Participants: David Asscherick, James Rafferty, Jeffrey Rosario, Ty Gibson
Series Code: TT
Program Code: TT000010
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00:01 [Music]
00:10 [Music] 00:21 I love the fact that we're calling this Table Talk, uh, 00:23 because this is a great way to get into the Word of God and to 00:27 invite other people to do the same and to participate in this 00:32 conversation. 00:33 I think it would be, just to jump in there, I think it would 00:35 be helpful for our listeners to know that when the cameras are 00:38 off, the talk continues. 00:40 In fact, you could probably say...and even before they turn 00:42 on, that's what I was gonna say. 00:43 We've probably done half as much or as much talking with the 00:48 cameras off as with the cameras on because that's the point. 00:52 I'm surprised you're not hoarse. 00:54 [laughter] 00:55 Are you calling me a horse? 00:56 Are you saying....at least you didn't say I was stubborn as a 00:59 mule. 01:00 No, I wouldn't compare percentages. 01:02 I think I've talked quite a bit too off camera. 01:04 James definitely has been.... 01:07 Saving my voice...saving my voice. 01:08 Ok, so, Table Talk. 01:11 I think it's a great concept. 01:12 We're experiencing the priesthood of all believers 01:15 here. 01:16 God wants us to study His word. 01:18 He wants us to probe it's content together so that the 01:22 synergy of collective thought brings new ideas and greater 01:26 clarity to the table, so to speak, and what we've been doing 01:30 is moving through a series that we've just kindof casually, 01:34 tentatively, as we began to formulate these ideas, what we 01:36 called the Big Picture Series, and it's a 13 part series, and 01:41 we're coming to the crescendo. 01:42 We're coming to the climax. 01:44 Amen. 01:45 This is number 10 in this series, and we've come from some 01:47 beautiful places in Scripture. 01:48 We've been talking about for example a concept that I'm super 01:53 excited about in Genesis 3:15, the wounded warrior. 01:56 That God made a promise, the first Gospel promise, right in 02:00 the presence of Adam and Eve, directly after their fall, and 02:04 speaking to the enemy himself, God made a promise. 02:08 I will put enmity between you and the woman, between your seed 02:12 and her seed, your lineage and her lineage, and I'm telling you 02:16 Satan, I'm telling you Satan, he's going to crush your head. 02:21 Yeah, you'll wound his heel in the process. 02:24 He will be wounded, but you're going to be crushed and humanity 02:29 is going to be redeemed in the Messiah. 02:32 And then we just kept moving through the Old Testament 02:36 scriptures, just into the prophecies, and now we're coming 02:41 to the New Testament, but where do we want to emphasize that 02:46 we're coming from? 02:47 Genesis 3:15, anything else, any other Old Testament concepts 02:51 that we're building momentum for into the New Testament 02:54 fulfillment. 02:56 Well, one of the things that we've also talked about in 02:58 addition to God' covenantal faithfulness is the whole, we 03:00 spent 2 or 3, at least 3 programs on the theodicy idea. 03:04 God's toleration of evil, God's allowance of evil. 03:09 God's patience with evil and evil doers, and that is not a 03:14 separate thing from God's covenantal faithfulness. 03:17 That is, both of those are going to be tied with a bow, the same 03:21 bow, which is the cross of Christ at the end. 03:23 God is going to bear, He is going to take upon Himself all 03:28 of the evil, all of the injustice, all of the iniquity. 03:31 And so these things are not 2 separate things, God's 03:34 righteousness and covenantal faithfulness, which is sort of 03:36 like a conversation for believers over here, those that 03:38 have faith, and then, well, why is there so much sickness, pain, 03:41 suffering, and disease in the world over here. 03:44 These are the same, they're both headed in the same direction. 03:46 They're one conversation, so it had to come to bear upon the 03:49 entire discussion that we're having about Scripture as a 03:54 whole. 03:55 It would not be an oversimplification as we go into 03:57 these last 4 conversations here, to simplify and say that Jesus 04:01 is the answer. 04:03 You know we sing those old songs, Jesus is the answer for 04:05 the world....that, you know I'm not a great singer, but... 04:08 What's that song? 04:09 You can carry a tune. 04:11 You know that song. 04:12 Jesus is the answer for the world today. 04:13 Above Him there's no other. 04:14 Jesus is the way. 04:15 You don't know that song? 04:16 Ok, it's a great little song. 04:17 Anyway... 04:18 Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus. 04:19 I know that song. 04:20 You know that one. 04:21 But that little phrase there, Jesus is the answer, is not just 04:22 a cute, quaint little campfire song, or just a little, you 04:25 know... 04:26 It's theologically rich. 04:27 No, it's hugely rich! 04:28 Jesus is the answer to theodicy. 04:29 Jesus is the answer to righteousness. 04:31 Jesus is the answer to covenant. 04:32 Jesus is the answer to prophecy. 04:33 He... 04:35 Not in a trite manner. 04:36 NO! 04:37 But with content. 04:39 He solves all the problems. 04:40 That's right. 04:41 We sometimes fail to appreciate or understand the hugeness of 04:44 the fact that God, infinite, illimitable, eternal, 04:47 omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient God became a man. 04:52 How could He not be the answer? 04:53 Yeah, that's right. 04:55 We're not dealing with a...no, this is huge, and the fact that 04:59 like a diamond, is multi-hughed and multidimensional, Jesus is, 05:03 if you look at him this way, oh, there's prophecy. 05:06 Oh, there's covenantal faithfulness, there's theodicy, 05:08 and we're doing that, and those strings are being drawn here to 05:11 a close. 05:12 We have this saying where we say, put your money where your 05:15 mouth is. 05:16 Isn't that what we always say? 05:17 And it's a beautiful thing because God makes all of these 05:19 grandiose promises and you just said, He becomes a man, and so 05:22 God is basically putting His money where His mouth is. 05:25 His word means something, and God is initiating and He's 05:28 actually going to do something about the stuff He's promised. 05:31 That brings to mind a New Testament text. 05:34 A single line from the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians chapter 1 05:40 and verse 20 that summarizes... 05:43 2 Corinthians 1:20? 05:46 Oh, second. 05:47 2 Corinthians 1:20. 05:48 2 Corinthians 1:20. 05:50 At first I thought you were going to 1 Corinthians 15 the 05:51 second.... 05:52 No, no, no, no. 05:53 Not yet. 05:54 Ok, 2 Corinthians 1:20. 05:55 2 Corinthians 1:20. 05:56 It's this amazing statement that encapsulates really what the 06:01 whole Bible is about. 06:03 And that's a high claim. 06:05 That's a large claim, but just listen to these words, and see 06:08 what you think. 06:09 For all the promises of God in Him, in Christ, are yes, and in 06:15 Him amen to the glory of God through us. 06:19 What do you think? 06:21 No, absolutely. 06:22 It's very definitive. 06:23 In Jesus Christ, all the promises of God... 06:27 Are yes. 06:30 They're yes. 06:31 They're amen. 06:32 It's saying God is making all these promises and then Jesus 06:34 shows and and God is like, amen. 06:35 That's right. 06:37 I like that! 06:38 That's exactly what I'm trying to say. 06:39 That's the Miami way of saying it. 06:41 [laughter] 06:42 The, the, the, what Jesus, what God says about Christ just as he 06:45 comes out of the waters of baptism is exactly that. 06:47 This is my beloved Son in whom, this is Him. 06:51 This is what I've been trying to say for generations and 06:55 generations. 06:56 That's what I'm talking about. 