Participants: David Asscherick, James Rafferty, Jeffrey Rosario, Ty Gibson
Series Code: TT
Program Code: TT000017
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00:01 [Music]
00:10 [Music] 00:21 --Alright, guys, we're in session number four of our 00:23 Righteousness by Faith series. 00:25 And it's been pretty interesting. 00:27 We began by just unpacking the idea of righteousness by faith 00:32 as a language that a lot people might not be familiar with. 00:34 And even those who are familiar with that language within a 00:37 theological and church context, I think it's important just to 00:41 bring that language down and make it accessible. 00:44 We began to understand that righteousness by faith, while it 00:48 sounds technical... 00:49 --It sounds churchy. 00:50 --Churchy, it's really about relationship with God. 00:55 It's a term that defines a way of relating from God to us and 01:01 then us reciprocating back to God. 01:05 And then we moved on and we really spent a lot of time 01:07 dealing with the Genesis account of the creation of man, the fall 01:13 of man and what that began to look like and then God calling 01:18 Abraham out. 01:19 That's pretty much where we left off. 01:21 And now, we wanna move into territory, where, first of all, 01:26 in Genesis, we find that, what we're calling the sin problem, 01:31 again, it sounds pretty churchy, kinda in house, but we're gonna 01:35 unpack it, what does the sin problem look like? 01:40 When we say the word sin, for example, are we talking about an 01:44 arbitrarily concocted list of rules that God, because he's 01:48 bigger than us and more powerful than us, is just imposing and we 01:53 had better do what he says or else because he's God and we're 01:56 not? 01:57 I mean, could he have just as easily come up with a different 02:00 list, like move those rocks over there and then move them back? 02:03 Or is there something about this word sin in scripture that is 02:08 intrinsic to the operations of our humanity as God created 02:14 humanity. 02:15 --Well, in the bigger picture, we talked about how, in Genesis 02:17 3, they only disobeyed God, we were talking about the process, 02:20 they didn't actually take the fruit until there was a 02:23 psychological sort of process that took place where they began 02:27 to question God. 02:29 So, basically, when trust broke up, 02:32 only then did the actual act follow. 02:35 I think you're talking about the definitions of sin, at a 02:37 fundamental level, it seems to be rooted in in distrust of God. 02:43 --It's relational. 02:44 Broken trust. 02:45 --And because it's relational, it's not arbitrary. 02:47 In other words, I think that that's a great question because 02:49 many people, I think, ourselves, maybe at this table, in the 02:52 past, have thought of things that God does as arbitrary, but 02:56 we should remind ourselves that nothing that God does is ever 02:58 arbitrary. 03:00 It's always purposeful, it's always intentional, and it's 03:02 always with our best good in mind. 03:04 So, when we talk about sin, we're talking about a violation 03:06 of a code, I guess the simplest way to say it would be 03:09 a transgression of God's law, right? 03:12 But then we even have to unpack that. 03:14 What is God's law? 03:15 What does that mean? 03:16 Why does he have a law? 03:17 What kind of a law is it? 03:18 Etc. We're kind of getting ahead of the cart here, but the point 03:20 is, is that sin is not arbitrary, the definition of it 03:24 is not arbitrary, it's patently relational because it's based on 03:27 a distrust of God and when we're coming out of the Genesis story, 03:31 we have seen, and I love that trajectory that you paint there, 03:35 we see from the creation in Genesis 1 and 2, okay, that's 03:37 all is well there, but from 3, 4, 5, 6, there's just this 03:42 downward slide. 03:44 We get into the time of the flood, and it's like, God is 03:46 like, they're thoughts are only evil continually. 03:51 --And actually, before we go that far, do you guys mind if we 03:53 do, if we read what I think is a major transition in the story. 03:58 We're talking about the progression of Genesis from 3 04:02 all the way to the flood, but Genesis 5, specifically, there's 04:05 this interesting detail here that kinda describes a 04:09 transition in human nature. 04:12 In verse 1, this is the book of the genealogy of Adam. 04:16 In the day that God created man, he made him in the likeness of 04:19 God, and the backdrop of that we're familiar with, Genesis 1. 04:24 Verse 2, he created them male and female and blessed them and 04:27 called them mankind the day that were created. 04:30 And verse 3 says, and Adam lived 130 years and begot a son in his 04:36 own likeness. 04:38 --There's the key. 04:39 --After his image, and he named him Seth. 04:42 So, it's really interesting, in the beginning, man, Adam is 04:45 created in the image of God in the likeness of God, then we 04:49 have all hell breaks loose in chapter 3, there's the breaking 04:53 down of trust with God and all the ramifications of that, and 04:57 then, now, in chapter 5 verse 1, there's this transition, 05:00 everyone who is born post Adam, obviously, is now born in his 05:04 image and after his likeness, Adam, that is. 05:07 Adam after the breaking down of his relationship with God. 05:12 So, now, we're coming into this world with a different wired 05:16 system. 05:18 We have different wiring. 05:19 --Well, we see that even in the Genesis 3 account, when God 05:22 comes into the garden to basically take account of what's 05:25 taken place, and he says to Adam, you know, essentially, 05:29 what's going on here? 05:30 Who told you that you were naked? 05:31 And his knee jerk instinctive response is to say, it's the 05:34 woman. 05:36 Right, and now, we sort of play a joke on that, you know, the 05:38 guy blames the girl, and that is, I guess, a little humorous, 05:39 but the larger point is that he has instantaneously gone from a 05:44 desire to please others and to be a blessing to others to being 05:47 other centered, to self-preservation. 05:51 Hey, I've got a, it's exactly what the serpent had said. 05:54 God's looking out for himself to the woman, you need to be 05:56 looking out for yourself. 05:57 Now that this switch has taken place from other centeredness to 05:59 self-centeredness, you don't have to teach him this. 06:03 Instinctively, the first, well, the woman that you gave me. 06:05 So then God turns his attention to her, and instinctively, she's 06:07 all about self-preservation as well, well, you put the serpent 06:10 in the garden. 06:12 So, there's the shift, so, now, you're right, when Seth is made 06:14 in Adam's image, it's not in an image that's naturally, by 06:17 default, inclined to give God the glory and to be service 06:20 oriented and love oriented and other centered, it's inwardly 06:24 focused. 06:26 --And that's the essence of the sin problem right there. 06:28 When we talk about sin, we're not talking about God just 06:31 making up some rules to see if we'll do what he says, we're 06:36 talking about God essentially being a God of love or other 06:40 centeredness in his nature, so he creates human beings to live 06:45 that way, to live with other centeredness, to live in his 06:48 love, and all of his laws, according to scripture, are an 06:53 outgrowth of that essential truth about his character that 06:55 God is love. 06:56 So, when sin is committed, sin is not just behaviorally 07:02 breaking a rule, it is a violation of the integrity of 07:06 love relationship. 