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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.
0:55
Welcome back to the forging table, the mission of Undaunted Life is equipping men to push
0:58
back darkness with content that forges spiritual, mental, and physical resilience.
1:02
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.
1:09
That's Zach.
1:10
That's Eric.
1:11
That's Matt.
1:12
And guys, we're digging into Nehemiah 3 today, which we're just going to skip Nehemiah 3
1:15
because it's lame and useless and like it's just a bunch of names and you know, talking
1:19
about gates of poo or whatever the done gate is or something like that.
1:23
And so, guys, I'm not being serious because there are different parts of the Bible, whether
1:27
it's, you know, entire books like numbers or genealogies or, you know, chapter three
1:31
at Nehemiah where it's like, well, there's nothing here.
1:34
This isn't as easy to read and pull stuff from as in one of the Pauline letters or something
1:38
like that.
1:39
There is something here for you in Nehemiah 3.
1:42
And so Matt, we were talking just off air a second ago about kind of the, because again,
1:47
you didn't come into Nehemiah like excited.
1:49
You're like, oh, I guess Kyle wants to talk about Nehemiah.
1:51
Let's talk about Nehemiah.
1:52
And then you get to a chapter like chapter three and it's like, you come off chapter
1:55
two and there's so much happening.
1:57
There's so much action.
1:58
It's like an action movie that turns into like a study of how spreadsheets work and it's
2:02
just like it doesn't seem like there would be anything there, but you get a lot from this.
2:06
Oh, for sure.
2:07
And I think, and I didn't say this, but this just kind of popped into my head.
2:10
So in life, you can, you can put projects or tasks into three days, day one, you're pumped.
2:18
Like, hey, let's go, everybody's in, everybody's enthused, everybody's jazzed, everybody's
2:23
excited.
2:24
Day three, obviously is the project is finished, but chapter three for me is day two.
2:29
You're in the muck in the mire of the day to day grind.
2:32
You don't get to skip day two because that's, that's often the most important part of the
2:39
whole process.
2:40
And it, it, it becomes this detailed account of what is going on, but like the reason that
2:45
this is such an important part is that you see that real people are being put where they're
2:53
at and they're being asked to build pretty much where they live.
2:58
The wall backs up to their house.
3:00
And so if they screw it up, like their house could be the first one that gets infiltrated
3:05
and destroyed if somebody tries to get into the city.
3:09
So it is, is important for you to have buy in, but it's important for you to have personal
3:15
buy in.
3:16
I think that's a big part of, of chapter three.
3:18
Yeah.
3:19
Let me go ahead.
3:20
Let me just add a little bit to that.
3:21
So we just talked about the gauntlet being thrown down, right?
3:25
Here we go.
3:26
You have a leader that's, that's gotten everybody involved.
3:29
And now for the rest of this chapter, he goes through and describes specifically this guy,
3:34
his daughter, they did this, this person, his son, they did this, this was their home.
3:38
Not only is he describing really great facts, which I think ground the Bible and show that
3:43
it's so authentic, but he's giving homage to the people that he's leading.
3:46
Yeah.
3:47
Specifically.
3:48
Yeah.
3:49
Also, we're building the wall here that down the road, Jesus is going to ride the donkey
3:53
through on the east gate.
3:55
So let's put it in perspective, what we're trying to accomplish.
3:58
And I think there's a lot going on in this chapter.
3:59
And I love this chapter for a lot of reasons.
4:02
As a project planner type person, he's sitting here saying, man, look at this thing come
4:05
together.
4:06
Yeah.
4:07
And he's so excited about it.
4:08
I think it's good to put yourself in that position and really think from what he's trying
4:12
to write.
4:13
Yeah.
4:14
And talking about like chapters that maybe don't feel like they have as much meat to
4:16
them.
4:17
I mean, I remember several years ago, a guy named Donald Miller, he wrote a blue light
4:21
jazz.
4:22
If you remember that long time ago, he's gone on to do other things.
4:25
But I remember one time in his blog, he said something about like the Bible and its practicality.
4:30
Maybe it's, maybe some of it's not as practical.
4:34
And there's certain aspects that you don't, you know, maybe don't need to take an account.
4:37
I remember going, whoa, whoa, what, you know, I like, I really like that book and I really
4:41
like your writing.
4:42
But I don't agree with that.
4:43
And so I remember, I was like, you know what, I'm going to start January 1st on a read,
4:48
my Bible plan and I'm going to find something practical from every single day that I read.
4:54
And you know what?
4:55
I ended up in numbers and I ended up in this chapter and other chapters and there was always
5:00
something practical that I could take out of it, even if it felt dry.
5:05
And it was, that was kind of my, you know, I don't know Don Miller, he doesn't know me,
5:09
but it was just my challenge myself to prove him wrong.
5:13
There's not something practical that we can take from every single aspect, every, every
5:17
single chapter of the Bible.
5:18
Well, even, even look at this, so Zach, you mentioned homage, paying homage.
5:22
So he's paying homage to people that are still alive while he's writing this, right?
5:26
And so if you think about it from a management or leadership standpoint, the people in your
5:30
team need to be acknowledged for the things that they do.
5:33
Now people's acknowledgement styles differ because I'm a guy that if I do something for
5:37
you and you don't acknowledge it and say, thank you, I'm going to want to kill you.
5:41
Right.
5:42
Like, that's just kind of like, I'm, because I'm crazy, like, but I also don't like heaping
5:46
amounts of praise.
5:48
So I need one little pat on the tushy, you know, flat hand, not cupped and I need you
5:52
to tell them.
5:53
Yeah, you write it down.
5:54
And it's like, just tell me once, Hey man, really nice job.
5:57
I'm really glad you knocked that.
5:58
You really knocked that out of the park.
5:59
But if you're like, Oh my gosh, Kyle, that is simply the greatest thing.
6:03
I've ever seen.
6:04
You're the smartest.
6:05
You're the best.
6:06
And if you keep going and going and going, I'm just going to walk away while you're talking.
6:08
I'm going to make it as awkward as it could possibly be.
6:10
So everyone's got their different style, but you're paying homage to these people that
6:13
are so important to what you're doing.
6:16
Because here's the other thing.
6:17
And this kind of goes back to what you were talking about, Matt.
6:19
He's paying the whole the book at Nehemiah, like again, Ezra Nehemiah used to be one book
6:24
and, you know, someone later decided to name it Nehemiah or whatever.
6:28
This could have all been about Nehemiah and how great Nehemiah is.
6:31
But he's naming people and naming their claim to the thing that they were rebuilding.
6:37
That's deeper than thank you.
6:38
And I would like to thank the blah, blah, blah family for building, you know, this gate
6:42
and for putting up this, whatever, whatever, no, no, he's like, they are a part of God's
6:46
work.
6:47
And he's acknowledging that from the very beginning.
