[Music] 00:00:00.70\00:00:10.73 [Music] 00:00:10.73\00:00:20.73 --Alright, guys, we're in session number four of our 00:00:21.43\00:00:23.80 Righteousness by Faith series. 00:00:23.80\00:00:25.80 And it's been pretty interesting. 00:00:25.80\00:00:27.30 We began by just unpacking the idea of righteousness by faith 00:00:27.30\00:00:32.06 as a language that a lot people might not be familiar with. 00:00:32.06\00:00:34.63 And even those who are familiar with that language within a 00:00:34.63\00:00:37.73 theological and church context, I think it's important just to 00:00:37.73\00:00:41.83 bring that language down and make it accessible. 00:00:41.83\00:00:44.30 We began to understand that righteousness by faith, while it 00:00:44.30\00:00:48.06 sounds technical... 00:00:48.06\00:00:49.73 --It sounds churchy. 00:00:49.73\00:00:50.83 --Churchy, it's really about relationship with God. 00:00:50.83\00:00:55.16 It's a term that defines a way of relating from God to us and 00:00:55.16\00:01:01.66 then us reciprocating back to God. 00:01:01.66\00:01:05.06 And then we moved on and we really spent a lot of time 00:01:05.06\00:01:07.80 dealing with the Genesis account of the creation of man, the fall 00:01:07.80\00:01:13.66 of man and what that began to look like and then God calling 00:01:13.66\00:01:18.20 Abraham out. 00:01:18.20\00:01:19.80 That's pretty much where we left off. 00:01:19.80\00:01:21.83 And now, we wanna move into territory, where, first of all, 00:01:21.83\00:01:26.53 in Genesis, we find that, what we're calling the sin problem, 00:01:26.53\00:01:31.70 again, it sounds pretty churchy, kinda in house, but we're gonna 00:01:31.70\00:01:35.33 unpack it, what does the sin problem look like? 00:01:35.33\00:01:40.06 When we say the word sin, for example, are we talking about an 00:01:40.06\00:01:44.13 arbitrarily concocted list of rules that God, because he's 00:01:44.13\00:01:48.53 bigger than us and more powerful than us, is just imposing and we 00:01:48.53\00:01:53.23 had better do what he says or else because he's God and we're 00:01:53.23\00:01:56.30 not? 00:01:56.30\00:01:57.56 I mean, could he have just as easily come up with a different 00:01:57.56\00:02:00.56 list, like move those rocks over there and then move them back? 00:02:00.56\00:02:03.93 Or is there something about this word sin in scripture that is 00:02:03.93\00:02:08.83 intrinsic to the operations of our humanity as God created 00:02:08.83\00:02:14.00 humanity. 00:02:14.00\00:02:15.26 --Well, in the bigger picture, we talked about how, in Genesis 00:02:15.26\00:02:17.53 3, they only disobeyed God, we were talking about the process, 00:02:17.53\00:02:20.66 they didn't actually take the fruit until there was a 00:02:20.66\00:02:23.06 psychological sort of process that took place where they began 00:02:23.06\00:02:26.10 to question God. 00:02:27.20\00:02:29.40 So, basically, when trust broke up, 00:02:29.40\00:02:31.40 only then did the actual act follow. 00:02:32.43\00:02:35.20 I think you're talking about the definitions of sin, at a 00:02:35.20\00:02:37.96 fundamental level, it seems to be rooted in in distrust of God. 00:02:37.96\00:02:43.20 --It's relational. 00:02:43.20\00:02:43.73 Broken trust. 00:02:43.73\00:02:45.03 --And because it's relational, it's not arbitrary. 00:02:45.03\00:02:46.96 In other words, I think that that's a great question because 00:02:47.53\00:02:49.23 many people, I think, ourselves, maybe at this table, in the 00:02:49.23\00:02:52.73 past, have thought of things that God does as arbitrary, but 00:02:52.73\00:02:56.00 we should remind ourselves that nothing that God does is ever 00:02:56.00\00:02:58.20 arbitrary. 00:02:58.20\00:02:59.10 It's always purposeful, it's always intentional, and it's 00:03:00.36\00:03:02.03 always with our best good in mind. 00:03:02.03\00:03:04.53 So, when we talk about sin, we're talking about a violation 00:03:04.83\00:03:06.86 of a code, I guess the simplest way to say it would be 00:03:06.86\00:03:09.96 a transgression of God's law, right? 00:03:09.96\00:03:12.80 But then we even have to unpack that. 00:03:12.80\00:03:14.30 What is God's law? 00:03:14.30\00:03:15.16 What does that mean? 00:03:15.16\00:03:16.00 Why does he have a law? 00:03:16.00\00:03:16.86 What kind of a law is it? 00:03:16.86\00:03:18.13 Etc. We're kind of getting ahead of the cart here, but the point 00:03:18.13\00:03:20.73 is, is that sin is not arbitrary, the definition of it 00:03:20.73\00:03:24.06 is not arbitrary, it's patently relational because it's based on 00:03:24.06\00:03:27.50 a distrust of God and when we're coming out of the Genesis story, 00:03:27.50\00:03:31.30 we have seen, and I love that trajectory that you paint there, 00:03:31.30\00:03:35.06 we see from the creation in Genesis 1 and 2, okay, that's 00:03:35.06\00:03:37.80 all is well there, but from 3, 4, 5, 6, there's just this 00:03:37.80\00:03:42.10 downward slide. 00:03:42.10\00:03:44.13 We get into the time of the flood, and it's like, God is 00:03:44.13\00:03:46.80 like, they're thoughts are only evil continually. 00:03:46.80\00:03:51.00 --And actually, before we go that far, do you guys mind if we 00:03:51.26\00:03:53.80 do, if we read what I think is a major transition in the story. 00:03:53.80\00:03:58.36 We're talking about the progression of Genesis from 3 00:03:58.93\00:04:02.06 all the way to the flood, but Genesis 5, specifically, there's 00:04:02.06\00:04:05.73 this interesting detail here that kinda describes a 00:04:05.73\00:04:09.43 transition in human nature. 00:04:09.43\00:04:12.03 In verse 1, this is the book of the genealogy of Adam. 00:04:12.03\00:04:16.06 In the day that God created man, he made him in the likeness of 00:04:16.36\00:04:19.50 God, and the backdrop of that we're familiar with, Genesis 1. 00:04:19.50\00:04:23.70 Verse 2, he created them male and female and blessed them and 00:04:24.46\00:04:27.80 called them mankind the day that were created. 00:04:27.80\00:04:30.86 And verse 3 says, and Adam lived 130 years and begot a son in his 00:04:30.86\00:04:36.90 own likeness. 00:04:36.90\00:04:38.10 --There's the key. 00:04:38.10\00:04:39.03 --After his image, and he named him Seth. 00:04:39.03\00:04:41.33 So, it's really interesting, in the beginning, man, Adam is 00:04:42.23\00:04:45.43 created in the image of God in the likeness of God, then we 00:04:45.43\00:04:49.63 have all hell breaks loose in chapter 3, there's the breaking 00:04:49.63\00:04:53.60 down of trust with God and all the ramifications of that, and 00:04:53.60\00:04:57.23 then, now, in chapter 5 verse 1, there's this transition, 00:04:57.23\00:05:00.53 everyone who is born post Adam, obviously, is now born in his 00:05:00.53\00:05:04.76 image and after his likeness, Adam, that is. 00:05:04.76\00:05:07.73 Adam after the breaking down of his relationship with God. 00:05:07.73\00:05:12.63 So, now, we're coming into this world with a different wired 00:05:12.63\00:05:16.86 system. 00:05:16.86\00:05:17.50 We have different wiring. 00:05:18.33\00:05:19.56 --Well, we see that even in the Genesis 3 account, when God 00:05:19.80\00:05:22.56 comes into the garden to basically take account of what's 00:05:22.56\00:05:25.36 taken place, and he says to Adam, you know, essentially, 00:05:25.36\00:05:29.00 what's going on here? 00:05:29.00\00:05:29.80 Who told you that you were naked? 00:05:29.80\00:05:31.03 And his knee jerk instinctive response is to say, it's the 00:05:31.03\00:05:34.43 woman. 00:05:34.43\00:05:35.46 Right, and now, we sort of play a joke on that, you know, the 00:05:36.73\00:05:38.13 guy blames the girl, and that is, I guess, a little humorous, 00:05:38.13\00:05:39.96 but the larger point is that he has instantaneously gone from a 00:05:39.96\00:05:44.33 desire to please others and to be a blessing to others to being 00:05:44.33\00:05:47.90 other centered, to self-preservation. 00:05:47.90\00:05:50.50 Hey, I've got a, it's exactly what the serpent had said. 00:05:51.13\00:05:54.00 God's looking out for himself to the woman, you need to be 00:05:54.20\00:05:56.20 looking out for yourself. 00:05:56.20\00:05:57.46 Now that this switch has taken place from other centeredness to 00:05:57.46\00:05:59.50 self-centeredness, you don't have to teach him this. 00:05:59.50\00:06:02.70 Instinctively, the first, well, the woman that you gave me. 00:06:03.30\00:06:05.53 So then God turns his attention to her, and instinctively, she's 00:06:05.53\00:06:07.20 all about self-preservation as well, well, you put the serpent 00:06:07.20\00:06:10.33 in the garden. 00:06:10.33\00:06:11.73 So, there's the shift, so, now, you're right, when Seth is made 00:06:12.33\00:06:14.86 in Adam's image, it's not in an image that's naturally, by 00:06:14.86\00:06:17.83 default, inclined to give God the glory and to be service 00:06:17.83\00:06:20.80 oriented and love oriented and other centered, it's inwardly 00:06:20.80\00:06:24.73 focused. 00:06:24.73\00:06:26.20 --And that's the essence of the sin problem right there. 00:06:26.40\00:06:28.43 When we talk about sin, we're not talking about God just 00:06:28.43\00:06:31.26 making up some rules to see if we'll do what he says, we're 00:06:31.26\00:06:36.36 talking about God essentially being a God of love or other 00:06:36.36\00:06:40.76 centeredness in his nature, so he creates human beings to live 00:06:40.76\00:06:45.13 that way, to live with other centeredness, to live in his 00:06:45.13\00:06:48.70 love, and all of his laws, according to scripture, are an 00:06:48.70\00:06:53.13 outgrowth of that essential truth about his character that 00:06:53.13\00:06:55.76 God is love. 00:06:55.76\00:06:56.93 So, when sin is committed, sin is not just behaviorally 00:06:56.93\00:07:02.40 breaking a rule, it is a violation of the integrity of 00:07:02.40\00:07:06.93 love relationship. 