07:08 First and foremost, vertically. 07:11 Secondarily, horizontally. 07:13 And you find this, if you fast forward to the New Testament 07:16 where Jesus comes along and he basically says, whatever the 07:19 nature of your relationship is to other human beings, that's 07:24 your relationship to me. 07:26 You remember that in Matthew 25. 07:29 Yeah, you feed somebody who's hungry, it's like you're feeding 07:33 me. 07:34 You don't feed somebody who's hungry, you don't tend to the 07:36 needs of those who are in need, and it impacts me. 07:40 There's this vertical horizon from God's standpoint. 07:44 John goes so far as to say if you hate another human being, 07:48 don't say you love God because there is an inextricable 07:54 connection between our human relationships and our 07:59 relationship with God. 08:00 So, vertical violation of the integrity of the love 08:03 relationship and then horizontal violation of the integrity of 08:07 love relationships. 08:08 --Isn't that the two, when Jesus was asked, what's the greatest 08:11 commandment? 08:12 And he says, well, there's two ways to sum up the whole thing. 08:16 The whole show is summed up with two things, love God and love 08:19 man, love your fellow neighbor. 08:21 So, those are the two things, and I always love the sequence 08:25 there, that the first one is to love God and the second one is 08:29 to love our neighbor. 08:31 Which is why I think, and we've been hitting on this over and 08:34 over in these conversations that the way we view and relate God 08:37 will affect the way we view and relate one another. 08:40 So, Jesus is saying, if you get the first one wrong, there's no 08:43 way you will know how to relate to your fellow man or to your 08:46 neighbor. 08:48 So, everything is centered on how we view God, the minute that 08:50 was broken down in Genesis, how they viewed one another was also 08:53 broken down. 08:54 --So, what do you guys think of this definition? 08:56 Do you think it would be theologically accurate to say 09:00 that sin is, you could put equals there, that sin is 09:05 anti-love? 09:09 Is that accurate? 09:10 --Yeah, totally. 09:11 --Sin is anything that violates the integrity of a love 09:15 relationship between God and humanity and humanity and 09:21 humanity. 09:22 Would you also agree, by logical extension, that all the 09:26 suffering and woe, everything that causes pain and suffering, 09:31 all the trauma of our world is traceable to these kinds of 09:38 violations? 09:40 --Yeah, of course. 09:42 --So, if those two things are true, those who may be sitting 09:46 in on this conversation who aren't that familiar with 09:50 biblical theology or the world view that we're advocating, 09:56 we can say to them, in a very inviting way, listen, God is not 10:02 an arbitrary control freak. 10:04 If you had a picture of God, a sense of God as some kind of 10:08 just sovereign powerful being who wants to get hold of you and 10:12 make you do stuff that is going to, you know, poop your party 10:16 and make life miserable, you've got it all wrong. 10:20 God is interested in bringing about in your life, in my life, 10:27 in every human being's life, consistent love relationships 10:33 that bring joy and happiness and peace, and even, the bible says, 10:37 pleasure. 10:39 God isn't against happiness, he's not against pleasure, he's 10:42 not against freedom, he's not into restriction. 10:46 God is into liberty, but liberty of the genuine kind that happens 10:52 within the parameters of love relationships that have 10:56 integrity. 10:57 --Okay, so, I have a question for you. 10:58 I resonate deeply with all of that, Ty. 11:00 I feel like we need to define our terms here a little bit 11:02 because we're saying sin is a violation of the love 11:04 relationship, it's a violation of the integrity of love. 11:07 Okay, so, we need to define this idea of love. 11:10 I mean, I think we've done is preliminarily, but can we give 11:14 some textual, at least, quick definition of what we're talking 11:19 about. 11:21 It's a violation of, in other words, we did that for sin. 11:22 Sin equals anti-love. 11:23 Okay, so, anti what? 11:25 --Yeah, what is love? 11:26 --Because some people are gonna say, well, you know, we know 11:29 that we live in a society that has taken the word love, it's 11:32 turned it upside down, it's shaken it around and it's spit 11:34 out something that doesn't look like what we see in scripture, 11:36 so let's just, at least for our purposes here, my own purposes, 11:40 let's define that so that we know precisely, if we're gonna 11:44 break down, break down, break down, let's define that, too. 11:47 --Yeah, another way you could say it is if God is saving us 11:50 out of sin into love, we've defined sin, but what is this 11:53 thing he's saving us into? 11:56 --There you go. 11:57 --Well, not to be a broken record or anything, but even in 11:59 just John 3:16, for God so loved the world that he, and then the 12:05 word gave, right? 12:07 So, fundamentally, love has to be other. 12:13 --Other centered. 12:14 --Other centered, right, he gave. 12:15 So, there's others outside of himself that are now central to 12:19 his, to his concern, to his everything, right? 12:24 So, love is other-centered. 12:28 --Jeffrey I want to add to that because 12:29 I don't know if you've ever encountered this, but I 12:34 sometimes, especially in marriage counselling, somebody, 12:38 when you begin to advocate the idea of giving as the definition 12:43 of love, inevitably, all of us have a lurking fear. 12:49 But if I give, what about the other person? 12:52 Are they gonna give? 12:54 Because we're looking at it through the lens of our natural, 12:59 innate, self-centeredness that's in place and it feels dangerous 13:04 to just give. 13:05 It feels like we might be taken advantage of, it feels like, and 13:08 --you might, --you might be taken advantage of. 13:10 So, I wanna add to John 3:16, Jesus gave this statement in, 13:16 this is one of my favorite bible verses. 13:18 It's in chapter 6 of Luke, and verse 38. 13:23 Watch what Jesus says here, this is absolutely astounding. 13:26 There's no punctuation in the original language, by the way, 13:29 so the way this reads, I think, what Jesus is saying here, is 13:34 the first word of verse 38 is give, period, or maybe 13:38 exclamation point if we wanna just emphasize, okay. 13:42 Jesus says give, period. 13:45 Full stop. 13:47 Then, he says this, and it will be given to you, good measure, 13:51 pressed down, shaken together, and running over shall men give 13:57 into your bosom. 14:00 Isn't that something? 14:01 Jesus is describing the circle, the circuit. 14:04 --Giving is receiving. 14:06 --Jesus is basically saying, it's not your responsibility to 14:13 steward the other person's giving. 14:16 It's your responsibility to be infectious with giving on your 14:22 own account. 14:23 To give, some people will take advantage of it. 14:25 Some people will walk all over you, but some people will drink 14:29 in that goodness, and they'll respond by giving back into your 14:34 life, and so the circle, the circuit of beneficence. 