Hey guys, real quick. So, I've talked to men literally all across the globe about where they're missing the mark and how they want to improve. They normally talk about how they wish they were in better shape, they wish they had a better relationship with their loved ones, they wish they had more success and influence at work, and some other stuff like that. But, here are some of the most common and biggest things that I hear. I wish I knew more about the Bible. I wish I could lead my family spiritually. I wish I could recall more scripture. I wish Bible study wasn't such a struggle. Well, guys, I've got news for you. You don't have to keep wishing. It's time for you to start doing. It's time for you to stop wasting your time and money on stuff that has no eternal value whatsoever. I keep hearing you talk about how you want to be more biblically literate and spiritually resilient, and now is your chance to prove that you mean it. That's why I want you to take advantage of our partnership with the most powerful Bible software on planet Earth, Logos. So, Logos approached me about putting something together for the Undaunted Lifers out there, and we collaborated to create something I'm super pumped about, the Undaunted Life Study Bundle. So, here's the skinny on the bundle. There are over 200 individual resources, and they include titles from authors like Voddie Bauckham, Charles Spurgeon, R.C. Sproul, John MacArthur, Matt Chandler, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, William Lane Craig, Paul Washer, John Stott, Doug Wilson, Paul David Tripp, J.I. Packer, and a whole bunch more. And there are so many helpful resources in there. There's Bibles, commentaries, Old and New Testament study guides, devotionals, systematic theologies, courses dictionaries histories encyclopedias, non-fiction books, and more, and more, and more. And here's the most insane part about this deal. If you were to buy each individual resource by yourself inside of Logos, it would cost you over $3,000. $3,000. But, if you get the Undaunted Life Study Bundle, you'll get all 200-plus resources for just $349.99. Guys, that's $3,000 worth of stuff for 350 bucks. Guys, that's almost 90% off. And you know that you waste more than that on the hobbies that you have right now all the time, and these won't help you with your discipleship and sanctification journeys, right? It's time to get real and take control of your Bible study and spiritual development. Click the link in the show notes for this episode. If you want the link, it's logos.com /undauntedlife. That's www.logos.com/undauntedlife or the link in the show notes. It's super easy to sign up. Again, go to the show notes and click the link or go to logos.com/undauntedlife, sign up for Logos, and get the Undaunted Life Study Bundle right now. This is Undaunted Life, a man's podcast. I'm your host Kyle Thompson. Let's get into it. Welcome back to the forging table. The mission of Undaunted Life is equipping men to push back darkness with content that forges spiritual, mental, and physical resilience. At the forging table, you'll see a group of regular guys forging spiritual resilience by digging into God's word, and we're welcoming all of you to come along on that journey with us. That's Eustace. That's Zach. That's Ryan. Ryan, there's something different about you, and I just can't quite put my finger on it. So, is it a new shirt? I'm wearing a new cologne. New cologne? What's your essence today? Can you give us an update on your essence? >> Much Ado About the Duke. I'm sorry, what? >> Much Ado About Much Ado About the Duke. A duke? Yeah. It's by Penhaligon. Yeah. It's English. So, is this supposed to be like Much Ado About like the Duke like inside the What is the the structure of the family order or something? >> like a storyline that Penhaligon did. And so, yeah. It's just this one's Much Ado About the Duke. >> the story of Penhaligon? No, I don't. I like the way it smelled. >> You know what it almost sounds like? Penhaligon. That sounds like a good name for a dragon. Speaking of dragons, uh today in Sunday school, did you survey uh a bunch of children because for anyone that doesn't uh realize what's what's going on here is there's been a a very healthy Forging Table debate about the serpent in the garden, whether that was like a snake, a big lizard, or a dragon. It's clearly a dragon. Even our pastor's team dragon. But you uh you surveyed a bunch of three-year-olds I am not team dragon. Three-year-olds? No, man, that's middle school. Okay, middle schoolers. Teaching you Yeah, we talked about Sunday. >> What did those apes think whenever you talked today? Uh they're smarter than the most of these guys at the Forging Table cuz they said it was a serpent. So what are you saying? Yes. I'm sorry. He looked directly at you. He woke up today and he goes, "Violence." Oh, that's it. That's it. I don't know why I looked I'm just so used to looking OVER THERE. IT WAS ACTUALLY HE'S TRYING TO BUY it back. It's not going to It's not going to You're just a calming face to look at, especially when I feel like I'm Yeah, no, uh no, there's a The kids were like I asked them. I was like, "You know, the serpent in the garden. Like do you think it was a snake or do you think it was a dragon?" Some kids were like, "Dragon." No, no, how how did you say it? Exactly. Go with it, Russ, cuz you said it that way cuz you were like, "Or was it a dragon?" >> Right. No, so I was just like No, he's he's team anti-dragon. He would have said, "Is it a dragon or is it a snake?" I did not lead them on at all. I said, "I don't believe that." I said to them I said I said, "Hey, the serpent do you think it was a snake or do you think it was a dragon?" Did you happen to listen to Mark's sermon this morning? >> I heard about it. My wife told me about it. Yes. >> about it, so you didn't actually >> I was teaching middle school. Okay, and there was no other option for Well, I mean, I could have skipped I could have skipped ABF. Yeah, and so or you could have What Skip what? ABF. >> Sunday school? Yeah, and so like but I mean, you could have seen it. But wouldn't it wouldn't it just be so interesting if he were to mention Oh, he did actually mention the dragon in the garden. He literally used the word >> the dragon in the garden? used >> word dragon and I text y'all immediately. >> Did he look at you and like head nod? >> Well, see, so I was I was in the lobby and but you know, he ran into me in the bathroom before we went out there and did it and so like you know, he and I we >> You guys had eye contact in the bathroom? >> a connection in the bathroom in the men's room, right? So don't take that anywhere it doesn't need to go. I'm not >> dragon connection. It's that team dragon connection. You just have that. That's like natural TRT. Is it when you're on team dragon? Just going to say it. >> Okay. So, he he said the dragon in the garden or did he talk about Revelation? >> you just go back. Just go back and listen to it. >> Because here's here's the thing. >> you're actually pulling something in that may be off base. >> about the dragon in Revelation. He was talking about the dragon in the garden. I know that our pastor is very much into eschatology and a lot of stuff comes back to prophecy. Eschatology is study of the end times? >> Yeah, and I think that are we are we at the end of Ephesians 6? We're wrapping up Ephesians 6. >> and probably more talking about Revelation. So, he wasn't really going into Revelation at all. He wasn't talking about He was talking about He was talking about Genesis? Yeah, and when you know what's interesting about you even saying that. >> teaching middle school. >> Oh, okay. >> Yeah, and writing songs on this guitar. So, that's not a thing. That's that thing you do, Reverend. That's a deep cut quote from that thing you do. >> even have a guitar. Oh, it's sorry. That's This is my fault. What happened? There's an app. So, he actually whenever he came on to talk about the Persian storm. So, for any of y'all listening to this, probably it's you know, a month or two ago. Yeah, he I mean, like cuz he he did a 3-hour interview on the show and didn't mention that he had a book coming out like in a few weeks. And I get this email from HarperCollins with all their releases for the rest of the year and it's like, oh, there's Tim Tebow and there's blah blah and I was like, Mark Hitchcock. And so, I call him and I'm like, dude, like what? Like you could have just like mentioned He's like, oh, I don't really like Self-promoting. >> Yeah, I don't really really promoting which is funny cuz I didn't know until a couple years ago that he had ever published a book. Really? >> like two dozen. And so, but anyway, as he was going through that book, he mentioned cuz you know, I kind of started with like, "How did you get this interest in eschatology, end times, you know, prophecy, those types of things?" And he kind of explained where all that came from, but then he's just like, "Yeah, but you know, at the at the church, like we're just doing books of the Bible, going through books of the Bible, and so I don't try to force it like a hobby horse. I don't try to force it and thrust it into every sermon. It's just like, if it comes up, it comes