00:07:06.93\00:07:08.63 First and foremost, vertically. 00:07:08.63\00:07:10.53 Secondarily, horizontally. 00:07:11.53\00:07:13.53 And you find this, if you fast forward to the New Testament 00:07:13.93\00:07:16.26 where Jesus comes along and he basically says, whatever the 00:07:16.26\00:07:19.70 nature of your relationship is to other human beings, that's 00:07:19.70\00:07:24.53 your relationship to me. 00:07:24.53\00:07:25.80 You remember that in Matthew 25. 00:07:26.93\00:07:27.66 Yeah, you feed somebody who's hungry, it's like you're feeding 00:07:29.13\00:07:33.03 me. 00:07:33.03\00:07:34.30 You don't feed somebody who's hungry, you don't tend to the 00:07:34.30\00:07:36.53 needs of those who are in need, and it impacts me. 00:07:36.53\00:07:40.10 There's this vertical horizon from God's standpoint. 00:07:40.10\00:07:44.53 John goes so far as to say if you hate another human being, 00:07:44.53\00:07:48.33 don't say you love God because there is an inextricable 00:07:48.33\00:07:54.90 connection between our human relationships and our 00:07:54.90\00:07:59.06 relationship with God. 00:07:59.06\00:08:00.26 So, vertical violation of the integrity of the love 00:08:00.26\00:08:03.46 relationship and then horizontal violation of the integrity of 00:08:03.46\00:08:07.30 love relationships. 00:08:07.30\00:08:08.66 --Isn't that the two, when Jesus was asked, what's the greatest 00:08:08.66\00:08:11.40 commandment? 00:08:11.40\00:08:12.66 And he says, well, there's two ways to sum up the whole thing. 00:08:12.66\00:08:15.33 The whole show is summed up with two things, love God and love 00:08:16.30\00:08:19.73 man, love your fellow neighbor. 00:08:19.73\00:08:21.96 So, those are the two things, and I always love the sequence 00:08:21.96\00:08:25.70 there, that the first one is to love God and the second one is 00:08:25.70\00:08:29.70 to love our neighbor. 00:08:29.70\00:08:30.60 Which is why I think, and we've been hitting on this over and 00:08:31.86\00:08:34.06 over in these conversations that the way we view and relate God 00:08:34.06\00:08:37.43 will affect the way we view and relate one another. 00:08:37.43\00:08:40.40 So, Jesus is saying, if you get the first one wrong, there's no 00:08:40.40\00:08:43.93 way you will know how to relate to your fellow man or to your 00:08:43.93\00:08:46.90 neighbor. 00:08:46.90\00:08:48.16 So, everything is centered on how we view God, the minute that 00:08:48.16\00:08:50.40 was broken down in Genesis, how they viewed one another was also 00:08:50.40\00:08:53.53 broken down. 00:08:53.53\00:08:54.60 --So, what do you guys think of this definition? 00:08:54.60\00:08:56.13 Do you think it would be theologically accurate to say 00:08:56.13\00:09:00.66 that sin is, you could put equals there, that sin is 00:09:00.66\00:09:05.93 anti-love? 00:09:05.93\00:09:07.70 Is that accurate? 00:09:09.20\00:09:10.03 --Yeah, totally. 00:09:10.03\00:09:11.16 --Sin is anything that violates the integrity of a love 00:09:11.16\00:09:15.66 relationship between God and humanity and humanity and 00:09:15.66\00:09:21.00 humanity. 00:09:21.00\00:09:22.13 Would you also agree, by logical extension, that all the 00:09:22.13\00:09:26.50 suffering and woe, everything that causes pain and suffering, 00:09:26.50\00:09:31.93 all the trauma of our world is traceable to these kinds of 00:09:31.93\00:09:38.33 violations? 00:09:38.33\00:09:39.56 --Yeah, of course. 00:09:40.16\00:09:41.86 --So, if those two things are true, those who may be sitting 00:09:42.30\00:09:46.73 in on this conversation who aren't that familiar with 00:09:46.73\00:09:50.50 biblical theology or the world view that we're advocating, 00:09:50.50\00:09:56.16 we can say to them, in a very inviting way, listen, God is not 00:09:56.93\00:10:02.60 an arbitrary control freak. 00:10:02.60\00:10:04.40 If you had a picture of God, a sense of God as some kind of 00:10:04.73\00:10:08.66 just sovereign powerful being who wants to get hold of you and 00:10:08.66\00:10:12.76 make you do stuff that is going to, you know, poop your party 00:10:12.76\00:10:16.93 and make life miserable, you've got it all wrong. 00:10:16.93\00:10:20.26 God is interested in bringing about in your life, in my life, 00:10:20.93\00:10:27.03 in every human being's life, consistent love relationships 00:10:27.03\00:10:33.56 that bring joy and happiness and peace, and even, the bible says, 00:10:33.56\00:10:37.66 pleasure. 00:10:37.66\00:10:38.66 God isn't against happiness, he's not against pleasure, he's 00:10:39.90\00:10:42.66 not against freedom, he's not into restriction. 00:10:42.66\00:10:46.46 God is into liberty, but liberty of the genuine kind that happens 00:10:46.90\00:10:52.60 within the parameters of love relationships that have 00:10:52.60\00:10:56.06 integrity. 00:10:56.06\00:10:57.06 --Okay, so, I have a question for you. 00:10:57.26\00:10:58.33 I resonate deeply with all of that, Ty. 00:10:58.33\00:11:00.26 I feel like we need to define our terms here a little bit 00:11:00.26\00:11:02.83 because we're saying sin is a violation of the love 00:11:02.83\00:11:04.93 relationship, it's a violation of the integrity of love. 00:11:04.93\00:11:07.26 Okay, so, we need to define this idea of love. 00:11:07.26\00:11:10.50 I mean, I think we've done is preliminarily, but can we give 00:11:10.50\00:11:14.06 some textual, at least, quick definition of what we're talking 00:11:14.06\00:11:19.80 about. 00:11:19.80\00:11:21.03 It's a violation of, in other words, we did that for sin. 00:11:21.03\00:11:22.70 Sin equals anti-love. 00:11:22.70\00:11:23.96 Okay, so, anti what? 00:11:23.96\00:11:25.56 --Yeah, what is love? 00:11:25.56\00:11:26.80 --Because some people are gonna say, well, you know, we know 00:11:26.80\00:11:29.76 that we live in a society that has taken the word love, it's 00:11:29.76\00:11:32.26 turned it upside down, it's shaken it around and it's spit 00:11:32.26\00:11:34.36 out something that doesn't look like what we see in scripture, 00:11:34.36\00:11:36.90 so let's just, at least for our purposes here, my own purposes, 00:11:36.90\00:11:40.76 let's define that so that we know precisely, if we're gonna 00:11:40.76\00:11:44.66 break down, break down, break down, let's define that, too. 00:11:44.66\00:11:47.06 --Yeah, another way you could say it is if God is saving us 00:11:47.06\00:11:50.43 out of sin into love, we've defined sin, but what is this 00:11:50.43\00:11:53.63 thing he's saving us into? 00:11:53.63\00:11:56.03 --There you go. 00:11:56.03\00:11:57.23 --Well, not to be a broken record or anything, but even in 00:11:57.23\00:11:59.30 just John 3:16, for God so loved the world that he, and then the 00:11:59.30\00:12:05.16 word gave, right? 00:12:05.16\00:12:07.70 So, fundamentally, love has to be other. 00:12:07.70\00:12:11.83 --Other centered. 00:12:13.26\00:12:14.50 --Other centered, right, he gave. 00:12:14.50\00:12:15.93 So, there's others outside of himself that are now central to 00:12:15.93\00:12:19.56 his, to his concern, to his everything, right? 00:12:19.56\00:12:24.76 So, love is other-centered. 00:12:24.76\00:12:28.76 --Jeffrey I want to add to that because 00:12:28.76\00:12:29.86 I don't know if you've ever encountered this, but I 00:12:29.86\00:12:34.50 sometimes, especially in marriage counselling, somebody, 00:12:34.50\00:12:38.23 when you begin to advocate the idea of giving as the definition 00:12:38.73\00:12:43.73 of love, inevitably, all of us have a lurking fear. 00:12:43.73\00:12:48.23 But if I give, what about the other person? 00:12:49.03\00:12:52.33 Are they gonna give? 00:12:52.33\00:12:53.26 Because we're looking at it through the lens of our natural, 00:12:54.50\00:12:59.90 innate, self-centeredness that's in place and it feels dangerous 00:12:59.90\00:13:04.10 to just give. 00:13:04.10\00:13:05.70 It feels like we might be taken advantage of, it feels like, and 00:13:05.70\00:13:08.10 --you might, --you might be taken advantage of. 00:13:08.10\00:13:10.63 So, I wanna add to John 3:16, Jesus gave this statement in, 00:13:10.63\00:13:16.16 this is one of my favorite bible verses. 00:13:16.16\00:13:18.96 It's in chapter 6 of Luke, and verse 38. 00:13:18.96\00:13:23.26 Watch what Jesus says here, this is absolutely astounding. 00:13:23.46\00:13:25.60 There's no punctuation in the original language, by the way, 00:13:26.43\00:13:29.40 so the way this reads, I think, what Jesus is saying here, is 00:13:29.76\00:13:34.56 the first word of verse 38 is give, period, or maybe 00:13:34.56\00:13:38.50 exclamation point if we wanna just emphasize, okay. 00:13:38.50\00:13:42.00 Jesus says give, period. 00:13:42.00\00:13:45.00 Full stop. 00:13:45.43\00:13:46.36 Then, he says this, and it will be given to you, good measure, 00:13:47.83\00:13:51.26 pressed down, shaken together, and running over shall men give 00:13:51.26\00:13:57.33 into your bosom. 00:13:57.33\00:13:58.83 Isn't that something? 00:14:00.33\00:14:01.30 Jesus is describing the circle, the circuit. 00:14:01.30\00:14:04.46 --Giving is receiving. 00:14:04.46\00:14:04.86 --Jesus is basically saying, it's not your responsibility to 00:14:06.60\00:14:13.90 steward the other person's giving. 00:14:13.90\00:14:15.53 It's your responsibility to be infectious with giving on your 00:14:16.70\00:14:22.06 own account. 00:14:22.06\00:14:23.00 To give, some people will take advantage of it. 00:14:23.20\00:14:25.56 Some people will walk all over you, but some people will drink 00:14:25.76\00:14:29.20 in that goodness, and they'll respond by giving back into your 00:14:29.20\00:14:34.16 life, and so the circle, the circuit of beneficence. 00:14:34.16\00:14:37.16 --The whole thing about giving and forgiving is often more for 00:14:37.16\00:14:40.76 our own benefit, even, than it would be for the other person, 00:14:40.76\00:14:44.36 right? 