Welcome And Life Updates

SPEAKER_00 0:16

Welcome and thanks for joining us on the Blue Chair Podcast, brought to you by Fresh Wind Church. Each month, we discuss the latest sermons from the perspective of the Blue Chairs.

SPEAKER_02 0:27

Hello, and welcome to the Blue Chair Podcast. I am Pastor Jared, and with me as always, Charles. How's it going? It's going well. It's been a minute since we sat down and had a good conversation.

SPEAKER_03 0:38

It has been a minute. I feel like I see you all the time, but just not in this room.

SPEAKER_02 0:42

This room is foreign to us, for sure. Right. We do have some explaining to do. Um, we have been possibly busier than we have ever been in our entire lives these last two months. We have both are just constantly working. Schedules are backwards. Um, for some reason, I thought it was a good idea to um help coach Lila's soccer team for one.

SPEAKER_03 1:05

That's a lot.

SPEAKER_02 1:06

Guess how much soccer I played?

SPEAKER_03 1:08

Zero. Not any. And I give you credit because I was also asked to help coach, and my schedule helps me by not having to do that. So I've got a cop out. I said no because my schedule doesn't align, and I also know nothing about soccer.

SPEAKER_02 1:24

So yeah, I have zero experience in soccer. Um, but uh there was an email that went out from Open Door and said, hey, we can use some soccer coaches. And I asked Allison and I was like, I'm not doing it. I don't know what I'm doing. Like, I'm gonna be telling them to kick the ball or throw the ball or whatever, and they're gonna be like, Oh, you can't grab the ball with your hands. And I'm like, that's weird.

SPEAKER_03 1:43

You're the only team out there throwing it into the goal.

SPEAKER_02 1:46

Exactly. I haven't told anybody to tackle somebody yet, which is good. Yeah, I mean, you could just start putting like rugby rules in there. That's I've tried. He won't. The coach won't, but it was the I know it was the first practice, and I'm watching this guy go and he's hurting cats, and I'm like, fine. So I walk up to him and I'm like, hey coach, um, I saw the email go out, and I've got zero experience when it comes to soccer whatsoever, but I played football and rugby and I wrestled, so and I'm also a youth pastor, and so like if you need me to yell at some kids, if you need a hand doing anything, let me know. He's like, please. I didn't even get the whole sentence out. He's like, please, that'd be awesome. I'm like, I was really hoping you would tell me that you were expecting hoping for somebody with more experience.

SPEAKER_03 2:33

That's funny.

SPEAKER_02 2:33

Nope. I'm on I'm on this coaching staff now, and uh we're doing good. We are seven and one, eight and one and one.

SPEAKER_03 2:42

That's awesome.

SPEAKER_02 2:43

Yeah, we tied one game, lost one to the other open door team.

SPEAKER_03 2:47

You know, and it's crazy because I feel bad for Oakland because her team, so she's on the youngest like side of the spectrum for U7. Yeah, so every team is like two years older, and they have gotten demolished all year long. And literally the last game they played, demolished. I can't lie, I can't lie about it. And it's it I feel bad for her, but the last game was against another open door team who happened to be the same age group, and it was amazing because that team also did not have any wins all season. Oh, nice, and they ended in a tie. And I was like, that is perfect. Like for both teams who have lost all season to both walk away with a tie. I'm like, that's fantastic. Oakland did amazing, they put her in his goalie, she stopped three. Nice, nice. I'm like, that's awesome. And uh, no, it's been it's been a good season. And Coach Noah, who you know, um, he did awesome with them. He wasn't there at the end because he actually um I'm not gonna out his business, but he was uh overseas doing training right now uh for pastoral leadership stuff. So he was not there for the last couple, but he did awesome.

SPEAKER_02 3:52

The fill-ins did awesome, the kids were all uh when we're explaining to the people that we're too busy, you don't bring up somebody who's busier than both of us.

SPEAKER_03 4:01

I mean, I'm not gonna say he's busier than both of us. I'm just saying he's doing work for the for God's kingdom, all right.