6:49
I'd encourage you to go online and look at the videos of the wall now just to get a sense.
6:52
Yeah, there's great ones on YouTube that you were sharing.
6:54
This work they're going through is no joke and we know what they're about to face.
6:58
And he's given, I mean, literally it stood out like I think there's a goldsmith and this
7:01
guy and his daughter and they're just getting after it, you know, that's, yeah, and you
7:06
know what's interesting is he's naming these folks that have done the work or are doing
7:11
the work.
7:12
But he also names the Tekoites, they're they're nobles, he said, but they didn't put their
7:16
shoulders to the work.
7:17
So he's like, yeah, so I'm going to call you out and your names are going to be in the
7:20
Bible too.
7:21
But their nobles would not stop to serve their Lord.
7:23
There's obviously people like, there's people that are kind of waiting back like, okay, I'm
7:28
going to let this play out before I, you know, hitch, hitch my wagon to this.
7:33
Maybe that's not the right word to use here hitch on hitch.
7:36
Hi, oh, but like they're waiting to see where is this thing going before I, you know, maybe
7:41
commit to this.
7:42
So yeah, but I think that's just a good life lesson.
7:46
That happens in every situation there are people that sit back and I don't know.
7:50
And it speaks to the body.
7:51
Right.
7:52
And I think all of them independently doing their specific portion to make this thing
7:56
happen.
7:57
Yeah.
7:58
I think we'd be naive to think that all of these people got along too.
8:03
So they're there.
8:05
The fact that they are united for this common purpose in a, I mean, just think of the people
8:10
you go to work with, like you don't, they're not all of them are your best friends.
8:14
You're still, you know, accomplishing a job with them.
8:16
If you work in a company where you're working with a lot of people.
8:18
They're like, the fact that there was this common ground that Nehemiah, Nehemiah had pulled
8:22
them all together.
8:23
Like that's, that's some, just amazing to think about.
8:26
Yeah.
8:27
One quick thing I heard, I'll never forget something I heard in college, which was Napoleon said
8:32
that his key to success is careful preparation followed by a rapid execution.
8:38
So in this case, they, they didn't just mess around and plan forever and all that stuff.
8:42
They got, they got the plan done.
8:43
They figured it out.
8:44
But when they got to business, they got to business.
8:45
And I think it was 52 days is what they said to get this accomplished.
8:48
I mean, record time.
8:49
Can you say that again, Napoleon's quote, it was careful preparation followed by rapid
8:54
execution.
8:55
Yeah.
8:56
I like that.
8:57
It's kind of, it's like the prep that goes into like painting, you're going to put it,
9:00
you've got a mask, everything takes forever.
9:02
It seems like when are we going to get this done?
9:03
And then the painting process is like that, if you've done it right, it just kind of goes
9:07
super quick, you know, when it's talking about it's the payoff of preparation.
9:10
Yeah.
9:11
Because part of the problem that you have is if you don't prepare for a project.
9:14
So if you think about it like in a home improvement context and yes, again, guys, I'm not the most
9:17
handy person in the world, but it's your level of preparation will lead to the level
9:21
of ease you have during the process.
9:23
Now when things happen during building things just get messed up and you know, you don't
9:28
have your tool or something breaks or like that stuff happens.
9:31
But there are a lot of people, Eric, that they don't spend the time taping off the areas
9:34
they need to tape off or covering the furniture and flooring and they then they go to paint
9:38
and then they spill something or they make a mistake.
9:41
Now they've got a second project, which is cleaning up the mess that they've made because
9:44
their level of preparation was so low.
9:46
And again, if you've seen anything from Nehemiah one and two is he was a prepared guy.
9:51
He had his ducks in a row, which didn't mean that he didn't make mistakes or anything
9:55
like that.
9:56
But you know, the level of preparation led to his level of success and the rapidity with
9:59
which they were able to get the project done.
10:01
Well, there's a God thing too.
10:02
I think Ben Franklin said, haste makes waste, right?
10:04
So later on in the chapters, some of these enemies and everything will look at it and say,
10:08
well, even if a Fox jumped on that, it would fall apart, you know, but there's there's
10:11
a God part of this because in 52 days, they made a wall that stood for a very long time.
10:16
Yeah.
10:17
I think you see the end product.
10:18
You don't really know what goes into that.
10:19
I think of Kobe Bryant, you know, he shot 60 shots a game, right?
10:24
We'll just say, let's let's just put it at 60 shots a game, but he was in the gym four
10:29
hours before he was even required to be there by his team shooting thousands of jump shots
10:37
to shoot it maybe 50 to 60 times a game.
10:41
Like you go and man must be nice to have a silky smooth jump shot like that and you're
10:46
watching with Kali.
10:47
Yeah, cool.
10:48
Must be cool, but you you miss because you just don't you don't know every day he's in
10:53
the gym at three o'clock for five hours of just shooting the exact same shot.
10:58
So that preparation is exactly why it looks so easy for him during the game.
11:03
Well, that reminds me of I remember, uh, this was years ago when I when I was working with
11:07
Major League Baseball, but at the time there's a catcher.
11:10
I was a huge fan of, but he was catcher versus San Francisco Giants, Buster Posey, certainly
11:13
one of the best catchers of his era.
11:16
And every baseball player baseball players, a little quirky, you know, they have different
11:19
drills.
11:20
But the thing is, is there are a lot of players that are so unbelievably talented.
11:23
They don't really work very hard.
11:25
And then there are the guys that are unbelievably talented and they work hard.
11:28
And then you, you know, you get a, you know, Mike Trout or, you know, Mickey Mantle or
11:31
Stan me as well.
11:32
But Buster Posey, what he would do is if you're familiar with baseball, you have your strike
11:36
zone and that strike zone can be gritted out to nine different ball positions.
11:41
So you know, left, middle and right in the upper part of the strike zone, middle part
11:45
of the strike zone, the bottom part of strike zone.
11:47
So what Buster Posey would do with his swing, he wanted to have a level swing where his
11:51
bat head was in the, um, basically in the zone, the longest to be able to make the best
11:57
contact.
11:58
But what he would do is he would take a T and he would set a ball up and he would set
12:02
the ball up in each of those nine positions and I think he would try to hit 10 balls directly
12:07
up the middle of the field from all nine different places where the ball can possibly land.
12:12
Now, if you're a hitter, that's not a poll hitter and you play all the fields and, you
12:16
know, which leads to better defensive alignments for, for you, because you can spray the ball
12:20
around, you can hit the ball of the park, you know, to left center to right center, you
12:23
know, from pole to pole, that was how he got his mechanism for keeping his swing tight.
12:30
And so you see these things where maybe it's a, it's a shooter that, you know, his jump
12:34
shot is just off for a long time.
12:36
A hitter that's just off a pitcher that's just off a golfer who swings just off.