14:37 --The whole thing about giving and forgiving is often more for 14:40 our own benefit, even, than it would be for the other person, 14:44 right? 14:45 --The other person might not wanna be forgiven, they might 14:46 still be angry. 14:47 --I remember I was driving down the highway in San Jose, 14:50 California, and I got a phone call from Dominican Republic and 14:54 it was my dad, and I talked to my dad once every 7 years 14:58 throughout my life. 14:59 And I was... 15:01 --And how old are you right now? 15:02 --I am 31 years old. 15:03 --So, you've talked to him 3 times. 15:04 --It's, I've seen him, I could just count with one hand, I just 15:07 barely even know my father. 15:09 Now, he passed away a year and a half ago. 15:11 So, I pick up the phone and it's him, and I'm completely shocked. 15:14 I'm like, it's not my birthday, it's not Christmas, why is hi 15:17 calling? 15:18 I pull over, and in a very serious tone, he basically says, 15:22 I just wanna know that there's nothing that you have nothing 15:27 against me. 15:29 Because, basically, he abandoned the family. 15:32 And it just turned out that he found out recently that he was 15:34 dying of cancer so he got on the phone and he was making the 15:37 rounds, calling all his children to make sure that there was 15:41 nothing against him. 15:42 And for the first time, I realized the gospel has 15:45 liberated me in my, even within my family. 15:50 --In a really practical way. 15:52 --I was able to say, with total honesty, I have nothing, no 15:55 hatred, no bitterness against you at all, and it was such a 16:01 shock to him, because he abandoned his family, you know, 16:03 before I grew up. 16:04 --He expected there to be, what're you doing calling, blah, 16:05 blah, blah. 16:07 --Yeah, and I realized, I'm not doing him a favor to let him off 16:09 the hook. 16:10 This is totally liberating, you know, I've been set free, the 16:13 gospel has set me free. 16:14 So, what you're saying here is, you give, you give, you give, 16:16 you're not sure if you'll receive, if the person will 16:18 reciprocate, but you will receive because the process of 16:21 forgiving is liberating for us as well. 16:25 --That reminds me of the title of the book, and the thing 16:29 that's interesting, the very creative about title of this 16:31 book is about forgiveness, keep that in mind, and 16:35 it's called Getting Even. 16:38 --That's awesome. 16:39 --Just last night, I was talking to our niece, 19 year old niece 16:42 is staying with us, lovely young lady. 16:45 And, you know, she's doing the whole boyfriend thing right now, 16:48 trying to figure that out, she loves God, she wants to put God 16:51 first, but she has a serious boyfriend, and he's from another 16:55 country, so they're kinda doing the long distance thing, he was 16:58 just here visiting, I got a chance to meet him. 17:00 Really great guy, actually. 17:01 After visiting with her last night, I was even more impressed 17:03 with him and just the way that he's carrying himself toward 17:06 her, the way that she's carrying herself toward him, there is a 17:08 responsibility there that I was really pleased to see. 17:11 Well, in the context of that, she, and I'm so thankful that I 17:14 have a relationship with her like this, and my wife does as 17:17 well. 17:18 She's asking us questions. 17:19 Like, what's appropriate? 17:22 How do I know that he loves me? 17:24 How do I know that I love him? 17:25 What should we be doing? 17:26 What shouldn't we be doing? 17:28 And I'm just thrilled in my innermost soul that here, you 17:30 have a 19 year old young lady, she's beautiful and she's asking 17:33 these kinds of questions. 17:35 Well, in the context of that, last night, what I said to her, 17:38 Ty, one of the things I said was, here's the thing, 17:40 a Christian relationship, a biblically based relationship is 17:43 seemingly crazy because you're going into it saying, what I 17:48 want out of this is the best good of the other person. 17:52 And if the other person is coming in with that same 17:54 mentality and perspective, and that's what you're figuring out 17:56 during the courting, dating, and engagement period, you figure 17:59 out, hey, this person really has my best interest in mind, too. 18:01 There is such a freedom and a liberty in knowing that you both 18:05 want the same thing. 18:06 This person wants the best good of this person. 18:08 This person wants the best good of this person. 18:09 So, what you both want is the best good of us. 18:12 This new thing that's been created. 18:13 I said, but when both people, as it were, back into a 18:16 relationship, protecting what's theirs, and the other person's 18:20 backing in and you're both, you can get that to work for a year 18:23 or 5 or maybe even 10, you can pull it off, but if at the end 18:26 of the day, the overarching theme of your marriage is, I'm 18:30 gonna keep what's mine and we get along pretty good and I 18:32 think you're fun and we both enjoy skiing, but I'm looking 18:36 out for what's me. 18:38 And here's something I said to her, I was even surprised when 18:39 this came out of my mouth, I said, many people, the 18:42 relationship that they have with their spouse, or their boyfriend 18:45 or their girlfriend or whatever, they're in a relationship with 18:47 that person because the way that that person makes them feel. 18:51 --I'm being fed by you. 18:52 --I was kinda surprised that I said this, but I said that is a 18:55 kind of social masturbation. 18:58 Because really, what it is, is I'm loving me through you. 19:01 --You're a tool. 19:03 --Exactly, exactly. 19:04 I'm loving me through you, rather than I'm loving you, like 19:06 you did with your father. 19:08 There's such a liberation in that, to not always be looking 19:11 out for yourself. 19:13 And I tell you, it just thrilled my soul to see this lovely young 19:17 growing, because I've known her since she was young, 19 year 19:19 old, just, and she's getting it. 19:22 She's getting and she's living with our family, Violet and I 19:25 have been married now for almost 15 years and we're deeply in 19:27 love. 19:29 And she's seeing, oh, so this can work. 19:31 We're not yelling, we're not screaming, that's just not 19:33 happening in our home. 19:35 So, she's saying, how do you, how do you? 19:37 --That's some good premarital counselling that you're giving. 19:41 I have to admit that I'm more of a sinner than you because you 19:44 all know this young lady I'm talking about, she's one of our 19:46 students, but she's developing a relationship with somebody you 19:50 all know who is also a student of ours, a former student of 19:54 ours. 19:55 So, she sends me an email, just yesterday. 19:57 Actually, a direct message on Twitter, and she says, 20:01 guess what. 20:02 And I said, I can't guess. 20:04 I'm in a relationship, guess who. 20:06 I guessed the wrong person. 20:08 Well, who's he? 20:09 She says. 20:12 So, then, she tells me who it is. 20:16 And I say, can you give him a message for me? 20:18 She says, yes. 20:20 Tell him that I love him dearly but I love you massively and 20:24 that if he hurts you, I'm willing to serve a life sentence 20:26 in prison to rectify the situation. 20:29 So, she actually passed the message on to the guy and then I 20:31 started feeling guilty. 20:32 So, you did a better job than me. 20:33 --Pre-marriage counselling with Ty. 20:36 If you mess with this girl. 20:37 --I'll kill you. 20:38 --I will spend my life in prison. 