0:00
LinkedIn is pretty great at a lot of things, like helping you tap into the latest trends
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and insights in your field.
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We cannot stop your co-worker from tapping her pencil.
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LinkedIn can help you find new jobs that align with your career goals.
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We cannot help you find the source of that weird smell in the office fridge.
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And while we can't stop your co-workers from bringing their hobbies into the office, LinkedIn
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can help you bring your career to the next level.
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And LinkedIn is the network that works for you.
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 foraging spiritual resilience
1:06
by digging into God's Word, and we're welcoming all of you to come along on the journey with
1:10
us.
1:11
So guys, before we get into Galatians 5, we do need to do some introductions because we got
1:14
a newbie at the table, as you guys remember me talking about in my little intro episode.
1:19
So we're going to have kind of a mixture of guys coming in at different times.
1:22
So no Matt did not get fired, he will be back on this, but you guys got to meet Ryan last
1:26
time and you got to meet Eric Browning.
1:28
They were with us on the last four episodes, but Derek England, you were here and this
1:31
new one.
1:32
So you've got two minutes to answer these three questions.
1:35
Okay.
1:36
Two minutes.
1:37
I can't do the math.
1:38
I will just start looking at you awkwardly, the closer you get to two minutes.
1:41
So when and how did you become a Christian?
1:43
How do you like to study the Bible?
1:45
And how does your brain work?
1:46
Go.
1:47
Okay.
1:48
And early, I was probably 12 or 13 at a Methodist summer camp.
1:54
About that.
1:55
That was it.
1:56
Yeah.
1:57
It's pretty specific.
1:58
And then, but that was early.
1:59
Young, you know, as you grow up, my faith became my own probably late teens, early twenties
2:03
dug into it.
2:04
How do I like to study the Bible?
2:05
I do it in what's called an inductive study.
2:08
You start, you look at the details of the study and then you put the details together
2:12
for larger themes or look at what the word is saying.
2:16
And then you do, you look at it yourself, hey, what does this say about God?
2:19
What does this say about me?
2:20
And how does this change me in relation to God because God's not changing?
2:23
And my brain works, I would say low and slow, Kyle, low and slow.
2:30
I'm fast and quick.
2:31
That's why he's basically staring at me and Derek and I've known each other for a very
2:34
long time.
2:35
We were on the same scholarship program in college.
2:37
He had just left the program when I came into the program and so been around for a while.
2:41
And, you know, I kind of edified everybody last time when I said, you know, kind of what
2:43
you would bring to the group.
2:44
Part of that low and slow is why I wanted you to kind of be a part of this group.
2:48
Because there are things in the scripture that I just want to quickly understand and
2:52
get to and you love to kind of chew on something and kind of see what you can parse out in
2:56
the long term.
2:57
And so there's a lot of wisdom there, but it's kind of a measured slow wisdom.
3:00
So guys with that, let's go and jump into Galatians five here over the next couple of
3:04
episodes.
3:05
We're going to be finishing up the book of Galatians.
3:07
And we obviously spent a lot of time on the first four chapters and, you know, guys, one
3:11
thing I noticed as I was going through Galatians five is like, how is it possible that there's
3:15
so much packed into, because if you just take away all the verses and all the chapters
3:20
or whatever and just look at it as one long letter, like this is not a very long letter
3:23
and there's so much there, but you know, Galatians five is just a continuation of Paul's overall
3:29
theme of, okay, you know, justification by grace through faith alone, not all this other
3:34
extra stuff.
3:36
But really even the first part of Galatians five, I'll just read the first couple of verses
3:40
here and then we'll kick it off.
3:41
For freedom, Christ has set us free, stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to
3:45
the yoke of slavery.
3:47
Look, I, Paul, say to you that if you accept circumcision, Christ will be of no advantage
3:52
to you.
3:54
And I just really like how he's talking about it and he's, he keeps banging home the point
3:59
of you keep trying to add stuff and like getting circumcised is not going to get you where you
4:04
want to be.
4:05
So let's just kick it off from there.
4:06
Hmm.
4:07
Yeah.
4:08
Go for it, Derek.
4:10
Well, I would do me.
4:11
Come on, new guy.
4:12
Hop in.
4:13
First off, I'll just say it.
4:14
That's good news for me that circumcision is not going to add anything to the value of
4:17
Christ.
4:18
I think that's good news for all guys.
4:19
Yeah, probably.
4:20
Yeah.
4:21
For the uncircumcised anyway.
4:22
I mean, yeah, that's true.
4:23
That's true.
4:24
We don't want devil circumcision.
4:25
Yeah.
4:26
Nobody wants that.
4:27
Yeah, I took away from that collection of verses that we're delivered from this present
4:33
evil age, we're delivered from our personal nature and then we're delivered from the curse
4:39
of the law.
4:40
And that that's also very good news, you know, and that was originally when we were going
4:46
through chapter two and chapter three, that's when we addressed those.
4:49
So it's just kind of like a reiteration is like, come on, guys, like, why did Christ
4:52
come?
4:53
It came to set us free.
4:54
Right.
4:55
It's not, it's not hard.
4:56
Right.
4:57
So I'll say catching up being the first guy here or being the new guy here, it is what
5:02
you're saying.
5:03
Eric is right.
5:04
I mean, one, two, three and four Galatians, one, two, three and four is all about imparting
5:08
that wisdom and understanding that it were free of the curse of the law.
5:13
And that's powerful stuff.
5:15
I think carry that into chapter five in the back of your mind.
5:19
And it is Paul's overarching theme throughout the entire thing.
5:22
It's just frustration with these Galatians of falling back into what are they called
5:28
Judaizers?
5:29
Yeah.
5:30
I think it was.
5:31
Yeah.
5:32
And finding myself reminding others and Paul reminding them that, hey, we're free from
5:36
the curse of the law and we don't have to follow the law itself for the law plus Jesus.
5:41
Yeah.
5:42
What I love about five though is I like to put two words together around five freedom
5:46
and flesh.
5:48
So we're looking at this first part, we're talking about our freedom through salvation
5:52
through grace alone.
5:53
But then we also got to think of when we look at the law, we, it makes us look at our flesh.
5:58
You know, like this is what we do in the flesh as non-believers, but this is what righteousness
6:04
looks like within the law.
6:06
We'll never get that based upon what we do.
6:09
That's why we need salvation in my grace alone.
6:11
But it's a good thing to look at when I'm needing to put my flesh into check.
6:17
I think even beyond that, I mean, when you start getting into, I mean, verse six for Christ
6:21
Jesus, neither circumcision nor own circumcision counts for anything, but only faith working
6:26
through love, but we, and that really bleeds over into verse seven is like, we, we think
6:32
that we know better.
6:33
And it's like, okay, it just can't be that simple.
6:34
Yeah, I get it.
6:35
Yeah, that's the message overall, but, you know, I've been, I've been around the block
6:39
a few times.
6:40
Like, I think that, you know, there's some extra there because verse seven is you were
6:43
running well, like who hindered you from obeying the truth, right?
6:48
And it's almost just kind of like, you know, for all of us, you know, we have kids at kind
6:51
of different ages.
6:52
And so for mine, they don't really understand these conversations, but it's like, Hey, you
6:55
were doing so well in this subject, or in this class, or you were abiding, you know,
7:00
the house rules so well.
7:02
What in the world happened?
7:03
And then, you know, as parents, it's like, okay, there's probably some bad friend influences
7:07
happening.
7:08
Maybe there's a television show like I just, you know, found out, you know, Peppa Pig,
7:11
you know, because you're trying to figure out what, you know, cartoons, your kids are
7:13
allowed to watch and like found out not only is there like scenes in Peppa Pig where there's
7:18
two mommies, but also they're like, no, no, no, Peppa Pig is teaching kids to always talk
7:22
back to their parents because that little rotten pig, you know, is always talking back to mom
7:26
and dad.
7:27
And so all of a sudden, if your kid, if you're just like blindly letting them watch something,
7:30
all of a sudden they're changing because everything else is happening.
7:34
So that's what I kind of feel like Galatians, what he's describing here is like all of a
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sudden there's a hindrance that wasn't there before and why in the world is it there now?
7:41
Yeah.
7:42
So I'll add to that, Kyle.