12:41
A lot of those guys don't go to a new complicated form for how to fix what's going wrong.
12:47
They go back to the basics and the basics for Buster Posey was, I just had two bad games
12:51
in a row.
12:52
I'm going back to the tee.
12:53
I'm going back to the nine grit, you know, the nine positions of the grid of the strike
12:56
zone.
12:57
I'm going to try to hit the ball at the middle and you see guys that have that consistency
13:01
of action.
13:02
But I guess that, that, that the core layer here for Nehemiah would be there was consistency
13:06
of effort and there had to have been to be able to get this work done in the short period
13:09
and time period that it came.
13:11
It wasn't like these guys strengthened their hands for the work of the Lord and then took
13:15
a whole bunch of breaks because, you know, things just kind of went awry like they were
13:19
ready and they kind of stuck to the basics again, they were building walls.
13:22
So that's they're putting stacking bricks on top of one another, like, yeah, it was,
13:26
it was hard work.
13:27
But to a degree at that time, it was basic to someone like me, like, the thought of building
13:32
a fence would be, you know, overwhelming.
13:34
But like these guys are rebuilding walls and it's very, very complicated.
13:36
But to them, it was just repetitive work and they just did it.
13:39
They got after it.
13:40
Yeah.
13:41
And they were extremely efficient.
13:42
Obviously.
13:43
I met, I met a guy just the other day.
13:45
He looked like Santa Claus, but he said, I just asked him, what you've been doing?
13:48
And he said, well, we, we actually did this.
13:50
He showed me this video of this silo that they had put together.
13:55
I said, we, this guy bought these, he was going to use them for this purpose.
13:58
And so he broke it down and we all met at his place to, to erect them.
14:03
And I said, Oh gosh, what was that?
14:05
Like a couple of day project looked like a pretty stout project.
14:07
He was like, Oh, well, actually we got it done in four hours.
14:10
I was like, wow, how did you do that?
14:12
And so not to go into incredible detail, but he's like, well, the interesting thing is you
14:16
need a crane.
14:17
The crane lifts up the top and he said, just lift it up a little bit.
14:21
And then each of the panels, each of the kind of the wall sections have has like six of
14:26
these panels that are curved.
14:27
And he said, we had my wife on one side, handing, handing somebody a bolt, another guy, handing
14:32
another guy a screw and the guy driving it.
14:35
And we had this going all the way around and he said that we all just worked together,
14:38
boo, boo, boo, boo, boo.
14:39
And then we'd raise it up just a little bit higher.
14:41
Do the same thing.
14:42
So we got it down in four hours.
14:43
I was like, that is incredible.
14:45
That is incredible.
14:46
The efficiency, you know, that must have gone into this, you know, had to be, be something
14:50
like that.
14:51
The efficient.
14:52
The efficiency came from the plan.
14:54
Yeah.
14:55
Right.
14:56
Exactly right.
14:57
And so I guess that's a good core layer for this for, you know, how are all these people
14:59
listed here, just dozens and dozens of people able to do what they were doing?
15:02
The other thing is they were working on different parts.
15:05
Some people were working on gates.
15:06
Some people were working on corners.
15:07
Some people were working on walls.
15:09
There had to been people that were just gophers, like they were going for this and going for
15:12
that and taking it to the different people, but they knew how the plan worked together.
15:18
So it wasn't like one family was working on the dungate and I'd just keep going back
15:21
to the dungate because I think it's hilarious.
15:23
But like, and then another group was working on the wall because if they're not on the
15:26
same page, when they, when they come together, when their sections come together and your
15:30
sections four inches higher than their section, now we've got a problem, right?
15:34
You know, that's going to be, that's going to be something that a scout from a, a rival
15:38
tribe or army or something like that, they're going to find that part of the wall and be
15:42
like, there's where we're going to attack.
15:44
That's where it's weakest.
15:45
Like we can kind of get after it.
15:46
And so they were all together and they were in unison while working separately.
15:51
And you could probably see this the best.
15:53
And I know not a lot of people in our audience are, are huge soccer fans.
15:57
But one, one of the things where I, where I first noticed this, having not watched very
16:00
much soccer, whenever I was in my 20s, my wife and I were overseas somewhere and they
16:05
do highlights for their sports shows very differently overseas, especially when they're
16:09
looking at soccer or rugby or cricket or something like that.
16:11
So over here, it's, you're getting an entire three hour game in 45 to 60 seconds.
16:16
You're getting the home runs.
16:17
You're getting the touchdowns.
16:18
You're getting the big dunks.
16:19
Like that's all you're getting.
16:20
But when they show soccer highlights over in Europe, they're showing you the build up
16:25
to the score.
16:26
They're not showing you the last pass and then the score.
16:29
They're showing you from where the offense of the other team was dispossessed of the
16:33
ball and the 60 to 90 second, maybe two minute buildup that actually led to the goal.
16:39
That's where you can see the fluidity of the motion of the planning of the structure of
16:45
the offense of that team, whereas if you're not an informed observer of soccer, you would
16:50
look at that and be like, yeah, just a bunch of dudes that can't use their hands passing
16:54
the ball from one another.
16:55
And if they get bumped by the air, they roll around the ground and pretend like they've
16:59
been shot by a sniper.
17:01
But like you're getting to see the buildup and now it goes back to something we were talking
17:04
about.
17:05
It's like, you're giving your team, the each individual member of your team the parameters
17:10
of your offense and saying, be creative.
17:14
You're the parameters, but be creative.
17:16
Yeah.
17:17
Like a coach comes up with a game plan.
17:18
Nehemiah comes up with a game, they're structured, there's a system, there's a process, but
17:22
each individual person has to do their own part, but they do it their way like they're
17:27
doing them.
17:28
And yeah, there's a, that's a great sports analogy and my, you know, my best, the best
17:34
teams that I played, I do like soccer and I'm played soccer to a pretty good extent.
17:41
Coach put a system in place, but then he trusted us to carry out that system, but also allowed
17:46
us to be creative in how we did that.
17:49
It's not robotic.
17:50
It's, I know what I'm supposed to do, but I have some freedom to do what I, what I think
17:56
or what I interact with or what comes across to be creative to, to carry out that plan.
18:01
And not to do you centralize command, right?
18:02
Right.
18:03
Make decisions.
18:04
Yep.
18:05
You know, not to beat a dead horse, but you know, everybody's got to pull their weight.
18:09
You know, one of the things I, I, I use it as an analogy in my practice is I see imagine
18:15
a football team who are your best players on the football team, the quarterback running
18:19
back wide receivers.
18:20
I was like, that's great.
18:21
I was like, well, imagine your spine is like a team.
18:26
Okay.
18:27
You've got X number of thoracic lumbar segments, whatever.
18:30
Imagine like some of the, you know, imagine your lineman just said, Hey, we're going
18:34
to sit out this.