06:58 It's Jesus. 06:59 It's the Hebrews 1 idea verses 1-3 that Jesus is God's final, 07:03 definitive word and revelation of Himself. 07:06 The prophets have been the conduit through which God has 07:11 communicated down through the ages, but now in these last 07:15 days, finally, fully, God has revealed the totality of His 07:20 plan, His purpose, and His character in Jesus Christ. 07:24 This, um, this particular word here in verse 20, for all the 07:29 promises of God in Him are yes. 07:32 One of your definitions, I think it was both you and James, had 07:35 this sort of covenantal definition of God makes a 07:39 promise, God fulfills a promise. 07:40 He makes a promise. 07:42 He fulfills a promise, and Paul's point here is that every 07:44 promise that God made in the Old Testament to Israel, every 07:49 promise that He made, that we can go through, Malachi to 07:52 Genesis, every one of those promises is yes and amen in the 07:57 person of Jesus. 07:58 And there are, and that's not just sort of ethereal, 08:02 theological truth. 08:04 There are very real senses in which that's the case, so, for 08:05 example, just a moment ago, I thought you were going to 1 08:08 Corinthians 15. 08:09 In 1 Corinthians 15 Paul refers to Jesus as the second Adam, 08:13 right, or the last Adam. 08:16 There's a very real sense in which the Gospel of Matthew 08:19 particularly and other Gospel passages build Jesus as the new 08:23 Israel, the real Israel, and there's all of these parallels 08:26 between Israel in the Old Testament where a man named 08:29 Joseph had dreams, and Jesus father, earthly father, named 08:32 Joseph had dreams. 08:33 Isaiah actually, Messianic prophecies name Jesus Israel and 08:36 Jacob. 08:38 And Hosea. 08:39 So the point here, not to go into the detail, we can do that 08:42 later if we want, is that God made these promises to Adam. 08:45 You know, you'll have eternal life. 08:47 You can eat of the tree. 08:48 You can expand the garden. 08:50 And those promises, Adam failed to meet the fulfillment of those 08:52 promises, right? 08:54 So, Jesus comes as the second Adam, and He picks up the baton, 08:57 to use a race analogy, that Adam had left. 09:00 And Israel, God had made a number of promises to His people 09:04 Israel, and then that baton was dropped on many occasions and in 09:07 many circumstances, and frankly, we too have dropped the baton, 09:11 so Jesus comes and He picks up Adam's baton, He picks up, which 09:15 is one and the same, Israel's baton, and He crosses the finish 09:19 line by His own faithfulness. 09:21 And so Paul's point here in 2 Corinthians 1:20 is all of those 09:24 promises that God made in the Old Testament are yes in Christ. 09:30 Can we say that God authored those promises and God finished 09:34 those promises. 09:35 He is the Author... 09:36 And the Finisher. 09:37 Isn't that what Hebrews say? 09:39 He's the Author and the Finisher. 09:40 You know, I like the context of this 2 Corinthians statement 09:42 that Ty brought to our attention. 09:43 2 Corinthians chapter 1. 09:45 I wanna just start in verse 18 because the context of it even 09:49 enriches the point that's made there in verse 20. 09:52 It says, but as God is faithful, our word to you was not yes and 09:57 no, for the Son of God was preached among you by us, by me, 10:03 by Silvanus, by Timothy, was not yes and no, but in Him was yes. 10:09 That's it. 10:11 That's his point. 10:12 All the promises of God in Him are yes and in Him, in Christ, 10:14 are yes and amen to the glory of God through us. 10:17 Now He who establishes us with you in Christ and has anointed 10:21 us is God. 10:22 He's the Author. 10:24 He's the Finisher. 10:25 He picks up...He makes the promises. 10:27 He picks up the baton. 10:28 But isn't the verse the author and finisher of our faith? 10:30 Yes. 10:31 The beginning and the end, bringing it all together. 10:33 Wasn't that a verse you shared yesterday in Hebrews 7? 10:35 Yeah, yeah, Hebrews 7:22 how He's a surety, He's a guarantee 10:39 both on the divine side and on the human side. 10:41 You know, I love this idea about how it's all about how God has 10:45 been faithful. 10:46 You know, I was doing a meeting in Canada, and outside of the 10:51 church building a lady came up to me because the subject we 10:56 were talking about was baptism. 10:57 This whole idea about public confession, and getting married 11:02 to God, so to speak, announcing to the world that you belong to 11:05 God, and you're entering into a beautiful relationship with Him, 11:09 and she pulled me aside outside of the church, and she was 11:12 weeping. 11:13 This was after the meeting, and she said, I wanted with all of 11:16 my heart to respond and to say that I want to get married with 11:21 God. 11:22 And I said, what's the problem, I mean, what's the problem? 11:25 And she said, and she went on to describe how she had been 11:30 divorced 2 or 3 times. 11:33 She had failed her husbands, and she told me, I'm afraid that if 11:39 I get married to God and make it official, I'm going to fail Him 11:42 the way I failed my husbands. 11:44 Wow. 11:45 That's intense. 11:46 And when I heard that, it was like....because I come from a 11:47 broken family and the women, my mother for example, has also 11:51 gone through some of those struggles, and I remember 11:55 telling her, I said, the beautiful thing with getting 11:58 married to God is that you may fail Him, but He will never let 12:04 you go. 12:05 You base your relationship with God on the fact that he is 12:08 faithful, and that He will never fail you, and that you can cling 12:13 to that, and I remembered that, and I thought, after the 12:17 conversation, that's so critical to understand is that the 12:20 motivating factor is that God is faithful. 12:24 And that's not just true in isolated stories in people's 12:27 lives. 12:28 It's true as we're talking about here. 12:29 The grand themes of scripture. 12:31 Go ahead. 12:32 Yeah, you brought up the marriage idea, and what that 12:35 woman was experiencing, and I feel that very deeply because I 12:39 also come from a similar background with a broken home, 12:43 but here's a story. 12:45 Here's a covenant story in the Old Testament in Ezekiel chapter 12:49 16, and God is the one telling the story, and this is an 12:54 amazing thing that He comes and He says, your birth and your 12:59 nativity and, excuse me, as for your nativity on the day that 13:06 you were born, your naval cord was not cut and you were not 13:10 washed with water nor cleansed. 13:12 You were not rubbed with salt, nor wrapped in swaddling 13:16 clothes. 13:18 No eye pitied you to do any of these things for you, to have 13:22 compassion on you. 13:24 But you were thrown out into an open field when you yourself 13:32 were loathed on the day of your birth. 13:35 So this is an abandoned baby that God is describing. 13:38 And when I passed you by and saw you struggling in your own 13:42 blood, I said to you and your blood, live. 13:46 Yes, I said to you in your blood, live, and I made you 13:51 thrive like a plant in the field, and you grew and matured 13:56 and became very beautiful. 13:58 Your breasts were well formed and your hair grew, but you were 14:03 naked and bare. 14:05 When I passed you by again and looked upon you, indeed your 14:08 time was the time of love, so I spread my wings over you and 14:12 covered your nakedness, yes, I swore an oath to you, and 14:19 entered into a covenant with you, and you became mine, says 14:22 the Lord. 14:24 Isn't that an amazing story? 14:27 It's one of my favorites. 