SPEAKER_02 4:06

Noah Zaleski does a lot of good stuff. I've known him since what second or third grade? No. First and second grade, we went to school together. He's a good dude. He works over at Open Door, and uh he's got he's got a lot of things going on and he does

Hard Questions Series Overview

SPEAKER_02 4:20

awesome work. But you're not here to hear us talk about our soccer schedules. You're here to talk about the perspective, the sermons from the last month from the perspective of the blue chairs. Right. And we are gonna go over the the hard the hard series, the hard question series, where um Ryan, Pastor Ryan, took our questions that we often ask and said, I'm gonna take I'm gonna take a shot at answering these as best I can, and I'm gonna address these. And all of these, I think he did a fantastic job at picking questions that all of us ask at some point. Even if we're not in a in a tough place, or even if we're not um struggling with our faith, you may have been asked the question yourself. And so you ask the question, like, all right, how do I answer God? Why do bad things happen? Why is it only Jesus? And why can I trust the Bible? Like those are three questions that at some point, I would argue nearly every person asks, Christian or not, asks those questions, and they're probably the first three you gotta answer when it comes to apologetics. And if you don't know what apologetics is, apologetics is the um it's the study of being able to explain the Bible, believe it or not. Um, and for the longest, I could not understand why it's apology, is it feel like that's the root word. Right. Yeah, I'm like, what are we what are we sorry for, guys? But apologetics is just explaining the gospel to people. And if our mission here at AFresh Witness is to have 30,000 gospel conversations, apologize, apologetics is how we do it.

SPEAKER_03 5:59

And I do want to emphasize what you just said too, because it is explaining the gospel to people. And one of the first classes that I took was it was called apologetics at the cross. And uh I and I only want to emphasize this because everyone's on TikTok, everyone's on social media, and and today, every time you turn something on, people's idea of apologetics is who can win the argument. So it's you see all these people on there claiming that they're doing apologetics, but ultimately when you look at the trend, is it's actually what they're doing is pushing people away from Christ. Because in the course that I took, apologetics at the cross, it's being able to present the gospel like you were just saying, but doing it in the light of the foot of the cross. So everything should be done in the humility that's pointing back to the cross, not to win an argument or a tit for tat. And all of a sudden today you see apologetics, and it's who can demolish um the Islamic faith or who can demolish this faith. And they're doing it in a hurtful way that ultimately, even if you win the argument, you're not bringing anybody to Christ in that way either.

SPEAKER_02 6:59

Yeah, you're just having people walk away, walk away angrily. And that's that's something I think in our society we've got to get a hold on drastically. And I'm I'm a nerd, I've studied old beginning of the US politics, and the campaign, the campaign trail has been as petty and wild as it is today. We might think that a pol uh politics has gotten so much more angry that they're saying terrible things, but I mean, you they used to have campaigns that if you elect this president, all of your women are gonna be stolen and whatnot, and it's crazy stuff. It's always been the thing that has changed is how we approach it and how we have these conversations, and that matters in the realm of Christianity tenfold, right? If you're just doing scare tactic tactics 24-7 to bring people to the cross, when they're not scared anymore, they're not gonna be at the cross. Yeah. And so having an understanding of these the answers to these questions and being able to explain these answers is critical with our mission as a church, but also with the uh the Great Commission. Goodness, that word wasn't coming. The Great Commission that Jesus gave us. But without further ado, let's jump into

Why Bad Things Happen

SPEAKER_02 8:20

um, I was thinking about starting at week one. Okay. Why do bad things happen? Um, I think you walk away hearing about Habakkuk, and you know, every time he said it, I just wanted to say, bless you.

SPEAKER_04 8:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:33

Every time Habakkuk, oh, bless you. Um that's my first thought from the blue chair is that every time Ryan said Habakkuk, I wanted to pretend he was sneaking. Throw him a pack of tissues. Oh, yeah. Um but how we approach God and we're saying, How are these bad things happening? And his answer is like, oh, it's gonna get worse. And he he just praises God in the midst of it. And it's true, the promise that he gave was Jesus, and that that promise came through, but we feel like we often need to defend God in those times, and God really didn't defend himself, he said, Hey, there's better coming. All right. I'm not gonna tell you when, I'm not gonna tell you how, I'm not gonna tell you anything else, but there's better coming. And in the midst of that, Habakkuk praised him and it leaves the the tone that he never walked away from God or anything like that later on. And I'm just wondering like what the thought that I had, another question from this um account that I had was like 20 years down the road, what's Habakkuk doing? I mean, it seems like he was still praising God, he stay stayed firm in his faith, and Habakkuk is a book of the Bible, and I I feel like that leans to the idea that he didn't run away from the faith. But being that faithful when your answer wasn't answered, when things are going crazy, that's good, that's good stuff, and it's hard to do.