18:35
We're going to sit out this series.
18:37
You guys are the best players on the team.
18:39
You got this.
18:40
Right.
18:41
How that would go.
18:42
It would not go well.
18:43
Imagine even one or two of them doing that.
18:44
I mean, it's not that you could not maybe pick up the slack a little bit and adjust be
18:49
creative or whatever, but we are meant to work as a team, just like the body of Christ,
18:53
as we'd see in like first Corinthians 12 is meant to work and everybody do their part
18:59
and do it well.
19:00
So speaking of that, I want to read something real quick and then ask a question.
19:04
So then Ilya Shib, the high priest rose up with his brethren, the priest and built the
19:09
sheep gate.
19:10
They consecrated it and hung its doors.
19:13
They built as far as the tower of the hundred and consecrated it.
19:17
Then as far as the tower of an canal.
19:21
So my question is, this is Nehemiah three, one, the very first verse.
19:26
What's the first gate that they built?
19:29
The sheep gate.
19:30
The sheep gate.
19:31
Yeah.
19:32
That's a very, very astute point.
19:35
So the sheep gate was the gate through which the animals were brought into the city, including
19:41
the temple sacrifices.
19:43
This gate reminds us of Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God who died for the sins of the world.
19:50
And it's also the high priest or the high priest and the priest are the one that built
19:54
it.
19:55
And the high priest and the priest and the one that built it.
19:56
That's also interesting too, because like you'd think of all the people that are exempt
20:01
from building the wall, the high priest whose job is to go into the holies of holies.
20:07
The holy of holies.
20:08
Sorry, Joby.
20:09
What's funny is I immediately thought of that anytime anyone misspeaks, Joby Martin somewhere
20:14
in Florida being like, these idiots.
20:15
Why didn't anyone go to Bible comment that, you know, they're, they're responsible for,
20:21
you know, the, the spiritual welfare of the people.
20:24
Like you'd think that, okay, yeah, if anybody's exempt, it's, it's the high priest.
20:28
But no, he's in here.
20:30
That's, that's a great, that's a great point.
20:31
Well, it's not me.
20:32
Right.
20:33
This is weird.
20:34
No, study Bible.
20:35
You're such a genius.
20:36
Wow.
20:37
You still, you'll never be mad at you.
20:38
Yeah.
20:39
He still brought it up though.
20:40
But, but I will say, I mean, obviously Christ has not come on the scene yet.
20:43
So this is why I love the Bible so much.
20:46
It sort of self-defense and the fact that you could read through something like we just
20:52
set this up as being one of those chapters that it could be kind of difficult to get
20:55
through.
20:56
But as you dig deeper, it's incredible.
20:57
So another thing that brings up for me, Zach, and again, I don't want to read too much.
21:02
It's poeticism.
21:03
A word.
21:04
Anyway, I'm, I'm tagging it to myself.
21:05
I just trademarked it.
21:06
I don't want to have any poeticism in rising boondock saints.
21:09
What's the symbology there?
21:11
But the word you're looking for is symbolism.
21:14
Symbolism.
21:15
Anyway, you guys shouldn't watch that movie.
21:17
It's terrible.
21:18
Um, but so they're starting with the focus of sacrifice.
21:23
So they're building a gate through which they will bring blood sacrifice.
21:27
And just trying to really kind of figure this out before I kind of say it, but I think,
21:33
I think this is okay.
21:36
If you were to describe Christianity or the Bible to a stranger, I think the first word
21:42
you could use is sacrifice.
21:44
Hey, can you explain to me what the gospel is sacrifice?
21:48
So it's the sacrifice of God giving his son to us so that we could even have grace.
21:56
Yeah.
21:57
And so grace is the foundation or sorry, sacrifice is the foundation with which grace is built
22:03
upon.
22:05
And I think that that's very important that you start there, that there is a sacrificial
22:10
element, but also these men of God, these high priests, they sacrificed their standing,
22:15
I guess, they lowered themselves as it were.
22:18
Yeah.
22:19
Allah, what Jesus did, lowering himself as the ultimate high priest to be a man, a lowly
22:24
man that had to travail and work and sweat and go to the bathroom and all those different
22:29
things.
22:30
And then everything else that came upon him that was heaped upon him because God sent
22:36
him for that express purpose.
22:38
And so it's the sacrifice that they started with.
22:41
And again, we don't know that that's the first thing that happened, but it's the first
22:44
thing that Nehemiah mentions.
22:45
And so dude, but I've never once even thought about that.
22:49
Yeah, it's incredible.
22:50
And then going back to just straight leadership tactics, right?
22:53
The fact that he gets this thing cranked up, they started this gate and they've got the
22:57
priest pitching in, they've got their little coalition built, right?
23:00
And you can get momentum with that with everybody watching.
23:03
Yeah.
23:04
And then it just goes from there.
23:05
Yeah.
23:06
And even just the order, I mean, the order of the way things were built, the temple was
23:09
built first.
23:10
And I just, I was thinking through that, I was like, well, I mean, you know, you think
23:15
the 10 commandments, like what are the, what are the first three commandments about?
23:20
They're about putting God first and so building that temple before the walls and all.
23:24
I think there's something to be even said about that in addition to what you just brought
23:28
up here just moments ago.
23:29
So I actually want to kind of go back a little bit to, I know we're, we're using a lot of
23:33
sports analogies with this particular thing, but I think there's something important here.
23:37
Eric, when you were talking about the valuation of players, right?
23:40
And so the, the tradable sports cards that are the most valuable are the, the quarterbacks
23:45
and the wide receivers and you know, every now and then you'll get a, you know, a big-time
23:49
cornerback or a middle linebacker or something like that.
23:52
But those are kind of the big guys in soccer.
23:54
It's your forwards.
23:55
It's your strikers.
23:56
It's, I mean, there weren't a whole lot of people like having big discussions about their
24:00
favorite defenseman, you know, in, in the Premier League or something like that.
24:03
You know, that's what nerds would get down to.
24:05
They get down to the actual level, like my favorite defenseman.
24:09
But like the valuation of players, when we talk about the body, Zach, I think you were
24:13
talking about this earlier, when we evaluate the body, we put different emphasis on sexier
24:19
skills.
24:20
And so the body needs a whole lot of different types of people in order to, or different
24:25
types of things in order to operate optimally, right?
24:27
The spine is pretty darn important, but so is your pinky finger, right?
24:30
Have you, like, if you've never jammed one of your fingers or toes, you have no idea how
24:34
important that particular finger or toe is until you don't have full use of it or painful
24:39
use of it, right?
24:40
But we put preachers and teachers in X orders in this high level, right?
24:47
Those guys, they have the sexiest things, the worship leaders, you know, maybe, maybe
24:51
they're actual worship leaders in that they're actually Christians and they actually read
24:54
the Bible and they want to have theological truths in the words that they sing.
