
conscience and not conviction, but it's like, I remember like before,
50:12
what's the best way to say it? So like I became a Christian like in 10th grade. Well, before then,
50:18
I had certainly seen porn and masturbated to it. And like, I still, there was something in me that
50:23
felt like this is this is wrong, I think. How'd you grow up? Well, it's like, yeah, I still felt
50:28
like that was wrong. And so I still felt that same shame afterwards. It was just like extra
50:32
shame. It was like super duper mega shame in the back of that type of thing. And it's like,
50:36
it seems a little different. I grew up with pornography being a bad thing. And yes, as a as a
50:40
teenager, I looked at pornography. And I felt guilty about it. But I had a friend who also looked at
50:44
pornography. And he thought it was okay, because his dad looked at pornography. You know what I'm
50:48
saying? So we have that conscience in us because of what we know from our family, but
50:53
or how we're growing up or whoever could have done something in our lives.
50:58
But we also, once we become Christians and we read the word and we know that
51:02
lusting after a woman in my heart is no different than sleeping with a little bit.
51:05
It's categorically different. And Eric, you've been talking about that.
51:08
Practically, though, we don't walk around naked. So there is something to be said that we are
51:14
covered up. There is a reason behind that. I'll go back to what I was going to say earlier. I was
51:20
thinking like just of a, when you said originally kind of moral, just a moral kid just kind of grows
51:24
up. It's a good person. Yeah, I just, I feel like they're working off cause and effect. So if they,
51:30
if they have a good, they're generally good hard on spiritual here in this, in this context,
51:36
and they look around, they go, you know what, when I'm nice at the people, they like me and they want
51:39
me to be around them. So I'll continue to be nice people. Then they grow up just tending to be nice
51:44
to people because it makes them feel accepted or whatever. As it gets a little bit older, the
51:49
pressures change a little bit. Now they want those people to still like them. And the problem is,
51:54
is when they're not identified with Christ, they have to then identify themselves with their friend
52:00
group. And if their friend group kind of veers off this way or that, they're now they're at risk
52:06
for, I still want to be nice. I still want to be accepted. Therefore, I'll do this thing or that
52:12
thing. If, and that may lead them down a really bad path. You know, so I think there is a pitfall
52:18
if we kind of just carry that out, but our mode, we may look really good on the outside. We may
52:24
have lots of friends, but I do think that ultimately it is self serving if we're not serving
52:30
someone else grounded in scriptural truth. Like, yeah, you could, that's a great point. If you have
52:35
cultural truth, I mean, that's leading your conscience. You know what I'm saying? Like,
52:39
if the culture says this is right or this is wrong, you know, you're whether you have,
52:43
whether you're a Christian or not, you're, you know, or if you're a non-Christian,
52:47
your conscience is going to go by what the culture says. But if you're a Christian,
52:51
now you know what biblical truth is. That's why I read in the Bible so important,
52:54
because even someone who leaves a good moral life can go to the gospel and hear Jesus said,
52:59
no one is good. Do you call me good? No one's good for God. When you say leading a moral life,
53:03
how do we know? And this gets back to, and I'm not supposed to say his name,
53:06
but Ravi Zachari is taught me this, but it's like origin meaning morality destiny. Okay,
53:10
so origin, where do we come from? Meaning, why are we here morality? What's the difference between
53:15
good and evil destiny? Where do we go when we die? And on the moral law thing, it's like,
53:19
okay, if you know what bad is, because people are like, you know, why do bad things happen to
53:21
good people? It's like, okay, well, in order to know what bad is, you have to have a, you know,
53:25
a comparison. So you need to know what good is in order to differentiate between good and
53:29
bad, you need a moral law. And you know, just talking about a moral law implies that there is a
53:34
moral law giver. And so in that particular context, you will have people that will lead a moral,
53:39
moral life and not know why, and not know why they say these things are bad and these things are not,
53:43
because I was talking to a guy, you know, last year, and we were talking about just basically
53:49
about how, okay, everybody knows that when you rape and kill a three year old girl, that that's
53:54
wrong. And it's like, wait a minute, how do we know that? I know that you prefer that,
54:00
that you think that. But you know, and again, another Ravi Zachariasism was like, okay,
54:04
there are some cultures that you love thy neighbor and then there are other cultures that eat them.