00:14:44.36\00:14:45.60 --The other person might not wanna be forgiven, they might 00:14:45.60\00:14:46.70 still be angry. 00:14:46.70\00:14:47.83 --I remember I was driving down the highway in San Jose, 00:14:47.83\00:14:50.76 California, and I got a phone call from Dominican Republic and 00:14:50.76\00:14:54.06 it was my dad, and I talked to my dad once every 7 years 00:14:54.06\00:14:58.46 throughout my life. 00:14:58.46\00:14:59.60 And I was... 00:14:59.90\00:15:01.23 --And how old are you right now? 00:15:01.23\00:15:02.20 --I am 31 years old. 00:15:02.20\00:15:03.03 --So, you've talked to him 3 times. 00:15:03.03\00:15:04.30 --It's, I've seen him, I could just count with one hand, I just 00:15:04.30\00:15:07.76 barely even know my father. 00:15:07.76\00:15:09.20 Now, he passed away a year and a half ago. 00:15:09.20\00:15:11.86 So, I pick up the phone and it's him, and I'm completely shocked. 00:15:11.86\00:15:14.50 I'm like, it's not my birthday, it's not Christmas, why is hi 00:15:14.50\00:15:17.63 calling? 00:15:17.63\00:15:18.83 I pull over, and in a very serious tone, he basically says, 00:15:18.83\00:15:22.10 I just wanna know that there's nothing that you have nothing 00:15:22.10\00:15:27.60 against me. 00:15:27.60\00:15:29.20 Because, basically, he abandoned the family. 00:15:29.20\00:15:31.20 And it just turned out that he found out recently that he was 00:15:32.06\00:15:34.26 dying of cancer so he got on the phone and he was making the 00:15:34.26\00:15:37.66 rounds, calling all his children to make sure that there was 00:15:37.66\00:15:41.56 nothing against him. 00:15:41.56\00:15:42.63 And for the first time, I realized the gospel has 00:15:42.63\00:15:45.43 liberated me in my, even within my family. 00:15:45.43\00:15:50.83 --In a really practical way. 00:15:50.83\00:15:52.06 --I was able to say, with total honesty, I have nothing, no 00:15:52.06\00:15:55.63 hatred, no bitterness against you at all, and it was such a 00:15:55.63\00:16:01.66 shock to him, because he abandoned his family, you know, 00:16:01.66\00:16:03.56 before I grew up. 00:16:03.56\00:16:04.76 --He expected there to be, what're you doing calling, blah, 00:16:04.76\00:16:05.90 blah, blah. 00:16:05.90\00:16:07.16 --Yeah, and I realized, I'm not doing him a favor to let him off 00:16:07.16\00:16:09.06 the hook. 00:16:09.06\00:16:10.33 This is totally liberating, you know, I've been set free, the 00:16:10.33\00:16:13.03 gospel has set me free. 00:16:13.03\00:16:14.30 So, what you're saying here is, you give, you give, you give, 00:16:14.30\00:16:16.70 you're not sure if you'll receive, if the person will 00:16:16.70\00:16:18.86 reciprocate, but you will receive because the process of 00:16:18.86\00:16:21.20 forgiving is liberating for us as well. 00:16:21.20\00:16:25.80 --That reminds me of the title of the book, and the thing 00:16:25.80\00:16:29.63 that's interesting, the very creative about title of this 00:16:29.63\00:16:31.80 book is about forgiveness, keep that in mind, and 00:16:31.80\00:16:35.43 it's called Getting Even. 00:16:35.43\00:16:36.83 --That's awesome. 00:16:38.10\00:16:38.43 --Just last night, I was talking to our niece, 19 year old niece 00:16:39.86\00:16:42.96 is staying with us, lovely young lady. 00:16:42.96\00:16:45.23 And, you know, she's doing the whole boyfriend thing right now, 00:16:45.23\00:16:48.86 trying to figure that out, she loves God, she wants to put God 00:16:48.86\00:16:51.50 first, but she has a serious boyfriend, and he's from another 00:16:51.50\00:16:55.83 country, so they're kinda doing the long distance thing, he was 00:16:55.83\00:16:58.50 just here visiting, I got a chance to meet him. 00:16:58.50\00:17:00.20 Really great guy, actually. 00:17:00.20\00:17:01.50 After visiting with her last night, I was even more impressed 00:17:01.50\00:17:03.33 with him and just the way that he's carrying himself toward 00:17:03.33\00:17:06.36 her, the way that she's carrying herself toward him, there is a 00:17:06.36\00:17:08.26 responsibility there that I was really pleased to see. 00:17:08.26\00:17:11.60 Well, in the context of that, she, and I'm so thankful that I 00:17:11.80\00:17:14.80 have a relationship with her like this, and my wife does as 00:17:14.80\00:17:17.46 well. 00:17:17.46\00:17:18.10 She's asking us questions. 00:17:18.10\00:17:19.33 Like, what's appropriate? 00:17:19.80\00:17:22.56 How do I know that he loves me? 00:17:22.56\00:17:24.13 How do I know that I love him? 00:17:24.13\00:17:25.86 What should we be doing? 00:17:25.86\00:17:26.70 What shouldn't we be doing? 00:17:26.70\00:17:27.93 And I'm just thrilled in my innermost soul that here, you 00:17:27.93\00:17:30.40 have a 19 year old young lady, she's beautiful and she's asking 00:17:30.40\00:17:33.46 these kinds of questions. 00:17:33.46\00:17:35.03 Well, in the context of that, last night, what I said to her, 00:17:35.76\00:17:38.10 Ty, one of the things I said was, here's the thing, 00:17:38.10\00:17:40.00 a Christian relationship, a biblically based relationship is 00:17:40.96\00:17:43.70 seemingly crazy because you're going into it saying, what I 00:17:43.70\00:17:48.30 want out of this is the best good of the other person. 00:17:48.30\00:17:51.60 And if the other person is coming in with that same 00:17:52.50\00:17:54.43 mentality and perspective, and that's what you're figuring out 00:17:54.43\00:17:56.86 during the courting, dating, and engagement period, you figure 00:17:56.86\00:17:59.23 out, hey, this person really has my best interest in mind, too. 00:17:59.23\00:18:01.63 There is such a freedom and a liberty in knowing that you both 00:18:01.63\00:18:05.80 want the same thing. 00:18:05.80\00:18:06.80 This person wants the best good of this person. 00:18:06.80\00:18:08.60 This person wants the best good of this person. 00:18:08.60\00:18:09.93 So, what you both want is the best good of us. 00:18:09.93\00:18:12.10 This new thing that's been created. 00:18:12.63\00:18:13.83 I said, but when both people, as it were, back into a 00:18:13.83\00:18:16.73 relationship, protecting what's theirs, and the other person's 00:18:16.73\00:18:20.16 backing in and you're both, you can get that to work for a year 00:18:20.16\00:18:23.10 or 5 or maybe even 10, you can pull it off, but if at the end 00:18:23.10\00:18:26.36 of the day, the overarching theme of your marriage is, I'm 00:18:26.36\00:18:30.30 gonna keep what's mine and we get along pretty good and I 00:18:30.30\00:18:32.93 think you're fun and we both enjoy skiing, but I'm looking 00:18:32.93\00:18:36.40 out for what's me. 00:18:36.40\00:18:37.36 And here's something I said to her, I was even surprised when 00:18:38.63\00:18:39.73 this came out of my mouth, I said, many people, the 00:18:39.73\00:18:42.00 relationship that they have with their spouse, or their boyfriend 00:18:42.00\00:18:45.16 or their girlfriend or whatever, they're in a relationship with 00:18:45.16\00:18:47.46 that person because the way that that person makes them feel. 00:18:47.46\00:18:50.66 --I'm being fed by you. 00:18:51.30\00:18:52.73 --I was kinda surprised that I said this, but I said that is a 00:18:52.73\00:18:55.76 kind of social masturbation. 00:18:55.76\00:18:57.83 Because really, what it is, is I'm loving me through you. 00:18:58.66\00:19:01.46 --You're a tool. 00:19:01.80\00:19:02.66 --Exactly, exactly. 00:19:03.36\00:19:04.56 I'm loving me through you, rather than I'm loving you, like 00:19:04.56\00:19:06.76 you did with your father. 00:19:06.76\00:19:07.66 There's such a liberation in that, to not always be looking 00:19:08.90\00:19:11.20 out for yourself. 00:19:11.20\00:19:12.03 And I tell you, it just thrilled my soul to see this lovely young 00:19:13.30\00:19:17.26 growing, because I've known her since she was young, 19 year 00:19:17.26\00:19:19.76 old, just, and she's getting it. 00:19:19.76\00:19:22.33 She's getting and she's living with our family, Violet and I 00:19:22.53\00:19:25.10 have been married now for almost 15 years and we're deeply in 00:19:25.10\00:19:27.76 love. 00:19:27.76\00:19:28.43 And she's seeing, oh, so this can work. 00:19:29.36\00:19:30.56 We're not yelling, we're not screaming, that's just not 00:19:31.00\00:19:33.40 happening in our home. 00:19:33.40\00:19:34.06 So, she's saying, how do you, how do you? 00:19:35.03\00:19:37.36 --That's some good premarital counselling that you're giving. 00:19:37.93\00:19:41.70 I have to admit that I'm more of a sinner than you because you 00:19:41.70\00:19:44.43 all know this young lady I'm talking about, she's one of our 00:19:44.43\00:19:46.83 students, but she's developing a relationship with somebody you 00:19:46.83\00:19:50.63 all know who is also a student of ours, a former student of 00:19:50.63\00:19:54.30 ours. 00:19:54.30\00:19:55.23 So, she sends me an email, just yesterday. 00:19:55.23\00:19:57.46 Actually, a direct message on Twitter, and she says, 00:19:57.96\00:20:01.20 guess what. 00:20:01.60\00:20:02.93 And I said, I can't guess. 00:20:02.93\00:20:04.26 I'm in a relationship, guess who. 00:20:04.26\00:20:06.90 I guessed the wrong person. 00:20:06.90\00:20:08.53 Well, who's he? 00:20:08.53\00:20:09.90 She says. 00:20:09.90\00:20:10.20 So, then, she tells me who it is. 00:20:12.06\00:20:15.73 And I say, can you give him a message for me? 00:20:16.16\00:20:18.06 She says, yes. 00:20:18.30\00:20:19.03 Tell him that I love him dearly but I love you massively and 00:20:20.26\00:20:24.00 that if he hurts you, I'm willing to serve a life sentence 00:20:24.00\00:20:26.43 in prison to rectify the situation. 00:20:26.43\00:20:29.36 So, she actually passed the message on to the guy and then I 00:20:29.36\00:20:31.76 started feeling guilty. 