14:29 I was a little staccato reading it because I pretty much have 14:32 this memorized in a different Bible version, and in that 14:34 version, verse 8 says, when I passed you by again, and I saw 14:39 that it was time for you to fall in love, and so I spread my 14:44 wings over you and made a promise to you and entered into 14:48 a covenant relationship with you and you became mine. 14:51 That's, that's the idea. 14:52 That's awesome. 14:53 Yeah, so God sees this abandoned child, which epitomizes 14:57 humanity, and another version says, where it says, you were 15:02 thrown into an open field and no one had compassion on you, the 15:06 other version says, you were abandoned, and no one loved you. 15:10 So, God is approaching humanity in it's horrible fallen, 15:18 sinful... 15:20 Helplessness. 15:21 Helpless state, and God is the one making the promises. 15:23 God is the one taking the initiative, and this is an 15:28 amazing revelation, not only of what God's intent is and what 15:32 He's doing, but this reveals God's heart. 15:35 I want to enter into a marriage relationship with you. 15:39 That woman, that woman was feeling the sting of her 15:44 unfaithfulness, and what she needed to encounter, and did 15:48 encounter no doubt, was God's faithfulness. 15:51 Amen. 15:52 A lot of the Old Testament points forward to Christ, 15:55 prophecies of Christ. 15:57 I think of Hosea chapter 2 verses 18 - 20, using the word 16:02 covenant and faithfulness and love and compassion to describe 16:05 the relationship he's going to have with a harlot, with an 16:11 unfaithful woman, and how He's going to betroth her unto Him 16:14 and His righteousness and His faithfulness even though she's 16:18 been unfaithful to Him. 16:19 And the whole book of Hosea, you know that Hebrew word links to 16:23 Joshua which ties or connects to Jesus in the New Testament, so 16:27 you see here the prophet is in a way demonstrating, illustrating 16:33 the faithfulness of Christ to an unfaithful woman in relation to 16:38 Christ being faithful to Hosea, yeah. 16:40 It's beautiful, the picture that we have. 16:42 Now, we go to the New Testament and we see that fulfilled in 16:44 Jesus. 16:45 You see that beautiful picture of the Old Testament fulfilled 16:48 in the faithfulness of Christ. 16:51 You know, we need to keep pursuing this subject, and it's 16:54 a beautiful one. 16:55 We need to take a break right now, though. 16:56 As we take that break, I think, uh, I think that people are 17:02 going to be excited to learn about Theresa who's somebody who 17:06 James and I met, actually, in Zambia, and she has an 17:12 incredible story, an incredible experience where she was 17:17 completely, um, terrified that she was going to die due to a 17:25 particular tumor she had that turned out to be benign, but she 17:29 didn't know that, and um, her experience was such that through 17:34 a miraculous encounter, she came across some literature from 17:38 Light Bearers, and as she read that literature, it gave her 17:43 peace, and step by step let her to the discovery of Jesus Christ 17:48 as her personal savior, so Teresa's story. 17:51 Powerful. 18:01 [Music] 18:06 The Discover Bible Guides are often people's first real 18:08 introduction to Christ. 18:10 The humble tracts act as ambassadors for truth. 18:14 this is how a young woman named Teresa found hope when she had 18:17 to deal with an abnormal growth that was causing concern. 18:21 I had that growth in my nose for more than 10 years. 18:31 My boss was like, Teresa, why do you keep that thing in your 18:35 nose? 18:36 Don't you know that it's dangerous to keep something 18:38 which is abnormal on your body. 18:41 It might have some deep roots which might lead to cancer. 18:45 Just go to the doctor. 18:49 I really didn't know what was gong to happen to me. 18:52 I was scared it might be cancer, or maybe they just had to cut 18:55 off the whole nose. 18:59 Though frightened, Teresa took her boss' advice and decided to 19:02 seek medical attention. 19:05 Even when I was going to the doctor that day, I wasn't 19:07 myself. 19:08 I cried to God, why me? 19:10 Why do I have this thing in my nose? 19:13 I had to board this bus, and in that but I just found a heap of 19:23 I had to board this bus, and in that but I just found a heap of 19:28 papers, Discover Guides, and then of those papers I just 19:32 picked one. 19:34 Uh, it was Discover Guide 7, it was saying something about 19:38 Nebuchadnezzar. 19:40 Who holds the future? 19:41 Who knows the future? 19:43 After reading that, I was relaxed, and I just kept on 19:57 praying, hoping that God knows everything, nothing bad would 20:00 happen to me. 20:02 I went to see the doctor. 20:03 He checked it, and it was like, my dear girl, this is nothing, 20:08 and I just felt a peace in me. 20:10 The peace I'd been waiting for all day long. 20:17 What I read in those papers, it was so beautiful that my faith 20:22 for God grew big. 20:25 I couldn't even imagine it. 20:27 I've never believed in God like that. 20:28 I believe that He knows everything. 20:31 There is a purpose why He created me. 20:32 I was feeling hazy when I entered the hospital gate. 20:40 After reading the Discover Guide, I felt light, as if ah, 20:43 something is just lifting me up. 20:46 That's how I felt. 20:49 I was, ah, like, thank God it's not cancer, and thanks for 20:53 telling me about the future. 20:58 Jesus says that all of you who are heavy laden, come to me, and 21:03 I will give you rest, and I did find that rest in Him. 21:07 I'm now at peace. 21:15 To partner with Light Bearers in spreading the Gospel, visit us 21:18 online at LightBearers.org or call us toll free at 21:21 877.585.1111. 21:25 You can also write to us at Light Bearers 37457 Jasper 21:30 Lowell Road, Jasper, OR, 97438. 21:36 Praise God for transformed lives! 21:37 I love Teresa, and what a privilege to know her as a 21:41 sister in Christ. 21:42 Great story! 21:43 Beautiful. 21:44 So, we're talking about the fulfillment of all of the 21:46 covenant promises in the person of Jesus Christ. 21:49 A great bridge into the New Testament fulfillment is Luke 21:53 chapter 1. 21:55 Now, you guys, this is a difficult passage. 21:57 We've all struggled with this section of Scripture because 22:01 there are parts that we're not sure at times whether we're 22:04 talking about John the Baptist or Jesus, but we do know this, 22:06 this prophecy of Zacharias is talking about both of them. 22:11 It's talking about the fact that Jesus is now coming into the 22:15 world to redeem His people. 22:18 To be the redeemer of the human race, in fact, and that John the 22:21 Baptist will be His forerunner, so in verse 68, Blessed is the 22:27 Lord God of Israel, for He has visited and redeemed His people 22:30 and has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of 22:35 David. 22:36 So this is Zacharias telling us that Jesus is now coming into 22:40 the world, and He's going to be a horn of salvation. 22:44 In scripture... 22:45 A strength. 22:47 That's right, horns represent strength and power, so Jesus is 22:50 coming into the world as the strength of God's salvation. 22:54 And then in verse 70, as He spoke by the mouth of His holy 23:00 prophets who have been since the world began. 23:04 So here again we have the idea that all the prophets are 23:07 foretelling one person, Jesus Christ. 23:11 The messiah is coming. 23:13 Verse 71, that we should be saved from our enemies and from 23:17 the hand of all who hate us. 23:18 Now, we need to remember that in Jewish thinking of the time, 23:24 there is an expectation of military and nationalistic 23:27 deliverance from political enemies, but that deliverance is 23:34 merely something that the people talk about with a veil before 23:39 their eyes, not realizing that the salvation that will be 23:43 accomplished through Christ transcends military and 23:46 political victory over political enemies. 