20:41 --It's okay in prison, I like to read. 20:44 Anyways, we have to take a break, and then, we'll come back 20:45 and we'll continue flushing out the sin problem. 20:49 --Excellent. 20:50 [Music] 21:03 --This is the story of Niyima, who took a bus to the doctor and 21:08 found a piece of paper with words of hope about Jesus, which 21:13 was left by a church member who unpacked a box that came from a 21:17 truck which drove in from Durban where a ship was docked that 21:22 sailed from Seattle, loaded with containers stacked high with 21:27 millions of tracts, trucked in from the Light Bearers 21:30 Publishing House, where more than 600 million pieces of 21:34 gospel literature have been printed in 42 languages. 21:39 Here's the amazing thing, Light Bearers distributes this 21:42 literature free of charge all over the world, and each piece 21:47 costs only 5 pennies to print, transport, and deliver. 21:53 Every day, millions of people buy a $5 cup of coffee, 21:58 $5 a cup, 5 days a week. 22:01 It adds up fast. 22:03 But at just 5 cents apiece, that same $25 can also ship 500 22:09 pieces of literature and give hope to people like Niyima, who 22:15 shared that paper with a classmate, who gave it to her 22:19 cousin, who shared it with his boss, who passed it to her 22:23 grandmother, who left it on another bus, where it will be 22:28 found by someone else. 22:31 And the story continues. 22:34 Five cents doesn't buy a lot these days, but in other parts 22:37 of the world, your nickel could change someone's life. 22:42 Your gift of $25 a month sends out 6,000 pieces of gospel 22:46 literature each year. 22:49 Fifty dollars sends out 12,000, and $100 a month sends out 22:53 24,000 messages of hope every year, all over the world. 23:00 Empower Light Bearers to continue the story. 23:04 Send your gift through lightbearers.org, or by calling 23:07 877-585-1111. 23:12 Who knew 5 little pennies could do so much? 23:16 [Music] 23:23 --We're talking about the sin problem and we're discovering 23:26 that sin is a very practical thing, it's a very relational 23:30 thing, not to make it sound good, it's bad, it's on the bad 23:33 end of the relationships that we have with God and with one 23:37 another. 23:39 But I think we've made, we've made some really good strides 23:42 for ourselves and maybe for others who are sitting in on the 23:45 conversation to define sin in language that helps us 23:51 understand that number one, sin is relational breakdown, and 23:55 number two, God is in favor of relational beauty and integrity 24:00 and he wants us to have relationships that flourish on 24:04 all levels in every way, but the problem is.. 24:07 --The horizontal, vertical and horizontal. 24:09 --Yeah, vertical and the horizontal, but the problem is 24:11 that we as human beings are messed up from the word go. 24:16 The bible goes so far, and we'll see this text in a moment, there 24:20 is not righteous, no, not one, but we were in Genesis, I'd like 24:24 to direct our attention and just see what emerges from the 24:28 conversation, to 2 bible verses in the Old Testament that I 24:32 think say a lot about the sin problem. 24:35 The first one is in Isaiah chapter 1, see what you guys 24:38 think of this, Isaiah chapter 1, and there is a local historic 24:43 application because Isaiah is addressing God through Isaiah 24:47 the prophet, is addressing the specific local historic 24:52 dysfunction of his people, Israel, at this juncture of 24:55 their history, okay, so that's the backdrop, but the language 24:58 is so applicable to the human condition as a whole in verses 5 25:03 and 6. 25:04 This is God speaking through Isaiah. 25:07 Why should you be stricken, notice the language, stricken 25:11 again? 25:12 You will revolt more and more. 25:15 The whole head is sick and the whole heart faints. 25:21 From the sole of the foot even to the head, there is no 25:23 soundness in it, but wounds and bruises and putrefying sores. 25:30 They have not been closed or bound up or soothed with 25:34 ointment. 25:35 So, this is medical language, right? 25:38 He's using words like stricken, sick. 25:42 --Putrefying sores. 25:43 --Putrefying sores. 25:44 That's strong language, isn't it? 25:46 --It's a visual. 25:48 --Okay, so, it's all physical language, it's medical language, 25:50 and it says that we have bruises and wounds. 25:52 Now, I just wanna point this out, because I think this is 25:56 true to the text, God is not assessing their physical 26:00 condition. 26:02 He's not looking at their bodies and saying, hey, I see a bruise 26:04 on your right arm. 26:08 You need to bandage that up. 26:09 And he's not saying you need to have some kind of ointment, some 26:13 kind of healing ointment that's made of, you know, Echinacea and 26:16 bee pollen. 26:18 Okay, he's not talking about physical stuff. 26:21 He's talking about the physical realm in order to talk about 26:25 things that are going on in our psyches, in our minds, in our 26:28 hearts, in our emotions, in our relationships. 26:30 And so, if you take it that way, when he says the whole head is 26:34 sick and the heart faints, he's basically saying, of the human 26:37 race, of all of us, even those at this table, he's saying, my 26:42 diagnosis is this, you are psychologically and emotionally 26:46 ill. 26:48 You are sick in the head. 26:49 You are dysfunctional on every level of your operations as a 26:54 human being. 26:56 The way you think, the way you feel and emote and process 27:00 things, the way you relate to people. 27:03 All your interactions are dysfunctional. 27:07 That's what God is basically saying to us here. 27:09 You look in the mirror every morning, you brush your teeth, 27:13 you shave, you comb your hair. 27:14 You are looking into the eyes of a crazy person. 27:18 You are looking into the eyes of somebody who is teetering on the 27:20 edge and but for the grace of God, there is no telling what 27:25 you and I are capable of. 27:27 --You know, what's really interesting here, Ty is. 27:28 --I'm serious, Jeffery. 27:29 --That's depressing. 27:30 --Well, hey, we gotta go down in order to go up. 27:33 --You keep looking straight at me as you're saying that. 27:35 --I'm looking into the eyes of a crazy person. 27:39 --But that's a powerful summary. 27:41 --It is, and we're talking about this in the context of verse 4, 27:44 which, also, in the context of our conversation is sin, we're 27:48 defining sin, we're defining it in relational language in which 27:51 we're talking about it as it affects our emotions and how we 27:54 interact with one another. 27:55 Before God gets into that somewhat cryptic, or we should 27:59 say, symbolic description, verses 5 and 6, he says in verse 28:03 4, ah, sinful nation. 28:06 A people laden with iniquity, a seed of evildoers, children that 28:10 are corrupters that have forsaken the Lord. 28:13 Now, notice this, this verse, these verses, are again, 28:15 augmenting and confirming our understanding of how sin is 28:20 relational. 28:21 Not only is it defined here as sinful, corrupt iniquity, but 28:26 it's also summarized with this phrase, who hath forsaken the 28:29 Lord? 28:31 You've forsaken the Lord, you've forsaken your relationship with 28:32 God, you're not connected to him, and therefore, you have 28:36 these wounds and these bruises and these putrefying sores, and 28:38 they haven't been mullified, they haven't been healed, they 28:42 haven't even been tended to, they're just open and they're 28:44 just putrefying, they're just rotting. 