7:43
So, um, vocationally, I help run a ministry and we talk about family and a lot of what
7:46
we talk about is parenting as well.
7:48
And something that we say in parenting, this is not an exact science, but it's a general
7:52
concept is that what determines how your children turn out is typically a third of their hard
7:59
wiring.
8:00
That's just personality.
8:01
That's the way they're hardwired.
8:02
Kyle, you've got two kids, two boys.
8:04
I think you'll find as they get older, um, even though they came from the exact same
8:09
situation environment, their personalities will be, it could be really really young.
8:15
Yeah.
8:16
So a third of it is wiring.
8:17
A third of it is parenting.
8:19
This is your input, this is Kelsey's input, this is our input into our kids' lives.
8:23
And then the other third is what you were talking about.
8:25
That's their peers and their experiences.
8:27
And you can apply that here as Paul is talking about to the Galatians, like who did you were
8:33
running so well?
8:34
Who hindered you?
8:35
What happened?
8:36
And so he has to come back and say as a parent, you know, in, I think it's chapter
8:39
four that he talks about, hey, the law was a tutor, right, a guardian, somebody who taught
8:44
us along the way.
8:45
Because I see Paul as that parenting impact here saying, oh, timeout, timeout, I understand
8:50
your personality.
8:52
I'm serving as a parent to lead you and guide you, but where's the influence coming from?
8:56
Who didn't?
8:57
What happened?
8:58
Right.
8:59
You think as human beings are persuaded in the fact that, hey, I can actually do this and
9:04
this is something I've done to kind of create my own salvation, you know, like, oh, if I
9:11
go get circumcised, that's an act of showing that, you know, I'm obedient.
9:15
Rather than just putting all of your love and faith into grace, like Christ did on the
9:20
cross.
9:21
Well, it was a tradition, right?
9:22
I mean, they were just falling tradition.
9:23
Yeah.
9:24
Yeah.
9:25
It's just falling to line.
9:26
So what we do, we've been doing it for a long time.
9:27
Go ahead.
9:28
Yeah.
9:29
I went through like a time of messiotic Judaism.
9:32
So you know, like it was really cool kind of seeing how they do things.
9:36
You know, they worshiped on Friday, didn't do anything on Saturday.
9:39
It kind of observed the Sabbath, but it fell back into those traditions.
9:44
But the great thing about it was it was faith alone is what they believe, but they did
9:48
want to fall into the traditions of the Jewish culture, which was interesting to look at,
9:52
but they didn't make that the way to the salvation.
9:56
Well, obviously in the first four of these, when we're talking through Galatians, we spent
10:00
a lot of time talking about, you know, Calvinist theology and how that compares to a lot of
10:03
different things.
10:04
And you're kind of the resident, you know, representative of that theology.
10:07
So it's interesting that that point of view and that question would come from you because
10:10
it's like, okay, that is very, very strict theology of grace through faith.
10:15
Like you can't do anything.
10:17
Like you can't even reach out your hand to grab God's hand to be lifted up like none
10:21
of that.
10:22
Like you were basically a robot that you were predestined to do this.
10:25
All those different things.
10:26
I'm describing this exactly how it is.
10:28
I'm not throwing in any jabs or anything like that.
10:30
But like to a certain degree, it's that is the most pure form of that ideology.
10:37
Like I feel like what Paul is saying in Galatians where it's like nothing, you can't do anything
10:42
because again, circumcision is not a nothing for, you know, adult males that are not circumcised.
10:46
Yeah, exactly.
10:47
That's a something.
10:48
And so if you're thinking to yourself, like you've been on this planet for 35 years and
10:51
then all of a sudden, you know, this person's telling you, yeah, yeah, yeah, Jesus, but we
10:54
also need to chop your PP and it's like, wait a minute.
10:58
But if you do that and you're like, dude, I'm super good because like I did this as an adult,
11:02
like look how dedicated I am, like it's a different level.
11:05
And then look at, you know, the Armenian argument, it's like, okay, it's Jesus and let me give
11:10
you my hand, Lord, you know, I'm going to grab your hand rather than no, I'm going to pull
11:14
you out of the water.
11:15
That's what that's what Christ did on the cross.
11:17
He pulled us out of the water, you know.
11:19
And so that's where it comes down to like, what were these guys thinking with in their
11:22
minds?
11:23
Was this their way of grabbing onto the hand to get themselves circumcised?
11:28
So are you, are you thinking like this would be similar to some of the early, the early
11:33
not prophets, what am I trying to think of just early church leaders and things where
11:37
they, I mean, some of them make themselves eunuchs, you know, they would, they would
11:41
take things way literally, they chop off their hand.
11:44
I think I think Paul goes into that.
11:46
No, he does.
11:47
He actually does.
11:48
So yeah, so let's just go into it verse 11 and 12 here.
11:51
But if I brother still preach circumcision, why am I still being persecuted?
11:55
In that case, the offense of the cross has been removed.
11:58
I wish those who unsettled you would emasculate themselves.
12:02
And so the ESV, I don't really like that translation as much.
12:04
It literally, the word is castrate like why don't you go ahead and castrate yourselves
12:08
because that is going to remove all temptation and all issues that you could potentially
12:13
have to go ahead and castrate.
12:15
And it's an exclamation point.
12:16
Right.
12:17
And so like that's the thing right there is like I literally wrote in my little note Bible
12:20
big mad like he's big mad right now because it's like, you know, because what is it, you
12:24
know, it's better.
12:25
Oh gosh, I'd have a millstone tied around your neck and cast into the sea like, like that's
12:30
big mad like that's big mad talking.
12:32
So is this to where it's like, look, at this point in the letter, he's been talking about
12:35
this, talking about this, talking about this.
12:36
And then also it's like, you know what, go ahead and just castrate yourselves.
12:39
Yeah.
12:40
Like that would be better than for you to be misled by or to mislead all these other people.
12:45
Like I thought that was an incredible moment of showing like righteous anger, of course.
12:48
Okay.
12:49
So Ryan, back to your first question.
12:51
Is this, could this be or could circumcision be an act of these believers who want to participate
12:58
in their faith?
12:59
Like grace plus.
13:00
Right.
13:01
Grace plus, right?
13:02
Yeah.
13:03
What?
13:04
How do you see that play out today?
13:05
Do you see that play out today?
13:06
Oh yeah.
13:07
I see it all the time.
13:08
Like what?
13:09
How?
13:10
How do you see that?
13:11
You see it in legalism arguments in regards to, Hey, I don't smoke.
13:12
I don't drink.
13:13
I don't cuss.
13:14
And then you see it in moralist arguments.
13:15
You know, I'm the church that's out there beating the poor all the time.
13:17
You know, you need to go out there and do this or whatever social economic thing you want
13:22
to go after.
13:23
It's grace plus, you know, it's not like, Hey, let's have, let's just talk about what Christ
13:27
did on the cross.
13:28
Let's talk about salvation.
13:29
Let's talk about, let's, let's, let's discuss salvation.
13:32
Let's look at grace.
13:33
But what else am I doing?
13:34
You know, and that's, I think that's what drew me to, you know, I hate using the term
13:38
Calvinism because it's, I'm a Christian.
13:39
No, you don't.
13:40
No, no, I would prefer to use reformed.
13:44
Okay.
13:45
Sorry.
13:46
Everybody write that down in your notes.
13:48
He would like to be referred to as reformed.
13:50
Reformed.
13:51
Reformed.
13:52
Horned horn.
13:53
But no, Calvinism is like, when I point out Calvinism, I'm pointing out, you know, my
13:56
train of thought on God's sovereignty, you know, this is where I'm going to, I'm leading
13:59
you where I'm going to go when I make a defense, you know, but in a reformed aspect is it's
14:04
like, it's not about me.
14:07
Like that's the problem with Christianity today is in even with the books and everything.
14:12
It's about you.
14:13
It's not about you.
14:14
It's never been about you.
14:15
The whole Bible has nothing to do with you and everything to do with Christ Jesus and what
14:20
he did on the cross, you know, and so that's where it comes down to.
14:24
That's why reformed theology really came to me, and, you know, and really pulled me in
14:29
was like, I'm not going to be able to do anything.
14:32
And I have a God who loves me so much that he pulled me out of the water and he opened
14:38
my eyes to the beauty of not only what his son did on the cross and what he did for me,
14:44
but also the beauty of his law, you know, it's like, yeah, the law is bad.