23:50 Alright, so verse 72, to perform the mercy promised to our 23:55 fathers, and to remember His holy covenant. 23:59 Now, that's where we want to come to. 24:01 God is fulfilling His promises in the Messiah for the express 24:06 purpose of performing His mercy, that is, His hessed. 24:14 This is Greek, of course, this is not the word hessed... 24:16 He's quoting that from the Old Testament. 24:17 This is a parallel concept. 24:18 To perform His faithful love promised to the fathers and to 24:23 remember His holy covenant. 24:25 Verse 73, the oath which He swore to our father Abraham. 24:30 And then Zacharias is just basically describing the fact 24:34 that his son, John the Baptist, is going to be the one who is 24:38 going to prepare the way and herald the coming of this 24:41 Messiah who is the fulfillment of all the Old Testament 24:45 promises. 24:47 Awesome. 24:48 There was something right in the midst of that. 24:50 I just have to throw this in. 24:51 I'd never seen this before, but when it says there in Luke 1, 24:55 what is it, 69, where it says He's raised up a horn of 24:59 salvation, of course, you know, the Jews could see that whether 25:04 they were goats or rams or ibex, or whatever they were, whenever 25:09 they would get into their butting of heads in the mating 25:11 season that typically the one with the bigger horns would 25:15 prevail. 25:16 So, very naturally, very logically, horns came to 25:18 symbolize strength and might and power, so check this out. 25:21 Just fast forwarding, don't turn there, but just listen to this. 25:24 Revelation chapter 12 verse 10, speaking of the coming of the 25:27 Messiah and the one that casts down Satan. 25:31 We've talked about that. 25:32 We've actually talked about this very verse. 25:34 Verse 9 the dragon is cast out who deceives the whole world, 25:36 etcetera. 25:37 Now listen to this, verse 10. 25:38 Now I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, now salvation and 25:40 strength and the kingdom of our God and the power of His Christ 25:45 have come for the accuser of our brethren who accused before our 25:47 God day and night has been cast out. 25:48 I love that. 25:49 I love that! 25:50 That is powerful. 25:51 So, here, He has raised up a horn of salvation, and now has 25:52 come not just salvation but strength because we need 25:54 strength. 25:55 And power. 25:56 You closed the last session, the both of you, between Hosea and 25:58 Ezekiel, and that little baby that was cast out in the field, 26:02 wallowing in it's own blood, umbilical cord still attached, 26:06 has no strength. 26:07 Left alone it's going to die. 26:08 It's, Ezekiel signifies the helplessness of the human 26:11 condition, Hosea the rebelliousness of the human 26:14 condition. 26:15 We need strength. 26:16 Yes. 26:18 I love that. 26:19 That woman that you discussed in, that came to your meeting, 26:20 she'd been failure, failure, failure in her marriages. 26:23 What did she need? 26:24 She wanted strength. 26:25 She needed somebody to do for her what she had failed to do 26:27 for herself. 26:29 And I love this too because you look at the context of this, and 26:31 Zachariah, it's a miracle. 26:33 What he's doing is actually a miracle because Zachariah has 26:35 been on the longest time out in the New Testament. 26:39 He's been on a 9 month time out. 26:41 He did not believe the words of the angel that were promised to 26:44 Elizabeth that they would have a child, and so the angel said to 26:49 him, you're not gonna speak again until the child is born. 26:53 And so he has not spoken for 9 months. 26:56 Yeah, yeah, yeah, I get it now. 26:57 Well, you go to the Old Testament, you've got a longer 27:01 time out. 27:02 Nebuchadnezzar was on a 7 year time out. 27:05 A 7 year time out. 27:06 But in the New Testament... 27:07 You never put your kids in time out that long did you? 27:08 Not quite. 27:10 [laughter] 27:11 You can't talk until you're 13! 27:12 It mighta helped. 27:13 Uh, so, no one's heard him say a word, so just the fact that he 27:20 opens his mouth and starts to speak, but here's what's really 27:23 powerful. 27:24 He is speaking under the influence and power of the Holy 27:27 Ghost. 27:28 He's filled with the Holy Ghost. 27:29 So this is prophecy. 27:30 So when you connect this to Revelation chapter 12, there's a 27:33 direct connection there with prophecy, and in that context, 27:36 he's talking, and I love this because, Ty, you alluded to this 27:40 verse here in verse 71. 27:42 That the Jews were not, you know, they were not necessarily 27:47 focusing on the spiritual enemies, but they were focusing 27:50 on their literal enemies, but truly, this was also a focus on 27:53 their spiritual enemies. 27:56 That we would be saved from our enemies. 27:58 Now that's Revelation chapter 12 verse 10 because here's the 28:01 accuser! 28:02 He is the enemy... 28:03 Oh, that's awesome. 28:05 And so it's so beautiful to see him prophesying under the 28:07 influence of the Holy Spirit, not just talking about his son, 28:10 but also talking about Messiah for whom his son would be the 28:14 forerunner. 28:15 I love that. 28:17 Beautiful. 28:18 Yeah, excellent. 28:19 So, that's a transition. 28:20 So now we're in, we're fully ensconced, embedded in the New 28:22 Testament. 28:23 We spent time in 2 Corinthians 1:20. 28:25 For all the promises of God are yes in Christ. 28:28 How do we, how would you like to proceed from here? 28:32 Because in my mind, you know we could talk about the Messianic 28:35 prophecies that, you know, you have these Old Testament 28:39 glimpses. 28:40 He'll be born in Bethlehem and none of His bones will be broken 28:43 and He'll be called a Nazarene, and then the New Testament picks 28:47 these up and starts reading Isaiah, Jeremiah, the prophets. 28:50 Well, here's a thought. 28:51 Go. 28:52 Here's a thought. 28:53 You shared an idea that there's this Old Covenant faithfulness 28:56 and then there's a covenant unfaithfulness. 28:59 This failure, this failure, this failure, and that Jesus Christ 29:03 being the author and finisher. 29:04 Jesus Christ being the one who connects the two, is the only 29:06 one that's been faithful, so when you look at this, and I'm 29:09 just gonna give an overview of Romans. 29:11 Romans chapter 1, Romans chapter 2, Romans chapter 3. 29:14 Bad news. 29:15 All bad news. 29:17 But what Paul is setting up there is this. 29:19 The Jews have been unfaithful. 29:21 The Gentiles have been unfaithful. 29:23 There's nobody that's actually seeking after God. 29:28 Romans chapter 3. 29:29 There is no one that is actually... 29:30 The whole world is guilty. 29:31 The whole world is guilty before God. 29:33 There's none that seek after Him, no not one, as it is 29:35 written, there's none righteous, no not one. 29:37 And this is Romans chapter 3 verse 10. 29:40 This is kindof a summery of Romans chapter 1 and Romans 29:43 chapter 2. 29:44 He's including the whole world here under sin. 29:46 They've all gone, there's none that understands. 29:49 There's none that seeks after God, verse 11. 29:51 They've all gone out of the way. 29:53 They've altogether become unprofitable. 29:54 There's none that does good, no not one. 29:56 Ok, I see where you're going. 29:57 I hope it's where you're going. 29:58 Yes. 30:00 And so he comes down here to this grand conclusion, and then 30:01 he says this, and this is, we're looking right here. 30:05 Please tell me you're going to verse 20. 30:06 Yes. 30:07 Ok. 30:08 Romans chapter 3 verses 19, 20 and 21. 30:09 It's so beautiful. 30:10 So, the law condemns us all. 30:13 We're all guilty before God. 30:15 We've all been unfaithful to the covenant. 30:16 That's verse 19. 30:17 Yes, verse 19. 