24:56
They don't just sing to Jesus like he's their boyfriend.
24:58
But like those are people that's like, they're so amazing, their voice is so good.
25:02
Look how great they play guitar.
25:03
And like this is amazing.
25:04
Like they're just entranced to buy it.
25:06
But then we don't think of the people that prepare the coffee in the same way.
25:10
We don't think about the people that prepare the that fill the baptismal up with water.
25:15
Make sure the chairs are in the right place.
25:17
Right.
25:18
And so I think that's a good time for us maybe even to pause and reflect on that that regardless
25:22
of what your skill set is, it is important to the body because the left guard is incredibly
25:29
important to Trevor Lawrence's safety.
25:31
He just is because if the left guard doesn't do his job, Trevor Lawrence could be smashed
25:37
before the ball even gets to the linebacker before he takes his three, five, seven step
25:41
drop to do anything that he needs to do.
25:44
Like those are very, very important people to the overall offense.
25:47
The same thing applies to the church.
25:48
What's the common thread?
25:50
What's the common thread there?
25:51
Like it's all servant hood.
25:54
The worship leader is serving.
25:56
The pastor is serving, the guy who makes the coffee is serving, like everybody is serving.
26:04
And I think just like everybody's building wall, like that's the common ground and how
26:09
how audacious of us or how prideful of us to think, Oh, I can't, I can't really.
26:16
I can't really like do anything because I'm not a pastor.
26:21
I'm not a worship leader.
26:23
I'm not, you know, in a leadership role at the church, like we're kind of diminishing
26:28
God.
26:29
Aren't we like, I'm just, I'm just a guy, man, you're a guy that needs to show up and serve,
26:35
show up, serve.
26:36
Yeah, that's a good point.
26:38
What, what do you think is going on with somebody that may have this perspective that
26:42
they're only watching the top guys or girl, you know, whatever?
26:46
Probably the question that you should be asking yourself is how am I participating?
26:51
Not what am I going to do any of that, just how am I participating?
26:54
Because as soon as you're showing up to church or whatever your situation is and you're having
26:58
to put in some effort, you will very quickly begin to appreciate the coffee guy and the
27:03
person taking out the trash person marching across the parking lot to make sure that everybody
27:08
gets in safe all the way up to including the top dog.
27:11
So if you don't appreciate what's being provided around you, the question I'd ask is how am
27:17
I participating?
27:18
Again, I think, so there's a very important thing I read a book years ago is called Outlaw
27:23
Platoon.
27:24
And so this was about, you know, some stuff that was happening during the GWAT and, you
27:30
know, really, really terrible situation.
27:31
A lot of guys died.
27:33
And I remember something in that book when these guys come back from being outside the
27:37
wire, they come back to base where these other soldiers were, you know, basically living
27:45
in relative, they were certainly living in peace they weren't in any danger where they
27:49
were at.
27:50
But they have Starbucks, they've got a gym, they've got AC that works, they've got hot
27:54
showers.
27:55
Oh, wow.
27:56
And, you know, these guys came back from their covered in blood and sweat and human excrement.
28:02
And they see all these people and they're the guys that just came back there in the back
28:07
of the food line.
28:08
And the author remembers being like, I could have killed everybody in there in that exact
28:13
moment, I was so angry.
28:15
I remember talking about that with my buddy Eddie Penny, who was a seal, not just a seal.
28:19
He was in seal team six and he's, you know, he's been as, uh, as downrange as downrange
28:24
gets.
28:25
I remember talking to him about that.
28:27
And he recalled a moment where he came back to, uh, thank it was Thanksgiving or Christmas.
28:33
It was one of those.
28:34
And he came back and the dinner that they provided on base, um, you know, here they are,
28:40
they come back there, they're tired or whatever and they just want to get some turkey and some
28:43
stuffing and some mashed potatoes and all that by the time they got there, all these
28:47
dudes that had just been sitting on base and in real in complete safety, they'd eaten everything.
28:52
The only thing I was left was rolls.
28:54
And in that moment, those guys that had just gone down range and killed a bunch of terrorists
28:59
and, you know, did the stuff that, you know, only they were equipped to do.
29:03
He was very, very angry that he's sitting there eating, you know, stale rolls and he
29:06
didn't get any turkey and all that.
29:08
But he said, Kyle, later when I reflected on that, I kept thinking none of the stuff
29:13
we did downrange was possible without those guys, nothing.
29:18
So the armor that never shoots the weapon outside the wire, he made sure my weapon worked
29:24
so that whenever I was pointed at a terrorist that it wasn't going to jam, it wasn't going
29:27
to mess up because if it jammed and messed up, then maybe I die instead of him, right?
29:32
And all these logistical people that are, they're not the most risk that they are at
29:38
is whether or not they're playing that lands them in Afghanistan is going to crash.
29:41
Like, they're not, they're not having bullets whizz past their head.
29:44
There are gradations to people's service and, you know, how much danger they were in, but
29:49
they're making it possible for those other people to do the things that they're doing.
29:53
So all the stuff Nehemiah is doing as a governor of sorts in Jerusalem at the time would not
29:58
have been possible without the 12 year old boys that were carrying bricks back and forth
30:04
to the masons that were getting the work done.
30:05
So I know that it was kind of a long time to elucidate that, but it's so unbelievably
30:09
important.
30:10
There's two extremes there too, right?
30:11
Like, we can, we can think, oh, I'm so low.
30:13
I can't offer anything, but on the flip side, we can also think like you're describing with
30:19
these stories of, you know, Navy Seals, I can, I can prop myself up so high that I feel so
30:27
entitled that when I, man, I do this.
30:31
Why am I not getting this?
30:33
That's not a good place to be either.
30:35
So there's two extremes there.
30:36
So many eyes.
30:37
Yeah.
30:38
Exactly.
30:39
Right.
30:40
I mean, exactly.
30:41
It is interesting because there is a balance.
30:42
I mean, we're obviously on a seal discussion here a little bit, but I go back to, if you're
30:48
on a team from a leadership perspective, you don't necessarily want to be on the front
30:52
of the back.
30:53
You want to be able to have perspective of everything that's going on and you need everybody to
30:56
be able to slot in and participate, however they need to, but your leadership, you need
31:00
to be involved front line, but, but your team needs to understand that in order for them
31:04
to be safe, you need to be, you need to be detached and have perspective as well.
31:09
So I think for me, it goes back to do you want to be right or do you want to be effective
31:12
and you just have to look around and go, how can I make this the most effective?
31:16
And that, that encourages everybody to participate, right?
31:20
And that's really what we're after when I also think that if we look at anything in
31:24
history, we're great things were accomplished.
31:27
So again, sports analogy, someone wins a Super Bowl, they win the World Series, um, you know,
31:32
a mission is completed and you don't lose any of your guys.