14:48
We can get pharocytical with the law, but the law is there as a mirror for us to look
14:53
at ourselves and know why we need a Savior.
14:56
And so it's a double-edged sword and it's something that, you know, we as a church need
15:01
to look at that that way.
15:03
Instead of looking down on people and holding people up to the law, we don't hold people
15:07
up to the law.
15:08
You know what?
15:09
I'm going to hold up to the law.
15:10
I'm going to hold up my Christian brothers up to the law.
15:11
And I'm going to use that to see what they're doing fruitfully.
15:14
And if they're not being fruitfully, I want to come to them with love, you know, I mean,
15:18
we'll go into brotherly love here in Galatians and I'm going to come to them in love and
15:22
I'm going to talk to them.
15:23
And I hope they would do the same for me, you know, so I don't want to go too far off
15:27
and do it.
15:28
No, it's actually good because it does really lead into 13 through 15 because we're talking
15:32
about freedom here.
15:33
And usually that's the big sticking point if you're having that Armenian reform to
15:36
or Calvinist debate is freedom or things like that.
15:39
But when you look through 13 through 15, there's there's a lot that's being described, but
15:46
I feel like everybody gets the certain part wrong.
15:49
So I'll just read 13 and 14 for you were called to freedom brothers.
15:52
Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh.
15:55
Again, there's a flesh thing coming through, but through love serve one another for the
15:59
whole law is fulfilled in one word or one statement.
16:02
You shall love your neighbor as yourself and I'll go and read 15.
16:04
But if you bite into vow or one another, watch out that you are not consumed by one another.
16:09
And so people will read that entire segment or this is in my opinion.
16:12
So y'all can check me on it.
16:14
They'll read that entire section right there.
16:16
And the words that they will pull out are freedom freedoms used twice in verse 13.
16:20
And they're like, wait, that's my excuse for a libertarianism.
16:23
I'm going to do whatever I want because I have freedom.
16:26
And as long as I'm not quote, unquote, hurting anyone, that's fine.
16:30
And then you start getting into conversations about church hurt, you get into conversations
16:33
about what is love actually, not the movie, but like what is love in the real and most
16:38
true sense.
16:39
Was that the first rom-com reference at the forging table?
16:41
So I thought it was your place way to go.
16:43
I've been planning that one for months.
16:45
I'm glad we got that in.
16:47
But like when people are like, oh, our Christian is just supposed to love and that's they would
16:52
translate that to mean, hey, leave me alone while I'm sinning.
16:54
Will you just let me sin, please?
16:56
You're making me feel bad, that type of thing.
16:58
But like it does really open us up to like, okay, what do we mean by freedom?
17:02
What we mean by freedom doesn't matter.
17:05
What does God through Paul mean when he's talking about freedom?
17:08
When he's talking about freedom here, he's talking about your freedom is through his salvation.
17:12
You don't have to go through the law anymore.
17:14
You are saved by grace alone.
17:16
Doesn't matter what you do once you're saved, you have the freedom to like, discuss our
17:22
mini-nism.
17:23
You know, like when we discuss our mini-nism and Calvinism, you know, I don't look at
17:26
my Romanian brother and be like, you know, that dude's going to hell, you know, Christian
17:30
freedom.
17:31
You know, like, no, I don't think that person's going to hell at all.
17:34
I think we're going to laugh about it in heaven.
17:36
One thing that's a big no-no for me is, you know, a church being led by a female senior
17:42
pastor.
17:43
You know, some people are okay with that.
17:44
I actually grew up in a church that was very egalitarian.
17:48
Would not go to a church that's egalitarian now.
17:50
But I would, I would still put that on to Christian freedom that for other churches do
17:55
that.
17:56
I'm not going to get worried about their salvation or being saved by grace alone.
18:00
There's Christian freedom in that.
18:02
So I think I guess I'll go ahead.
18:06
So I've got a different spin on freedom or the way that I interpret that, right?
18:09
Because as I, you are called to freedom, what is freedom and how do you get to freedom?
18:13
Well, freedom, the cost of freedom is discipline.
18:17
The cost of freedom is discipline and freedom is the fruit of discipline.
18:21
It goes both ways on that, right?
18:22
And so we are a dis, we are disciplined to the law of Christ and loving one another and
18:26
that calls us to freedom because we're free as Paul references in other scriptures.
18:32
We are before Christ, we were what?
18:33
We were a slave to sin.
18:35
And so Christ through Christ, life, death and resurrection, that's what paid for our freedom.
18:40
And so it is not a freedom in our actions, but I think it is a freedom from being a slave
18:46
to sin, but Christ paid the price.
18:48
And so we're now a slave to Christ, but in that discipline to cry, the law of Christ is
18:53
the freedom.
18:54
That's a lie.
18:55
Yeah.
18:56
But you're in Christ and show you should have the Holy Spirit and it should be then the
19:00
Holy Spirit, that's leading and guiding, so it's less about having to try to obey laws.
19:07
It's more about living within the love, I'm not getting, I'm not going too far on that,
19:12
but living within that love that he provides and the guidance and the wisdom and all of
19:19
that.
19:20
Does that make sense?
19:21
I'm with you.
19:22
The other thing too is cultural differences.
19:24
We're talking to, you know, Galatia here, you know, I'm sure their cultural differences
19:31
and then an Ephesus or then the Romans.
19:35
And so, you know, I think we're talking about cultural difference between, you know, the
19:39
Jewish people and the people of Galatia, you know, so you have freedom in your cultural
19:44
references in regards to the law.
19:47
So like, they probably didn't get circumcised, you know, and so they don't need to get circumcised,
19:54
even though that's a Jewish tradition, so to be a believer.
19:57
And so I think that's where they kind of open up on Christian freedom as well.
20:00
Yeah.
20:01
And I think like, I don't have a sign in my living room that says, "Please do not spit
20:05
on the floor."
20:06
Right.
20:07
Right.
20:08
It's not there.
20:09
It's because it's implied that I'm not going to do that.
20:10
I love my house.
20:11
I respect my house.
20:12
You know, so I think that's part of it, you know, is when we become believers, it's not
20:17
like we need to have, we do have, there are rules, there are laws that make sense, but
20:21
we are, we're obeying them because of and out of love that makes sense.
20:25
Right.
20:26
Yeah.
20:27
And let me add to that.
20:28
When I say discipline, I do not mean discipline to mosaic law.
20:30
That's not what I'm, I'm referencing more to towards the discipline of the Holy Spirit
20:34
that lives in us.
20:35
That's moving us and growing us towards sanctification, right?
20:38
It's because we love the Lord and we love Christ and we love one another, that we will
20:43
discipline our bodies.
20:44
I mean, Paul talks about discipline and his bottings, disciplining his body.
20:48
So he is not like one boxing at the air.
20:50
Right?
20:51
I mean, not here in Galatians, but he references that somewhere else.
20:54
And so that is what we're to do.
20:56
We, we, Kyle, this is why I love undaunted is because you are not leading men to become
21:03
Christians or to lead a deeper Christian life so that they can have complete and total
21:06
freedom and just still go do what they want, right?
21:10
No, you're leading men to that so that they can push back darkness, but that is spiritually,
21:15
mentally and physically.
21:17
And all three of those things take discipline and they take disciplines.
21:20
So that they can have the freedom to go push back darkness, right?
21:23
And that that's exactly the point is you have freedom to do those things just because you
21:28
have the freedom to do it does not mean you are equipped to do it.
21:30
And so that's why we talked about equipping men to push back darkness.
21:33
And so because it's kind of like some people want to call to do this.
21:36
It's like, well, do your skill sets and your passions and all that, do all that meet in
21:41
the same direction of the thing you feel like you're called to do?
21:44
Is it, is it possible that you're mistaken?
21:45
Like, that's a great question to ask people.
21:47
Are you possible?
21:48
Is it possible that you're mistaken?
21:49
And I think this whole freedom part comes back.
21:51
And I think I mentioned this on previous episodes, you know, goes back to what C.S. Lewis talks
21:55
about in mere Christianity about, you know, creating a world full of robots or automata
21:59
or automatons is not really a world worth creating.