54:08
And so like, those are two very different things. And it's like, just to assume that everybody says
54:13
the same thing, like, why can we look at a depraved, you know, Ted Bundy or Jeffrey Dahmer or someone
54:18
like that and say what they did was clearly wrong, because we're living in an era of your truth.
54:22
Well, everybody does write in their own eyes. Right. And so that was right in their own eyes,
54:26
and whether they felt guilty afterwards or not, in the moment they were acting in their truth and
54:30
they were acting in their things, why can we as a society say that? No, no, no, those things are
54:34
wrong. And it goes way beyond, well, you know, if we kill off a bunch of our chimps, that's not good,
54:38
you know, for the rest of the tribe or something like that, it goes way beyond that, because we know
54:43
that there's a level of human depravity that comes back to a moral law. And so that's where it kind of
54:47
gets in to all this stuff with with this is like, there's a reason why we act out in the way that we
54:52
act out. But whenever you do become a Christian, Ryan, it goes back to kind of what you were saying,
54:56
it changes exactly what that's grounded in that math. That's what you said as well, like it's
55:01
grounded in something like you don't have your feet planted firmly in midair. You have them firmly
55:04
planted in the reality what you see in scripture. But we do get a lot from culture because we are
55:10
culturally Christian. We have a Judeo Christian ethic growing up here in the West. That's why
55:14
atheists can get away with saying you should do good things. It's because they're building their
55:19
atheism and their materialism off of a Judeo Christian ethic. And I don't even realize they're
55:23
smiling it in. You've got to call them to the mad on consistency too. Like Jeff, Jeff Durban does,
55:28
he does presuppositional debating all the time with AC atheists. And one of his, you know,
55:33
his starting arguments is getting them to be on level terms like, what is an atheist? If you're
55:39
consistent with what atheism thinks, then we're all just stardust bumping into stardust and nothing
55:45
really matters. But if you're not, you're not really an atheist. If you're pulling truth from the
55:50
Bible to say, well, this is right and this is wrong, like you're not consistent with the world view
55:56
of atheism. And so like you're saying, like, well, you're pulling culture or truth because we were,
56:00
our culture is grounded in Judeo Christian ethic. And so then you have to borrow
56:08
from the Bible, right? That's a whole point. Yes. Frank Turks book stealing from God. That's
56:13
the entire point. Absolutely. I was going to say, you know, just kind of capstone that thought I
56:19
had that I tell my kids, tell myself, it's like, when you know yourself, when you know where your
56:27
identity is, then you don't care what other people think about you. You know, so when we're
56:35
identified with Christ and that's where we get our satisfaction, then we in essence can, and I just,
56:41
I really like, because I've had this kind of the question come up multiple times. I thought it
56:46
through just times where Paul seems very arrogant. But I don't, I don't think it's arrogance at all.
56:53
I look at it. I'm like, no, this guy knows 100% where his identity is. And he's not going to let
57:00
anyone else tell him who he is or what he has to do. And it's rightly ordered. Well, I think the
57:05
arrogance thing for Paul comes from a, that's a cultural worldview. Like we in our culture would
57:11
view that as arrogant. And so people can put that spin like 2000 years ago. That was not arrogant
57:17
at all. That was crazy. Yeah. But yeah. But now we can look at it and go like hindsight is always
57:23
2020, right? We can go back and say, well, Paul was a womanizer and Paul was arrogant. But like,
57:27
we're looking at that through our cultural lens. Well, and also we live in a culture where if you
57:32
make any declarative statements that are on the Judeo Christian side of the ledger,
57:37
you're, you're bigoted and you're terribly, terribly judgmental. And it's so funny because
57:41
they don't apply that same standard to themselves. Because they would say anything that aids the
57:46
planet is a good righteous thing and anything against that is wrong. Anybody that affirms
57:50
somebody that's LGBTQ plus that is good, but anybody who challenges them is not. And so it's,
57:55
it's an inconsistency in the worldview. But even Eric, as it goes back to something that
57:59
you were saying, that's where we get into verse 20. It's like where when you're talking to your
58:02
kids, it's like, what are we grounding this in? Who are we now? What is our identity? Verse 20,
58:06
Galatians two, verse 20, I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ
58:11
who lives in me in the life I now live in the flesh. I live by faith in the Son of God,
58:16
who loved me and gave himself for me. Again, guys, you've heard that scripture a bunch.