up, and it's pertinent to you know, the exegesis of of the verse or whatever, but Can you go back to the reference of a hobby horse? Is that because people with horses force it into the conversation like, "I've got a horse." Is that the Hobby horse is just a colloquialism where it's just like, okay, this is my thing that I like. So, so let's So, he's big into AI. So, Zach's big into AI. He's like, "What? You looked at me like you're shocked. What do you What I God, he's nonverbal sometimes. I just want I think everybody Everybody chose violence today. No, so it's like it's for somebody when all roads kind of lead back to a discussion about whatever their main topic is. So, someone in my Their hobby horse might be AI or golf or jujitsu or music. Yeah, yeah, that was his hobby horse. And he's like, "Get off your hobby horse." Yeah, ooh, that's not actually an expression, but we can make it an expression. Uh, but before we get too far, we've already gotten about 5 minutes in. Many of you out there in listener land may have noticed the new intro outro music of The Forging Table. So, a few weeks ago, we had a new debut of Void Awakened, their song Conqueror. That is going to be our intro outro music for our Tuesday, Thursday episodes or any like special releases we have. But we have a great relationship with Brook Brook Reeves of the legendary uh Christian death metal band Impending Doom. He did a long uh like 3-hour podcast here a couple months ago. But uh they have a song called Christ is King, and so that's going to be the intro outro music, just differentiating it a little bit for the listener because as I told y'all from the beginning cuz you know, y'all were both here for the beginning for Forging Table. I was like, "If I stop doing interviews and I stop doing solo episodes, we will not stop The Forging Table." So, if anything else, it would roll off and be its own like autonomous thing. But, uh anyway, so I wanted to have a little bit of a differentiation. But, for for those of you it's a very very short song. You should check it out. Christ Is King by Impending Doom. I do want to read the lyrics to you because part of the thing is, you know, if you're not used to listening to metal or or if you don't really pay attention to vocals, you might miss some lyrical content. But, short song, I want to read it here. As I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. As I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. My simple prayer is that when I die, hell rejoices. I'm out of the fight cuz in this war, I will know Christ is king. Christ is king. Christ is king. And so, I've been uh informed by dorks on the internet that even saying Christ Is King makes you like, you know, super pro-Israel or anti-Israel depending upon which people you listen to. Yep, it's actually a thing. But, uh we're saying it as a statement because obviously Christ is king. So, you guys will hear that in the outro as well. You will hear our boy Brook Reeves uh screaming that. But um very very important changes happening at the for- Oh, before So, did you get that? >> that a reference to Was it Lewis that said that? C.S. Lewis? Yeah, that when he dies his only hope is that basically >> looked that up cuz I think I think I think that may have been something C.S. Lewis said that Yeah, let me look it up. Well, it may have been a quote from someone else that C.S. Lewis quoted. Yeah, that's what I'm wondering. Kind of like Lego Batman. You know? Okay, can we talk about Lego Batman for a little bit? That's like the third time you've referenced Lego Batman. Lego Batman's awesome. If y'all don't know, that's that's >> different ones. I didn't know which one. I tried to watch it the other day or tried to put it on for the boys, not watching by myself. But, like there were a bunch of different ones that I'll I'll have to see if there was like an official There was the official Lego Batman and it is uh Oh man, I own it. Uh can you show me the the cover? Don't show it on the screen, but okay. >> Speaking of quotes, I do have a funny story. Can I share it? >> hit your story while he's looking that up. Uh so, my son the other day we were He's going to be so He's He's going to be embarrassed I'm saying this, but this really funny. And he took it lightheartedly. So, we're sitting in the other day at a restaurant and he's looking up the TV after we've ordered and kind of he's kind of zoned out and it's, you know, insurance commercial after insurance commercial saying different stuff and he goes, "Man, I just don't get it. Like, what they just want you to call and they'll give you a quote?" I go, "Oh, yeah?" And he goes, "So, what? They like you call and they're just like when life throws you a pitch, pick up a bat or when life throws you a curveball, pick up a bat and swing?" And me and my wife just look at each other and we're like, "What?" >> That is great. >> You And he goes, "Yeah, like the whole like call, we'll give you a quote. Like, what's the point? They just give you they just like tell you different quotes to try to get your business for you to call?" >> You know what? >> I was like, "That is actually >> to launch that business. Like, that your kid's an entrepreneur. He came up You call this number, we'll give you a quote. It might be Shakespeare, might be Madonna, but like we're giving you a quote. >> I told him I was like, "We always talk to me about writing a joke book cuz he says so many funny things. We're like, 'That needs to go in your joke book and then you need to extend it out about the idea that basically you pick your career off of trying to be like an insurance because you thought you were going to be be able to give people quotes and then you end up just like working with numbers, so That's funny. >> Zach, did we find out the quote? Who was it? Uh it's I don't have it as definitive yet, but the So, the quote was Are you using AI? Yeah, but not the one not the one I normally use. Uh my prayer is that when I die, all of hell rejoices that I'm out of the fight, commonly attributed to C.S. Lewis, but it's not it's not him. Uh could be a guy named C.T. Studd. I don't know. Dude, what a name. It's not an immediate answer. It's not >> Dude, is it too late to rename my son? >> it What is it a uh When you have a different name, you like use it not an alias, but >> Okay. Yeah, for a book. What is Pen name. A pen name. Pen name. Yeah. That'd be my pen name. C.T. Studd? >> CT Stud. Do you know what Ryan's is? What? No. >> Lunchable. Lunchable. Yeah, my uh we my son kind of gave him the nickname Lunchable today. >> Yeah, man. Even Kyle's kids are throwing punches. What's the reference to Lunchable? I don't know because I walked in late. Fat. No, I don't think that was it. I think we just watched him walked in late. And James is in that stage where he just >> It wasn't James. It was Eli. It was Eli. >> Eli came up with the name Lunchable. He looked at me. He's like, "What's up, Lunchable?" And I was So, I was like, "Bro, you're just throwing darts early. I just walked in." >> I will say like both of my sons are trying to figure out like comedic timing. They're trying to especially James. That's why I thought it was James that said it because he's he'll just say things and he thinks his reaction makes it funny. So, he'll say something that is obnoxious or neutral or just not funny and then he'll just like die laughing on his own. And so, I'm trying to explain to him a little bit of like timing and you know your your non-verbals, your lead up, your finish. Like then you know there's there's a lot of things to make a joke. Yeah. And so, we're trying to teach him that. I'm still working on it. Still working on it. It could be a work in progress for everybody. >> it's a good joke when my wife rolls her eyes. Does that work for all of us because I feel the same thing? Yeah, pretty much she rolls her eyes. Yeah, when I when she rolls her eyes, I'm like, "Yeah, that one." I might find it funny when I'm not trying. And so, like if I'm trying to say something funny, yeah. That's like an actual skill. No, but but I actually realized if she rolls her eyes, it probably wasn't funny. More than likely. Uh did want to make another reference to something. So, a lot of changes, forging table, right? So, we got you know, new group, we got the new intro outro music. Uh we got the Horns new essence, which is the the main thing that's new about him. Um but this timer. We've talked about this timer. This timer is like so, we got a lot of ghost members of the forging table. So, like Joby, you know, you know, you know, sorry Joby. We got Don't Tell Terry for for Terry Fake. Shout out Terry Fake. Like we we got a lot of things that you >> Chandler doesn't like me. That's my favorite one. >> yeah. Well, no. It's It's you don't like Chandler and then you know, that's that's how that works >> reciprocated. You're speaking of a great way to introduce someone to somebody. It's like, "Hey, uh Matt, here's my buddy Ryan. He's not a huge fan of yours. All right, y'all have a good uh rest of your day." Um >> low. But this >> pretty rough. timer. This little five six dollar timer from Amazon has caused more consternation, more stress at this table because people not knowing how to reset it, people