22:01
But when you're given the freedom to do anything, one of those things you'll have the freedom
22:06
to do is to love or to hate or to lift up or to destroy.
22:11
And so you're given the freedom of the dichotomy and I guess you get to pick which side you're
22:15
going to end up on.
22:16
And this, I guess this kind of comes back down, I don't want to, you know, move off
22:19
the freedom thing, if you all have more to say, but then it starts getting into it really
22:22
tees up when we're talking about fruits of the spirit, but we don't even get to the fruits
22:26
of the spirit until we get into the things that will keep us from inheriting the kingdom.
22:29
So I think that we could spend quite a bit of time there.
22:31
But like, you know, do you have anything else to say on the freedom side?
22:34
Cause I feel like that's, that's very, very important.
22:37
Eric, no, I'll go, I'll go back just a little bit if you don't mind a verse for I just because
22:41
it's, it's just kind of staying, it's just out there. It's like, well, somebody's going
22:46
to have a question.
22:47
It says you are severed from Christ, you who will be justified by the law who have fallen
22:51
away from grace.
22:53
I don't, I don't think we should just blow through that. Like what, from a, or a, from
22:58
more of a, like lose your salvation, not lose your salvation. Can we just as a group maybe
23:02
clarify what we, what we think about that?
23:05
Yeah, I don't think it's about losing salvation.
23:09
I think it's more about your, your taking away God's grace. Cause he goes back to that
23:14
when he talks about Christ at the cross, you know, and he's like, when you go and you
23:17
circumcised yourself, you're, you're, and you do it through legal means, cause you're
23:23
legally trying to do it, um, that you're basically taking away what Christ did at the
23:28
cross. And so from there, I, I think he's saying like you're putting your faith in your
23:32
circumcision, you're not putting your faith into the grace of salvation. And so you push
23:37
that grace away. Doesn't mean, you know, there's things that I've done in my life that I pushed
23:42
away God's grace or I, I pushed away what he's wanting me to do because I listened to my
23:47
flesh rather than to the Holy spirit. And that doesn't mean that my salvation fell away.
23:51
It's just that I idolize something or then I should have idolized him. So, and they're
23:56
idle, they're basically idolizing circumcision.
23:59
So yeah, I agree with Ryan here. Um, I don't think it is a, in my personal opinion, I don't
24:05
feel like it's a losing salvation, but it is a separating of that relationship. And I mean,
24:10
if you look at, so you're talking about verse four, but if you look at verse three, which
24:14
Kyle read as well, I testify again to every man who accepts circumcision that he is obligated
24:19
to keep the whole law. And that right there, I underlined when I was reading that because
24:26
it is the whole law, we're talking all 613 or 618, uh, rules and requirements, right?
24:31
And so if you choose one, that's where, and you guys might have talked about this a couple
24:35
of weeks ago, but that is where our Western brains don't compute with this essentially
24:40
Eastern mentality of we see laws as each individual separate law, right? So there's 613 laws.
24:47
Well, that's fine. I kept 610 of them. Well, under that, Paul references, you broke the
24:51
law. It's as bad as breaking any of them, right? For us, we think of, hey, they're speeding
24:57
laws on the road, which is completely different than murdering somebody. Um, and so for here,
25:02
I think he's saying, if you're obligated to keep the whole law and he referenced previous
25:06
and in Galatians three and four that you are cursed under the law, and it's only through
25:12
Jesus that he breaks that cursed. And so it is, if you choose the law, you're separating
25:18
consciously separating yourself from a relationship with Jesus.
25:21
I like that. One of the things that I was reminded of is this kind of this word picture,
25:27
um, of a, of a, of a son asking his dad, can I borrow the car, go out? And dad says, okay,
25:34
here are the keys. And so he goes out. Well, in the process of coming home, he accidentally
25:40
bumps into a car and dents the back bumper. Um, and, um, comes home, doesn't say anything,
25:47
goes in and just does this thing. Next day happens. Dad and son don't say anything. Clearly
25:55
by this point, the dad knows something, um, but the son is not fast up. So in that moment,
26:02
the dad has not set, he's not stopped loving his child, his son. That's not what's going
26:07
on. But there is a wedge there because there's something that has been unspoken and unresolved.
26:13
Um, and so they're, they're still love between the two, but one needs to fess up, you know,
26:18
to have that relationship restored. Yeah. I was just thinking of it along the same line.
26:23
So I didn't have any disagreement. Just the, the idea of kind of walking away from that
26:26
grace. That's just right there. You have it. You're going to end up flat on your back.
26:30
You know, at camp, we used to call it FOB flat on back. Well, that's, that's how we operate.
26:34
I think whenever we try to do this on our own, and it's just exhausting. Really. And so I,
26:39
I find that oft, oftentimes when I'm trying to do things on my own power, I'm trying to
26:45
plus one it, um, that I, I find that I just end up flat on my back.
26:49
And so what I, what I feel like all this, so that's a great point, Eric and Eric. So
26:53
I'm going to mess y'all's names up. I'm going to switch off at some point and I've
26:55
known you guys literally forever. But what I think this brings up, and this was something
26:59
as I was kind of studying and looking back and this is just specifically pertaining to
27:03
verse four. And I'll actually read this, this one sentence from, uh, John MacArthur's commentary
27:06
on this for particular, particular section, their desertion of Christ and the gospel
27:10
only proves that their faith was never genuine. No, no, don't say it, Ryan. What? What? This
27:15
is great. He's quoting MacArthur commentary. Isn't it? Isn't it? Cause everyone thinks
27:20
I'm a hater. Oh, MacArthur. Okay. And here I am reading his words. Maybe it's because
27:23
I value him. Are you going to let me finish my sentence? I'm sorry. I just, you just brought
27:27
a smile to my face. I could, I could feel your smile even though I was looking down. I'm
27:30
going to go ahead and read this, reread this sentence. It's okay with you. Is that okay?
27:33
All right. Here we go. Their desertion of Christ and the gospel only proves that their
27:37
faith was never genuine. And it has a cross reference for Luke eight, 13 and 14 and first
27:43
John to 19. So what this brings up for me is here recently, and I literally just forgot
27:47
the guy's name. I know this would happen. He's upset the gram on Instagram. Uh, his name's
27:51
like, uh, Tim Ross or something or it's okay. So, uh, recently I saw him say this and I know
27:57
it's been posted around a lot over the last several months or whatever. Um, but he was
28:00
talking about church hurt, which is kind of, dude, this, this literally, you know, we'll
28:04
have to maybe curb this part of the conversation and keep it as nice as possible because we
28:08
got to talk about the fruits of the spirit, but he's basically talking about how there
28:12
are people that are leaving church because they've been hurt by the church and church
28:15
hurt is this catch all phrase now that if you've ever been told your sin was wrong or
28:21
that no, you, you can't, you know, be a guy and date a guy or know any of these things.
28:26
It also takes up people who were sexually molested by pastors or who had their money
28:30
stolen from crooks inside the church or things like that. But it's all in this kind of this
28:33
big catch all category, right? But then he talks about these people that have been hurt
28:37
by the church and then he's like, and then they stop following Christ. They, they stop
28:43
going to church and he kind of mentioned it. It's like, okay, if you get food poisoning
28:47
from one restaurant, do you just say, I'm not going to ever eat at a restaurant again?
28:50
Or Hey, I'm not going to eat at that restaurant again. And so his point that he was making
28:55
is like, no, no, no, no, you were never in love with Jesus. If this is all it takes to
28:59
get you to walk away from the faith, you were never in love with Jesus. You were in love
29:02
with your church. You were in love with your pastor. And when you're church or your pastor
29:05
let you down, then that's kind of the thing, which gets us into this big massive conversation,
29:10
not just about church hurt, but about when do you get salvation? Can it leave you? Like,
29:16
yes, this is opening up the can of worms for once save always saved, those types of things
29:20
predestination to be able to accept those things. Election like it gets into all that.
29:27
But I'm really glad you went back to verse four because there's a lot of discomfort there
29:31
for me because I tend to agree with what that guy said in terms of how he's categorizing
29:35
these people. I was like, wait, wait, you know, if that's all it took for you to move
29:38
away, then you were never really dedicated. Think about like if you're, if your wife like
29:41
didn't, you know, move the laundry over when she said she would or, you know, was a little
29:45
bit late to come, you know, pick something up for you or something like that. And then
29:48
also you're like, we're getting a divorce. It's like, I don't know that you were ever
29:51
really dedicated to that woman. If it takes something like that, that can get you kind
29:54
of moved on. So I know it opened up a lot of can of worms. So y'all just feel free to
29:57
jump in and let's get after it. Everybody looked at Ryan. Why never looked at Ryan?