SPEAKER_03 10:03

I know that's it's definitely something that I struggled with, and I was actually just having this conversation the other day too about how hard it is to remain faithful and everything in those moments where you don't feel like God's working. And I I know I've gone through those areas where I see these things happening, and just because I can't tangibly see God, I start I started having these mindsets that I couldn't see God working, so I raise the question like where is God? Um, and we look at like the Israelites, right? They were wandering in the wilderness for you know 400 years, and you had promises that were given to them that I will, you know, rescue you soon. And it's like, okay, well, how soon is soon? It's been 400 years.

SPEAKER_02 10:48

In fairness, when you've been alive for eternity and you will be, 400 years is a drop in the bucket.

SPEAKER_03 10:54

But that's my point, is like I'm you know, I've had conversations with people where like you hear the word soon or you feel like it's coming soon, and it it it may never be in our lifetime, and like that's something that I've wrestled with through you know, pain, suffering, and loss in my life is it's like I know that there's a promise that you know I will be in the kingdom, and I don't expect my life now to match exactly what I want. He's given me the promise, and when that promise comes is on his time. So it's like that's where I've had to rest my my peace and faith in the knowing that he gave a promise, that promise is gonna come, and when it comes is on his time, and I need to stop pushing for you know peace and comfort now because it may not come now, it may not come at all in this lifetime, exactly.

SPEAKER_02 11:41

But um, and I think we can even tweak this question a little bit for the Christians, right? If you're a Christian and you already have the answer to the big question, like bad things happen because that it's kind of going off, you made me think of it. Bad things happen because the world is broken, right? Um, but as Christians, sometimes we're like, God promised this over my life. Like I believe that God wants me to do this. Why isn't he opening the doors? And why isn't it why isn't this working out? Like I do, I go to the church, I go to church, I do all these things, um, and it's not a bad thing, it's just an opportunity you want opened, right? And you're you're sitting here asking, why is it happening like this? First and foremost, God works on his time. We're we're here for the ride, and that's not wrong or an an indictment of God. Um, but when we're sitting here wondering why something isn't happened the way we want it to happen, we just need to trust that God's got a plan and it's gonna work out. And um that takes a lot of faith. One of the things kind of adjusting here, sorry. Um not adjusting, shifting gears. One of the things that I think Ryan, um, Pastor Ryan pointed out that is so crucial, and it it's like nails on a chalkboard to some people, me specifically, is that everything happens for a reason and God won't give you more than you can handle. I'm like, don't tell people that. No, that's that's not it. That's not it at all. Um God can use terrible things and make them awesome. It's not that doesn't mean that God's making the terrible things happen. You know what I mean? Yeah, like God's not over here making young children suffer, right? But can God use a terrible situation and empower you to help other people, lift other people in the midst of that suffering? A hundred percent. And that's what some of that means, not all of it. Um that's what they're trying to portray with I got everything happens for a reason. Like, no, the God didn't do that just so God didn't make something terrible happen just so we can talk about it or just so we can do X, Y, and Z. It's possible. I doubt it. I I genuinely do. But um, because like you consider the book of Job and things like that, like God let that stuff happen, and it's a tough pill to swallow. But it does create this false sense of all right, God, you've got something bigger and better coming my way, what's gonna happen? And then when it doesn't show up, you're breaking spirits at that point, you're just crushed. And we gotta, as Christians, we gotta be careful of that, in my opinion.

SPEAKER_03 14:23

Right. And then there was something else too, with um, I'm gonna butcher it and say it funny, but Habakkuk is less than that. I think what stood out to me was that um he wasn't condemned for asking those questions, he was actually bringing them to God. And when I look back, like that shows me my shortcomings when when I was first, you know, trying to come to Christianity and and understand God is you know, when I was going through all my struggles and loss and everything, I wasn't even attempting to bring those to God because I posed a question for myself on um, I think there's a difference between underst or between questioning God because you want to actually understand him, and questioning God because you've already decided he isn't there. So, like for me, I I reflect back on those days and I try to ask myself, like, which one was I? Like, was I not asking him the questions because I didn't understand him, or was I not asking the questions because in my mind I was already trying to paint that he wasn't even there present in those situations? And uh I don't know, I

Showing Up In Grief

SPEAKER_03 15:30

think it challenged me a little bit. And to talk and taking that and leading into what else you were just saying about you know, certain comments that that you ask people. Um is there was there's when when I was going through so Erica's been with me through a couple of the losses that I've had, um and she's been blessed to not really have to go through that yet. So she was one of the ones that really didn't know like what to say, what to do. Um, and I think she learned being with me as I went through these things that um I really didn't need her to say anything. Like a lot of times if you say something, even though you're not intending it to be the wrong thing, a lot of times you're gonna end up saying the wrong thing that's totally not gonna help the situation at all.