not knowing how to start it. And so like a year ago, I just kind of throw out there, "I'm going to get an hourglass." I go down the research rabbit hole trying to find an hourglass. Well, if it's an actual hourglass, they're not very small. And then if you find one that's like small enough to where it's not going to dominate the table, super ornate, like doesn't really fit the vibe or whatever. And so like I've just said, "Okay, we just got to kind of stick with this so that everybody could be on the same page. We kind of look and see that we're wrapping to a close. Let's not go to a next big section. Let's not open up a huge can of worms or anything like that." Go to the post office the other day. Come on. And I go in there. And there's a little, you know, so I go to my little PO box and I got some letters and all that. And then I get a little key that goes to one of the lockers. Okay, something's a little bit too big. And there's this big box, big box in there. And I go in there and there's no return address. There's no note on the inside, nothing. And this is what I see. This is not the big box. Guys, we got an hourglass. No. Come on. And it's not Tolkien-esque? Very nice. >> It fits the vibe a little bit better. And here's the other thing. You might be thinking to yourself, "Is it an hourglass? Does it actually go to 1 hour?" And I timed it. And if I'm lying, I'm dying. Those final grains of whatever's in there, probably sand, came down right at the 60-minute mark. >> So here's the thing. Right now, we're 14 minutes in. Okay. So on this one, this is just going to be decorative. Uh but then we're going to make a We're going to sacrifice this to the electronics gods on the next one. We're going to leave this running for now. Can we actually take a video of us just throwing it up in the air and shooting it with the shotgun? >> We Well, that that could be sufficient. I will say my wife has claimed it. She's like, "Well, when y'all are done with my timer, give it back." and I Oh, it's her timer. So, and they probably >> you, Kelsey, for letting us use it for this last 3 years. I do, too. Days of Our Lives. We were talking about all the little stuff. That's right. And that came up and You look like you look like the type of person that would watch Days of Our Lives. Oh, yeah. There was a whole thing. So am I cuz I would watch it. That was I guess you have to have a beard? No, the type The type of person that watches Days of Our Lives was the type of person that had a grandparent that watched Days of Our Lives. My grandma did. She was one of those. Yeah. Yeah, and never know what was the woman with the lipstick. All right. And so, hey, you know what? Actually, this is This is pretty good. Look at Yeah, well, I mean, it's Days of Our Lives-esque. They There's the Days of Our Lives. That's what you would see. There you go. At the beginning. There. It's almost like that's an hourglass. It looks like that one. Yeah. So, shout-out to you nameless, faceless, anonymous individual for giving us an hourglass. Guys, tune in next week and we will actually flip that thing over and you will see how close we are to getting to the hour whenever we get through. Go, what's up? No, I'm good. All right. Well, let's let's actually flow into the scripture. So, we're going to be starting this batch in Romans. We're still in Romans 7, working our way through Romans, guys. I know we get new viewers every single week. If you go back and listen to the previous Forging Tables, you know, we go through Genesis and Matthew and Acts and Nehemiah and a bunch of other different books of the Bible. And we were just basically doing an hour at a time. Or in Genesis, maybe we'd double or even triple up. But when we approached Romans, we just wanted to do it very differently. As Matt Chandler, you know, told us, it's like, "Look, Romans is Mount Everest. You don't just try to sprint up Mount Everest." And so, we're basically just recording for roughly an hour, seeing how far we get. And so, we've been in Romans for months and months and months at this point. We're just now in Romans 7. But we stopped last time. We wrapped up in Romans 7, verse 6. And so, Ryan, if you would go ahead, we're going to go ahead and uh just going to hit these next two verses. So, let's go Romans 7:7 and 8. All right. >> And you're reading from ESV. >> ESV. Let's go. My message Bible was on All right, it's on loan. It was on loan. Yeah. So, What then shall we say? That the law is sin? By no means. Yet, if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, "You shall not covet." But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment seizing an opportunity through the commandment, excuse me, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead. So another um translation for the covetousness that was just mentioned is evil desire. And so, cuz I feel like the there's not a sting really much in modernity with something like the word covet or covetousness. Cuz most people think it's like, "Oh, yeah, you know, your neighbor gets a new car and you're like, I wish I had a new car." Or, you know, your buddy gets a promotion and you're like, "Well, I haven't got a promotion in a while." But it's so much deeper than that because I mean coveting was in the Ten Commandments. Now, it was it was the last one, but I don't know that there's necessarily a rank order, but I mean this is it's an inward attitude, not an outward action for the most part. And so, but what covetousness leads to is the breaking of other commandments. Absolutely. So, I mean, if you start lying, it's cuz you're trying to get ahead. If if you I mean, all the way up to murdering somebody, it's like hey, they have something or someone or I'm jealous. And I heard uh what was that book from back in the day? It was like uh Kite Runner? Yeah. Yep. Yeah, yeah, it was popular maybe 20 years ago, 25 years ago, and they made a movie as well. But it's like uh I think the dad of the protagonist in that book talked about how every uh bad thing is a form of theft. So, like if you steal from someone, you're literally you're like performing theft, but But if you kill someone, you're stealing their life from them. If you lie to someone, you're stealing the truth from them. But I thought it was interesting for Paul here as he's starting to build out this next part of his argument where he basically relies on the idea of covetousness, which might be missed on some people in modernity. Yeah. I was going to say I agree with that. That's um pretty interesting if you go back and look at the 10 Commandments because you know, all nine of the other ones are outwardly visible. And so it goes back and really underscores how this is an internal thing. And certainly lays the groundwork, I think objectively, for why nobody can keep the Commandments. I don't think I think every human being that's ever breathed would tell you that they've coveted something. Even if they haven't killed somebody or, you know, gone through adultery or whatever. Uh so it's interesting that this is the one that he zeros in on in Rome, in this environment where he's talking with both Gentiles and Jewish people, that he's trying to explain both things in tandem. Because the Jewish people are thinking, well, we have the law. And the Gentiles are, you know, they don't really care about the law, but in both cases, they can relate to the fact that you're breaking this commandment. And I think it kind of it pulls double duty. Well, I'm curious I was just going to say I'm curious for you guys because as you were describing that and even as I was reading the section, I was like, okay, cuz you know, the basically what he's talking about here is the law is a mirror, right? You've seen Wes Huff talk about that to where it's like, you know, the law can't clean you and I mean, we're going to see that throughout all the way through in in the Romans 8 as well. All you can do with a mirror is smudge your face up more, right? If if you're dirty. But it's just like I was thinking to myself and I'm curious for y'all like, when I have coveted, right? When I've been, you know, coveting someone else or I had this covetous covetousness like kind of ramping up in my spirit, what did that lead to? And I'll say for me, for my version, it would just be tremendous amounts of bitterness. Which is another thing that can for the most part, like well you can hide it. There are other people that are so bitter that it's just written all over their face every time you interact with them. But I would say for me, like you could just hide that bitterness towards other people and then it turned into, you know, just being honest like, you know, wanting bad things for them. Like as opposed to wanting good things for them, I'll say one thing that I maybe learned last year that has helped me with this is when someone else seems to be sprinting or doing really really well in their race, like praise God for them doing well in their race. But what a lot of people do is they will take someone else's race, someone else's promotion, someone else getting engaged, someone else, you know, having a baby, whatever, and then they place it onto their life and it's like, why are you disappointed in the fact that you're not doing as well in