28:46 --When you have an open wound, it stinks. 28:52 We come into one another's proximity in relationships and 28:56 we notice things about each other. 28:58 And the closer you come to any one of us as human beings, you 29:02 start noticing some things that are disconcerting and we realize 29:08 that people are walking with limps, not physical limps 29:11 necessarily, people are walking with spiritual and 29:14 psychological, emotional, relational limps. 29:16 People are sensitive to the touch. 29:19 You know, sometimes you say something to somebody that you 29:22 think is just, you know, nothing, it doesn't mean 29:24 anything, you're just reaching out with your words, you say 29:26 something and they react. 29:29 Why are they reacting? 29:31 Why are they reacting? 29:32 They're reacting because you just touched a sensitive area. 29:36 You sense something, 29:37 --I have to tell this story. 29:38 --you touched a wound. 29:40 --What did you say to who? 29:41 --Oh, no, no. 29:42 Okay. 29:43 --David, we know you say things to people that... 29:44 --I know, I'm a bad human being about that, but I was with this 29:46 person not too long ago, and we were sitting in a group, and I'm 29:50 just talking as I'm, you know, I just talk and just being me and 29:53 just talking, and we started talking about, you know, 29:56 muscles, and, oh, yeah, you know you've got muscles or whatever. 29:58 There was guys and girls in the conversation and somebody 30:01 mentioned something about how they had really small wrists, it 30:04 was a guy, he went, yeah, I have kinda small wrists. 30:05 And I was sitting next to this girl who's a good friend of the 30:08 family's absolutely beautiful, just such a godly Christian 30:11 woman, and I grab her hand and I'm like, like, look at your 30:15 wrists, they're really big and thick, 30:19 and I'm talking to a woman, right? 30:21 And she's like, yeah, and she's goes on, so anyway, I think 30:24 nothing of it, the conversation continues to go. 30:26 So, the next day, one of our friends comes up to me, and 30:30 she's like, I can't believe what you said to...and I'm like, 30:32 what? 30:34 Just a roladex in the mind trying to think of what I said, 30:37 and she's like, you hurt her deeply. 30:39 I'm like, I love this person. 30:40 What could I have said? 30:42 And she's like, never talk about a woman's appearance, much less 30:46 say that she has thick wrists. 30:50 And I was like, but the point is, I don't think she was being 30:54 overly sensitive, I think I was being insensitive, but the 30:58 larger point is, it's not who was at fault, whether I was just 31:01 being insensitive, but the point is, people are sensitive about 31:04 those, you can say something and not even know that you're 31:06 touching a nerve or a wound with somebody because we're all, 31:11 there are things that you could say that would wound me, or I 31:13 should say, would touch me in places that I already have 31:15 wounds and brokenness. 31:17 And so, too, with each of us, there is this, I loved it when 31:21 you said, God, you know, Doctor God, that's kind of the picture 31:23 that emerges. 31:24 He diagnoses the situation. 31:26 And God's diagnosis is not different for Ty and James and 31:29 Jeffery and this lady, you know, I said had large wrists. 31:32 None of that. 31:34 His diagnosis, although the manifestations might be 31:35 different. 31:37 We all have the same disease. 31:39 And the disease is a fundamental brokenness in our relational 31:43 nature which inclines us to self-preservation, at times, 31:48 self-exaltation and just selfishness. 31:52 --I used to see, just to take this a step further, we all have 31:57 interactions with a lot of people. 32:00 Those of us at this table maybe more so than the average person 32:03 because we're continually travelling and staying in 32:07 people's homes even, and we're being hosted places where we're 32:11 conducting public lectures and so on, and so we meet a lot of 32:15 people, and I used to pull back, just emotionally I guess from 32:22 people who were what I would regard as obnoxious, or somebody 32:29 who is just getting too close into my space and you can feel 32:33 spray on your face, and you back up a step, and there are people 32:37 who are insensitive about, yeah, the shower, there are people 32:42 who, and I used to notice these things in people's personalities 32:47 and pull back and then, when I began to understand what's going 32:51 on in the human experience, I began to realize that these are, 32:54 these things like having, being opinionated, or being quote 32:59 unquote, loudmouthed, you know, and just saying things, or being 33:04 obnoxious in personality, and whatever we notice, and we 33:09 notice these things and people notice them in us, I began to 33:13 realize these things are manifestations. 33:15 These are limps, these are wounds. 33:19 The person who I perceive as obnoxious and there's no doubt 33:22 about it that somebody, other people may perceive me as having 33:25 defects of character, and they do, of course, but all of a 33:30 sudden, I began to realize that human contact and acceptance and 33:35 drawing close and affirmation and being friends with somebody 33:40 who's on the margins because of their limp, they've been 33:46 marginalized and nobody can stand them, I began to think 33:50 wait a minute, what would happen if, and I've experienced 33:53 on a number of occasions, now, over the years, that if you draw 33:57 close to somebody who you perceive as obnoxious, then 34:01 they begin to draw close to you, and they begin to 34:05 normalize and you begin in your obnoxious character 34:11 traits, to normalize through people's acceptance. 34:13 We shouldn't be pulling away from people because we see 34:16 things in them that we don't like. 34:18 We should be going out of our way to draw close to people that 34:22 we see things in them that we don't like because they have a 34:25 need and we should simultaneously realize that 34:27 we're not occupying the high ground of meeting their need, 34:30 but then, that we ourselves are in relationships with people 34:34 where we have needs that people would not be offended by the 34:38 stupid things that we say and do, but would accept us no 34:42 matter what. 34:43 --I hate to take this back to Genesis, but I think the point 34:44 you're making is really profound in relationship to Adam and Eve. 34:48 For example, Eve messed up and Adam followed suit. 34:54 In how he related to her, when you take that through to its 34:57 logical conclusion. 34:59 What you're saying here, and the way it came across to me is 35:01 this, and that is not only should we not back up from that 35:05 person that's acting that way, but the very act of backing up 35:09 causes us to be the very same way they are. 35:13 And the very act of drawing close to them causes us to lose 35:17 that attitude that's in us ourselves, because one of the 35:21 reasons we're, in the bible, in Romans, it says one of the 35:23 reasons why we judge others so harshly is because we recognize 35:27 in them the very same principles that we have in our own heart. 