30:19 Now, verse 20, now by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh 30:22 be justified in His sight, for by the law is the knowledge of 30:26 sin, but now the righteousness of God without the law is 30:31 manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets, even 30:35 the righteousness of God which is by faith in Jesus. 30:41 Now, that is the King James, which is by the faith of Jesus 30:44 Christ unto all and upon all them that believe, for there's 30:49 no difference. 30:50 Ok, we gotta spend some time on this verse. 30:52 This is beautiful. 30:53 [laughter] 30:54 This opens it up. 30:55 You took us to, in my opinion, exactly the right place. 30:58 So, with your guys permission, lets just look at verse 21. 31:01 But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed. 31:05 First of all, we need to pause and say, what is God's 31:07 righteousness? 31:09 It's his covenant faithfulness. 31:12 That's right. 31:13 That's exactly correct. 31:15 It's not some, you know, airy, fairy... 31:16 God's morally pure. 31:17 God is morally pure. 31:19 God, in your words, Ty, from several conversations ago, He 31:21 made a promise. 31:22 He kept a promise. 31:23 Well, I'm saying the opposite, David. 31:26 The word right is there, yeah? 31:27 No, I'm not saying the opposite. 31:28 I'm saying it's not this very simplistic, well God is morally 31:31 pure, or God just does right things and He doesn't do wrong 31:35 things. 31:36 I mean, that's true too, but this is a very specific 31:38 carryover from the Old Testament. 31:41 this is a specific concept, and the concept of God's 31:45 righteousness in Romans, well in all of Paul, is the covenant 31:49 faithfulness of God to follow through to keep His promises. 31:52 Because every promise that He made, He fulfilled. 31:56 He fulfilled. 31:58 He fulfilled. 31:59 And we have incidences of this just in the natural world. 32:00 The sun comes up every day. 32:02 The rain falls as it needs to. 32:03 Our hearts, bup bup bup bup, still beat. 32:05 Our lungs still have air. 32:06 So, the righteousness of God, the covenant faithfulness of 32:09 God, apart from the law is revealed. 32:10 Now, the idea here of apart from the law, many people are going 32:14 to read that and think, oh, we don't need to keep the 10 32:17 commandments anymore! 32:18 Apart from the 10 commandments. 32:19 Apart from God's moral...but that's not what Paul is saying. 32:21 He's saying that God covenant faithfulness has been revealed 32:24 to us apart from our keeping of all the writings of Moses. 32:28 In other words, God is faithful regardless of the fact that 32:31 we're not. 32:33 That, that's the point. 32:34 And he says that. 32:35 Being witnessed by the law and the prophets. 32:36 Now, that phrase there literally means that this was the point of 32:39 the law and the prophets all along. 32:41 The point of the law and the prophets all along was to point 32:44 to the Messiah, not to point to some rulebook whereby I'm going 32:48 to keep it myself in my own power and my own strength. 32:51 I'm going to gain covenant status because of what I have 32:54 done. 32:55 No, he says that the law and the prophets all along pointing to 32:57 God's covenant faithfulness. 32:58 And can we add to that, they were also pointing out our 33:00 inability. 33:01 That's right. 33:02 All the way along, God gave us opportunity to see over and over 33:05 again, even with Abraham and Sarah, over and over again that 33:07 we cannot do it in ourselves. 33:08 We're dependant on Him and on His promises. 33:10 We're the baby wallowing in the field, bathed in our own blood, 33:12 umbilical cord still attached. 33:14 What are you gonna do? 33:15 You're going to die. 33:17 So, the Bible really nowhere is a white knuckle book. 33:19 It's no where a bootstrap book. 33:20 What does that mean? 33:22 It's nowhere a book in which the onus of responsibility is on the 33:28 human being to git 'er done. 33:29 It' not... 33:30 Git 'er done. 33:32 [laughter] 33:33 It's not a matter of God changing His mind along the way. 33:36 He didn't in the Old Testament say, I'm gonna try to save these 33:39 guys by their law keeping. 33:42 I'm just gonna mandate and I'm gonna require and I'm gonna 33:47 require. 33:48 I know they can do it if they would just try hard enough. 33:51 So, what's the white knuckle thing? 33:54 Mmmmmm..... 33:55 Oh, ok! 33:56 I got it. 33:57 Holding on for dear life. 33:58 And the bootstraps thing, lifting yourself up. 33:59 Yeah, so in other words, this idea that God in the Old 34:00 Testament was trying to save people by law keeping, but that 34:04 didn't work, so now I'll send Jesus. 34:05 No, God all along intended to save through Christ. 34:10 Because Jesus is simply the fulfillment of what God was 34:13 trying to do all along. 34:15 Yes. 34:16 That's right. 34:17 Exactly. 34:18 With your permission, I wanna just finish verse 22. 34:19 Even the righteousness of God, which we've defined here as His 34:22 faithfulness to the covenant, through, and now, King James 34:26 here I think falls on it's face a little bit here because it's, 34:29 New King James, excuse me, because it says, through faith 34:31 in Christ. 34:32 Yeah, all versions fall on their face here. 34:33 Yeah, but King James says the faith of Christ, and not getting 34:38 into too Greek here, but the phrase here is "pistus Christu" 34:41 which literally just means "faith Christ." 34:44 And that can be rendered as "faith in Christ" or, that's the 34:50 objective, or "the faithfulness of Christ." 34:53 The faithfulness of the subject of the sentence. 34:57 So that if we read it that way, which I think is the correct 34:59 way, and it's the way the King James renders it. 35:00 And there are a few translations that get it right, just, but not 35:03 many. 35:05 Even the righteousness of God through the faithfulness of the 35:08 Messiah, Jesus Christ. 35:09 Now watch this. 35:11 You have a redundancy here. 35:13 This is why we can be quite certain that this translation is 35:14 the likely one, the faithfulness of the Messiah because the 35:17 very next phrase says, to all and on all who believe. 35:21 So, if he says, oh, we're saved by faith in Christ, and we 35:24 believe in Christ. 35:25 It's redundant. 35:27 It's redundant. 35:28 But if it says we're saved by the faithfulness of the Messiah, 35:30 and we believe it, now the redundancy disappears, and the 35:33 locus or the place of salvation is on Christ's faithfulness 35:39 and my response. 35:41 Not and my response. 35:42 And my response to Christ's faithfulness is an act of joy, 35:46 and act of praise, and act of worship, and an act of 35:49 obedience. 35:50 Now, I would add something here, David. 35:51 You may not agree with me on this. 35:53 This, there may be a difference here in our understanding, but I 35:55 would say that, as Paul is summarizing chapters 1 and 2, 35:59 verse 22 is critical because I believe he's including 2 groups 36:02 of people here. 36:04 Ok. 36:05 And I think that's brought out in verse 23 also. 36:06 Even the righteousness, the faithfulness of God, the 36:10 covenant faithfulness of God which is by the faith of Jesus 36:13 Christ unto all, everyone, and upon all them that believe, for 36:19 there is no difference. 36:21 In other words, all of us are in the same boat. 36:23 Jews and Gentiles, we've all come short of God's glory. 36:26 None of us are seeking after God, so Christ has been faithful 36:29 to all and those that believe. 36:34 In other words, you see here that he has, the faith of Jesus 36:37 has come unto all, otherwise none would exist. 36:40 None would breathe. 36:41 None would be alive. 36:42 And upon them that believe, for there is no difference 36:44 between.... 36:45 Yeah, I got no problem with that. 36:47 Ok, so all have sinned and come short of the glory of God being 36:49 justified freely by the grace, through the redemption that is 36:52 in Christ Jesus. 