31:35
But as you were talking, I was thinking about the Sistine Chapel and the work of Michael
31:40
Angelo.
31:41
And guys, if you haven't been to Rome, if you haven't been to Vatican City, like you need
31:44
to spend some time in St. Peter's Basilica, you need to look at the last judgment, you
31:48
need to go in there and you need to know what it smells like inside the Sistine Chapel.
31:51
You need to look up and just see that.
31:54
Do you all think that Michael Angelo built the scaffolding when he was painting?
31:58
Right.
31:59
Do you think he was getting up and down off the scaffolding to get his paint like, or
32:05
was he focused on the work of creating perhaps the greatest piece of art that we still have
32:10
in a majority?
32:12
And again, Michael Angelo is the name that we remember the name of the painting and the
32:16
different details.
32:17
Those are the things that we remember, but who made it possible?
32:20
And then you've heard this, I don't even know if this story actually happened.
32:22
But when that guy, maybe Kennedy, that was getting a tour of NASA and he's, you know,
32:28
he sees a janitor, you know, sweeping up the floor and he asks a janitor, you know, what
32:31
do you do?
32:32
Here he goes.
32:33
I'm putting a man on the moon.
32:34
And it's like, yeah, that's cute for like business school and all that.
32:36
But it's a great lesson to where it's like, what if they were at a filthy work environment
32:41
at NASA?
32:42
And they literally like the engineers couldn't get any of their work done because there's
32:45
coffee stains all over their workstations and everything sticky and they're distracted
32:49
mentally.
32:50
They can't focus on the things that they need to focus on because they're dealing with
32:53
also their crap that they, that is not their job.
32:56
So I think that that's important.
32:57
Just again, anytime you look at something that is important and that has been done at
33:01
a high level, hold a lot of hands went into that, not just the sexy hands.
33:04
I think that also goes back to our identity.
33:07
Where does our identity come from?
33:09
Is our identity wrapped up in what we do on a day to day basis?
33:11
I'm the janitor that only I just take out the trash or I just sweep and mop or is my
33:16
identity in Christ?
33:17
And I understand that what I do every day is not only in service to other people but
33:22
is in service to God.
33:25
I talked to a guy a couple months ago who runs a pretty significant executive coaching
33:31
firm and start up business.
33:34
So if you have a business and you're at a certain threshold, you can come to his group
33:37
and they've got all these coaches and different people, right?
33:39
And we're having lunch and he said, you know, Zach, one of the issues that we see with people
33:44
who have been successful is they sell these companies and financially they're set.
33:48
And then they go through a significant depression and so much of our programs are set on trying
33:53
to help them understand what their next, you know, phases and it's just them attaching
33:59
their identity to what they do.
34:02
And I've seen, you know, myself, I've had experience with that as a younger person.
34:05
I mean, it was a big deal when I had to figure out that this is not me.
34:08
Yeah.
34:09
I had somebody come in and say, you know, I don't work for this company.
34:13
I work at this company for my family.
34:17
That was in a professional context.
34:18
So we would, we would add to that and say, you know, I represent God and that's, that's
34:24
what I attach my, my, uh, worth to.
34:26
And then everything else flows from that right now remembering, uh, Colossians three 22 and
34:30
23 says, whatever you do, do it heartily working hardly for God and not for man.
34:36
And so there's the idea of who we're working for as you just kind of mentioned, but also
34:41
there's this idea that whatever we do, whether you're in, you know, in the, in here, you're
34:46
the perfumer or whether you're the, the priest or whether you're a, a small child working
34:52
along son, your, your, your dad, whatever you do, do it well.
34:56
You know, um, I think that's really important.
34:58
I was, I want to share, um, from first Peter, uh, to four, um, this because I was just thinking
35:06
about like all the stones they were placing and I was reminded of us as living stones.
35:12
Let me read this.
35:13
And, and coming to him as to a living stone, which has been rejected by men, but his choice
35:19
and precious in the sight of God, you also as living stones are being built up as a spiritual
35:25
house for a holy priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God through Jesus
35:31
Christ and it goes on and talks more about the rejection of the, of that stone in Jesus
35:37
and that, and that becoming the chief cornerstone, but I just thinking about like there was a
35:42
very physical work going on here of them laying stones, but, uh, practically speaking, we also
35:48
are being built up, you know, not only individually through sanctification, but also as corporately
35:54
through our church and through our fellowship that we have with one another to be able to
35:58
accomplish God's work, not because he needs us, but because he allows us to be a part
36:02
of his grander story and commissions us, um, to find joy, um, in glorifying him through
36:09
it.
36:10
Eric, that's actually one of the things I wanted to talk about in preparation for Nehemiah
36:12
three is you see this throughout the entire book of Ezra and Nehemiah, but certainly
36:18
in, uh, Nehemiah one, two and three is God does his work through people.
36:25
I think sometimes Christians think that they are just innocent bystanders or just spectators
36:30
in what God is doing and they treat it that way and oh man, I don't know if you said this
36:34
one or on last week's episode where it's like, you know, God can move mountains, but he expects
36:38
you to bring a shovel.
36:39
Right.
36:40
Like that type of attitude is important and I feel like maybe I'm wrong.
36:43
I'm curious how y'all feel about this.
36:46
Most Christians are completely fine being a spectator because they, they heard some dork
36:52
in junior high say, let go and let God and they're just like, that's how I'm going to
36:56
operate from here on out forever.
36:58
And it's like, I'm not going to actually do anything because God's going to do it.
37:02
Like what is my work compared to God?
37:04
And it's like you're asking the wrong question.
37:07
The wrong question is what is God going to do through you using your hands?
37:12
We serve a God that hung the stars and literally created the earth, but he loves us so much
37:21
that he invites us to be a part of that plan and to be a part of that story, not as bystanders
37:31
like you're saying, but like active participants.
37:34
The Bible is full of, it's all crooked pencils.
37:37
I think, I think you use that, that a lot.
37:42
Making straight lines.
37:43
He's using crooked pencils to make straight lines, but the pencil still has to do the thing.
37:47
Like God's sovereignty does not mean that men are not active participants.
37:54
And I, Nehemiah is a perfect example of that.
37:58
Yeah.
37:59
Matt, one commentary I read called these people responsible human agents.
38:03
All three of those words are very important.
38:05
They're not just agents, they're human agents, right?
38:07
Because God has agency control over the whole of humanity.
38:11
He can tell the rocks what to do, he can tell the wind what to do, he can tell the birds
38:14
what to do.
38:15
So he has agency.
38:16
These are human agents that are responsible.
38:19
They have responsibilities that require discipline to do the things that need to be done.
38:24
And especially when we get into Nehemiah four, like I'm just chomping at the bit to get
38:27
into the Nehemiah four.