35:31 Who are you that judges another man and you do the same things? 35:34 And what he's saying in there is when you judge another man and 35:37 you recognize those principles, when you pull away, you're gonna 35:40 end up doing the same things, but when you pull near, you now 35:43 are developing a character and allowing God to work through you 35:47 to actually rid those principles that are in all of us from your 35:51 own heart. 35:52 --Those limps. 35:53 --Yeah, those limps. 35:54 You're healing yourself in the process of reaching out to heal 35:56 somebody else. 35:57 --It goes back to what we said earlier, that all of scripture 36:00 and almost all of human experience, in some significant 36:03 degree, is a commentary of Genesis chapter 1, 2, and 3. 36:07 There is such a density there, psychologically, 36:11 anthropologically, geologically, I mean just whatever, there's 36:14 just so much in Genesis 1, 2, and 3, the thing that you were 36:19 just saying reminded me of a quotation that I just tweeted 36:21 the day before yesterday from Ralph Waldo Emerson, and he 36:24 says, I love this, it is one of the beautiful compensations of 36:28 life that no man can sincerely try to help another without also 36:33 helping himself. 36:34 That's the thing you're saying. 36:36 When you draw near, it's not just in some great magnanimity 36:39 to be a blessing, you know, in a condescending way to this other 36:41 person, you yourself are being oriented around a grander truth. 36:49 And it's not me occupying, as you said, Ty, the high ground, 36:51 let me stoop down and help you down here. 36:53 --You're not doing them a favor. 36:54 --You're doing yourself a favor and them a favor, but both of 36:56 you are being reoriented toward the vertical, which is the love 37:00 of God, that's the thing. 37:02 --Your cup's being filled and overflowing. 37:03 --My point was, if I perceive that you're obnoxious in some 37:08 aspect of your personality, or that you're annoying, maybe 37:11 that's a better word, I'm really blind if I don't realize that, 37:18 that thing that I see in you is not seen in me from somebody 37:24 else. 37:25 --Well, how does God view, I mean, how is God's perspective 37:29 of us be, and how obnoxious would we be in God's eyes, if we 37:33 related to other, if God related to us in the way that we relate 37:38 to other people, we would be toast. 37:41 --Scripture says that over and over again, there's a, my 37:43 mother, who is not, she's a Christian, I wouldn't call her, 37:46 like, a full on, you know, fundamentalist Christian, but 37:49 early on in my... 37:52 --Which wouldn't be a compliment, by the way, in my 37:53 opinion, I just have to throw that out. 37:55 A full on fundamentalist Christian. 37:56 --No, no, no, that's not a compliment, in other words, 37:58 she's somebody who loves God and who takes him seriously and she, 38:01 even early on in my experience, began to orient me toward this 38:05 other-centeredness, even though I, you know, it's a lesson hard 38:08 learned, but she cross stitched, and I still have this, she cross 38:11 stitched this thing for me, and it was Gandhi that said it, 38:14 actually, and yet, the principle is absolutely, patently biblical 38:18 and Christian, and he said, imperfect, ourselves, we must be 38:23 careful in our treatment of others. 38:27 When we know what our own brokenness, we should be keenly 38:32 aware that God's perspective on us is a whole different 38:35 perspective than my perspective on you. 38:37 I don't occupy some sort of high ground, and you don't occupy 38:39 some sort of high ground over and against me. 38:41 God is the one who occupies the moral high ground of the 38:44 universe. 38:45 He is love in his very nature, in his very essence, in the very 38:47 fiber and fabric of what makes God, God, and we are all 38:51 wallowing, according to Doctor God, in Isaiah 1, with broken 38:55 heads, broken hearts, broken bodies, broken psyches, broken 38:57 relationships, and the only way to be reoriented properly toward 39:02 one another is to be reoriented properly toward him, and it's so 39:07 liberating and it transforms the landscape of all of your 39:12 relationships, both familial, friends, coworkers, 39:15 acquaintances, fathers who have abandoned you, I've had the same 39:18 experience, Ty had the same experience. 39:20 I mean, every one of us at this table did not have a strong 39:24 father figure, and yet, there is such, and my father is still 39:27 alive, even though I've only talked to him on the phone twice 39:29 and he was totally disinterested in getting involved. 39:32 But I have such freedom in my heart toward him, no antagonism, 39:36 nothing. 39:38 It's nothing to me. 39:39 I mean, I would love to, in fact, right after I got 39:41 converted, I contacted him, I was 23 years old, got ahold of 39:44 him, and I just wanted to let him know that I had experienced 39:49 the forgiveness of God in Christ and I just wanted him to know 39:52 that I forgave him and that was there, because it must just be 39:56 eating away at him. 39:57 I mean, me and my brother both. 40:00 Where's he? 40:02 --I had the same experience in mine, you know, we've all 40:04 experienced the abandonment of the father figure, of course, 40:08 I've never known my father at all, but I had a stepfather, who 40:12 was extremely violent and just the mention of his name would 40:17 arouse in my body, my physical body, kind of a shaking, you 40:25 know, just because of the things I witnessed that he had done to 40:29 my mother and what a liberation. 40:32 And this wasn't something that I'd disciplined myself to do, I 40:35 would have to say that this happened to me almost by 40:38 osmosis, just by acquainting myself with the gospel and the 40:43 love of God for me, what a liberation it was to hear his 40:49 name, to think of him, to have somebody bring him up and to 40:52 genuinely feel nothing anymore in my body in my heart. 40:58 --Nothing negative. 40:59 --Nothing negative. 41:00 --Just freedom. 41:01 --Yeah, just total freedom. 41:02 I don't hate him. 41:03 He's still alive, I don't hate him and I think I could have a 41:07 conversation with him. 41:09 Not a warm, fuzzy conversation. 41:11 --But you don't wanna strangle him. 41:13 --But I'm saying, I don't hate him, there's no anger there in 41:18 my heart anymore, and that is not something that I just tried 41:21 hard enough to pull off. 41:23 --I know we have to take a break, but what I love most 41:25 about what you said there, Ty, and in addition to the fact that 41:27 God has given you freedom, God has given you liberty, it's that 41:30 it's not something that you worked for and you went through 41:32 a program, it was by osmosis, as you say, just dwelling and 41:35 abiding in the love of God and in the gospel. 41:40 It's healing you. 41:41 To use the Isaiah 1 metaphor, you are being healed. 41:46 --Incrementally, God's love permeates. 41:50 --It is with huge theological implication that when Jesus 41:53 comes, he spends a lot of time preaching, but he spends even 41:56 more time healing people and sometimes, explicitly saying, 42:01 I'm healing this person's physical body so that you can 42:05 know that I have the ability to heal their relational, 42:08 spiritual, psychological brokenness. 