36:53 That is in Christ Jesus. 36:54 It's not in us. 36:55 It's not in our faithfulness. 36:57 It's in His faithfulness. 36:58 Yeah. 36:59 The promises, the relationship that God had with Abraham, 37:02 because all of this goes back to Abraham. 37:04 Not all of it. 37:05 Some of it goes back to Adam even of course before that, but 37:08 Abraham is this central figure in the New Testament, in fact 37:10 when you were just reading in Luke 1, one of the things that 37:12 it says is to perform the covenant that He swore to 37:13 Abraham. 37:15 We have to disabuse our mind of the idea that the covenant that 37:19 God made with Abraham was primarily Abraham's promises to 37:24 God. 37:25 Oh, God if you lead there, I will, and if you lead, then I 37:28 will do, and I will...the locus, the primary point of the 37:32 covenant that God had with Abraham was God's promises to 37:35 Abraham and Abraham's response of believing it. 37:39 Yeah. 37:40 I believe that you will give me the land. 37:41 I believe that you will give me descendants. 37:43 I believe that you will give me the Messiah. 37:44 And that's where the Old Covenant came in as a type with 37:48 Hagar because up until that point of belief, Abraham was 37:52 still dependant on himself, so when he goes off with Hagar, 37:55 that's still not fully believing what God has promised. 37:58 And to take it a step further, Paul in Galatians, he actually 38:01 uses that relationship that Abraham had with Hagar as the 38:04 type, the example of trusting to self. 38:08 Old covenant. 38:09 Trusting to me. 38:11 My flesh. 38:12 Is that what the whole circumcision thing was about as 38:14 well? 38:15 Of course. 38:16 Trusting in flesh. 38:17 Because he was trying to fulfill god's promise to send a son, to 38:19 give him a heir, through his own power. 38:22 Through his own genealogy. 38:23 Through his own means. 38:25 You know what's really interesting? 38:26 Paul picks this up in the next chapter in Romans. 38:29 Now just listen to these two verses right here. 38:31 Of course, of course. 38:32 Right here he's talking about... 38:33 We need to do a whole Table Talk on Romans. 38:34 No, I'm serious. 38:35 Chapter 1 is the first session. 38:37 We just need to go through it. 38:38 Look at these two verses. 38:40 In Romans chapter 4 verses 19 and 20. 38:45 He says, and this is right in the midst of the story here. 38:47 I'll pick it up in verse 18, who against hope believed in hope 38:50 that he might become the father of many nations according to 38:53 that which was spoken, so shall thy seed be, and being not weak 38:57 in faith, this is talking about Abraham, being not weak in 39:00 faith, he considered not his own body now dead, when he was about 39:05 100 years old, neither yet the deadness of Sarah's womb. 39:08 He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief but was 39:12 strong in faith giving glory to God being fully persuaded, verse 39:16 21, that what he had promised He also would be able to perform. 39:20 That's the point. 39:21 Isn't that beautiful? 39:23 Other than the little hiccup with Hagar, Abraham is the 39:25 blazing, incandescent example in the New Testament of believing 39:30 the promises of God. 39:32 Can you say that one more time? 39:34 I love that. 39:36 Ok. 39:37 Other than the trip up with Hagar, Abraham is the blazing, 39:38 incandescent example in the New Testament of believing the 39:42 promises of God. 39:44 Has anyone ever told you you have a way with words? 39:46 [laughter] 39:47 The blazing, incandescent... 39:48 Example. 39:49 Woo! 39:50 We need a couple dictionaries on the table. 39:52 We actually need a break, is what we need, so uh, we'll just 39:54 take a break and come back and continue pursuing the subject in 39:57 our final segment. 39:59 Awesome. 40:01 [Music] 40:06 Every human heart needs a deep, abiding sense of God's love, joy 40:11 and peace. 40:12 With multiplied millions in print, Secrets of Peace is in 40:15 constant demand as a timeless treasure of spiritual insight. 40:19 For your free copy, call 877.585.1111 or write to Light 40:25 Bearers 37457 Jasper Lowell Rd, Jasper, OR 97438. 40:32 Once again, for your free copy of Secrets of Peace, call 40:36 877.585.1111 or write to Light Bearers 37457 Jasper Lowell Rd, 40:45 Jasper, OR 97438. 40:48 Simply ask for Secrets of Peace. 40:52 [Music] 40:58 We've been dropping some pretty awesome stuff about the 41:00 faithfulness of God, and I think one of the major distinctions 41:04 that was made in the last conversation here was, faith in 41:07 Jesus or faith of Jesus, and that's a dynamic. 41:12 That's a switch in dynamic because the emphasis is on God's 41:17 covenant faithfulness, but there's a thing here that I was 41:20 waiting to jump in and you guys were so on fire that I didn't 41:23 want to interrupt the chemistry here, but in Mark chapter 1, 41:27 there's another dynamic to this and that is the fact that all of 41:35 this amazing stuff, we're not simply asked to believe these 41:39 things without sufficient reason to take it seriously. 41:43 I mean, let's be honest, there's different world religions. 41:46 there's different worldviews. 41:47 There's a lot of things. 41:49 There's a lot of claims to truth, but the beautiful thing 41:53 about the Christian message in my conviction. 41:56 The Biblical message. 41:57 The Biblical message is God, as I said earlier, put His money 42:01 where His mouth is. 42:03 He actually has acted on His promises, but in Mark 1 there's 42:07 this bridge. 42:09 there's this breaking of the silence between all of those 42:11 promises in the Old Testament, and this is basically the first 42:14 time Jesus quote unquote opens his mouth, yeah? 42:18 All this preparation in Mark 1, it says in verse 14, John is 42:24 thrown in prison, ok? 42:25 And Jesus comes to Galilee and He's preaching the Gospel of the 42:31 kingdom of God, and this is His, this is His choice for His first 42:36 sermon. 42:37 Verse 14. 42:39 And He says, the time is fulfilled. 42:42 I want to emphasize that. 42:44 The time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand. 42:47 Repent and believe in the Gospel. 42:49 We keep talking about believing in the faithfulness of God, so 42:53 the first sermon Jesus preaches is calling our attention to the 42:58 fulfillment of a time, and in a previous conversation we were 43:02 breaking down Daniel chapter 9, and how, I remember Ty lit up in 43:07 Daniel chapter 9 when we were talking about the coming 43:10 Messiah, and we were given a specific segment of time where 43:16 the Messiah would come. 43:18 And so here, Jesus right on time shows up and the first thing out 43:24 of His mouth is, the time is fulfilled. 43:27 Why, the reason I'm so excited about that is this. 43:30 I interact with a lot of people, and you guys all do, you're on a 43:34 plane, you're in the airport, you're, wherever you are, you're 43:37 interacting, rubbing shoulders with people, many of which, do 43:40 not share our excitement about the Bible and the Word of God. 43:46 There's a lot of skeptics who question the validity of the 43:49 Bible, and I always like to remind people that God does not 43:54 expect us to put our brains in the, on the bookshelf. 43:56 In other words, you can still use your brain and still 44:01 believe. 44:03 These are not fables. 44:04 These are not cute children's stories. 44:06 These things are actually real. 44:08 There are reasons to believe in our faith, so all of these 44:10 promises that God has made, when they're fulfilled, it's God's 44:14 way of saying, I'm not asking you to believe some 44:17 philosophical proposition merely. 44:19 I'm asking you to believe. 44:22 I'm inviting you to believe and to have confidence in the fact 44:26 that I don't just say things. 