30:02
You said Ryan, predestination. You know what we're going to do? I'm going to make you
30:06
wait. We're going to make you marinate on those things and we're like, I would like to
30:09
marinate. Okay. You marinate. So, so Derek or Eric, like hop in here because dude, there's
30:13
a lot there wrapped up in that. Yeah, I'll give you just my two cents. It's neither one
30:19
side or the other. But, um, you know, one of the things we've that I kind of that I would
30:25
that I've learned and grown up kind of believing is, you know, when when Satan loses someone,
30:33
okay, so I'm already jumping on to one side. When Satan loses someone permanently, then
30:38
um, his job then shifts from not trying to prevent him from gaining salvation, but then
30:48
ruining his life so that he's not an influence to anyone else to make him worthless. Yeah.
30:52
So that, so then when when I see that, and as you say that, I do look at that possibility
30:57
of they walked away, Satan had his way with them and kind of destroyed their influence.
31:04
And so that's just, they're going to, they're going to sneak in by the skin of their teeth,
31:08
kind of thing, no rewards or whatever. You know what I mean? So I see that side of it.
31:13
It's just a side. He thoughts? Hop in. I don't know. I don't know. Exactly. Uh,
31:22
um, I mean, I have a tendency to agree with that. I've never heard that statement, Kyle.
31:26
I've never heard that, that concept of, hey, if, if that's all it took for you to walk
31:31
away from the faith from, to walk away from a relationship with Jesus, then you weren't
31:34
really. Yeah. Did you ever have it? Exactly. That's the point. And, and I have a tendency
31:38
to agree with that. Yeah. I have a tendency to agree with that because if it, where does
31:43
he talk? I mean, we're about to get into the fruits of the spirit, right? But that is,
31:46
hey, if you walk in the flesh, you live in the flesh, if you walk in, if you live by the
31:49
spirit, you walk in the spirit. And so fruits are evidence of a healthy tree. And in this
31:56
case, hey, if that's all it took, then you're a pretty unhealthy tree to begin with. Well,
32:01
Derek, let's go back a little bit before even what we're discussing. Because yes, this does
32:05
kind of go into the, the fruits of the spirit, obviously, but then it gets into why, why
32:11
would somebody feel like they were making the choice? I don't mean like in a free will sense,
32:15
but why does someone feel like they're making the choice to turn away from Christ? And does
32:20
it have something to do with the fact of how they accepted Christ in the first place or
32:24
when they feel like they accepted. Absolutely. So is that the, is that the church camp thing?
32:28
Like I'm sure there's a category for that. Is that the, I went to, you know, a Hillsong
32:32
concert or an elevation worship and, you know, I worship for an hour and a half and I was
32:35
sweaty and all of a sudden I was like, okay, yeah, I'm, you really ginned up in this emotional
32:39
situation. Now I'm going to make an intellectual call based on emotions only. And then once
32:43
the emotions were off, which could be on the drive home or 10 years from then, like, is
32:48
it like, I mean, it's not even them just questioning their salvation because they're choosing to
32:51
walk away, right? True. So, so I think in my mind, what it comes to is what were the expectations
32:57
when they accepted Christ? What, what are the, what are the expectations? Did they choose
33:01
to follow a Christ that didn't really exist? And I don't mean Christ obviously does exist
33:06
and lives in us through the Holy Spirit. But what I'm saying is what were their expectations
33:10
of a God that they're walking into relationship with completely wrong. I mean, did they expect,
33:16
Hey, I'm going to accept Christ. And as a result, this church will treat me perfectly
33:21
I and anywhere on that spectrum, right? Hey, I don't want my toes to get stepped on to
33:28
somebody embezzled money or they got molested or whatever. Like, that's a huge spectrum
33:31
that can't happen to them. But did they expect that when I walked into a relationship with
33:35
Christ that nothing bad is ever going to happen and I can do whatever I want because I was
33:39
called to freedom, right? Like, is this this false theology and understanding of what that
33:45
actually means walking into a relationship with Christ? I think it has to be at some
33:48
point, right? I think it's, you know, it's obviously important for you to understand
33:52
why you're making that decision. I mean, you're exact, I was thinking of moral therapeutic
33:57
heism, right? Yeah, it's just like, God wants me to be happy. Right. Well, I'm not happy.
34:01
So God has failed me on their form out. Got it. That's it. Hey, I walked into relationship
34:07
with Jesus because nothing bad happens to good people. And I'm a bad, I mean, I'm a
34:11
good person. So let's actually keep ping ponging right here in this whole triangle and let's
34:15
just keep Ryan over there. You just keep there. No, no, hop in here because there's, there's
34:19
so like Ryan, they're literally, there's so much there that that can be discussed because
34:24
like every time you lift up one of the corners of one of these arguments, like it opens up
34:30
not only, you know, hundreds of years, if not thousands of years of theology arguments,
34:34
right? But it also opens up, you know, just your basic understanding of the human condition.
34:40
And so like, again, it's almost like we're giving short shrifts to that this one particular
34:43
scripture, but that's kind of the nature of the forging table. So I'm quoting Spurgeon
34:46
again. Okay. So we're not responsible to God for the souls that are saved, but we're responsible
34:52
for the gospel that is preached. And then way we preach it. Okay. And that's what it comes
34:57
down to is how are these people coming to Christ? Are they coming to Christ broken knowing that
35:02
they are depraved human beings? They see the law. They know that they can ever be the law
35:09
that Christ was the law. Like when, what was it? Christ, Christ is the law. I think that was a,
35:13
you know, something that was a couple months back was a kind of an issue that was coming around.
35:18
Christ became the law. He actually walked it, lived it, and did everything they needed to be
35:25
done. And that's, that's our mirror, you know, and we got to realize that we're not there.
35:30
You know, we never will be. That's why he's here. And so when people come to Christ based upon
35:35
prosperity gospel, you know, like, Oh, I want, I want to be out of debt, you know, or I want to be,
35:40
um, I want to have money. I want to have the McMansion or they come to Christ for healing.
35:45
Oh, well, I feel like if I come to Christ, you know, all this sickness in me is going to go away.
35:50
Well, what happens when you don't make that money and you don't have that healing? You never died
35:53
to self because it's all about me again. It's not about Christ. It was about Christ. You wouldn't
35:59
walk away from that. But from the time that you believed, it was about me. And so then it comes
36:05
down to the salvation talk. Like I will always say, you know, you never had it, you know, but
36:09
that's not my job. You know, my job isn't to go look at Kyle and go look at Eric and look at
36:14
Eric and just be like, you know what, I wonder about their salvation. You know, I'm going to go and
36:18
check your fruits all the time. That's, that's not me. I've got a checklist, really. I've got a
36:22
checklist. I'm kidding. Yeah. Yeah. And so that's the thing is like, I want to take you from your
36:27
word, but I'm also going to watch your actions. It's the same thing you're going to do when it comes
36:31
to leaders within your church in your area. But there is church heard out there. I mean,
36:35
I've gone through church heard. I mean, yeah, I didn't mean to dismiss. I was fairly
36:38
dismissive and how to describe it. But yeah, yeah, there's church heard out there. You know,
36:41
I went to a church, you know, no one ever wants to hear, but this isn't the place for you, you know,
36:47
like if I'm wrong where I'm wrong, why don't you show me in the Bible where I'm wrong? Show me
36:51
through scripture where I need to learn, be my shepherd, not my TED talk pastor. And we, I feel
36:58
like Christianity nowadays is all about the person. Like there's a, there's a church that I went to
37:03
that was all about God is for you. God is for you. But that's it. That's all they say is God is for
37:08
you. And it's like, what is God for? It makes you the point. Yeah. You know what God's for?
37:14
God's for you to repent and believe. You know, that's what God is. Well, God's for his glory.