42:11 --I love what we're saying, the way that I've spoken it to 42:16 myself at times is the more I partake of God's love and grace 42:21 and the knowledge of his love and grace toward me, it 42:24 gradually takes up all the emotional space inside of me. 42:30 There's darkness over here, there's anger, there's 42:32 resentment, there's hatred, there's all this stuff that's 42:35 taking up space inside of our heads and our hearts, and the 42:39 love of God just permeates and it just takes up more and more 42:42 space and more and more space and in the process, it's 42:44 squeezing out all the other stuff. 42:48 Well, David, you said we have to take a break and we really do, 42:51 but we do have one final segment in this particular conversation, 42:55 and I think there's even more. 42:57 I said I had 2 scriptures in the Old Testament that I was 43:00 wondering, and there's one more that I'm wondering what you guys 43:02 think of, so we'll talk about that when we come back. 43:06 [Music] 43:15 --The Light Bearers Story is a short award-winning video that 43:19 gives an inside look at one of the boldest and most effective 43:22 missionary ventures of our time. 43:24 You will see how multiple millions of gospel publications 43:27 are flooding the nations free of charge by surprisingly simple 43:31 means. 43:32 For your free copy of the Light Bearers Story, call 43:34 877-585-1111, or write to Light Bearers, 37457 Jasper Lowell 43:42 Road, Jasper, Oregon 97438. 43:47 Once again, for your free copy of the Light Bearers Story, call 43:50 877-585-1111 or write to Light Bearers 37457 Jasper Lowell 43:58 Road, Jasper, Oregon 97438. 44:02 Simply ask for the Light Bearers Story. 44:06 [Music] 44:15 --During the break, something kind of funny happened, there 44:19 was an evidence of our fallen condition as a human race, 44:23 because, I don't know why, but we have some play doh on the 44:25 table and Jeffery.... 44:28 --I wish you hadn't called attention to the fact that we 44:29 have play doh on the table. 44:31 --Jeffery wouldn't touch any of it because he was afraid that 44:32 our germs or somebody else's germs were on it. 44:34 So, David gave Jeffery his own little piece that nobody's 44:40 touched, well now, David's touched it. 44:42 --Well, I've not like gooped it up though. 44:46 --Jeffery doesn't want it. 44:47 --You guys have atoms, genes, and germs and I wanna stay clear 44:50 of it. 44:51 --That brings me to the second scripture in the Old Testament 44:55 that I'm wondering what you guys think of because these aren't 44:57 common verses, this is Jeremiah 17. 45:00 These aren't common verses that people use to talk about the sin 45:04 problem. 45:06 We just commonly jump to 1 John 3:4, sin is transgression of the 45:10 law, and we focus on the outward aspect of the problem, but as 45:17 Isaiah 1, which we just covered, points out, and now Jeremiah 17, 45:21 look at verse 1 and then look at verse 9, see what you guys think 45:25 here, verse 1, the sin of Judah is written with a pen of iron, 45:32 with the point of a diamond, it is engraved on the tablet of 45:37 their heart. 45:39 Now, this is interesting, first of all, I'm just wondering. 45:42 This language is obviously metaphoric. 45:46 A pen of iron? 45:48 The point of a diamond? 45:49 These are just hard substances that can create indelible, 45:54 deeply etched marks, right? 45:57 And where is this deep, indelible marking taking place? 46:01 It's on the heart, in the heart. 46:03 And notice that it says that the heart is a tablet, what's a 46:06 tablet? 46:08 Well, a tablet, actually, this is a tablet, this is an old 46:10 school tablet that I'm using. 46:12 This is a tablet, and here's a new school tablet, you got the 46:15 iPad here, you got the iPad mini, what's a tablet? 46:18 A tablet is a device for accumulating data or 46:22 information. 46:24 So, this scripture literally says, sin writes things inside 46:29 of us. 46:31 The human heart, the human psyche, the human conscience is 46:35 a receptacle for outside influences that make their 46:41 indelible impression on the inside. 46:44 Guilt is accumulated inside of us through the commission of 46:48 sin. 46:49 Habit patterns are formed through committing sin. 46:52 But then in verse 9, it's just amazing what he says here, the 46:57 heart, that is the heart that in verse 1, has sin inscribed in it 47:00 with the point of a diamond, as it were. 47:03 The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked, 47:08 and then this question, who can know it? 47:12 So, here, Jeremiah is basically saying, the sin problem not only 47:18 involves the outward commission of sin, the outward violations 47:23 of relationships, it also involves an inner dimension of 47:28 sin being written on our hearts and then he says that we're so 47:34 desperately and deeply and profoundly wicked that we don't 47:39 even know ourselves. 47:41 We don't know truly how dysfunctional, broken, wounded, 47:44 damaged, depraved, that we really are. 47:48 And when it says that our hearts are deceitful and who can know 47:51 it, one of the ways that we manifest our brokenness is that 47:57 we basically lie, to ourselves and to others. 48:02 We project, we project personas, we come up with, you know, 48:06 somebody has neglected their children for years and years and 48:11 years, and the way they compensate for that is by 48:14 building a false narrative that elevates them. 48:17 Well, I'm a workaholic. 48:19 Well, it's a little bit demeaning to confess, I'm a 48:22 workaholic, but actually, it elevates me in my estimation so 48:26 I don't have to cope with the deeper issues that I ruined my 48:30 relationship with my children by pursuing money and career and 48:33 profession, but I compensate for it by viewing myself in a 48:40 deceptive way. 48:42 I don't face the thing that's really there, I deceive myself, 48:46 the heart is deceitful above all things, who can know it? 48:48 I don't know how truly fallen, broken, damaged, wicked I am. 48:54 --I don't understand myself. 48:57 But I love verse 10, is the answer to who can know it, verse 48:59 10, I the Lord search the heart. 49:02 I test the mind. 49:04 --He's the doctor, he's the one that can give. 49:06 --You need God in order to understand yourself. 49:08 --That's right. 49:09 --A couple, oh, I don't know, if it was two conversations ago, 49:11 but I mentioned this fantastic quotation. 49:14 I'll have to actually bring up the full quotation. 49:16 By Blaise Pascal, where he basically says, without an 49:19 understanding of the sinfulness that is innate to us and within 49:24 us as a result of the fall described in Genesis 3, he says, 49:28 we remain incomprehensible to ourselves. 49:32 We have, and then he goes on to say, because we are, we find 49:35 ourselves, you know, battered between two positions, having a 49:38 desire for goodness and love, but an incapacity to do it. 49:43 --Yeah, we're morally bankrupt. 49:44 --He said if we had no desire, we would be only like the 49:45 beasts, right? 49:48 We'd just, we're just a bundle of desires and we do the thing, 49:49 but we have this moral desire or longing for something more. 49:54 We have a sense that we were made for something greater, but 49:56 we have an inability to attain to it. 49:58 So, we're trapped between a longing for this, or a 50:02 connection to this being enslaved to this but a longing 50:05 for this, and he says, we're incomprehensible to ourselves. 50:08 --That just reminds me of my whole conversion experience. 