00:20:31.76\00:20:32.90 So, you did a better job than me. 00:20:32.90\00:20:33.93 --Pre-marriage counselling with Ty. 00:20:33.93\00:20:36.00 If you mess with this girl. 00:20:36.00\00:20:37.43 --I'll kill you. 00:20:37.43\00:20:38.86 --I will spend my life in prison. 00:20:38.86\00:20:40.90 --It's okay in prison, I like to read. 00:20:41.20\00:20:42.63 Anyways, we have to take a break, and then, we'll come back 00:20:44.00\00:20:45.86 and we'll continue flushing out the sin problem. 00:20:45.86\00:20:49.23 --Excellent. 00:20:49.23\00:20:50.93 [Music] 00:20:50.93\00:20:58.60 --This is the story of Niyima, who took a bus to the doctor and 00:21:03.36\00:21:08.36 found a piece of paper with words of hope about Jesus, which 00:21:08.36\00:21:13.33 was left by a church member who unpacked a box that came from a 00:21:13.33\00:21:17.50 truck which drove in from Durban where a ship was docked that 00:21:17.50\00:21:22.00 sailed from Seattle, loaded with containers stacked high with 00:21:22.00\00:21:27.13 millions of tracts, trucked in from the Light Bearers 00:21:27.13\00:21:30.60 Publishing House, where more than 600 million pieces of 00:21:30.60\00:21:34.53 gospel literature have been printed in 42 languages. 00:21:34.53\00:21:38.43 Here's the amazing thing, Light Bearers distributes this 00:21:39.36\00:21:42.56 literature free of charge all over the world, and each piece 00:21:42.56\00:21:47.53 costs only 5 pennies to print, transport, and deliver. 00:21:47.53\00:21:51.26 Every day, millions of people buy a $5 cup of coffee, 00:21:53.66\00:21:56.96 $5 a cup, 5 days a week. 00:21:58.33\00:22:00.76 It adds up fast. 00:22:01.80\00:22:02.63 But at just 5 cents apiece, that same $25 can also ship 500 00:22:03.83\00:22:09.53 pieces of literature and give hope to people like Niyima, who 00:22:09.53\00:22:15.96 shared that paper with a classmate, who gave it to her 00:22:15.96\00:22:19.06 cousin, who shared it with his boss, who passed it to her 00:22:19.06\00:22:23.20 grandmother, who left it on another bus, where it will be 00:22:23.20\00:22:28.06 found by someone else. 00:22:28.06\00:22:29.53 And the story continues. 00:22:31.06\00:22:32.36 Five cents doesn't buy a lot these days, but in other parts 00:22:34.53\00:22:37.60 of the world, your nickel could change someone's life. 00:22:37.60\00:22:41.20 Your gift of $25 a month sends out 6,000 pieces of gospel 00:22:42.46\00:22:46.76 literature each year. 00:22:46.76\00:22:47.93 Fifty dollars sends out 12,000, and $100 a month sends out 00:22:49.10\00:22:53.83 24,000 messages of hope every year, all over the world. 00:22:53.83\00:22:59.06 Empower Light Bearers to continue the story. 00:23:00.80\00:23:03.20 Send your gift through lightbearers.org, or by calling 00:23:04.10\00:23:07.70 877-585-1111. 00:23:07.70\00:23:11.60 Who knew 5 little pennies could do so much? 00:23:12.70\00:23:14.96 [Music] 00:23:16.96\00:23:23.03 --We're talking about the sin problem and we're discovering 00:23:23.03\00:23:26.66 that sin is a very practical thing, it's a very relational 00:23:26.66\00:23:30.53 thing, not to make it sound good, it's bad, it's on the bad 00:23:30.53\00:23:33.00 end of the relationships that we have with God and with one 00:23:33.00\00:23:37.73 another. 00:23:37.73\00:23:39.00 But I think we've made, we've made some really good strides 00:23:39.00\00:23:42.63 for ourselves and maybe for others who are sitting in on the 00:23:42.63\00:23:45.83 conversation to define sin in language that helps us 00:23:45.83\00:23:51.50 understand that number one, sin is relational breakdown, and 00:23:51.50\00:23:55.70 number two, God is in favor of relational beauty and integrity 00:23:55.70\00:24:00.33 and he wants us to have relationships that flourish on 00:24:00.33\00:24:04.16 all levels in every way, but the problem is.. 00:24:04.16\00:24:07.90 --The horizontal, vertical and horizontal. 00:24:07.90\00:24:09.03 --Yeah, vertical and the horizontal, but the problem is 00:24:09.03\00:24:11.76 that we as human beings are messed up from the word go. 00:24:11.76\00:24:15.73 The bible goes so far, and we'll see this text in a moment, there 00:24:16.53\00:24:20.00 is not righteous, no, not one, but we were in Genesis, I'd like 00:24:20.00\00:24:24.40 to direct our attention and just see what emerges from the 00:24:24.40\00:24:28.46 conversation, to 2 bible verses in the Old Testament that I 00:24:28.46\00:24:32.83 think say a lot about the sin problem. 00:24:32.83\00:24:35.06 The first one is in Isaiah chapter 1, see what you guys 00:24:35.06\00:24:38.26 think of this, Isaiah chapter 1, and there is a local historic 00:24:38.26\00:24:43.70 application because Isaiah is addressing God through Isaiah 00:24:43.70\00:24:47.83 the prophet, is addressing the specific local historic 00:24:47.83\00:24:52.73 dysfunction of his people, Israel, at this juncture of 00:24:52.73\00:24:55.36 their history, okay, so that's the backdrop, but the language 00:24:55.36\00:24:58.66 is so applicable to the human condition as a whole in verses 5 00:24:58.66\00:25:03.06 and 6. 00:25:03.06\00:25:04.40 This is God speaking through Isaiah. 00:25:04.40\00:25:07.16 Why should you be stricken, notice the language, stricken 00:25:07.66\00:25:11.06 again? 00:25:11.06\00:25:11.93 You will revolt more and more. 00:25:11.93\00:25:14.86 The whole head is sick and the whole heart faints. 00:25:15.63\00:25:20.26 From the sole of the foot even to the head, there is no 00:25:21.03\00:25:23.73 soundness in it, but wounds and bruises and putrefying sores. 00:25:23.73\00:25:30.30 They have not been closed or bound up or soothed with 00:25:30.60\00:25:34.23 ointment. 00:25:34.23\00:25:35.00 So, this is medical language, right? 00:25:35.86\00:25:37.93 He's using words like stricken, sick. 00:25:38.20\00:25:42.20 --Putrefying sores. 00:25:42.20\00:25:43.66 --Putrefying sores. 00:25:43.66\00:25:44.70 That's strong language, isn't it? 00:25:44.70\00:25:46.80 --It's a visual. 00:25:46.80\00:25:48.06 --Okay, so, it's all physical language, it's medical language, 00:25:48.06\00:25:50.00 and it says that we have bruises and wounds. 00:25:50.00\00:25:52.56 Now, I just wanna point this out, because I think this is 00:25:52.56\00:25:56.06 true to the text, God is not assessing their physical 00:25:56.06\00:26:00.40 condition. 00:26:00.40\00:26:01.20 He's not looking at their bodies and saying, hey, I see a bruise 00:26:02.46\00:26:04.53 on your right arm. 00:26:04.53\00:26:08.16 You need to bandage that up. 00:26:08.16\00:26:09.43 And he's not saying you need to have some kind of ointment, some 00:26:09.43\00:26:13.56 kind of healing ointment that's made of, you know, Echinacea and 00:26:13.56\00:26:16.96 bee pollen. 00:26:16.96\00:26:18.63 Okay, he's not talking about physical stuff. 00:26:18.63\00:26:21.00 He's talking about the physical realm in order to talk about 00:26:21.00\00:26:25.33 things that are going on in our psyches, in our minds, in our 00:26:25.33\00:26:28.23 hearts, in our emotions, in our relationships. 00:26:28.23\00:26:30.26 And so, if you take it that way, when he says the whole head is 00:26:30.26\00:26:34.03 sick and the heart faints, he's basically saying, of the human 00:26:34.03\00:26:37.53 race, of all of us, even those at this table, he's saying, my 00:26:37.53\00:26:42.36 diagnosis is this, you are psychologically and emotionally 00:26:42.36\00:26:46.53 ill. 00:26:46.53\00:26:47.53 You are sick in the head. 00:26:48.03\00:26:49.40 You are dysfunctional on every level of your operations as a 00:26:49.83\00:26:54.56 human being. 00:26:54.56\00:26:55.36 The way you think, the way you feel and emote and process 00:26:56.56\00:27:00.23 things, the way you relate to people. 00:27:00.23\00:27:03.13 All your interactions are dysfunctional. 00:27:03.46\00:27:06.80 That's what God is basically saying to us here. 00:27:07.00\00:27:09.53 You look in the mirror every morning, you brush your teeth, 00:27:09.53\00:27:13.13 you shave, you comb your hair. 00:27:13.13\00:27:14.53 You are looking into the eyes of a crazy person. 00:27:14.53\00:27:17.53 You are looking into the eyes of somebody who is teetering on the 00:27:18.36\00:27:20.56 edge and but for the grace of God, there is no telling what 00:27:20.56\00:27:25.06 you and I are capable of. 00:27:25.06\00:27:25.96 --You know, what's really interesting here, Ty is. 00:27:27.03\00:27:28.30 --I'm serious, Jeffery. 00:27:28.30\00:27:29.86 --That's depressing. 00:27:29.86\00:27:30.86 --Well, hey, we gotta go down in order to go up. 00:27:30.86\00:27:32.83 --You keep looking straight at me as you're saying that. 00:27:33.23\00:27:35.03 --I'm looking into the eyes of a crazy person. 00:27:35.03\00:27:38.06 --But that's a powerful summary. 00:27:39.13\00:27:41.56 --It is, and we're talking about this in the context of verse 4, 00:27:41.90\00:27:44.73 which, also, in the context of our conversation is sin, we're 00:27:44.73\00:27:48.50 defining sin, we're defining it in relational language in which 00:27:48.50\00:27:51.96 we're talking about it as it affects our emotions and how we 00:27:51.96\00:27:54.43 interact with one another. 00:27:54.43\00:27:55.66 Before God gets into that somewhat cryptic, or we should 00:27:55.66\00:27:59.36 say, symbolic description, verses 5 and 6, he says in verse 00:27:59.36\00:28:03.46 4, ah, sinful nation. 00:28:03.46\00:28:05.76 A people laden with iniquity, a seed of evildoers, children that 00:28:06.36\00:28:10.56 are corrupters that have forsaken the Lord. 00:28:10.56\00:28:12.80 Now, notice this, this verse, these verses, are again, 00:28:13.00\00:28:15.96 augmenting and confirming our understanding of how sin is 00:28:15.96\00:28:20.16 relational. 