someone else's race? Like it's their race for a reason. I equipped them for that race. Let's focus on the race that I equipped you with or for. And so for you guys, I'm wondering like what what coveting has led to even for you individually. Well, you're wanting us to tell you what >> don't have to give you We don't have to be specific. I literally just told you I was like, I would hope for bad things detailed examples. This is when Carl was left at the table alone for that Come on, guys. He doesn't like getting air. Y'all are all Y'all are all veterans at this point. You know you don't have to give us names and dates and places. >> and dates. I'm the biggest sinner of us all. I I think so. Y'all own it. Yeah. Some some some stuff I was reading that's along the same lines is that that's where a lot of sin starts. Even goes back to Genesis and and what he says here where he says that um in eight, he says that sin enticed him, let me see, eight, but seizing opportunity um that it's like it's like that that in and of itself, um wanting something that you're not supposed to have is kind of the basis of all sin because all sin is God saying, "This is what I want for you, and I want you to be okay with that." And then the heart of coveting is you're just desiring something that is not set up for you, that is not yours, it's not in the plan for you. Um and God is saying, be okay with that. And we see all the way back to the fall, we have trouble with being okay with what we are designated to have versus what we're designated not to have. I think when it comes down to coveting, I've coveted from all three of you guys at this table. Your golf game. Mhm. Just how you can just sit here and like just be able to speak ornately and calmly and everything on on your positions. I've found myself coveting that. Your beard. I like how y'alls are based on your ability. Mine's based on nothing that I could control. It is an ability. All right. It's a sick beard. I don't even care if it's red. We don't We don't get to work on it. Like I can't like work on my beard. I can't just name one of us, you know? Like there there might be a something. >> I knew there was something coming because he was going to me last. I was like, okay, great. So, thanks. Thanks a lot Ryan. >> You have a nice beard. Hey, uh can you go ahead and tell us something horrible that you thought about somebody else or somebody that you wanted to die because you were coveting them? Yeah, let's go ahead and roll that out there. Yeah, what was the last time I drove on a highway? Yeah. Yeah, everybody's heard that story at this point. You were ready to fight me in the Paseo district. Uh and I swear on my life. No, I'm just joking. No, I just like I think coveting when it comes down to looking at things like I think you you kind of nailed it and when you said it's an internal thing. And and Jesus talks about in the Sermon on the Mount, you know, the heart. And when he talks about sin, you know, you have all these Pharisees and these Sadducees, look at my actions, my actions are good. But internally, we don't know what their heart is doing. And most time, if you're human, unless you're Jesus, you were coveting at some point. And I've coveted in in multiple points in life that led to, you know, could have led to theft or, you know, adultery or who knows, but but the thing is is like when it when when we talk about the law and we talk about sin and and what Paul's talking about here is you brought up Huff's thing about the mirror. >> Yeah. And I feel like that's what he's trying to bring out is like he's talked about the law the whole time and now you're getting into these Gentiles and they're like, "Whoa, man, this law sounds like it's just sin." And he's like he's like, "By no means is it sin." He's he's saying it's it's it's a mirror. And so he's just trying to make the point that the law is showing you what sin is and why you need to change and why you need Christ. Well, and just to belabor that, I mean, I've talked about this multiple times on the show, but C.S. Lewis basically said try to go 5 minutes without sinning and you'll prove to yourself it's not possible. And I would say from a an Old Testament standpoint, this is the one that he'd be talking about. Even if you don't desire to covet, it's going to enter your mind. Just like Paul says, we're fighting against kind of your flesh and what you don't want to do versus what you do do. It's just it's the thing that highlights the issue that we have. It reveals the dirt that's on you. It's not the mirror that's the problem, it's the dirt that it's exposing. >> It reveals the the the default right? So, Joby's brought this up before and I think it's it's good. It's like, "Hey, are you the person whenever you get sent a group picture that you're in that you try to you just innately by default try to find yourself in the picture first?" Are there people that don't? Well, I so like I I thought about that and I'm like, "Oh, man, that's me." Like I'll find it and like, you know, and the meme is for girls, but it works for guys as well. It's like you will you will evaluate the group picture based on how you feel you look inside in it. Like everyone else could be like best smile of their life, absolute 10 out of 10, makeup on point, hair do on point, beard on point. And if you got this like, "Oh, I just farted" face, it's just like, "I'm not really big fan of that picture." That's when you know that if you really like love someone, I don't know if you've ever but I I have noticed the switch sometimes in me whenever we have taken pictures that my family or my kids, there's a little pause in looking at myself and wondering but like if I have a kid that looks really bad in a picture, I'll scrap that one and be like, "No, I don't want that for them." Even though I look great in that picture, you know? It's going to No. Hey, I I took a picture of the boys cuz the boys came up here and it's just like the absolute like cutest thing in the world, but they want to talk into dad's microphones like dad's buddies. And so they'll come up here and they'll throw the headphones on and then they'll just have a conversation across the table. And I swear to goodness, I sat here for probably 3 minutes trying to get a good picture of both of them, which for a 5-year-old and a 4-year-old like is almost impossible for them to not be But like But it was kind of like, "Okay, yeah, like I wanted it for their sake." So like, you know, cuz they'll go back and like we'll look through old pictures and old videos and all that and we'll laugh and we'll do all that kind of thing. And so it's kind of a similar a similar thing like that, but back to the point is like, "Yeah, it's been 5 minutes not sinning. It's been 5 minutes not wishing you had something else, not lusting after somebody else, not coveting what they've been able to accomplish." And I mean, it happens all the time and you know, when you brought up Brian, I think that's really interesting. Like And I I think you were being serious about the golf game. Right. And your beard. Yeah, well, okay. Well, thanks. But it's like so like his his ability to to play golf at a certain level For the record to the real golfers out there, there's nothing super spectacular. >> Dude, he plays good golf. >> golfer is what he said. What's the difference on Master's Sunday, which apparently is a holiday for nerds, too, by the way. I know. When you started playing golf, remember? We looked at you. Yeah. We were We were here. We were all here. Is this going to be a thing? Yeah. Every Master's Sunday I'm not cuz I I've I'm curious what's going on right now. I know we're not supposed to talk about things that happened cuz by the time this happened Yeah, this happened like we're in the future, guys. Like that that's part of the issue. Like we are in the future right now. And when you say, "Have started playing golf," you mean I played golf for the first time in like 15 years for the benefit of my friends?" >> was it was progress. >> Sounds like it. Progress? The You want to talk about regression? The point that I was trying to make is essentially you're looking at something that is a positive. Like if somebody likes something, so let's say it's golf or or hunting or jiu-jitsu or whatever and and they're they're good at it or they have some acumen at it or something like that. It's a good thing to be like, I'm so happy for Bob that you know, Bob likes woodworking and man, he just made himself a canoe. And my goodness, like whoever thought he'd go from making a chair to a canoe and good for Bob. And then almost immediately it leaks into well, you know, if I if I had the if I had the time, you know, then I I could probably learn to woodwork. You know, if if I had a shop, you know, like if my if my dad left me some money when he died and I could buy some land with a shop. You see where it goes? Like that's >> me That makes me laugh cuz my kids I was watching something with my kids and they were do like somebody was doing something on the TV and like my kids like, I could do that. I'm like, no, you can't. >> literally that plays right back into Genesis where where they they start thinking they're like, oh, if I had the knowledge of good and evil, I'd be