50:10 I remember in my early years, teenage years and when I became 50:16 a Christian at 21, I remember having that whole experience. 50:19 I remember one day, just looking out the window, it was winter, 50:23 there was snow on the ground, and we lived in a neighborhood 50:26 with a slight hill and my friends were in the home and we 50:29 were all just kinda listening to rock and roll music and partying 50:33 and whatever and there was a car that was driving up the hill 50:36 really slowly, and one of the reasons it was driving up the 50:39 hill really slowly is because it was wintertime and there was 50:41 snow on the ground and it couldn't get traction, and so it 50:44 was driving up the hill really slowly and my friends, you know, 50:48 when you're standing there looking out the window, people, 50:50 you know, you're in a community, they'll come over, hey, what're 50:52 you looking at, so we're all, so everyone comes over to the 50:55 window and they're all looking at this car, we all start 50:56 looking at this car and we're noticing the predicament it's in 50:59 and everyone just starts laughing, oh, come and look at 51:02 this, this guy can't get up the hill, this guy can't get up the 51:03 hill, this guy can't get up, and normally, that's what I would 51:07 do, that's the way I would think, I would just, ah, yeah, 51:09 look at that, it's so funny. 51:11 But there was something in me, as you describe it there, that 51:14 wanted to be more than just a part of the heard and something 51:19 in me that was looking at that situation in a different way, 51:23 like you said, looking for something that was higher than 51:26 just this animal mentality of ah-ha-ha you know, type of 51:29 thing. 51:32 And something prompted me to say something that was really 51:34 strange to everyone, including myself. 51:37 I said, we should go out there and help him. 51:39 And I'm telling you what, it was so weird because I said, did I 51:42 say that? 51:44 And we did, we all went out there and we helped push that 51:47 car, and you know what was really interesting, what was 51:48 really interesting is, we went out there, we helped push that 51:52 car up the hill, and all of us felt great. 51:56 And all of a sudden it was all of a sudden like, you know what? 51:58 This is what I was made for. 52:01 This is what we're made for. 52:03 --That's the Emerson quote. 52:04 One of the beautiful compensations of life that no 52:06 man can sincerely help another without also benefitting 52:09 himself. 52:11 God has made the universe to work that way. 52:13 --Yes, and that was a major component in my shift of 52:15 direction in life. 52:17 Majorly, just that little thing right there. 52:19 --It is amazing how the little things stick with you. 52:21 When I look back over the things, it's not the, you know, 52:23 it's not always the big, monumental, it's the little 52:25 conversations, I can resonate very much with that. 52:28 Something that occurred to me about the text, you're going 52:32 back to the text, is that if you have to write something with 52:34 iron and a diamond, what does that tell you about the 52:36 substance on which you're writing. 52:38 --It's hard. 52:39 --We have play doh here, right, so if you flatten a play doh, 52:42 you can make a impress, because it's soft, it's pliable and it's 52:45 easy to write, but if God says, oh, on your heart? 52:48 Oh, no, no, no, no. 52:49 --I have to use iron. 52:51 --Iron and diamonds to write on your heart, and to sort of 52:52 utilize another, the same biblical metaphor, but in 52:55 another biblical context, Ezekiel 36, it talks about your 52:58 heart is stony, right, your heart is made of stone and it's 53:03 such a rock hard stone that I can just only barely etch with, 53:08 as it were, a diamond and iron into your heart. 53:11 That tells us that, that hardness is a concrete 53:16 solidification of our heart in a certain direction and in a 53:20 certain bend, that thing that we were describing, being locked 53:22 into this, but longing for this. 53:25 It's a moral hell is what it is. 53:26 --And also, the context of it is, if something is that hard 53:30 that it needs a diamond to write into, it's, you can't remove it. 53:33 Sin is written with the pen of iron. 53:36 So, this is an immovable, this is an immovable thing that 53:41 you're dealing with here, it's in our nature, and you can't 53:43 just erase it. 53:45 You can't just reform it. 53:47 --Great point. 53:49 --James, what you were saying triggered some memories in my 53:51 mind because this text is saying that the human heart is 53:56 deceitful above all things, we imagine ourselves to be elevated 53:59 above others. 54:01 I mentioned a moment ago that I was raised in a home where there 54:03 was a lot of violence. 54:05 Well, one of the things was, as a kid and as a teenager, I so 54:09 recoiled at it that said to myself, I would never, and I 54:13 will never, and I would never ever do anything like that. 54:17 I imagined that violence was foreign to my nature, but then I 54:22 found myself in a situation in the 8th grade with this in my 54:26 background where I'm being continually pushed around by a 54:31 group of kids because I'm the new kid in the neighborhood, and 54:34 finally, I find myself, this person who thinks I could never 54:38 do anything violent at the urging of the other kids, and 54:42 even at the urging of my stepfather, I find myself 54:45 sitting over another human being in the park behind the school 54:49 with my fists clenched, driving my fists violently, 54:55 uncontrollably, into this other kid's face, he's bleeding, he's 55:00 beginning to go unconscious and it takes the other kids to pull 55:04 me off of him. 55:06 This is the kid who says, I would never do that. 55:10 --But your heart is deceitful. 55:11 --My heart is deceitful, I'm capable of violence. 55:16 In fact, I say sometimes in preaching and, inevitably, 55:21 people would come up to me and say, I don't know if that's 55:24 true, that's pretty dark what you just said, and here's what 55:26 it is, and I say, you've never witnessed anything so low, so 55:29 heinous, so horrible that any human being has ever done in 55:33 history that you yourself would not do given the same pressures, 55:39 circumstances, background, you would. 55:43 --Or that you could do. 55:44 --You could do, you're capable of the worst things imaginable. 55:47 --The same wiring in Cain's head is the same wiring system that 55:52 you have in your head. 55:55 --Because at the end of the day, if reality is built around the 55:57 principle of self-preservation, I have to, whether it takes 56:01 violence, deception, manipulation, coercion, whatever 56:05 it takes, and here's the tragedy, and we're getting 56:07 there, but many people imagine that God is just like that, 56:10 because he's the most powerful being in the universe, he's 56:14 above, so if everybody's looking out for their own best interest, 56:16 and God is looking out for his, who's a match for God? 56:19 --And even when we think that we're righteous, the only reason 56:21 I haven't done anything crazy is because you haven't crossed, you 56:24 haven't stepped on my feet, or my toes sufficiently. 56:27 --Good closing point, because it's over, but we're gonna come 56:30 back and explore this subject more. 56:33 [Music] |
Revised 2014-12-17