00:28:20.16\00:28:21.40 Not only is it defined here as sinful, corrupt iniquity, but 00:28:21.80\00:28:26.63 it's also summarized with this phrase, who hath forsaken the 00:28:26.63\00:28:29.90 Lord? 00:28:29.90\00:28:31.16 You've forsaken the Lord, you've forsaken your relationship with 00:28:31.16\00:28:32.60 God, you're not connected to him, and therefore, you have 00:28:32.60\00:28:36.00 these wounds and these bruises and these putrefying sores, and 00:28:36.00\00:28:38.83 they haven't been mullified, they haven't been healed, they 00:28:38.83\00:28:42.23 haven't even been tended to, they're just open and they're 00:28:42.23\00:28:44.63 just putrefying, they're just rotting. 00:28:44.63\00:28:46.53 --When you have an open wound, it stinks. 00:28:46.53\00:28:50.90 We come into one another's proximity in relationships and 00:28:52.30\00:28:56.13 we notice things about each other. 00:28:56.13\00:28:57.63 And the closer you come to any one of us as human beings, you 00:28:58.03\00:29:02.53 start noticing some things that are disconcerting and we realize 00:29:02.53\00:29:08.76 that people are walking with limps, not physical limps 00:29:08.76\00:29:11.90 necessarily, people are walking with spiritual and 00:29:11.90\00:29:14.56 psychological, emotional, relational limps. 00:29:14.56\00:29:16.96 People are sensitive to the touch. 00:29:16.96\00:29:19.13 You know, sometimes you say something to somebody that you 00:29:19.40\00:29:22.06 think is just, you know, nothing, it doesn't mean 00:29:22.06\00:29:24.66 anything, you're just reaching out with your words, you say 00:29:24.66\00:29:26.33 something and they react. 00:29:26.33\00:29:28.26 Why are they reacting? 00:29:29.33\00:29:30.40 Why are they reacting? 00:29:31.10\00:29:32.36 They're reacting because you just touched a sensitive area. 00:29:32.60\00:29:36.56 You sense something, 00:29:36.56\00:29:37.43 --I have to tell this story. 00:29:37.43\00:29:38.10 --you touched a wound. 00:29:38.10\00:29:38.63 --What did you say to who? 00:29:40.70\00:29:41.70 --Oh, no, no. 00:29:41.70\00:29:42.46 Okay. 00:29:42.46\00:29:43.53 --David, we know you say things to people that... 00:29:43.53\00:29:44.80 --I know, I'm a bad human being about that, but I was with this 00:29:44.80\00:29:46.96 person not too long ago, and we were sitting in a group, and I'm 00:29:46.96\00:29:50.70 just talking as I'm, you know, I just talk and just being me and 00:29:50.70\00:29:53.46 just talking, and we started talking about, you know, 00:29:53.46\00:29:56.30 muscles, and, oh, yeah, you know you've got muscles or whatever. 00:29:56.30\00:29:58.90 There was guys and girls in the conversation and somebody 00:29:58.90\00:30:01.20 mentioned something about how they had really small wrists, it 00:30:01.20\00:30:04.16 was a guy, he went, yeah, I have kinda small wrists. 00:30:04.16\00:30:05.70 And I was sitting next to this girl who's a good friend of the 00:30:05.70\00:30:08.60 family's absolutely beautiful, just such a godly Christian 00:30:08.60\00:30:11.66 woman, and I grab her hand and I'm like, like, look at your 00:30:11.66\00:30:15.90 wrists, they're really big and thick, 00:30:15.90\00:30:17.83 and I'm talking to a woman, right? 00:30:19.36\00:30:21.20 And she's like, yeah, and she's goes on, so anyway, I think 00:30:21.20\00:30:24.03 nothing of it, the conversation continues to go. 00:30:24.03\00:30:26.06 So, the next day, one of our friends comes up to me, and 00:30:26.46\00:30:30.16 she's like, I can't believe what you said to...and I'm like, 00:30:30.16\00:30:32.96 what? 00:30:32.96\00:30:34.16 Just a roladex in the mind trying to think of what I said, 00:30:34.16\00:30:37.06 and she's like, you hurt her deeply. 00:30:37.06\00:30:39.06 I'm like, I love this person. 00:30:39.06\00:30:40.76 What could I have said? 00:30:40.76\00:30:42.86 And she's like, never talk about a woman's appearance, much less 00:30:42.86\00:30:46.40 say that she has thick wrists. 00:30:46.40\00:30:48.83 And I was like, but the point is, I don't think she was being 00:30:50.10\00:30:54.53 overly sensitive, I think I was being insensitive, but the 00:30:54.53\00:30:58.63 larger point is, it's not who was at fault, whether I was just 00:30:58.63\00:31:01.10 being insensitive, but the point is, people are sensitive about 00:31:01.10\00:31:04.16 those, you can say something and not even know that you're 00:31:04.16\00:31:06.90 touching a nerve or a wound with somebody because we're all, 00:31:06.90\00:31:10.10 there are things that you could say that would wound me, or I 00:31:11.30\00:31:13.83 should say, would touch me in places that I already have 00:31:13.83\00:31:15.86 wounds and brokenness. 00:31:15.86\00:31:17.23 And so, too, with each of us, there is this, I loved it when 00:31:17.50\00:31:21.06 you said, God, you know, Doctor God, that's kind of the picture 00:31:21.06\00:31:23.40 that emerges. 00:31:23.40\00:31:24.06 He diagnoses the situation. 00:31:24.06\00:31:25.76 And God's diagnosis is not different for Ty and James and 00:31:26.26\00:31:29.70 Jeffery and this lady, you know, I said had large wrists. 00:31:29.70\00:31:32.90 None of that. 00:31:32.90\00:31:34.00 His diagnosis, although the manifestations might be 00:31:34.00\00:31:35.96 different. 00:31:35.96\00:31:37.20 We all have the same disease. 00:31:37.20\00:31:39.40 And the disease is a fundamental brokenness in our relational 00:31:39.40\00:31:43.63 nature which inclines us to self-preservation, at times, 00:31:43.63\00:31:48.30 self-exaltation and just selfishness. 00:31:48.30\00:31:51.40 --I used to see, just to take this a step further, we all have 00:31:52.46\00:31:57.20 interactions with a lot of people. 00:31:57.20\00:31:59.60 Those of us at this table maybe more so than the average person 00:32:00.86\00:32:03.46 because we're continually travelling and staying in 00:32:03.46\00:32:07.30 people's homes even, and we're being hosted places where we're 00:32:07.30\00:32:11.83 conducting public lectures and so on, and so we meet a lot of 00:32:11.83\00:32:15.10 people, and I used to pull back, just emotionally I guess from 00:32:15.10\00:32:22.76 people who were what I would regard as obnoxious, or somebody 00:32:22.76\00:32:29.13 who is just getting too close into my space and you can feel 00:32:29.13\00:32:33.96 spray on your face, and you back up a step, and there are people 00:32:33.96\00:32:37.63 who are insensitive about, yeah, the shower, there are people 00:32:37.63\00:32:42.36 who, and I used to notice these things in people's personalities 00:32:42.36\00:32:47.40 and pull back and then, when I began to understand what's going 00:32:47.40\00:32:51.30 on in the human experience, I began to realize that these are, 00:32:51.30\00:32:54.36 these things like having, being opinionated, or being quote 00:32:54.36\00:32:59.83 unquote, loudmouthed, you know, and just saying things, or being 00:32:59.83\00:33:04.36 obnoxious in personality, and whatever we notice, and we 00:33:04.36\00:33:09.63 notice these things and people notice them in us, I began to 00:33:09.63\00:33:13.43 realize these things are manifestations. 00:33:13.43\00:33:15.80 These are limps, these are wounds. 00:33:15.80\00:33:19.16 The person who I perceive as obnoxious and there's no doubt 00:33:19.70\00:33:22.83 about it that somebody, other people may perceive me as having 00:33:22.83\00:33:25.70 defects of character, and they do, of course, but all of a 00:33:25.70\00:33:30.30 sudden, I began to realize that human contact and acceptance and 00:33:30.30\00:33:35.70 drawing close and affirmation and being friends with somebody 00:33:35.70\00:33:40.73 who's on the margins because of their limp, they've been 00:33:40.73\00:33:46.56 marginalized and nobody can stand them, I began to think 00:33:46.56\00:33:50.20 wait a minute, what would happen if, and I've experienced 00:33:50.20\00:33:53.76 on a number of occasions, now, over the years, that if you draw 00:33:53.76\00:33:57.06 close to somebody who you perceive as obnoxious, then 00:33:57.06\00:34:01.96 they begin to draw close to you, and they begin to 00:34:01.96\00:34:05.96 normalize and you begin in your obnoxious character 00:34:05.96\00:34:11.06 traits, to normalize through people's acceptance. 00:34:11.06\00:34:13.46 We shouldn't be pulling away from people because we see 00:34:13.73\00:34:16.73 things in them that we don't like. 00:34:16.73\00:34:18.20 We should be going out of our way to draw close to people that 00:34:18.96\00:34:22.13 we see things in them that we don't like because they have a 00:34:22.13\00:34:25.06 need and we should simultaneously realize that 00:34:25.06\00:34:27.43 we're not occupying the high ground of meeting their need, 00:34:27.43\00:34:30.40 but then, that we ourselves are in relationships with people 00:34:30.63\00:34:34.56 where we have needs that people would not be offended by the 00:34:34.56\00:34:38.96 stupid things that we say and do, but would accept us no 00:34:38.96\00:34:42.00 matter what. 00:34:42.00\00:34:43.26 --I hate to take this back to Genesis, but I think the point 00:34:43.26\00:34:44.53 you're making is really profound in relationship to Adam and Eve. 00:34:44.53\00:34:48.23 For example, Eve messed up and Adam followed suit. 00:34:48.23\00:34:52.76 In how he related to her, when you take that through to its 00:34:54.23\00:34:57.56 logical conclusion. 00:34:57.56\00:34:58.63 What you're saying here, and the way it came across to me is 00:34:59.86\00:35:01.86 this, and that is not only should we not back up from that 00:35:01.86\00:35:05.93 person that's acting that way, but the very act of backing up 00:35:05.93\00:35:09.83 causes us to be the very same way they are. 00:35:09.83\00:35:12.56 And the very act of drawing close to them causes us to lose 00:35:13.33\00:35:17.86 that attitude that's in us ourselves, because one of the 00:35:17.86\00:35:21.26 reasons we're, in the bible, in Romans, it says one of the 00:35:21.26\00:35:23.63 reasons why we judge others so harshly is because we recognize 00:35:23.63\00:35:27.30 in them the very same principles that we have in our own heart. 