37:21
And he has glorified when you repent and when you die to self. Yeah. And so that's that's again,
37:25
I think you said it, you know, maybe a half hour ago when you're talking about, hey, the Bible's
37:29
not about us. It's not the point. He goes back to whenever matching on our went in and burned the
37:33
house down at Elevation Church when he's like, you're not David. Yeah. The story of David and
37:38
Goliath is not about you and your struggles. Your struggles are not Goliath. You are not David.
37:43
And he just said it. He's like, Hey, if you were the one throw in the stone, you would have missed.
37:47
Yeah. Well, let's go three stones. You would have missed every time like David's faith.
37:52
But if it's all about if God is for us who can be against us, yes, it is truth and it is really
37:58
fun to sing and it's very uplifting. But again, it takes us away from what I think you're getting
38:03
out, which is the authenticity of the message to begin with because it's that's where I guess I
38:08
struggle with secret sensitive churches where they're doing everything they can to lower the
38:14
barriers of the entry, which is good in and of itself in terms of getting people in the door.
38:20
But you can't dilute the gospel. Right. So great. Yeah. You know, if you want to play secular music
38:26
in the parking lot, if you want to serve everybody's favorite coffee and all that to get them in the
38:29
door, like I have no problems with that. But are you diluting the gospel? Are you also diluting
38:34
the very next step, which is a baptism discipleship, like all those different things that should be
38:38
expected? Because discipleship doesn't come in a thank you for coming to Jesus. Welcome packet
38:42
that you take home with you that's got some worship music in it and you know, a stiff version of the
38:45
Bible. Well, it comes down to, I think the biggest problem in church today is pragmatism.
38:50
It's like, well, this is working. Let's keep doing it. You know, and it's like, yeah, you may be
38:55
getting people through the door, but how many are authentically coming to Christ? You know,
38:58
if you've got so much church hurt that you came to somebody about their sin and they got so hurt
39:04
that they're like, I can't come to this church anymore. They don't accept me for me. It's like,
39:08
no, you know, we accept you as a believer who is like minded to us, who says, I repent of my sin
39:17
and my flesh and I'm coming to Christ. You know, and if you're not, if you're not doing that,
39:21
you're not living out these fruits. You know, like, what's the point? What's the point of being a
39:25
part of this community? You know, well, that's the other point. There is no such thing as community
39:30
because how many modern churches don't actually have membership? Like I remember there was a church
39:34
here in my community that's like, and you know, we ended up not going there for a myriad of different
39:37
reasons. But whenever we went there and visited one, one Sunday, they were like, we are wiping the
39:41
church scrolls clean. We are starting over because we want membership to mean something. And they
39:47
didn't really have the processes in place to actually make it mean something. But the sentiment
39:51
was correct to where it's just like, you can go to, you know, any, you know, whatever mega church
39:56
around and you can just be a person that goes in, but there's no requirements for membership. Like,
40:01
that's one thing, you know, I talk about Joby Martin and church 1122 down in Florida a lot,
40:05
because he basically tells people like, Hey, if you don't go on a mission trip within the first
40:10
three years here, I need your seat. Because it's like Jesus's ministry was three years long. Okay.
40:15
So if you're just coming here to absorb stuff, if you're just going to come in here to sponge
40:20
off of my sermons or sponge off the music or sponge off of some of the facilities or different
40:24
things that we do, that's not the whole point. That's not the point, sir. It's like, Hey,
40:27
I need your seat. And a lot of people, you're going to get some mean emails when you send that
40:31
to people, you know what I mean? But it's like, it's setting a standard, but we don't even have a
40:35
standard of membership in most modern churches anymore, because that's requiring too much of people,
40:40
right? It's like, Oh, that's, that's a little bit of truth. If you're telling somebody like, Hey,
40:43
I need you to do more than what you're doing, not like in the Judaizers sense, but just like,
40:48
no, no, no, if church is going to be a meaningful thing, if you're going to be part of this ecclesia,
40:52
like you're going to be part of this ecclesia, you're not just going to pop in when it's convenient
40:55
for you and when you don't have a lake weekend or football tickets or something like that.
40:58
I want non believers to pop in and soak it in. I don't want people who are already believers
41:03
coming in, just soaking it up and not, and not adding to the community. You know, I, that's, I mean,
41:09
even if you are a believer, I'm hard pressed to find a believer who doesn't want to get into their
41:14
community and into their church and do something. I mean, like, it's just a fruit, you know, that's
41:19
a fruit to look at. You know, it's like, man, I love the church that we go to. I want to do whatever I
41:24
can to be a part of that church. I want to sacrifice where I need to to be a part of this church,
41:28
because I love what it's doing. I love the, I love what God's doing in that church and seeing
41:33
people come to price through them. So, you know, I just feel like, you know, you're right on the
41:39
church membership part. I mean, everybody's moving away from that. I've been on this group on,
41:45
you know, Facebook that's a bunch of pastors and you have some pastors who are sending out emails,
41:51
you know, to church members who haven't shown up who are part of the community. And, you know,
41:56
there's a lot of excuses going around and they're trying to be loving and they're trying to figure
42:00
that out. But then I had other pastors chastising him, chastising, like, this whole membership thing
42:05
is ridiculous. You know, like, you don't know what they're going through, blah, blah, blah, blah.
42:10
And it's just like, come on, man, lift this guy up. He's trying to hold the scripture,
42:14
you know, but it's not pragmatic anymore. Well, and standards are really, really offensive.
42:17
Derek, I'm going to let you hop in and get the last word on this section, because we do need to
42:20
move on to church this year. Got it. Two things. One, Ryan, if I hear you and Kyle, what I hear,
42:24
you say is number one, can you truly accept Christ without understanding your own sin,
42:29
without looking in the mirror? That's, I think that's the point that you're making, right?
42:32
You can. It's impossible. It's impossible. And so number two, what do we do about that?
42:36
As men around this table, as men in our communities, in our churches, in our society,
42:40
whatever it is, what do we do about that?
42:42
Well, I'll give you a thought, two thoughts. Number one, I was putting my little girl down to
42:51
to sleep several months ago, and she said we were praying and talking and she leaned over. She goes,
42:57
I love Jesus. And I was like, oh, that's real sweet, sweetheart. And I, you know,
43:02
it touched me. And then I was like, do you know why Jesus came? And she was kind of blank and
43:07
silent. And I was like, and so I, you know, it's not like we don't talk about the gospel. It's just
43:13
that she was just saying that she loves Jesus because daddy loves Jesus. And so it just prompted
43:19
me. I was like, you know what? We just, when we pray, I need to be working in some gospel messages
43:25
into our prayers and things like that, because she needs to understand it as she doesn't need to
43:29
just have some social pressure from dad and mom, or the 30 people that go down front at some camp
43:34
in about the next two or three, four years and feel compelled that she needs to make the decision
43:38
because all of her friends are down there. She needs to understand and really, and I was looking
43:43
through here at, at the verses and I had some notes here. One of the, one of the things that
43:49
what that was interesting, and you tell me you cut me off if I'm going too long, is, you know,
43:54
it talks about a little leaven leavens, the whole lump, you know, there's several references to that.
43:58
The gospel is not meant to be watered down. It's not meant to be palatable. It's meant to
44:03
expose our sin, right? And then lead us to salvation. And so we know that, that Godly sorrow produces
44:10
repentance leading to salvation. And so I think that's really important. What you said is correct.
44:16
You cannot, unless you understand where you are in relationship to the Lord God, then there's no
44:22
way you can become safe on the one very practical thing. And I'll just ask if you got what he has,
44:27
think about this is just about being able to communicate your testimony.
44:32
Is that how important that is that? Again, it's not going to be a salvation thing, but just like,
44:38
if you don't, if you cannot tell someone, if you're not explained the gospel and explain where you
44:43
were and where you are now, like, not that that disqualifies you, but shouldn't that be something
44:48
that we emphasize with believers, new believers as a part of discipleship?