44:28 I'm stepping into time and space and you will be able to see the 44:32 fulfillment of my promises. 44:35 There's evidence behind this. 44:37 There's evidence behind it. 44:38 Yeah. 44:40 Jeffrey, you're talking about the fact that we meet people 44:41 with all kinds of world views. 44:42 It's interesting that people do reject the Bible oftentimes, but 44:46 I think it's on a false premise because the Bible is generally 44:51 perceived by people as an ethical rulebook where God is 44:56 demanding something. 44:58 He's extracting. 45:00 He's requiring something, and, excuse me, there are a lot of 45:04 rules there that He's imposing, but the Bible isn't a book of 45:08 good moral advice. 45:10 It's a book of good news, and there's a difference between 45:15 good advice and good news. 45:17 All the religious systems of the world are claiming to offer 45:21 good, ethical, moral advice. 45:24 This is how you ought to live, but the Bible is offering good 45:30 news. 45:31 It's telling us something that God has done. 45:34 Something God is in His very nature and character, and has 45:39 done for us in Himself. 45:42 That's the essence of the good news of the gospel. 45:47 We're in Mark chapter 1. 45:48 We were in Romans, if you don't mind just back in Romans, we 45:52 went straight to chapter 3, but what about chapter 1 where Paul 45:54 says I'm not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ in verse 16, 45:59 for it's the power of God unto salvation, but check out verse 46:05 17. 46:07 In it. 46:08 In what? 46:09 The good news, the gospel, the righteousness of God is 46:13 revealed. 46:14 That's the whole point. 46:16 We're interpreting, and rightly so, righteousness, the 46:19 righteousness of the New Testament, the righteousness of 46:21 God, as the covenant faithfulness of God. 46:24 God following through to keep all of His covenant promises, so 46:28 Paul explicitly says, I'm not ashamed of the gospel of Christ. 46:31 It's the power of God unto salvation to everyone who 46:35 believes, for in it, in the gospel, God's covenant 46:39 faithfulness is revealed, and that revelation in Christ is the 46:44 stimulus that arouses our faith to action toward Him. 46:50 Now, I'm digging all that, but it's in that that we find this 46:53 beautiful, ethical view of life. 46:58 that's the stimulus. 47:00 It flows from that. 47:01 That's the part where I'm saying it stimulates response, so yeah, 47:03 there, the Bible does convey a very high moral ideal. 47:08 Love. 47:09 Love is the ideal. 47:10 Love for God. 47:11 Love for man. 47:12 Yeah, but it's not conveying that ideal as something that's 47:16 put on human beings as the onus of responsibility's on you 47:20 because you need to get it done. 47:23 The white knuckle thing again. 47:24 You can't get it done, hence the Messiah. 47:27 Hence the savior. 47:28 I got two thing I wanna say here. 47:30 Part of the reason, Ty, that that misunderstanding and 47:33 misapprehension of scripture exists in much of popular 47:37 culture is that the church has failed in that regard. 47:39 In other words, we have to, it's very easy to keep the mirror on 47:42 the world. 47:43 Look at yourselves. 47:45 You misunderstand, but at some point we have to turn and, oooh. 47:47 In other words, if people have a misunderstanding of the Bible, 47:52 of scripture, and of the Christian message, let it be 47:53 because, we have to own the fact that at some level it's because 47:55 much "Christianity" is not Biblical truth, let's be honest. 48:01 "Christianity" is not Biblical. 48:04 This is how deep the misconceptions go. 48:07 As we pointed out a few moments ago, even the Bible translations 48:12 that we have, the very way we translate the scriptures misses 48:18 the intent of the gospel often. 48:20 Not always, and not every translation, but it tends to put 48:25 the onus of responsibility of the human being to do something 48:29 in order to initiate response from God. 48:33 It's the opposite. 48:34 Yeah, but it's the opposite. 48:36 God's initiating it. 48:37 God's taking the initiative. 48:38 And it's there too, right? 48:39 He's the pursuer. 48:40 It's also there in the text I just read, in Mark 1:15. 48:42 The time is fulfilled. 48:43 The kingdom of God is at hand, but then comes repent and 48:46 believe in the gospel. 48:49 But even the word repent here is not so much focused on the idea 48:55 repent, that is, change your behavior. 48:58 Rectify yourself ethically, morally. 49:00 The word here repent means actually, change your way of 49:05 thinking, your entire paradigm, your way of perceiving reality, 49:10 God and your relationship to God. 49:12 Change on the inside. 49:14 Ty and I just talked about this recently. 49:16 We were doing another set of commentaries, and the word here 49:18 for repent here in the New Testament is most often the word 49:20 metanoia. 49:22 Metanoia, which sounds like the word paranoia, right? 49:24 And it comes from nous, which is mind, and meta, in this context, 49:30 it means forth or afterward. 49:31 So the word literally mean, the word repent, it means to think 49:35 differently from this point forward. 49:36 So Jesus says, the time is fulfilled... 49:38 Turn and do a 180. 49:40 ...start thinking differently because the kingdom of God is at 49:42 hand and believe the gospel. 49:44 And it's also because until you do that you can't believe 49:47 because it's repent and believe in the gospel, so there seems to 49:51 be a sequence there. 49:52 Now there's something I just don't want to lose. 49:54 It goes back to something you said, Jeffery, earlier, and it's 49:57 gonna, maybe we can hopefully loop back to this conversation 50:00 about the covenant faithfulness of God in Christ, but that is 50:02 that, you talk about God putting His money where His mouth is. 50:05 I resonate so deeply with that because James is a thinker, I'm 50:09 a thinker, Ty is a thinker, you're a thinker, and many 50:11 people outside who look sort of askance or with, you know, 50:18 suspicious eyes at Christianity think that it's just pie in the 50:20 sky, fairytales, Santa Clause, etcetera. 50:23 However, you know and I know that there is fantastic 50:27 historical evidence, historical data that corroborates the basic 50:32 picture of Jesus in the New Testament, including but not 50:36 limited to extra Biblical confirmations of a man named 50:38 Jesus who lived at about this time, who did these things, who 50:41 suffered this death under these circumstances, so this is not 50:44 just somebody said, hey let's follow and they invent some 50:46 creature or man and they say he did this, this, this, and this. 50:49 The Christian faith is an historical faith and as such, 50:53 it's a risky faith, in this sense. 50:55 Christianity has essentially put its neck on the chopping block 51:01 by making certain historical claims about Jesus, about the 51:04 nature of His resurrection, about the nature of the times in 51:06 which He lived, and if the Bible and the New Testament could be 51:10 shown to be historically inaccurate or historically 51:12 manufactured, then the truth of Christianity fails based on the 51:19 lack of historical truth of Christianity. 51:21 All this covenant talk is just a bunch of mumbo jumbo. 51:24 That's right. 51:25 Because if these things were not historically true, because the 51:29 theology is growing out of the historical. 51:31 That's the point. 51:34 That's my point. 51:35 Did God deliver the children of Israel out of Egyptian bondage? 51:37 Did God actually appear to Abraham? 51:40 Did God? 51:41 Did God? 51:42 Did God? 51:43 If He didn't, the covenant is based on those actual events. 51:48 That's the whole point That's powerful. 51:50 Paul's point in 1 Corinthians 15 is that if Christ didn't 51:53 literally rise from the dead, our faith is empty. 