00:35:27.30\00:35:31.16 Who are you that judges another man and you do the same things? 00:35:31.90\00:35:34.26 And what he's saying in there is when you judge another man and 00:35:34.93\00:35:37.53 you recognize those principles, when you pull away, you're gonna 00:35:37.53\00:35:40.53 end up doing the same things, but when you pull near, you now 00:35:40.53\00:35:43.73 are developing a character and allowing God to work through you 00:35:43.73\00:35:47.46 to actually rid those principles that are in all of us from your 00:35:47.46\00:35:51.06 own heart. 00:35:51.06\00:35:51.86 --Those limps. 00:35:52.23\00:35:52.76 --Yeah, those limps. 00:35:52.76\00:35:54.03 You're healing yourself in the process of reaching out to heal 00:35:54.03\00:35:56.43 somebody else. 00:35:56.43\00:35:57.70 --It goes back to what we said earlier, that all of scripture 00:35:57.70\00:36:00.93 and almost all of human experience, in some significant 00:36:00.93\00:36:03.73 degree, is a commentary of Genesis chapter 1, 2, and 3. 00:36:03.73\00:36:07.60 There is such a density there, psychologically, 00:36:07.60\00:36:11.23 anthropologically, geologically, I mean just whatever, there's 00:36:11.23\00:36:14.93 just so much in Genesis 1, 2, and 3, the thing that you were 00:36:14.93\00:36:19.43 just saying reminded me of a quotation that I just tweeted 00:36:19.43\00:36:21.46 the day before yesterday from Ralph Waldo Emerson, and he 00:36:21.46\00:36:24.63 says, I love this, it is one of the beautiful compensations of 00:36:24.63\00:36:28.66 life that no man can sincerely try to help another without also 00:36:28.66\00:36:33.70 helping himself. 00:36:33.70\00:36:34.73 That's the thing you're saying. 00:36:34.93\00:36:36.16 When you draw near, it's not just in some great magnanimity 00:36:36.16\00:36:39.76 to be a blessing, you know, in a condescending way to this other 00:36:39.76\00:36:41.90 person, you yourself are being oriented around a grander truth. 00:36:41.90\00:36:49.00 And it's not me occupying, as you said, Ty, the high ground, 00:36:49.20\00:36:51.30 let me stoop down and help you down here. 00:36:51.30\00:36:53.36 --You're not doing them a favor. 00:36:53.36\00:36:54.63 --You're doing yourself a favor and them a favor, but both of 00:36:54.63\00:36:56.76 you are being reoriented toward the vertical, which is the love 00:36:56.76\00:37:00.93 of God, that's the thing. 00:37:00.93\00:37:01.90 --Your cup's being filled and overflowing. 00:37:01.90\00:37:03.83 --My point was, if I perceive that you're obnoxious in some 00:37:03.83\00:37:08.13 aspect of your personality, or that you're annoying, maybe 00:37:08.13\00:37:11.50 that's a better word, I'm really blind if I don't realize that, 00:37:11.50\00:37:18.56 that thing that I see in you is not seen in me from somebody 00:37:18.56\00:37:24.36 else. 00:37:24.36\00:37:25.60 --Well, how does God view, I mean, how is God's perspective 00:37:25.60\00:37:29.93 of us be, and how obnoxious would we be in God's eyes, if we 00:37:29.93\00:37:33.50 related to other, if God related to us in the way that we relate 00:37:33.50\00:37:38.46 to other people, we would be toast. 00:37:38.46\00:37:40.13 --Scripture says that over and over again, there's a, my 00:37:41.26\00:37:43.20 mother, who is not, she's a Christian, I wouldn't call her, 00:37:43.20\00:37:46.76 like, a full on, you know, fundamentalist Christian, but 00:37:46.76\00:37:49.83 early on in my... 00:37:49.83\00:37:51.60 --Which wouldn't be a compliment, by the way, in my 00:37:52.16\00:37:53.50 opinion, I just have to throw that out. 00:37:53.50\00:37:54.83 A full on fundamentalist Christian. 00:37:55.03\00:37:56.33 --No, no, no, that's not a compliment, in other words, 00:37:56.33\00:37:58.06 she's somebody who loves God and who takes him seriously and she, 00:37:58.06\00:38:01.96 even early on in my experience, began to orient me toward this 00:38:01.96\00:38:05.86 other-centeredness, even though I, you know, it's a lesson hard 00:38:05.86\00:38:08.06 learned, but she cross stitched, and I still have this, she cross 00:38:08.06\00:38:11.80 stitched this thing for me, and it was Gandhi that said it, 00:38:11.80\00:38:14.43 actually, and yet, the principle is absolutely, patently biblical 00:38:14.43\00:38:18.93 and Christian, and he said, imperfect, ourselves, we must be 00:38:18.93\00:38:23.53 careful in our treatment of others. 00:38:23.53\00:38:25.63 When we know what our own brokenness, we should be keenly 00:38:27.20\00:38:32.86 aware that God's perspective on us is a whole different 00:38:32.86\00:38:35.80 perspective than my perspective on you. 00:38:35.80\00:38:37.30 I don't occupy some sort of high ground, and you don't occupy 00:38:37.30\00:38:39.60 some sort of high ground over and against me. 00:38:39.60\00:38:41.73 God is the one who occupies the moral high ground of the 00:38:41.73\00:38:44.33 universe. 00:38:44.33\00:38:45.60 He is love in his very nature, in his very essence, in the very 00:38:45.60\00:38:47.80 fiber and fabric of what makes God, God, and we are all 00:38:47.80\00:38:51.83 wallowing, according to Doctor God, in Isaiah 1, with broken 00:38:51.83\00:38:55.73 heads, broken hearts, broken bodies, broken psyches, broken 00:38:55.73\00:38:57.70 relationships, and the only way to be reoriented properly toward 00:38:57.70\00:39:02.80 one another is to be reoriented properly toward him, and it's so 00:39:02.80\00:39:07.90 liberating and it transforms the landscape of all of your 00:39:07.90\00:39:12.23 relationships, both familial, friends, coworkers, 00:39:12.23\00:39:15.13 acquaintances, fathers who have abandoned you, I've had the same 00:39:15.13\00:39:18.93 experience, Ty had the same experience. 00:39:18.93\00:39:20.23 I mean, every one of us at this table did not have a strong 00:39:20.23\00:39:24.66 father figure, and yet, there is such, and my father is still 00:39:24.66\00:39:27.96 alive, even though I've only talked to him on the phone twice 00:39:27.96\00:39:29.83 and he was totally disinterested in getting involved. 00:39:29.83\00:39:32.26 But I have such freedom in my heart toward him, no antagonism, 00:39:32.26\00:39:36.40 nothing. 00:39:36.93\00:39:38.06 It's nothing to me. 00:39:38.06\00:39:39.63 I mean, I would love to, in fact, right after I got 00:39:39.63\00:39:41.53 converted, I contacted him, I was 23 years old, got ahold of 00:39:41.53\00:39:44.20 him, and I just wanted to let him know that I had experienced 00:39:44.20\00:39:49.46 the forgiveness of God in Christ and I just wanted him to know 00:39:49.46\00:39:52.90 that I forgave him and that was there, because it must just be 00:39:52.90\00:39:56.80 eating away at him. 00:39:56.80\00:39:57.73 I mean, me and my brother both. 00:39:57.73\00:39:59.06 Where's he? 00:40:00.00\00:40:00.83 --I had the same experience in mine, you know, we've all 00:40:02.03\00:40:04.76 experienced the abandonment of the father figure, of course, 00:40:04.76\00:40:08.93 I've never known my father at all, but I had a stepfather, who 00:40:08.93\00:40:12.46 was extremely violent and just the mention of his name would 00:40:12.46\00:40:17.86 arouse in my body, my physical body, kind of a shaking, you 00:40:17.86\00:40:25.03 know, just because of the things I witnessed that he had done to 00:40:25.03\00:40:29.33 my mother and what a liberation. 00:40:29.33\00:40:32.10 And this wasn't something that I'd disciplined myself to do, I 00:40:32.10\00:40:35.86 would have to say that this happened to me almost by 00:40:35.86\00:40:38.96 osmosis, just by acquainting myself with the gospel and the 00:40:38.96\00:40:43.20 love of God for me, what a liberation it was to hear his 00:40:43.20\00:40:49.16 name, to think of him, to have somebody bring him up and to 00:40:49.16\00:40:52.70 genuinely feel nothing anymore in my body in my heart. 00:40:52.70\00:40:58.13 --Nothing negative. 00:40:58.13\00:40:58.93 --Nothing negative. 00:40:58.93\00:40:59.70 --Just freedom. 00:40:59.70\00:41:00.60 --Yeah, just total freedom. 00:41:00.60\00:41:01.66 I don't hate him. 00:41:01.66\00:41:03.96 He's still alive, I don't hate him and I think I could have a 00:41:03.96\00:41:07.80 conversation with him. 00:41:07.80\00:41:09.16 Not a warm, fuzzy conversation. 00:41:09.16\00:41:11.60 --But you don't wanna strangle him. 00:41:11.60\00:41:13.10 --But I'm saying, I don't hate him, there's no anger there in 00:41:13.10\00:41:18.10 my heart anymore, and that is not something that I just tried 00:41:18.10\00:41:21.10 hard enough to pull off. 00:41:21.10\00:41:23.36 --I know we have to take a break, but what I love most 00:41:23.86\00:41:25.13 about what you said there, Ty, and in addition to the fact that 00:41:25.13\00:41:27.60 God has given you freedom, God has given you liberty, it's that 00:41:27.60\00:41:30.06 it's not something that you worked for and you went through 00:41:30.06\00:41:32.40 a program, it was by osmosis, as you say, just dwelling and 00:41:32.40\00:41:35.40 abiding in the love of God and in the gospel. 00:41:35.40\00:41:39.13 It's healing you. 00:41:40.00\00:41:41.60 To use the Isaiah 1 metaphor, you are being healed. 00:41:41.60\00:41:45.30 --Incrementally, God's love permeates. 00:41:46.23\00:41:49.90 --It is with huge theological implication that when Jesus 00:41:50.13\00:41:53.46 comes, he spends a lot of time preaching, but he spends even 00:41:53.46\00:41:56.70 more time healing people and sometimes, explicitly saying, 00:41:56.70\00:42:01.90 I'm healing this person's physical body so that you can 00:42:01.90\00:42:05.13 know that I have the ability to heal their relational, 00:42:05.13\00:42:08.83 spiritual, psychological brokenness. 