38:28
Because so many things in Nehemiah four seem, oh, very un-Christlike and un-Christlike and
38:34
kind of mean.
38:35
And why would they even need to do that?
38:36
And you know, I've heard people even say before, they're like, you know, you don't need to
38:40
exercise.
38:41
You don't need to take care of yourself.
38:42
You've got Jesus.
38:43
You don't need to get a vaccine.
38:44
And no, I'm not talking about the vaccine, he's like, you don't need any vaccines because
38:48
you have Jesus.
38:49
And it's like, wait a minute, you know, I remember when, when Joby said something to
38:53
me before, and by the time y'all are hearing this, it will have been after my, my voice
38:57
surgery.
38:58
So we'll see how that goes.
38:59
But he's like, Kyle, if you get this surgery and your voice is better and it's fixed and
39:03
all that 200 years ago, we would have called that a miracle.
39:06
Now it's called a procedure, but it's still a miracle, like it is a common grace that we
39:11
have now.
39:12
It's like a common grace, like I'm reading through a book right now that's going through
39:15
some, you know, medical practices that were happening in the 16 to 1700s.
39:18
And it's like, I don't, I'm glad I'm alive.
39:21
Right.
39:22
People are like, is there an area you would want to go back and lift?
39:24
No, maybe to yesterday, I would want to go back to yesterday and like maybe 2019.
39:28
Yeah, like something like that.
39:31
Maybe an era where it's still where I still got an iPhone, but then I can kind of like
39:33
time the market just a little bit.
39:35
No, I don't want to go back to Roman times to live.
39:38
I like to go down to visit, but then come back so I can eat food in air conditioning,
39:43
right?
39:44
And so, but again, I don't want to get too far away from the point there.
39:46
But again, there's a lot of agency responsibility there.
39:49
There are two things at tension here.
39:51
And I think a lot of people get hung up on.
39:53
And I think, you know, you, you kind of speak to this, um, I think, you know, people who
39:58
would consider themselves Calvinists can really get hung up on this, but there's two
40:02
tension throughout the entire Bible that God is sovereign and his will will be done.
40:07
No matter what.
40:09
And that man is responsible.
40:10
And I think we can swing the pendulum one way or the other, but I like what Spurgeon says
40:17
on that.
40:18
And I really liked your interview a few months ago with Joby, where you asked him specifically
40:23
about that.
40:24
His response was great.
40:25
Like these things are attention, but they, they're both true and they don't contradict
40:29
each other because they're both in the Bible.
40:31
Like, so, and Nehemiah is probably one of the greatest examples of that of God's will is
40:38
being done because God ordained it to be done, but also Nehemiah and all these people are
40:45
active participants to carry that out because he's allowing that to happen.
40:49
Yeah.
40:50
And you might as well just get used to this because I can't imagine that we get to heaven
40:54
and we just, I mean, I get it will rest and we will have freedom from the, the temptation
41:00
to have sin and that sort of thing.
41:02
But, but aren't we going to have, still have responsibilities?
41:05
Aren't we still going to be working?
41:08
You know, so, I mean, if you don't like to do it right now, you're not going to like
41:11
heaven very much.
41:12
Yeah.
41:13
Well, we know how it's set up pre fall, right?
41:15
There was, there were jobs to be done.
41:16
Yeah.
41:17
Or just idle or you, you wasn't, Adam wasn't.
41:20
Um, you know, I guess just reading this a little bit just to get into some of the details
41:25
on it.
41:26
Wearsby does a good job, I think trying to tie the gates and the different things into
41:31
things that are relevant.
41:32
And one here that I highlighted, I thought was interesting as he says, the refuse gate.
41:37
I think you were talking a little bit about this was located at the southernmost tip of
41:41
the city near the pool of Siloam.
41:44
It was a nasty pool, I'm sure.
41:46
It was a main exit to the valley of Hinnom or the city disposed of its garbage.
41:51
The Greek word Gehenna refers to the valley of Hinnom, identifying this is the area that
41:56
Jesus used as a picture of hell.
41:58
Yeah.
41:59
The sanitary disposal of the waste materials is essential to the health of a city.
42:03
It reminds us that like the city, each of us individually must get rid of whatever defiles
42:09
us or it may destroy us.
42:11
And it references second Corinthian seven one and first John one nine.
42:15
So in these words, this implies that, you know, we have some work to do along with God
42:20
to identify those things.
42:22
And I know in the last episode, we talked about, you know, some of the things that we
42:24
need to be working to rid ourselves of and all that.
42:26
So I just wanted to kind of pull in some of the specifics that they're talking about
42:31
here.
42:32
There's a lot of different gates and different things.
42:35
I know you could gloss over, but I think there's there's plenty of ties to dig into and right
42:39
after that in verses 15, 16 talks about the king's garden.
42:45
And I just thought it was interesting.
42:46
I was reading a quote a quote from Charles Spurgeon. It was actually part of a sermon.
42:51
Just as a side note, there were six different gardens of the king.
42:56
There was the garden of Eden.
42:58
There was the garden guests that 70.
43:00
There was the garden tomb.
43:03
There was the human heart and the church as a whole, and then ultimately the garden of
43:07
paradise and heaven.
43:09
So just again, trying to tie back a little bit to as are three good old Calvinist purge.
43:16
Are you looking at me?
43:17
Why?
43:18
Why do you say that?
43:19
And then look at me.
43:20
Because the problem is is all these dang reform nerds are like, Oh, look at those close
43:23
questions.
43:24
It's like, I don't want to answer your questions.
43:25
Okay.
43:26
I got things I got to do.
43:27
The thing that I feel like is important in all of this as well.
43:30
And maybe this is an overarching point.
43:32
Maybe as we re wrap to a close here on Nehemiah three is that humans don't give themselves
43:38
enough.
43:40
They don't think about their own responsibility enough.
43:42
I feel like and I mean, I saw a video the other day in this video that I've seen before,
43:46
but there was a woman that had, I think 10 kids and like eight of them were living with
43:51
her in like a hotel room or something like that.
43:53
And she's like, someone's got to take care of these kids.
43:56
Look at all these kids I got and somebody better take care of them.
43:58
And I'm just thinking myself, you and the multiple baby daddies, that's who, but we've
44:06
been lulled to sleep and modernity that we, we make the bed, but we don't have to lie
44:11
in it.
44:12
Right.
44:13
Uncle Sam's going to take care of it.
44:14
Uncle government's going to take care of it.
44:16
You know, some ministry or whatever is going to take pity on us and those types of things.
44:21
And if that is seeping out of your normal life, it's going to seep into all the most
44:26
important areas of your life, raising of children, having your job and, and creating
44:30
things for society.
44:31
Because again, point to any societal ill, right?
44:35
Any single one that we have today, think of your favorite one guys got in your brain.
44:40
Great.