58:20
Your pastor has likely talked about that scripture a bunch. But as we wrap up Galatians two here,
58:25
that is so important for us to remember, it goes back to whoever said at first,
58:28
it's the audience of one. And who is that one? Is that one you in your own navel gazing narcissism?
58:33
Is that is that one culture? Because you so desperately want to be accepted by culture?
58:38
Or are you going to honor God and damn the consequences? Because there are certain things that
58:42
in this whole situation with Paul and Peter, Paul pushed a bunch of relational chips towards the
58:46
center of the table. And I bet you he was fine with that relationship with Peter being harmed,
58:51
because he was going to honor God in that moment. And that is my encouragement to everybody listening
58:55
to this. Is there going to be guys in your life? There are going to be times in your life where
58:58
you're going to have to put relational chips in the center of the table. And that guy might be
59:01
mad at you. That guy might blast you in the face. But if you were in the righteous position,
59:05
based on the good word, not your own understanding of morality and some vague sense of where we are
59:11
in modernity. But if that's what you're willing to do, you are loving your brother in a way that
59:15
he will not even potentially comprehend in that moment. But it's one of those things that when
59:19
you come back around and you may never get the apology, you may never get the guy to be like,
59:23
Oh, yeah, you were right back in the day. But if you're standing on righteousness,
59:26
if you're on the positive side, the moral side, the God side of the moral ledger,
59:31
it is going to be awesome for you. But guys, there's so much more that we can say here,
59:34
but we have to leave it there. But come back next Sunday, because we'll dig into Galatians three,
59:38
make sure you read that so you're prepared for next week. Are you excited about Galatians three?
59:42
I feel like you're excited. You're willing to mess up the outro just to show how excited you are.
59:47
That's totally fine. But guys, make faces. Hey, that's okay. We can make faces. This all good.
59:51
But before that you go, we are going to do a quick resilience boost out on Daunton life.
59:54
Our mission is equipping men to push back darkness with content that forge a spiritual
59:58
mental and physical resilience. The only link I've got for you today is a link to our donation
1:00:01
page. Guys, if you support the content that we do here on the forging table or anywhere else,
1:00:05
the only way we're able to pull that off is because we have guys like you that are supporting us
1:00:08
with your dollars. So go there and check that out guys. Thanks so much for listening to the show.
1:00:11
We do appreciate it. Wherever you're listening to this, please subscribe,
1:00:14
rate and leave us a positive five star review. If you want me to come speak live at your event
1:00:18
or on your podcast, you shoot me an email to info@andontin.life. That's I N F O and on to not life.
1:00:24
Follow us on Instagram and likes on Facebook and check out our website for everything else,
1:00:27
including how to donate to keep more content like this coming your way. Just go to www.andontin.life.
1:00:32
And as always, we want to thank the band August Burns read for allowing us to use their music
1:00:36
for our content. The music on this podcast is our song cutting the tides, which is off their
1:00:40
10th anniversary re-recording of their album leveler. The links are in the description. I'm
1:00:45
your host Kyle Thompson. Remember, keep pushing back darkness, keep forging spiritual, mental,
1:00:51
and physical resilience. Keep seeking the lion of Judah.
1:01:10
We are very loved.