like God. >> Yeah, I'd be able to overcome this dragon. I could handle this if I if I was like him and you got to think Paul too like his journey from being uh you know, being a Pharisee, being the top class of that and then going to say this like he probably picked out coveting because he realized that as a Pharisee, that was probably the one that he's stayed struggling with the most. Like he wasn't committing adultery, he wasn't doing all this other stuff. But as a Pharisee with when you read about them, the whole system was based off of this like so-and-so is better than so-and-so and this person studied under this person and there is just uh inbreeding of this covetousness uh within his group. So, I mean, later on he talks about the law and how the law killed him. I wonder if he's not referencing coveting because he's like, yeah, as soon as I found out about the law and I found out all these things I could keep, then as soon as I did that, well, I'll just throw out coveting. Like I couldn't stop from coveting the fact that other people were doing it better than me. I just This is off subject. But here we are. We're at the table. Let's go. >> I don't want to get off subject. You just looked at me. No, I'm supremely curious cuz I was about to say something and then you went The primary Hebrew word for serpent or snake is nakash. Used in the Garden of Eden, Genesis 3. It often implies shining one, enchanter, or creature connected to divination. Other Hebrew terms for serpent include saraph, fiery burning serpent, and tannin, sea monster and dragon. burning So, like But the one used is nakash, which is snake. How did this Sorry. Are you reading from the NIV version of the Bible? I cuz he said he said he said You didn't hear him? Someone heard it? He said dragon. only name things that you have seen. And so, if they hadn't seen it as a dragon, they wouldn't have named it as a dragon. That's what I Why would it be Make a very good point. That's what I said. But they didn't see it back then. They're just referencing the closest thing that they had to it. a serpent because a snake because it has no limbs because its limbs were taken. And how is it possible that all these The dragons that they probably saw cultures across the millennium have cave paintings of these winged flying fire-breathing dragons. brings up the fall. And even our pastor this morning mentioned the dragon in the garden and you just can't get over it. It's okay. I'm going to get you your team dragon hat. I'm going to get you a team dragon shirt. We've already got the sure shirts. How about team dragon? Come on, man. I'm not going to be there. Let's get Let's get your tattoo game back going. Dragon on the chest, something like that. earlier. we're kind of hologram that if you looked at them in a different way they would change. We should do one that is like a snake, it looks like, and then when you turn turns into a dragon. When you look more towards the truth, it turns into a dragon, something like that. I feel like Res made a really good point and I ruined it and I feel really bad about this. Well, you should. You should. Shame on you. So, we have So, we have Mark, our pastor, who brings up archaeological discoveries. We have Titus Kennedy and some others. Shout out. this morning did a phenomenal job talking about Jake so I wanted to tie in a couple of things cuz I thought these were interesting. Number one is did you guys look into any like archaeological anchors for any of this stuff by any chance? So it says we can date Paul's time in Corinth with remarkable precision thanks to the Gallio inscription which was discovered in Delphi, Greece in 1905. It's a letter from Emperor Claudius that names Junius Gallio my friend and proconsul proconsul of is it Achaia? Achaia? Achaia? How do you pronounce that? Achaia? Achaia? Okay. Which is the same Galileo before whom Paul was dragged in Acts of chapter 18 12 through 17. And so this dates everything that's being talked about here. It's very specific. And the last one I wanted to talk about which I guess is lesser known but more interesting is the the Erastus inscription. In 1929 archaeologist excavating near the theater in Corinth found a limestone pavement with a Latin inscription reading Erastus in return for his aedileship which is this pavement stone which he did his at his own expense. In Romans 16:23 Paul writes from Corinth and mentions Erastus the city treasurer. The name, the location, the civic office and the dating all line up. This is one of the very few cases where we may have an archaeological confirmation of a specific individual mentioned in a New Testament letter. Not a king or a governor but a regular member of a local church. It says the gospel was reaching people at every level of Roman society. Wow, that's cool. I like that. Let's go to the >> mentioned Titus Kennedy. Yeah. So Titus has been on the show multiple times before. He was I think he may have been my first in studio interview after we we out the studio cuz he was actually coming to speak at Fake Bible. But he actually wrote the this book that I'll show to the camera right there and that one whenever the landing the magical editor does. But it's called Archaeology and the People of the Bible. And so the subtitle exploring the evidence for the historical existence of Bible characters. And so basically what this book is this is his latest book. So shout out Titus Kennedy. We really appreciate his his scholarship and his work. It's all all these different people and the archaeological findings that substantiate their existence uh where they were, what they did while they were there, like all these different things because one of the interesting things about this book is almost every character in this book at one time uh in terms of the historical record or any of those types of things there was not a record. Yeah, this was a myth that this person was even there. And that's what I tell people every time is like if the Bible was just a collection of bunk stories from these people that were just trying to like control the populace, get money, get women, all these types of things, then every year that passes there would be more and more archaeological discoveries that would disprove what's happening or what purported to happen in the Bible. And the exact polar opposite is what always happens. It's like, "Hey, this was at the Pool of Siloam. When's the recent one?" It's like, "Oh, that wasn't even here. We can't find Oh, you know, we're we're doing some digging and oh, wouldn't you know, we found the Pool of Siloam, right? We found this is an inscription with this particular person in this particular place." And so I know different disciplines can be difficult for guys to kind of get into especially if you don't understand it, but Titus Kennedy's work is is very approachable. It's very digestible. And so I would definitely recommend that. >> Are you going to have him on for that? So uh I'm not sure if we'll we'll have him back on for this because I I I would want to have him back back in here for that. And at this point I'm looking like 3 months out. It's kind of a process. >> say so I heard him talking a little bit with Frank Turek recently about this book. And just some amazing things that he goes. I think they I like, you know, five people from the Old Testament, five people from the New Testament, and they just kind of hit it pretty pretty fast. It's incredible. Wow. Yeah, I mean, the list uh if I had AI if I already had the chip in my brain, I would have just been able to look at this list. How many people do you think that is? If you had a Give give her a guess. Mhm. I'm going to say about 40. I'm going to say about 40. 60 Well, what's your What Hey, actually, I'm going to use this in the next episode. What's your guess? Uh I'm going to actually going to say 82. >> So, 82 from Russell Ussher. So, how many How many people do you think this is, Ryan? Each one of those is a person? >> Each one of those is a person? >> Yep. I'm going to go with 68. Okay, Ryan Horn's at 68. This is all going to make sense next week, I promise. Zachary? God, he's got his serious face. My God, you just got super defeated. >> 92. He just used an account column like I would have all the time at it. >> All right. He kept moving it. You were You were the first Yeah, yeah, that's basically what happened. All right, so very good. One thing that I did want to point out about this, so um so, I forgot the the author. It's over there. I can uh maybe grab it for next week. But when Mark was on here, Mark Hitchcock was on here last time, he mentioned uh the Warren Wiersbe um single volume Well, actually, it's a single volume on the Old Testament, single volume on the New Testament commentary. And then there's another commentary by a couple of guys. What What was it? >> Walvoord. The Walvoord? Is that the one with the DTS guys? >> that's James >> on the right. No, I got it. Actually uh went to church John Walvoord. I went to church with his grandson. Look at there. He lives here. Yeah yeah. >> uh John Walvoord, so that's w a l v o o r d and Roy Zuck. The Bible Knowledge Commentary, the Bible Knowledge Commentary. And so, what I've told people the way that I've approached Romans is, you