44:53
When I think where it comes from, and to maybe put a bow on this a little bit to even answer your
44:58
question is when we're presenting the gospel, so thinking in terms of like presenting to your
45:04
daughter, because your daughter is what six seven seven. Okay. So when you're presenting the gospel,
45:10
you present a gospel that is full-throated, but not crushing. Yep. And so because if a gospel
45:15
doesn't have teeth, then it's it's not the gospel. But if it it's teeth that devour only, then that
45:20
that's not good either. It goes back to I remember Mark Driscoll. I know we're not supposed to talk
45:24
about Mark Driscoll, but he's super careful. He took a picture with Ferding. But yeah. But the
45:28
thing about about he that he talked about recently is like, you know, you have to show your kids
45:33
lion and lamb. That's what we talk about and don't talk to it all the time. It's like, if you only
45:37
look at Jesus as a lamb of God, you're getting a part of the gospel, you're getting part of the
45:40
picture, but you're missing in enough, like, you're technically missing 100% of the picture because
45:45
your understanding is inaccurate. Okay. Because he's 100% grace, grace 100% truth 100% land 100%
45:51
lion. And so there is a way that you can present the gospel to a seven year old girl's heart,
45:55
where she feels convicted and uplifted. And I think that that is a very, very important thing.
46:00
When we're talking about what gospel are we preaching? Is it a prosperity gospel? Is it a
46:05
hey, just check these boxes gospel? Or is it the truth of scripture? And again, guys, I do have
46:10
to kind of push through to the section because, you know, I do want to make sure we get to the
46:13
fruits of the spirit. But what, what kind of precludes the fruits of the spirit starts in verse 19,
46:17
where it says, now the works of the flesh are evident, sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality,
46:22
idolatry, sorcery, ennity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions,
46:27
envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these, I warn you, as I warned you before,
46:31
that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. The reason why I wanted one
46:35
to set that up before the fruits of the spirit is the very first one listed with sexual immorality,
46:39
the word there is poor Nea, or poor Nea, that is the word word where we get the word pornography.
46:44
The first century here of that, or reader of that in the Greek would have known that to mean
46:50
every form of sexual immorality. So sex outside of wedlock, bestiality, homosexuality, orgies,
46:56
like all these different things. And so when people say, you know, the New Testament doesn't
46:59
really talk about sexual immorality, or Jesus never mentioned it or something like that,
47:03
that's just kind of flat out wrong. But to get into the fruits of the spirit, this is verse 22.
47:07
But the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,
47:13
gentleness, self control, against such things, there is no law. Okay, so a couple of questions here.
47:18
Which ones of these do you suck at the most? So that's that's the first one. And then the
47:23
second one, this is more of a preferential question because I don't know because I know
47:25
everybody reads some different commentaries in here. There are people that think that this is a
47:29
descending list of importance that they think it starts with love as the number one most important
47:35
and the second most important is joy. The third most important is peace. Well, let's actually
47:39
start there. Like, because I read that several places, I never thought about this as a descending
47:43
order of importance list. But the people that no, the people that wrote that were heavy weights.
47:48
And I'm not really yes. And so I'm not going to name them because I literally can't remember
47:51
which commentary I was reading that in, but I'm not reading fluffy commentaries. And they were like,
47:55
this love is the most important. And behind it is joy. And behind that is this. I'd never heard
48:00
that before. I don't want to get too far off into the weeds here because I'm way more interested in
48:03
the other question about which one do you suck at the most? But have y'all ever seen that? Like
48:07
where I was descending order? Okay, I've never heard that. Never. You know, let's just move past
48:10
that then. So I don't think it's best to think of it in that way. I'm like, I'm going to be doing
48:14
some research on this. Do you said heavy hitters? Yeah, but but again, and I'll be able to find it
48:19
on the break. But but again, the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness,
48:23
goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self control. And I got to tell you, when I read that list,
48:27
there's maybe no more convicting sentence in the Bible for me because I'm like, there are aspects
48:33
of my everyday life where you couldn't check a single one of those boxes if you had to describe
48:38
me. And like that again, part of that's wiring part of that's personality. But even if you're wired
48:43
to be fairly aggressive, even if you're ready for war at all times and those types of things,
48:47
these things should still be evident. And so for me, I just if I'm being honest, there's not one on
48:52
there where I feel like, yeah, aside from kindness with strangers, like I'm never just rude to people
48:56
for the sake of being rude. I'm always going to give people the benefit of the doubt. But the moment
49:00
you give me something to, to quibble or you know, quibble about or something like that, I'm gonna
49:04
get after it. So but for you guys, what do you think? Well, for me, I would I would put my I was I
49:13
was feeling really good because you put you said self control was the least I didn't say that I said
49:18
other people so if you don't have that, sometimes I'm not very good at that, you know, it was really
49:24
interesting my wife and I took a I don't want a personality test. It was just it's called a Taylor
49:30
Johnson temperament analysis test. Wow, it just came back to you. Do you get a percentage for
49:36
everyone that signs up for the test? What's your promo code promo code promo code Eric if
49:41
you're doing that super fancy test guys, you know, but what was interesting about that is there were
49:44
there were areas it's kind of like the what the Chinese symbols or whatever like the snake and the
49:49
bowl maybe to go together or whatever it is I don't even know but but there were areas in our life
49:54
where we complimented and we're and we're and when we took it, we were like, you know what we do?
49:59
We don't really bubble there but but then on this area of is a clobble or quibble, by the way,
50:04
did I say I don't know you said I don't know. I don't know. It's not a word. I don't think I don't
50:07
think I'm just I think it's a little quibble. It's not that important but I just yeah I was
50:11
following my leader. Okay. Okay, great. I'm following you. You idiot. Go ahead.
50:15
But that wasn't very lovely. I was talking about me. I was talking to me. I'm the idiot here.
50:22
Okay. Can we just move on? We don't have to make this a big point guys. Yeah, I'll just keep saying
50:26
it. Yeah. No, it's good. But I just stopped quabbling. I found that what where Lauren and I
50:32
tended to have an issue was on just any kind of like if there was anger, then we went from just a
50:39
little bit anger to boom, like a lot of anger like there wasn't a whole lot of in between.
50:45
And so we had to work really hard on trying to tame that down because that that's an area where
50:50
you get me riled up, man. I don't I don't have very good self control. Especially with someone
50:55
that's they can get very angry. You don't really have gears either. I'm looking at you. Yeah. Well,
50:59
okay, that's funny as you're describing it because I'm like, I've never seen you angry.
51:03
But like that's the thing is some people like that there's no gears. So like for me, I'm in neutral
51:07
in the, you know, or I'm in park in the garage or I'm in six gear driving through the neighborhood.
51:11
Like it's just it's chaos. Yep. But and I will say that the the root of that is going to be
51:17
pride. Most of the time, you know, in our homes, we know how to pick on each other. We know how
51:22
to get those little buttons in there. And so if somebody hits an area of pride in my life, that's
51:26
that's where I tend to get a little short. I think my problem is patience. Like my kids will test my
51:33
patience. Like they move so slow. Like you need to speed it up. And I catch myself just getting
51:39
frustrated with them. It's like, man, I need to work on my patience. What about outside? Because
51:43
I think most people would echo that sentiment regardless of their personality with their kids.
51:47
So would you say that you're impatient outside of stuff with your kids? Like I work or stuff with
51:52
your wife? Like trying to think what outside of that? No, because it's funny. Like Eric hearing
51:59
you talk about outside. I'm horrible at everything. Well, not like it's funny. Y'all are saying
52:05
that because Eric, I don't see the anger thing in your personality. And I I've never pegged you
52:09
as an impatient person. And so that's the thing where I'm like, okay, that's that's somebody from
52:13
the outside that gets to see you. But the thing is, too, though, like, when are we going to be our
52:17
realist? You know, no one's around. Yeah. Is that even reward? I won't quabble about
52:22
which word it is. What's the problem about being a realist? It's bad. Yeah, it's hashtag quabble.
52:27
Yeah. So, you know, when we're with our families, that's when we're
52:31
that's when I think we need the fruits the most. You know what I'm saying? Like, I'm going to treat
52:36
somebody new like Derek or Kyle differently than I'm going to treat my wife or I'm going to treat
52:41
my kids or my brother or my sister, you know? And so I think the fruits really come out more
52:46
with the people that you're around every day. And so if there's, you know, I can be patient with
52:51
anybody all day because that's just, you know, I wouldn't have to deal with them anymore. Yeah,
52:55
I don't have to deal with them. Yeah. But when I have to deal with my wife or I have to deal with
52:59
my my kids, I can lose my patience. And I think I think that's why, you know, when we when we look
53:05
at these when we look at this list, we look at our family life because, you know, I think that's
53:09
what it's tested though. Okay. So Ryan, I'll jump on that and then I'll talk about me.