00:42:08.83\00:42:10.76 --I love what we're saying, the way that I've spoken it to 00:42:11.83\00:42:16.83 myself at times is the more I partake of God's love and grace 00:42:16.83\00:42:21.00 and the knowledge of his love and grace toward me, it 00:42:21.00\00:42:24.53 gradually takes up all the emotional space inside of me. 00:42:24.53\00:42:29.60 There's darkness over here, there's anger, there's 00:42:30.36\00:42:32.36 resentment, there's hatred, there's all this stuff that's 00:42:32.36\00:42:35.20 taking up space inside of our heads and our hearts, and the 00:42:35.20\00:42:39.00 love of God just permeates and it just takes up more and more 00:42:39.00\00:42:42.83 space and more and more space and in the process, it's 00:42:42.83\00:42:44.70 squeezing out all the other stuff. 00:42:44.70\00:42:48.40 Well, David, you said we have to take a break and we really do, 00:42:48.80\00:42:50.73 but we do have one final segment in this particular conversation, 00:42:51.10\00:42:55.93 and I think there's even more. 00:42:55.93\00:42:57.80 I said I had 2 scriptures in the Old Testament that I was 00:42:57.80\00:43:00.23 wondering, and there's one more that I'm wondering what you guys 00:43:00.23\00:43:02.66 think of, so we'll talk about that when we come back. 00:43:02.66\00:43:04.23 [Music] 00:43:06.63\00:43:15.90 --The Light Bearers Story is a short award-winning video that 00:43:15.90\00:43:19.20 gives an inside look at one of the boldest and most effective 00:43:19.20\00:43:22.50 missionary ventures of our time. 00:43:22.50\00:43:24.96 You will see how multiple millions of gospel publications 00:43:24.96\00:43:27.80 are flooding the nations free of charge by surprisingly simple 00:43:27.80\00:43:31.10 means. 00:43:31.10\00:43:31.70 For your free copy of the Light Bearers Story, call 00:43:32.80\00:43:34.86 877-585-1111, or write to Light Bearers, 37457 Jasper Lowell 00:43:34.86\00:43:42.76 Road, Jasper, Oregon 97438. 00:43:42.76\00:43:46.53 Once again, for your free copy of the Light Bearers Story, call 00:43:47.00\00:43:50.63 877-585-1111 or write to Light Bearers 37457 Jasper Lowell 00:43:50.63\00:43:58.46 Road, Jasper, Oregon 97438. 00:43:58.46\00:44:02.00 Simply ask for the Light Bearers Story. 00:44:02.33\00:44:04.63 [Music] 00:44:06.56\00:44:13.90 --During the break, something kind of funny happened, there 00:44:15.90\00:44:19.03 was an evidence of our fallen condition as a human race, 00:44:19.03\00:44:23.20 because, I don't know why, but we have some play doh on the 00:44:23.20\00:44:25.43 table and Jeffery.... 00:44:25.43\00:44:28.33 --I wish you hadn't called attention to the fact that we 00:44:28.33\00:44:29.86 have play doh on the table. 00:44:29.86\00:44:31.13 --Jeffery wouldn't touch any of it because he was afraid that 00:44:31.13\00:44:32.83 our germs or somebody else's germs were on it. 00:44:32.83\00:44:34.90 So, David gave Jeffery his own little piece that nobody's 00:44:34.90\00:44:40.60 touched, well now, David's touched it. 00:44:40.60\00:44:42.36 --Well, I've not like gooped it up though. 00:44:42.36\00:44:44.13 --Jeffery doesn't want it. 00:44:46.66\00:44:47.93 --You guys have atoms, genes, and germs and I wanna stay clear 00:44:47.93\00:44:50.70 of it. 00:44:50.70\00:44:51.96 --That brings me to the second scripture in the Old Testament 00:44:51.96\00:44:54.46 that I'm wondering what you guys think of because these aren't 00:44:55.33\00:44:57.50 common verses, this is Jeremiah 17. 00:44:57.50\00:44:59.93 These aren't common verses that people use to talk about the sin 00:45:00.50\00:45:04.10 problem. 00:45:04.10\00:45:04.83 We just commonly jump to 1 John 3:4, sin is transgression of the 00:45:06.10\00:45:10.03 law, and we focus on the outward aspect of the problem, but as 00:45:10.03\00:45:17.26 Isaiah 1, which we just covered, points out, and now Jeremiah 17, 00:45:17.26\00:45:21.43 look at verse 1 and then look at verse 9, see what you guys think 00:45:21.43\00:45:25.73 here, verse 1, the sin of Judah is written with a pen of iron, 00:45:25.73\00:45:32.13 with the point of a diamond, it is engraved on the tablet of 00:45:32.96\00:45:37.56 their heart. 00:45:37.56\00:45:38.50 Now, this is interesting, first of all, I'm just wondering. 00:45:39.86\00:45:42.36 This language is obviously metaphoric. 00:45:42.36\00:45:46.03 A pen of iron? 00:45:46.03\00:45:47.56 The point of a diamond? 00:45:48.13\00:45:49.43 These are just hard substances that can create indelible, 00:45:49.43\00:45:54.13 deeply etched marks, right? 00:45:54.13\00:45:56.46 And where is this deep, indelible marking taking place? 00:45:57.00\00:46:01.30 It's on the heart, in the heart. 00:46:01.30\00:46:03.73 And notice that it says that the heart is a tablet, what's a 00:46:03.73\00:46:06.70 tablet? 00:46:06.70\00:46:07.46 Well, a tablet, actually, this is a tablet, this is an old 00:46:08.70\00:46:10.26 school tablet that I'm using. 00:46:10.26\00:46:11.73 This is a tablet, and here's a new school tablet, you got the 00:46:12.36\00:46:15.06 iPad here, you got the iPad mini, what's a tablet? 00:46:15.06\00:46:18.23 A tablet is a device for accumulating data or 00:46:18.53\00:46:22.76 information. 00:46:22.76\00:46:23.56 So, this scripture literally says, sin writes things inside 00:46:24.80\00:46:29.80 of us. 00:46:29.80\00:46:30.66 The human heart, the human psyche, the human conscience is 00:46:31.86\00:46:35.26 a receptacle for outside influences that make their 00:46:35.26\00:46:41.60 indelible impression on the inside. 00:46:41.60\00:46:43.50 Guilt is accumulated inside of us through the commission of 00:46:44.36\00:46:48.03 sin. 00:46:48.03\00:46:48.70 Habit patterns are formed through committing sin. 00:46:49.76\00:46:52.46 But then in verse 9, it's just amazing what he says here, the 00:46:52.80\00:46:57.23 heart, that is the heart that in verse 1, has sin inscribed in it 00:46:57.23\00:47:00.63 with the point of a diamond, as it were. 00:47:00.63\00:47:03.36 The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked, 00:47:03.90\00:47:07.53 and then this question, who can know it? 00:47:08.16\00:47:11.10 So, here, Jeremiah is basically saying, the sin problem not only 00:47:12.86\00:47:18.66 involves the outward commission of sin, the outward violations 00:47:18.66\00:47:23.76 of relationships, it also involves an inner dimension of 00:47:23.76\00:47:28.56 sin being written on our hearts and then he says that we're so 00:47:28.56\00:47:34.43 desperately and deeply and profoundly wicked that we don't 00:47:34.43\00:47:39.13 even know ourselves. 00:47:39.13\00:47:40.26 We don't know truly how dysfunctional, broken, wounded, 00:47:41.03\00:47:44.73 damaged, depraved, that we really are. 00:47:44.73\00:47:47.70 And when it says that our hearts are deceitful and who can know 00:47:48.40\00:47:51.03 it, one of the ways that we manifest our brokenness is that 00:47:51.03\00:47:57.06 we basically lie, to ourselves and to others. 00:47:57.06\00:48:01.76 We project, we project personas, we come up with, you know, 00:48:02.70\00:48:06.90 somebody has neglected their children for years and years and 00:48:06.90\00:48:11.13 years, and the way they compensate for that is by 00:48:11.13\00:48:14.16 building a false narrative that elevates them. 00:48:14.16\00:48:17.66 Well, I'm a workaholic. 00:48:17.86\00:48:18.83 Well, it's a little bit demeaning to confess, I'm a 00:48:19.93\00:48:22.56 workaholic, but actually, it elevates me in my estimation so 00:48:22.56\00:48:26.86 I don't have to cope with the deeper issues that I ruined my 00:48:26.86\00:48:30.06 relationship with my children by pursuing money and career and 00:48:30.06\00:48:33.83 profession, but I compensate for it by viewing myself in a 00:48:33.83\00:48:40.10 deceptive way. 00:48:40.10\00:48:41.03 I don't face the thing that's really there, I deceive myself, 00:48:42.30\00:48:46.10 the heart is deceitful above all things, who can know it? 00:48:46.10\00:48:48.53 I don't know how truly fallen, broken, damaged, wicked I am. 00:48:48.73\00:48:54.03 --I don't understand myself. 00:48:54.93\00:48:56.06 But I love verse 10, is the answer to who can know it, verse 00:48:57.30\00:48:59.10 10, I the Lord search the heart. 00:48:59.10\00:49:01.33 I test the mind. 00:49:02.10\00:49:03.10 --He's the doctor, he's the one that can give. 00:49:04.00\00:49:06.53 --You need God in order to understand yourself. 00:49:06.53\00:49:07.76 --That's right. 00:49:08.63\00:49:09.90 --A couple, oh, I don't know, if it was two conversations ago, 00:49:09.90\00:49:11.90 but I mentioned this fantastic quotation. 00:49:11.90\00:49:14.10 I'll have to actually bring up the full quotation. 00:49:14.10\00:49:16.50 By Blaise Pascal, where he basically says, without an 00:49:16.50\00:49:19.16 understanding of the sinfulness that is innate to us and within 00:49:19.16\00:49:24.16 us as a result of the fall described in Genesis 3, he says, 00:49:24.16\00:49:28.30 we remain incomprehensible to ourselves. 00:49:28.30\00:49:30.70 We have, and then he goes on to say, because we are, we find 00:49:32.46\00:49:35.36 ourselves, you know, battered between two positions, having a 00:49:35.36\00:49:38.66 desire for goodness and love, but an incapacity to do it. 00:49:38.66\00:49:42.90 --Yeah, we're morally bankrupt. 00:49:43.13\00:49:44.46 --He said if we had no desire, we would be only like the 00:49:44.46\00:49:45.76 beasts, right? 00:49:45.76\00:49:46.76 We'd just, we're just a bundle of desires and we do the thing, 00:49:48.03\00:49:49.50 but we have this moral desire or longing for something more. 00:49:49.50\00:49:54.56 We have a sense that we were made for something greater, but 00:49:54.56\00:49:56.63 we have an inability to attain to it. 00:49:56.63\00:49:58.36 So, we're trapped between a longing for this, or a 00:49:58.36\00:50:02.06 connection to this being enslaved to this but a longing 00:50:02.06\00:50:05.26 for this, and he says, we're incomprehensible to ourselves. 