51:56 It's a joke. 51:57 It's a faith in what? 51:59 In nothing. 52:00 In a really nice figure that we've manufactured, so now even 52:01 for our skeptical friends, I'm really interested what you think 52:05 about this, Ty, all of us, but especially Ty. 52:07 Even for our skeptical friends, I would hope that even if they 52:13 said I don't believe the Bible. 52:14 I don't believe in God, and I don't accept it, they should be 52:17 able to say in their very next breath, but man it's a beautiful 52:20 story. 52:21 That's right. 52:23 Yeah. 52:24 If they can't appreciate it as truth and as the Word of God, 52:28 let our preaching be such that they can appreciate it 52:30 aesthetically. 52:32 That's a great story. 52:34 So that they would want to believe it. 52:35 That's the point. 52:36 Because at some point, you and I know, the hard headed, 52:39 intellectual [punching sounds] 52:41 , and that works, and there's a place for that, but if the story 52:44 is not attractive and beautiful and if it's not deeply resonant 52:48 with the human condition... 52:50 Didn't you drop that from Psalms, to behold the beauty of 52:54 the Lord. 52:55 But so much Christian preaching does not make God beautiful. 52:57 I mean, we have to own that. 53:00 We have to own that much of our preaching... 53:04 It hints at it, at a mental level, at an intellectual level, 53:06 at a rational level, and completely reframe the way we're 53:10 representing the character of God from the get go, right from 53:13 the beginning, God needs to be rightly represented, and if He's 53:17 rightly represented, He is attractive in and of Himself. 53:21 We don't need to paint Him up. 53:22 We don't need to do anything to help Him out. 53:23 We simply need to convey God for who God really is, and He is 53:27 beautiful in the extreme. 53:29 It's the Lewis thing. 53:30 You go ahead. 53:31 You go ahead. 53:32 I won't lose my thing. 53:33 I was just thinking on what you were saying, we have to own it. 53:34 It's the church's fault. 53:35 We need to repent. 53:36 Isn't that the great bulk of what Jesus is doing in the 53:40 gospels? 53:42 When you look at Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, Jesus is 53:45 constantly boom, boom, boom, boom with the religious 53:47 establishment of His day. 53:49 Jesus becomes the greatest, outspoken critic of mainstream, 53:53 popular religious misconception, so Jesus is always confronting 54:00 the scribes, the Pharisees, the lawyers of the law and all of 54:02 this, and His message is, uh, no, that's not what God is like. 54:09 God is like this. 54:10 So, it's powerful because that's exactly, that's on the agenda. 54:13 God is like Jesus. 54:15 And going to the next level, it's not just, that's not what 54:16 God is like and that's not what the kingdom of God is like, it's 54:18 also, that's not what the Bible's about. 54:20 The Bible doesn't even teach that. 54:21 Yeah, yeah! 54:22 You don't understand the scriptures, He would say. 54:24 You search the scriptures, and in them you think you have 54:26 eternal life, but you missed the story. 54:27 You read the words and missed the story. 54:29 How's that possible? 54:30 Yeah, yeah. 54:31 These are they which testify of Me. 54:33 You read the words and you miss the story. 54:35 And then you said something earlier that I just had to throw 54:37 out, you know that great Lewis quote where he talks about how 54:39 does the Bible need to be defended? 54:41 He said in the same way that a caged lion is defended. 54:43 Just let it out. 54:44 [laughter] 54:46 How do we make God beautiful? 54:48 By just exposing people to who He is. 54:51 We don't have to dress it up. 54:53 This idea, and this would be a good place to land this plane, 54:57 is that Jesus actually was foretold in all the Old 55:03 Testament prophecies. 55:04 In the New Testament is the end to which all of that was 55:07 pointing. 55:08 This is a text in chapter 10 of Romans verse 4 that is often 55:12 misunderstood. 55:13 It says, Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to 55:16 everyone who believes, and sometimes this is interpreted to 55:19 mean that the moral law of God, that the 10 commandments is done 55:22 away with in Christ, but really what's being described here, the 55:26 Greek word for end is telos, like telescope, and the idea 55:31 here, like a slinky for example, here's the Old Testament 55:36 scriptures... 55:37 Oh, he's working' the slinky. 55:39 I knew it'd come in a some point. 55:41 The Old Testament scriptures are moving forward, and the New 55:44 Testament is the telos, Jesus is the telos. 55:48 He is the fulfillment of everything that was foretold in 55:53 the Old Testament. 55:54 In other words, He's the end in the sense that He's the... 55:58 Goal. 55:59 Goal. 56:00 Not the end in the sense of the termination. 56:01 Not the termination, but the goal of all of scripture is 56:04 Jesus Christ. 56:06 That's the point. 56:08 He is the, so you would render that, you could translate that, 56:11 Christ is the goal of the law of righteousness to everyone who 56:15 believes. 56:16 And law there is the entire corpus of Old Testament 56:18 scripture. 56:19 And righteousness there is covenant faithfulness. 56:21 His is the one by, Christ is the one that shows us what covenant 56:25 faithfulness looks like. 56:26 Believe it. 56:27 That's what He said. 56:28 And that's good news, by the way. 56:30 It's not good advice, it's good news that stimulates response. 56:34 I love the distinction. 56:35 I love that distinction. 56:36 Let me just sort of speak to this from my own story here. 56:40 We've talked in the past about sort of our own maturation in 56:42 reading and our maturation in faith. 56:44 Most people I think, and I may be incorrect in this, but most 56:47 people that I've encountered when they come into faith in 56:50 Christ, especially when you've come from way out in, which you, 56:53 you, all of us did at this table. 56:55 The temptation is to swing toward the ethical, moral, 57:01 elements of the Bible. We want concrete. 57:03 I'm gonna do this. I'm not gonna do this. 57:05 I stopped doing this. I gave up this. 57:06 I did and, ch, ch, ch...and there's nothing wrong with that. 57:09 It's probably a necessary corrective if you came out of 57:12 the world like we did, but at some point in our development 57:16 and in the development of our listeners, it has to move beyond 57:19 that. 57:20 It can't just be a series of moral exhortations and 57:23 standards. 57:24 It swings to a confidence in Christ. 57:28 That doesn't diminish the ethical, but it contextualizes 57:32 why and who and the attractiveness. 57:36 It brings a balance and frankly it brings a Biblical grounding 57:39 to the story that's not just rooted in lists. 57:42 I think it's a difference, David, between saying that 57:44 obedience to God's law is necessary. 57:48 Obedience to God's law is inevitable in the right 57:54 framework and in the right... 57:56 And a privilege. 57:57 And a privilege, in the framework of the faithfulness of 57:59 Christ. 58:00 You got me with the word inevitable. 58:01 You got me. 58:03 I wanted to argue, but you got me. 58:04 This has been a really great discussion. 58:06 I've enjoyed it thoroughly, and the bottom-line takeaway is that 58:10 the whole Bible is about God making promises and then keeping 58:15 those promises in the person of Jesus Christ. 58:18 Amen. 58:19 That's the bottom line. 58:20 Let's believe them. 58:23 [Music] 58:26 To receive our free, monthly newsletter and a list of Light 58:28 Bearers resources, visit us online at LightBearers.org or 58:33 call us toll free at 877.585.1111. 58:38 You can also write to us at Light Bearers, 37457 Jasper 58:42 Lowell Rd, Jasper, OR, 97438. |
Revised 2014-12-17