53:16
I think it was Amy Carmichael who originally had the statement of, hey, when you take a container
53:23
and you bump it, whatever comes out of it is originally what's inside of it. And I think if I
53:28
hear you right, it sounds like that's what you're saying, right? Like, hey, I can keep the lid on
53:32
around people that I don't know, new people, work situations, this and that. But when somebody I
53:37
know or I'm comfortable with bumps into me, oh, man, what's inside of me immediately spills out
53:43
over the and it's already there. Can I say it? Yeah, when I let my hair down? Oh, it's different.
53:47
Oh, for those of you just listening to this, he has an astonishingly little amount of hair.
53:51
So it's almost unfair. Okay, that was bad. No, okay. Okay. So for me, though, I would say,
53:59
for me, it's joy. Joy. I'm not an overly joyful person. I grew up in a house that
54:08
as an now that I'm older, looking back, it was kind of negative. Like all the perspectives in
54:14
the home were complaining or negative. And so the fact that I made it out without an overly
54:19
negative perspective was kind of is impressive. But it's easy for me to take that twist and look
54:25
at the glass half empty or complain about something instead of, in this case, purposefully choosing
54:31
joy. Okay, so it's funny you say choose joy because that is one of my wife's
54:35
favorite like statements. And it's one of the most annoying statements in the world to a guy like me
54:40
to where it's just like, choose what? Someone's like, joy. And it's like, what does that mean, though?
54:45
What does that mean? Like, does joy mean contentment? Does it mean perseverance in the face of
54:50
negative circumstances? Is it resilience? Like, so what is joy? And I don't mean that like,
54:54
you know, philosophically, necessarily, go, go. I like what you said, though. I think joy is
54:59
being content. Like, find joy. Is that how you meant it, Derek? I don't know if I meant content.
55:04
I meant more thankfulness or gracious. I mean, that's another because I think about, I think in
55:10
scripture when it talks about through praise and Thanksgiving, we approach heavenly gates, right?
55:14
I mean, it without thankfulness and looking at what God's done for us. Here's a question. I had
55:19
another men's group, right? Is if Jesus never did another thing for me the rest of my life,
55:24
could I be thankful? If the rest of my life was incredibly horrible, horrible, could I still be
55:32
thankful? Isn't that the point of being a gospel? Isn't that, I mean, it's an incredibly convicting
55:36
statement. And so for that, I feel like I have to choose joy, regardless of my circumstances,
55:41
in the face of my circumstances, I can understand because in James, I think it says, right? Consider
55:48
it all joy, my friends, when you face trials of all kinds. And so, yeah, unfortunately, Kyle,
55:54
I think it is. You got to be happy, bro. See, I guess that's part of my thing is, again, it comes
56:01
back to wiring, but into a certain degree, like you should fight against your stripes because
56:04
your stripes will be able to hold you down at some point. But it's like, some people are happy just
56:09
in the availability of things they like. And some people are happy in being able to attain
56:14
and track down and hunt and capture the things that they like. And so that goes back to a competitive
56:19
spirit that goes back to which I guess kind of back in. So I'm just relooking at this list. I was
56:24
hearing you guys talk. And of all of these, it's the gentleness piece. I know that's a shock to you
56:30
guys. It's going to be the gentleness piece. This is for you. Yeah, this is for me. Yeah, no idea.
56:35
But that's the piece that it would be easier for people to say, okay, that is just an outpouring
56:40
of stuff that's already in there already. And you, where does that aggressiveness come from?
56:44
Where does that whatever? But, you know, Eric, when you and I were doing some Bible study stuff
56:47
years ago, you were talking about William Farrell and how he's just like this hyper aggressive
56:51
church father and like he was just an absolute gangster. And the thing about it is, this
56:56
goes back to a story and then we'll likely have to wrap up with some final thoughts from
57:00
you guys. But there was a guy, I don't think I've talked about this before, if I have going
57:03
and saw me, but there was a guy who I respected more than anybody else. He was like my main
57:07
businessman tour, always went to him with, you know, leadership and management advice that I
57:11
wanted and things like that, a local guy here. And one day I came into his office and we had a
57:16
meeting and he was like so jazzed up by the meeting and everything that happened. But then the next
57:20
time we met like a month later, he was less jazzed up and I couldn't really perceive why. And then
57:25
the next time we met, he kind of explained to me what had happened the last two times he and I
57:29
met, he goes, Kyle, a couple of months ago, you're in here and you got me so energized and so
57:33
revved up and so like ready to go like I was ready to run through a brick wall. And you were the same
57:39
the next time we met. And it was exhausting to me, like that level of intensity and aggression and
57:45
all that. And he goes, you know what? When I walk into a room, I always calm the temperature down.
57:51
Like that's my style. And he basically said, Kyle, you need to try to do that. Like you need to try
57:56
to be that person. And at the time I'm young, like I'm in my probably mid 20s. And I'm like,
58:00
Oh my gosh, this is maybe the smartest person in all business. And this is one of my mentors.
58:04
And he's like, basically you need to you need to be more like me. And it took me years before I
58:11
realized like, no, like God didn't make me like you. Like I'm not the guy that comes into the room
58:17
and makes everyone feel comfortable. I'm the guy that comes in the room makes everybody feel
58:20
challenged. And that's not always great for everybody. And I certainly don't do that perfectly.
58:26
But can you imagine if I tried to change who I was? Like if I if I was, you know,
58:31
a zebra that all of a sudden tried to be a fish, it's like, no, like I wasn't made for that
58:35
environment. I wasn't made to do that. I was made to be really good at being a zebra or something
58:39
like that. And so I guess that's kind of that kind of goes into this as well. That is not an
58:43
excuse, you guys, to look at this list and see the thing that you're the worst at and be like,
58:45
wow, it's just who I am. God made me this way. But at the same time, like you're wiring is there
58:50
for a positive purpose for his glory. Absolutely. And I think that there's a time and a place,
58:54
right? Like I don't think that Paul reads this list and says love, joy, peace, patience, kindness,
58:58
goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control. So Kyle, when you go into jujitsu,
59:01
I want you to be loving, joyful, peaceful, patient, kind, good, faithful, gentle. And you know what I
59:07
mean? Definitely. I think that there's a there's a time and a place if you're talking about gentleness,
59:11
but with your young boys, can you be gentle? Yes, you can. With your wife, can you be gentle when the
59:18
time it when it's time for that? And I think yes, you can. And so there in is a fruit of the spirit
59:25
in its appropriate time. I mean, Psalm one one talks about a tree planted by rivers of water who
59:31
produces fruit in its own season. And so this is fruit and it produces fruit in its season. So
59:36
you're not going to produce all of these all the time. I think that's an unreasonable expectation.
59:40
And to your point, hey, just because maybe joy is one that I struggle with doesn't mean I'm
59:45
never going to produce joy. And it doesn't mean I have to be joyful all the time in each season.
59:49
When it's a tool that can be deployed in the correct situation. And so that's like, you know,
59:54
when I was talking about market risk, we was talking about one of the things that will help
59:58
natural lines learn how to be more like lambs is when they have daughters. And so like all of
1:00:03
you guys have daughters, I only have sons. And so so that's a little bit different. But that's
1:00:07
kind of one of those things as well. It's like you learn. But he also talked about like if you are a
1:00:12
natural lamb and you're incapable being the lion, that is just as dangerous because there are going
1:00:16
to be lines that are going to come from your for your daughter and you're not going to be able to
1:00:19
fend them off. And society is going to tell you that's a good thing. Because you know, if you're
1:00:23
more like a lion, like that's toxic. And you don't want to be that guy. But there is nothing
1:00:27
virtuous about a weak man that is incapable of being a lion. And that gets off into a bunch
1:00:31
of other things. But guys, this has been a great discussion, but we're going to have to leave it
1:00:34
there. I know there's more to be said. But guys, I want to make sure that you come back next Sunday
1:00:37
where we are going to dig into Galatian six. And if there was anything that we left on the table,
1:00:41
we may bring that up when we get into the discussion of Galatian six, but make sure you guys read
1:00:46
Galatian six or you're prepared to hop in with us next week. But before we let you go, we are going
1:00:49
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