know, with some sections I'll really spend a lot of time with RC Sproul's Romans in a Year. With other sections, I got a whole row of Romans commentaries over there. Like, there have been months where I will just stare at the at them, and I'm almost waiting for one to like Speak to me. >> Yeah, like literally and I'm like I don't normally do that. I'm not normally ethereal, but there's always one that's like it just sticks in there. It's like it just kind of got stuck in there and but with this this last batch I was really looking at the Wiersbe in this one per Mark's recommendation, but that one right there the D. A. Carson logical seminary one. Um it talks about verse seven. I don't know if you knew this, but I just wanted to say it. Um One thing that Warren Wiersbe is known for in a lot of his preaching if you watch him cuz he's kind of the pastor of pastors. Super passionate about there is therefore now no condemnation. It's like a a consistent thing. So as we're going through all of this, we've got to honor Wiersbe cuz he hammered that home in almost a significant amount of his content. If if you have it, you ought to like pull up the video and show him saying it. He's pretty passionate about it. Yeah, so that that commentary talks about verse seven how Paul for the first time in Romans changes to the first person singular. Yeah, starts talking about himself. Yeah. So he's been in third person. He's been in second person and he's been in first person plural. Mhm. And as we start getting into, you know, 13, 14, 15, we're going to see him referring directly to himself because there was a lot of arguments and we were certainly not going to get there this this week, maybe next week. There's a lot of arguments about who is Paul referring to, what is Paul referring to, what time, like all those things and it's like >> the first time? Cuz I'm looking down and I'm seeing seven was the first time he's first person. Yeah, first person singular. >> I would say that. >> Yeah. And so again, the this has been hard for me to remember. I don't know how it's been like for you guys. Um well Ryan, maybe a little bit easier for you cuz the the way that you approach the the these texts, you spend a lot of time just rereading the text, rereading the text, rereading the text before you start going to outside sources. Mhm. But for me, I have to continually remember someone stood up in an ecclesia, in a gathering of people and read this letter in its totality, right? From beginning to end. Whereas we might spend an hour on a verse or two, right? They were They were seeing the the peaks and valleys and the ups and downs of the narrative that was happening here. And again, if somebody were doing this in English, most astute listeners would recognize, "Hey, he's kind of been talking about a lot of different groups. He's been talking about kind of like all y'all, you know, if you know, wherever that fits in for the pronouns and all that." But then this Now he's first person singular. And so everybody who would have heard him saying this would have heard, "Oh, he's talking about himself now." Right? That This is not just addressing a group or just oh, kind of like flying over everybody. He's addressing a very specific group. Uh anything else on 7 and 8 before we move on? All right. Russ, if you would go ahead and read uh let's do Let's do 9, 10, 11, 12. So, a nice little chunk there and you'll be reading from ESV. Yes, sir. >> All right, 9, 10, 11, 12. Uh I always go over, so let me Okay, there we go. 12. Do you want me to hold my hand where you need to stop? >> No, I'm good now. I I always just keep reading. >> not awkward. We're good. Cuz your hands are so cold. >> Well, it's It's It's just All right. I was once alive apart from the law, but when uh the commandment came, sin came alive and I died. The very commandment that promised life provided to be death to me. For sin, seizing the opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me. So, the law is holy and the commandment is holy and righteous and good. Can you read it again so I can hold hands longer? No. >> No, okay. All right. Hey, that worked out well. I It didn't I mean, I could have My hands got warmer as you kept going. >> And I think in my head, my brain is going to process the verse numbers as I'm reading and it never does. And then about halfway through my reading, I start thinking about where I'm at. Like, do y'all ever do that where you're just thinking more than you're actually reading. It's a weird. Oh, so you mean like every time I read anything ever, I get to the end of the page and I'm like, absolutely no clue what just happened. No idea where the argument is going from here. So when we get into this next section, so in in verse 9, where it's talking about you know, I was alive apart from law, he's not talking about the Mosaic law here. But it's it's um It it it does talk about when there's a significance of the covetousness law that you know, dawned on Paul because as we move through here and this was a point that Wiersbe made is like legalistic churches. Yes. Churches that built Well, actually, you know what? Hey, hit it. No, I was saying like that's exactly what I wrote down. And you can amen that and I'll call and response it because I love the point that Wiersbe made. He said, legalistic churches. I didn't do the best job of setting this up, but hopefully I'll bring it home. Legalistic churches they they can't possibly follow the law to the T because it's impossible for fallible humans to do that. And so hyper-legalistic churches do not grow and typically die because they're trying to operate based on their own power. Which is not an argument to throw away the law. That's antinomianism like we're we're not doing that, but it's like look, if everything about your church is not about grace, it's you know, even not about truth, it's just about do these things and don't do those things. Like don't cuss, don't chew, don't run with boys or girls that do. Like no dancing, no secular music. And it's like if that's your entire approach to this, it's like you've missed the entire boat. Well, there's it's like a two-sided thing that I was looking at when it came to like legalistic churches cuz I grew up in kind of a very legalistic church as a kid. It was more charismatic, right? >> more charismatic and it was always like oh, that you know, you need to do this or you need to do that to get to like some sort of perfectionism which we'll talk about again as we get into the rest of chapter 7. But, one of the things that we look at in regards to legalism is how it's used on the opposite side though, too. You have churches that will be like, "Well, to get to some certain part of like spirituality, you have to meet all these things which we would call legalism. No smoking, no drinking, not doing any of this stuff." Like making these rules to make you kind of fit into their their idea. But, then you have people on the outside who are like, when you get to like I would say like more of the grace more of like the more about grace and less about wrath and less about sin. Where they're like, Well, they'll talk about like, "Well, you know what? That's not true. That's legalism." You know, I think Sproul brought up a really good thing where they went to a lady about who was leaving her husband and her and her kids. And he was talking to her about coming back and everything. He's like, "You know, the Bible says this." She's like, "Don't bring that legalism." And it's like, "Satan wants us to see the law as something bad." And when you have legalistic churches that turn the law bad. And then you have other moralistic churches that turn the law into something bad because they don't want you to think that you're this horrible person that you you sin or anything like that. And so, it's kind of a twofold thing that you'll see it on both sides. I think that's a really good point specifically because Yeah, it's like that just clicked for me whenever you said it. It's just like you have these people that are uncomfortable with what the Bible says because of where they put themselves and their preferences in reference to it. And I've said this a lot and I thought I thought it was a great thing that Joey came up with like he's at his church and he holds his Bible up like this and he's like, "It says a lot about you in terms of like where you are and where you consider yourself in reference to what this says." Because if you put yourself on top of it, your preferences, the things you like, the things you don't like, the things that you end up doing as opposed to below it. Like submitting to this as your authority because there's not a single person alive that can read every page of this and like it. Right? Just innately and naturally because we are still fleshly as is, you know, huge theme of this part of scripture. There's going to be things in here that you're like, I don't like that because it makes the mirror bigger, puts uh some lights around the mirror that are a little brighter specifically for me. There's going to be things in here you don't like because of people you love that struggle with some of the things in here that are called sin and abominable and things like that. And so it's like, but again, and