44:41
And if you point to a lot of things, and if you were to only do a univariate analysis,
44:44
you can say, father's not being in the home, you know, kids not being educated, fathers
44:50
not being in the home.
44:51
Kids joining gangs, fathers not being in home, kids being violent, kids getting pregnant,
44:57
kids getting other people pregnant at a young age, like murders, rapes, fathers not being
45:02
in the home, but we love to point to everything else.
45:06
And we don't live in a shame culture anymore.
45:09
That's one thing I'm reading a book right now and, you know, depending on the timing,
45:12
I may have already interviewed this person, but it's like the history of abortion in America
45:16
from like the 1600s to today.
45:18
It's a 500 page book and it is a whirlwind, but they're talking about like back in the
45:22
day, you know, this was, I guess, fairly common that women would be hesitant to sleep with
45:26
a man unless they were married, obviously, or unless they promised to be married.
45:31
And so you would have these men that would say, let's have sex and, you know, we're going
45:36
to get married, right?
45:37
And then when you know it, they would do that and then they would renege on that show and
45:40
if the girl got pregnant, they would super renege on that or something.
45:44
However, the communities, if they found out that a man slept with a woman and impregnated
45:50
her or just slept with her in general, the community would say, you're going to wiper.
45:55
That's what you're going to do.
45:56
You're going to marry her.
45:57
You made a decision this.
45:59
So that's where the whole concept of a shotgun wedding.
46:01
But in that time, they didn't even need the shotgun because the shame that came from the
46:06
community was so much scarier than the potential of the girl's dad putting a shotgun in your
46:12
back and marching you down the aisle.
46:13
I think that speaks to the community, like what we are built to be in community and have
46:17
that accountability.
46:18
We're called to be where our feet are and if I, if I sin and have sex with someone outside
46:25
of God's ordained plan, which is marriage, okay, be where your feet are.
46:32
Step up, show up, be a man and like carry out the call that you that you have like it's
46:41
it's not always I'm called to go save that 10,000 people.
46:45
I'm called to do this.
46:46
I'm called to do that.
46:47
I'm called to serve my wife and my two kids and I don't always get that right.
46:52
But that's my calling and that's where I've got to be and you've got your laptop.
46:55
We can't really see the time or so for anybody, I think the camera actually turned off.
47:02
So here's the two things.
47:03
The first one is I don't know if you saw Ray Comfort posted a recent video and he said,
47:07
I thought this is interesting.
47:09
If you get in a car accident with a pregnant person, the baby dies, it's manslaughter, right?
47:14
You can be charged with double murder and some states or double vehicular murder or homicide.
47:19
Okay.
47:20
So you could you could walk down that path.
47:22
I just didn't know if you'd seen that.
47:24
These are two comments that I read that probably hit me the hardest and all of this study.
47:27
So I just thought I'd throw these out there for everybody to look at in three twenty nine.
47:30
These are the comments about three twenty nine.
47:32
The East Gate led directly to the temple and it's probably what we know today is the Golden
47:36
Gate.
47:37
Tradition says that Jesus entered the temple on Palm Sunday through this gate in the sixteenth
47:42
century.
47:43
The gate was sealed with blocks of stone by the Turkish sultan, Saul Salaman, the magnificent
47:50
Jewish and Christian tradition, both connect the Golden Gate with the coming of the Messiah
47:54
to Jerusalem and the Muslims associated with the future judgment.
47:58
Last part, Ezekiel saw the glory of the Lord depart from the temple at the East Gate and
48:04
the Lord will return to the city the same way.
48:07
So you have every reason to associate this gate with Christ's return and to remind yourself
48:13
to abide in him that when he appears, we may have confidence and not be ashamed before him
48:20
that is coming.
48:21
So for me, a couple of quick highlights would just be go look at the videos.
48:25
You can see this.
48:27
If you want to get a sense of how real this is, it says this is where the glory of God
48:31
exited.
48:32
This is where Christ is coming back specifically.
48:34
And that last sentence about we don't want to be ashamed when he comes back.
48:38
If you feel like you're living in some unrepented center, you've got some issues that are going
48:42
on, get that cleaned up.
48:44
And if you need help, get it.
48:46
I think it's a tremendous point, and I will say last night before we recorded the sec,
48:50
you sent a message to all of us with two different videos.
48:53
One was a 3D rendering of the city and then there was another one that was kind of like
48:56
a historical retelling of kind of what was happening in that area.
49:00
And some of you guys like the maps in your Bible, well, there are things that you can
49:04
get because, you know, we wonder about the size of certain things and how that is in reference
49:09
to whatever.
49:10
And if you've never been to Israel, it's kind of hard to kind of understand.
49:12
We think of Jerusalem as way bigger than it actually is because we've never actually
49:15
been there and seen it.
49:17
But it does give you an idea, the scope of the work, but also, again, as we've mentioned,
49:23
if you're reading the Bible as if all of this points to the narrative of Christ, that points
49:26
to the gospel, then the mentioning of the sheep gate first, as you just taught all of us at
49:31
this table and a lot of people in the audience, that is not insignificant.
49:35
That's also not by happenstance and that's also not by accident.
49:38
Another text that you sent to everybody last night is you're going through the action Bible
49:41
with your son and when you know it, you turn the page last night before you come in here
49:46
to do this recording to Ezra, which is the setup for Nehemiah, which is, you know, setting
49:51
up things in history, that point to the gospel.
49:54
And I said kind of tongue and cheek, yeah, it must have been a coincidence.
49:57
Like that is just just just so happened to be the next thing that you and your son were
50:01
going over.
50:02
And so there's certainly we don't live in a world full of coincidence is not everything
50:05
that ever happens in history points to God, but this is something that it's like we clearly
50:09
see things that are pointing to God in his redemptive story and humanity.
50:13
So guys, hopefully that has been a good, you know, understanding of Nehemiah three to where
50:19
there is enough that you can glean from this.
50:21
You may need help from commentaries.
50:23
You may need help from the Holy Spirit just telling you, Hey, there's something here.
50:26
Don't skip this Browning.
50:27
It's what you're talking about earlier.
50:28
Like, Hey, there's got to be an application here that I have to find.
50:31
It's just not going to be readily apparent.
50:33
It's not going to jump out and smack me in the face, but we're going to just have to leave
50:36
that there for now, but come back next Sunday where we are going to dig into Nehemiah four.
50:41
Oh boy.
50:42
Oh boy.
50:43
Oh boy.
50:44
I'm so excited to dig into Nehemiah four.
50:45
Like that is worth the price of admission for the entire book of Nehemiah, but make sure
50:49
you read Nehemiah four before you come here next week.
50:52
But before we let you go, we are going to do a quick resilience boost and adult to life
50:55
or mission is equipping men to push back darkness with content that for just spiritual, mental
50:59
and physical resilience.
51:00
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52:29
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52:48
I'm your host, Kyle.