00:50:05.26\00:50:07.60 --That just reminds me of my whole conversion experience. 00:50:08.06\00:50:10.66 I remember in my early years, teenage years and when I became 00:50:10.66\00:50:16.26 a Christian at 21, I remember having that whole experience. 00:50:16.26\00:50:19.46 I remember one day, just looking out the window, it was winter, 00:50:19.46\00:50:23.03 there was snow on the ground, and we lived in a neighborhood 00:50:23.03\00:50:26.26 with a slight hill and my friends were in the home and we 00:50:26.26\00:50:29.80 were all just kinda listening to rock and roll music and partying 00:50:29.80\00:50:33.03 and whatever and there was a car that was driving up the hill 00:50:33.03\00:50:36.63 really slowly, and one of the reasons it was driving up the 00:50:36.63\00:50:39.13 hill really slowly is because it was wintertime and there was 00:50:39.13\00:50:41.76 snow on the ground and it couldn't get traction, and so it 00:50:41.76\00:50:44.90 was driving up the hill really slowly and my friends, you know, 00:50:44.90\00:50:48.26 when you're standing there looking out the window, people, 00:50:48.26\00:50:50.16 you know, you're in a community, they'll come over, hey, what're 00:50:50.16\00:50:52.66 you looking at, so we're all, so everyone comes over to the 00:50:52.66\00:50:55.16 window and they're all looking at this car, we all start 00:50:55.16\00:50:56.60 looking at this car and we're noticing the predicament it's in 00:50:56.60\00:50:59.36 and everyone just starts laughing, oh, come and look at 00:50:59.36\00:51:02.10 this, this guy can't get up the hill, this guy can't get up the 00:51:02.10\00:51:03.66 hill, this guy can't get up, and normally, that's what I would 00:51:03.66\00:51:07.70 do, that's the way I would think, I would just, ah, yeah, 00:51:07.70\00:51:09.43 look at that, it's so funny. 00:51:09.43\00:51:10.50 But there was something in me, as you describe it there, that 00:51:11.76\00:51:14.20 wanted to be more than just a part of the heard and something 00:51:14.20\00:51:19.30 in me that was looking at that situation in a different way, 00:51:19.30\00:51:23.40 like you said, looking for something that was higher than 00:51:23.60\00:51:26.43 just this animal mentality of ah-ha-ha you know, type of 00:51:26.43\00:51:29.90 thing. 00:51:29.90\00:51:31.00 And something prompted me to say something that was really 00:51:32.20\00:51:34.40 strange to everyone, including myself. 00:51:34.40\00:51:36.83 I said, we should go out there and help him. 00:51:37.23\00:51:38.53 And I'm telling you what, it was so weird because I said, did I 00:51:39.23\00:51:42.36 say that? 00:51:42.36\00:51:44.63 And we did, we all went out there and we helped push that 00:51:44.63\00:51:47.50 car, and you know what was really interesting, what was 00:51:47.50\00:51:48.90 really interesting is, we went out there, we helped push that 00:51:48.90\00:51:52.20 car up the hill, and all of us felt great. 00:51:52.20\00:51:55.73 And all of a sudden it was all of a sudden like, you know what? 00:51:56.53\00:51:58.76 This is what I was made for. 00:51:58.76\00:52:00.86 This is what we're made for. 00:52:01.73\00:52:03.03 --That's the Emerson quote. 00:52:03.36\00:52:04.46 One of the beautiful compensations of life that no 00:52:04.46\00:52:06.23 man can sincerely help another without also benefitting 00:52:06.23\00:52:09.36 himself. 00:52:09.36\00:52:10.06 God has made the universe to work that way. 00:52:11.03\00:52:12.23 --Yes, and that was a major component in my shift of 00:52:13.00\00:52:15.66 direction in life. 00:52:15.66\00:52:16.46 Majorly, just that little thing right there. 00:52:17.43\00:52:18.43 --It is amazing how the little things stick with you. 00:52:19.56\00:52:20.66 When I look back over the things, it's not the, you know, 00:52:21.86\00:52:23.00 it's not always the big, monumental, it's the little 00:52:23.00\00:52:25.60 conversations, I can resonate very much with that. 00:52:25.60\00:52:28.66 Something that occurred to me about the text, you're going 00:52:28.66\00:52:32.20 back to the text, is that if you have to write something with 00:52:32.20\00:52:34.50 iron and a diamond, what does that tell you about the 00:52:34.50\00:52:36.70 substance on which you're writing. 00:52:36.70\00:52:38.33 --It's hard. 00:52:38.63\00:52:39.90 --We have play doh here, right, so if you flatten a play doh, 00:52:39.90\00:52:42.13 you can make a impress, because it's soft, it's pliable and it's 00:52:42.13\00:52:45.80 easy to write, but if God says, oh, on your heart? 00:52:45.80\00:52:48.40 Oh, no, no, no, no. 00:52:48.93\00:52:49.93 --I have to use iron. 00:52:49.93\00:52:51.13 --Iron and diamonds to write on your heart, and to sort of 00:52:51.13\00:52:52.70 utilize another, the same biblical metaphor, but in 00:52:52.70\00:52:55.53 another biblical context, Ezekiel 36, it talks about your 00:52:55.53\00:52:58.30 heart is stony, right, your heart is made of stone and it's 00:52:58.30\00:53:03.16 such a rock hard stone that I can just only barely etch with, 00:53:03.16\00:53:08.53 as it were, a diamond and iron into your heart. 00:53:08.53\00:53:11.20 That tells us that, that hardness is a concrete 00:53:11.43\00:53:16.06 solidification of our heart in a certain direction and in a 00:53:16.06\00:53:20.00 certain bend, that thing that we were describing, being locked 00:53:20.00\00:53:22.70 into this, but longing for this. 00:53:22.70\00:53:24.60 It's a moral hell is what it is. 00:53:25.03\00:53:26.76 --And also, the context of it is, if something is that hard 00:53:26.76\00:53:30.70 that it needs a diamond to write into, it's, you can't remove it. 00:53:30.70\00:53:33.53 Sin is written with the pen of iron. 00:53:33.53\00:53:36.40 So, this is an immovable, this is an immovable thing that 00:53:36.40\00:53:41.36 you're dealing with here, it's in our nature, and you can't 00:53:41.36\00:53:43.66 just erase it. 00:53:43.66\00:53:45.13 You can't just reform it. 00:53:45.36\00:53:47.16 --Great point. 00:53:47.16\00:53:47.76 --James, what you were saying triggered some memories in my 00:53:49.03\00:53:51.40 mind because this text is saying that the human heart is 00:53:51.40\00:53:56.03 deceitful above all things, we imagine ourselves to be elevated 00:53:56.03\00:53:59.70 above others. 00:53:59.70\00:54:00.43 I mentioned a moment ago that I was raised in a home where there 00:54:01.70\00:54:03.30 was a lot of violence. 00:54:03.30\00:54:04.33 Well, one of the things was, as a kid and as a teenager, I so 00:54:05.60\00:54:09.93 recoiled at it that said to myself, I would never, and I 00:54:09.93\00:54:13.70 will never, and I would never ever do anything like that. 00:54:13.70\00:54:17.46 I imagined that violence was foreign to my nature, but then I 00:54:17.46\00:54:22.46 found myself in a situation in the 8th grade with this in my 00:54:22.46\00:54:26.60 background where I'm being continually pushed around by a 00:54:26.60\00:54:31.66 group of kids because I'm the new kid in the neighborhood, and 00:54:31.66\00:54:34.50 finally, I find myself, this person who thinks I could never 00:54:34.50\00:54:38.76 do anything violent at the urging of the other kids, and 00:54:38.76\00:54:42.23 even at the urging of my stepfather, I find myself 00:54:42.23\00:54:45.16 sitting over another human being in the park behind the school 00:54:45.16\00:54:49.46 with my fists clenched, driving my fists violently, 00:54:49.46\00:54:55.16 uncontrollably, into this other kid's face, he's bleeding, he's 00:54:55.16\00:55:00.73 beginning to go unconscious and it takes the other kids to pull 00:55:00.73\00:55:04.23 me off of him. 00:55:04.23\00:55:05.90 This is the kid who says, I would never do that. 00:55:06.40\00:55:10.36 --But your heart is deceitful. 00:55:10.80\00:55:11.86 --My heart is deceitful, I'm capable of violence. 00:55:11.86\00:55:16.20 In fact, I say sometimes in preaching and, inevitably, 00:55:16.90\00:55:21.83 people would come up to me and say, I don't know if that's 00:55:21.83\00:55:24.03 true, that's pretty dark what you just said, and here's what 00:55:24.03\00:55:26.26 it is, and I say, you've never witnessed anything so low, so 00:55:26.26\00:55:29.56 heinous, so horrible that any human being has ever done in 00:55:29.56\00:55:33.60 history that you yourself would not do given the same pressures, 00:55:33.60\00:55:39.80 circumstances, background, you would. 00:55:39.80\00:55:43.46 --Or that you could do. 00:55:43.46\00:55:44.73 --You could do, you're capable of the worst things imaginable. 00:55:44.73\00:55:47.00 --The same wiring in Cain's head is the same wiring system that 00:55:47.00\00:55:52.83 you have in your head. 00:55:52.83\00:55:53.80 --Because at the end of the day, if reality is built around the 00:55:55.06\00:55:57.63 principle of self-preservation, I have to, whether it takes 00:55:57.63\00:56:01.33 violence, deception, manipulation, coercion, whatever 00:56:01.33\00:56:05.00 it takes, and here's the tragedy, and we're getting 00:56:05.00\00:56:07.30 there, but many people imagine that God is just like that, 00:56:07.30\00:56:10.96 because he's the most powerful being in the universe, he's 00:56:10.96\00:56:14.26 above, so if everybody's looking out for their own best interest, 00:56:14.26\00:56:16.36 and God is looking out for his, who's a match for God? 00:56:16.36\00:56:19.56 --And even when we think that we're righteous, the only reason 00:56:19.76\00:56:21.80 I haven't done anything crazy is because you haven't crossed, you 00:56:21.80\00:56:24.30 haven't stepped on my feet, or my toes sufficiently. 00:56:24.30\00:56:27.06 --Good closing point, because it's over, but we're gonna come 00:56:27.33\00:56:30.53 back and explore this subject more. 00:56:30.53\00:56:33.53 [Music] 00:56:33.53\00:56:34.53