this I've talked about this a lot on the show recently, this crisis of discernment that that we run into. And I referred to the the state of theology. I mean, I did like in one week I did an episode for the podcast, I had a daily blade uh that was all about this, and then I taught Sunday school on it to where there's the Ligonier and Lifeway did the state of theology survey uh for 2025. And in order to even be in the survey, you had to be a self-described evangelical. And there were like four different things that you had to affirm to be considered. But one of them is that the Bible is my highest authority. Right? That That's what it would say. And then they would have all these statements that you could either agree with or disagree with. And one of them, a majority of evangelicals responded that God accepts the worship of all religions to include Judaism and Islam. Wow. Another one, uh only about half of the people agreed that God made marriage between one man and one woman. Half of evangelicals. So, if these are people cuz again, if you answered no to any of those first four questions, you were out of the survey group because you were not be able to be considered evangelical. And so it's like all those people they treat this differently. Either they read it and don't like it, but more than likely, I as my contention is, they're not reading it. Cuz they don't actually believe this is the word of God because if you think this is the word of God, you inherently have to know that it is like structurally important, right? But it's also the highest authority that you could possibly appeal to. And so you could just see the reason why these people are answering these questions in this way whether in the affirmative or the negative, it's because they've allowed culture Yeah. to put itself above this. They've allowed tradition to put itself above this. They've allowed wherever the overton window is currently located to be above this. And so it becomes preferential as opposed to authoritative. Absolutely. I'm hesitant to bring this up because it's pretty personal, but I kind of I guess I feel compelled, so I will to the extent that it's appropriate. But I shared this with you recently. Um I've got, you know, two children. One is currently um in a Christian school here. It goes to school with, you know, a lot of our community. And then I've got another one who's been waiting forever to try to get into this school, this Christian school. And in the meantime he attends a local Episcopalian school. And because of my wife and I are circumstances when COVID hit and all of that, we couldn't have we couldn't do public because we had to travel and the school had to be open. And so we've made these adjustments. Anyway, this uh the environment's different. Um you know, they promote um not necessarily promote, but they're okay with what Episcopalians are okay with. And the, you know, homosexuality and all these other things that come up. And so because my my son's in that environment, we have to have discussions about this at at night and bedtime and talking about what the Bible says. And those are difficult conversations because he's literally surrounded by people who don't believe the same thing inside of a quote-unquote Christian environment. Mhm. So while we're having these conversations at home, it's really about, you know, prefacing this on God calls us to love others first. >> Absolutely. But he also calls us to be truthful, speak the truth in love. And that's a pretty difficult political environment for a you know, a 10 or 11-year-old to to to deal with. And so inevitably, you know, something comes up and we get a phone call from the administration. And I I get a phone call that says, "Hey, I think we're about to have a conversation with the principal or whatever about homosexuality and trans and all this stuff." And so, I end up going in and and I have to have a conversation with this vice principal about this, and I have to explain that in our home, you know, we we are Bible-believing Christians, and this is what we believe. And so, I've got to walk my son through that. And he's sitting there grappling with it cuz there are kids that are being raised in homes that don't believe the same. And he has a difficult way of trying to get through that. You know, eventually, I think he told somebody, "You need therapy." Who believed in, you know, they had family that were trans and homosexual. >> say it to be mean. He didn't. It's just my my literal son is trying to find a solution. He said, "You know, you may need therapy." Which didn't come across very well. But, at one point, the the the point is this. It was one of those times in my life where I had to sit inside a room, and there's consequences for this kind of thing potentially, and you had to um put yourself under what the word says. And I literally looked at this person and said, "You can't argue with me. You know, you kind of have to argue with God about this cuz this is what's written, and that's what my family follows." And fortunately, you know, it it was accepted. It was taken relatively well for the circumstances. Um and then, of course, trying to coach him through that. And I think that, you know, generally speaking, as leaders for our family and for our kids, and we're thinking about the environment increasingly that they're going to have to go through, that's what it means to to stand on what this says and live by it. And you know, you're going to have to be you may be in situations where you have to be very clear uh when there's consequences. So. Well, that was the big point that I made towards the end of my crisis of discernment episode is I love to teach people questioning strategies, especially uh Christians or political conservatives, whether it's on hot button issues or something like that. I I don't like teaching the arguments as much as I like teaching the questions to ask back to the person that is arguing with you. >> Solid gold. The person that asks the questions is the one in control, not the one that answering the questions, right? And people are like, that doesn't make a lot of sense. Every interview I've ever watched it the person answering is in control. >> What do you mean? The So, the person asking the questions shut your mouth. I know what you're doing. But if you're asking the questions, you are dictating the terms of the conversation. So, for instance, if I were to ask you a question and I was trying to get you to refer to something specific, and you refer to the something specific in your answer, well, it's cuz I led you there. And if you answer, which is what you're taught in basically PR class, negotiations, political classes, don't answer the question asked, answer the question that you would have asked you to set yourself up for your best answer or whatever. If someone answers that way, it feels so weird and awkward cuz if I ask you like, what's your favorite donut and you explain to me your favorite author from the 1800s, it's going to make you look foolish, right? So, you're answering the question you wanted to answer, but I'm the one that's in control. And so, for a lot of people I will tell them, hey, this is how you should ask a question, but the big question is, to what authority do you appeal? Based on what authority are you making this moral proclamation? Like, this this is the the discussion I have with Catholics. I'm like, if the Pope, right? And we went from one Pope that did this a lot to apparently another one that's going to do this a lot. When the Pope says something that does not jive with the Bible at all, to whose authority do we appeal? And they're not typically a huge fans of that question because the Pope is supposedly not the Bishop of Rome, but the Vicar of Christ on Earth, somehow, right? And there's been an unbroken line of succession from Peter to today with the people that have had that position. But that's what I like to tell people. What it does is it takes them back to the word of God because if the word is not your final and complete authority, then you have to uh determine what is the ground that I'm standing on and you know, is it a solid foundation or not? I don't have the answer for this, but recently I think I heard something that the Catholic Bible includes a couple of extra books and one of them makes the statement somehow that it's a requirement to have a mediator. So from their perspective the authority that they're appealing to I guess would be their version of the word of God. But my my question is if they're supposed to be a mediator, why was the curtain torn? You and I obviously we all agree on this. That's that's just my question. But from their perspective They use the scripture that upon this rock I will build my church and that is Peter. >> For Peter. Yeah, and then they use the scripture that says uh where Jesus said, "I'm giving you the keys. Uh what you bind here on earth you bind in heaven." And they use that as a reference that basically like the dictates of Peter and the lineage of Peter and the succession of the papal authority have a binding power just as if it was gospel coming from >> they're taking an interpretation of >> I'm not a Catholic, so Catholics, I'm sorry. That that would be an interpretation of the same books that we believe to be sacred. So not not not my take on there's some additional books that I think that is true too and maybe they draw them out with the more than what I think. They do have some additional. But they I I take your point for sure. My understanding it's mainly based off of these two principles. >> I I I find that quite I shouldn't say funny, but if if Peter is the last word of Christ or the word of Christ after Christ has been gone, you know, and resurrecting, why did Paul call him out in Galatians? You know what I'm saying? Like like Paul calls Peter out in Galatians like I I I just don't understand how they can build upon that. And I feel like that's the way that they try to have control. Um they try to build control based upon the Pope. And you see that in a lot of denominations where control is trying to build like through legalism and through what we've talked about here. So >> of this started with some pure intent. So I'm actually reading a book right now. Uh I'm in a not a book club uh where we read a book once a month, but we call it not a book club cuz Oh, not a book club. >> Yeah. Uh and I picked the book for this month and everybody is making uh fun of me because I picked a a book that's really big. We're going to struggle to get through it. It's basically the entire church history. And so right now I'm going through >> Tried by Fire? Uh no, no. It's not just So that was on my That was my second on the list and I I basically started reading both of them and decided that it was more geared towards um just the just the martyrs, whereas this one is more Full church history. >> And so like it's been really revealing to see where a lot of these things started with a pure heart of needing a you need a a unity in Christ, you need an authority there. There was a lot of stuff being put together and a lot of things coming in they were trying to fight. And then whenever you have that authority, you have power, and you get to see this process. And I think you almost look back and you're like, "Well, Jesus, why didn't you set it up with a little bit more guidelines at the front?" And then you know, Terry talks about the whole human experience has been God growing us up. And it's almost like if we're the if the church is the bride of Christ, you can really look at it from the context of this long-term maturing of the bride. Like he is actually walking us through this maturing stage of we got to go through that. We've got to have that rub. We've got to decide what needs to happen there. And he doesn't want to just like throw it out. He There's something happening within the church. If you look at the long history of it, um the I don't know, makes me feel a little bit better about about that God is taking us somewhere as a church. When he left the helper. Right. >> Right. When again, this this all kind of circles the same drain, which is authority. So, if you look at the Apocrypha, which here's the interesting thing about the Apocrypha that if if we go with church tradition and councils and all these different things, who was in charge of those councils? It was, you know the the Catholic Church was in charge of these different things. And the the canon was was different. Like they didn't change the canon during the the Reformation or things like that. And so, the canon has been canonized been substantiated there in for a long time. But the what was brought up was, you know, you know, on this rock I I will build my church. So, is the rock a person or a belief? Well, let's let the text read for itself. So, I'll be reading. So, this is in Matthew This is in Matthew 16. So, I'm going to read the section that's 13 through 20. Is it the ESV? >> we'll wrap up and this will be in the ESV. Is there a different version that I'm going to see what the message might say. But Well, I would say we could end with that, but I like ending with a bang and >> Hey man, life's a garden, dig it, you know? Okay. That makes sense. Here we go. >> keeping on. Reading from the ESV, which is an actual translation of the Bible, not an interpretation that one guy had in his own fever dream. >> about Eugene. All right, here we go. Now, when Jesus came to the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, "Who do people say that the Son of Man is?" And they said, "Some say John the Baptist, others say Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets." He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?" Simon Peter replied, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living living God." And Jesus answered him, "Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah." He's referring to Peter. "For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my father who is in heaven. And I tell you, you are Peter, and on on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven and whatever you loose on earth shall be loose in heaven. Then he strictly charged the disciples to tell no one that he was the Christ. And so the entire breakdown comes from verse 18 and I tell you you are Peter and on this rock is Peter the rock being referred to or is it the declaration that Peter just made which is the gospel that Jesus is the Christ the son of the living God? >> And just and just so that people understand the reason why that is so um intertwined there is because the name Peter literally means the rock. So like not to just say like it's very simple his name does mean the rock so there is some context that they're like well this is kind of a play on words which you got to think Jesus didn't not know that he was doing a play on words but >> So with that Christ was talking about Peter recognizing he was the Christ and basically reiterated the gospel, correct? What was that part that you said that he said flesh and blood or flesh and bone did not reveal this to you but my father in heaven? Yep. I thought that was interesting. >> So that's verse 17 for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you but my father who is in heaven. And one important note about rock It's basically saying Peter you're not that smart. Well This is his Right. It's exactly >> this is his It was imputed to him but here's the other thing about the the rock and all that the the footnote for rock used here is that rock and Peter have words that sound similar not that they're the same word. And that's an important distinction. Kind of like dragon and snake. Uh no not like that at all actually but that's the thing so it's not cuz Peter doesn't mean rock. >> So for the most part a lot of people have said that but the actual footnote in the ESV Bible after word rock I'll read the actual footnote. The Greek words for Peter and rock sound similar. Phonetically. Phonetically. >> they're phonetically similar but they are not Hey, Zack means this, Ryan means this, Russell means this. Like, hey, this is what my name means. It's that they phonetically sounded the same in the Greek language, right? So, it's perhaps not as interesting as what people think that it is, right? And again, you have you have to think Look at how current papal tradition aligns with who Peter was. So, it took them a thousand years after Christ to be like, all right, you know, priests can't have can't have wives, can't have children. Peter had had a wife and kids, okay? Like, his house was the house that was destroyed so that the paralytic can be like, you know, lowered down to the feet of Jesus, you know, for for salvation and healing and all those different things. And so, when we look at things in modernity, a lot of it just came from man-made tradition. It is way closer to what the Pharisees and Sadducees tried to do with with the truth and with religious experience than it came to what Jesus was saying. And so, uh we don't have time really to get into a big long >> to bring that home, you're saying that on this rock we're saying is the gospel. Yes. Yeah, that he just proclaimed. Right. And so, and sometimes people say, well, it's not a complete gospel cuz again, the statement made by Simon Peter, you are the Christ, the son of the living God. Wrapped up in that one sentence is the gospel because the son of the living God shows that yes, you are the son of God. There's Trinity in there as well. If you if you want to have a little bit of Trinity, at least two-thirds of the Trinity would be part of that as well. And you are the Christ. Who is the Christ? The Messiah that was going to save people, right? It's all right there in that statement. And so, is he really saying that I'm going to build my church on this singular person that will soon deny me? Now, he was reaffirmed after the resurrection. He denied three times Peter did. >> sheep. And then, he was reaffirmed three times, feed my sheep. Yes, I will feed my sheep. Yes, I will feed my sheep. Yes, I will. Is he really saying that he's going to build it all on this singular fallible human that will die within a few decades of this all going going down? Or is he saying that he's building it on the truth that he is the Christ? Therein lies the debate. We're going to leave it there for today. But guys, before we let you go, we are going to do a quick resilience boost out of Undaunted.Life. 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