SPEAKER_01 16:16

Exactly.

SPEAKER_03 16:17

Um, and she did a couple times, and like it never really got to me. It's I didn't hold it against her or anything, but um I and I never really understood this concept until talking with Tim and even going through scripture and now going to school. But Tim's really like pushed this idea on sometimes it's just the presence of being there. You don't have to say anything at all. A lot of times people just want the comfort of knowing somebody's there to hear what they're going through, and um, just the presence that can you know, try to bring a little bit of joy into the situation or peace, you know, whatever it may be, just the still quietness of somebody being there, you know, next to them. Yeah, and that's something that I I've been through it, so I understand it in the sense of I didn't need her to say anything, I just wanted her next to me. I needed to know that I was supported, that you know, she cared enough for me to be there. That was the biggest part is you know, she was outside of Christ, you know, she was the rock that you know I I really I needed her in my life during those times. Um I always need her in my life, but my goodness.

SPEAKER_02 17:19

No, I think you're entirely correct. We and that's probably where a lot of these answers come from. That we're like, what do we say? Like, how do we how do we spin this together for good? There's no spinning, there's no spinning. Jesus wept. Yeah, Jesus knew what he was gonna do, but by just seeing the the the cost of sin, the cost of that separation, and the destruction of the original goal that or plan that God had for the world, like it broke his heart.

SPEAKER_03 17:53

And I'm glad you bring that up because the and this is gonna make me sound like such a softie, but literally thinking about what I wanted to talk about today and that because I actually had that in here as a note, the whole Jesus wept thing, because I think about the struggle I was going through with my mom and asking those hard questions to God, like, where are you? Like, where are you doing all this? Like, why is this happening to me? And I even started questioning, you know, Ryan talks about people who are doing all these other things and they're succeeding. You have someone who's good that's suffering. Like, why are these people succeeding right now? And why are they climbing? Why are they winning? And you got someone, and I won't, I don't like using the word good, but someone who you don't think deserves to go through what they're going through while you watch these wicked people rise. And you know, I I thought about that and I thought about my process with my mom and everything, and how I wasn't seeing it. And then after, you know, the experiences that I went through that ultimately brought me to God, and I started reading this verse, and I don't remember if Ryan said it or if I read it somewhere else, but if you think about that verse alone, Jesus wept, he could have rushed right past him and went and raised Lazarus and everything else, but he didn't. He stopped as a God who came into his creation and wept with them. And it's like I think about that, and I'm like, here I was the whole time questioning where God was and all of it. And God is right there in the mess with us, and he even showed it by weeping with them. Dude, there's some really good song.

SPEAKER_02 19:18

Uh, You Were on the Cross by Matt Mayer. Matt Maher or Mayer, I don't know. It's not Mayer as in John Mayer, but Matt Mayer.

SPEAKER_04 19:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 19:27

Uh Maher. And it it presents that same thing. Like, where were you in all of this? And it's and the culmination of the song is You Were on the Cross. Like you were paying the debt of my depravity, my sin, my brokenness. You paid for that in the midst of it. Um and we wonder where he is. He's he's right there with us. He he knows this pain and this sorrow and this emptiness and brokenness. Well, right, he has felt it firsthand with us. Yeah. Um I was listening to How Deep a Father's Love for Us on the Way Here, actually. I'm in a hymn mode, dude. You boys, and it's Celtic worship too, so it's like bagpipes. And dude, if anyone pulls up next to my car and I'm jamming out some bagpipes, don't say anything, just keep moving past. Um but like the idea that the father loved us enough to put all of that on his son, like to the point where he looked away. Like, I can't witness the brokenness of this.

SPEAKER_03 20:32

I'm so glad you brought that up because that's what when you brought that up, that's exactly where my mind was going to is like we asked the question of where are you in those moments of pain. But as he was on the cross, there was a moment where like the communication between him and the father stopped. And it's like how heartbreaking for both of them to not have that community, like a communication he's had the whole time, and then on the cross during those hours where the communication just stopped. It's like, you know how heartbreaking that must have been to like just be feel torn from the father? I can't even imagine it.

SPEAKER_02 21:07

And to think about the weight. It's all of the grief to ever exist. All of it at one time. All of it thrown on you. All of it just oh that and that's what he pointed to to Habakkuk saying that. And it's and if you think about it, alright, think about this. And it just popped in my head, so I'm working this out on the fly. It's like he told Habakkuk you're gonna keep going through all of this. I have a plan. And every bit of that extra pain that God put on himself in that. God knows what's going to happen on the cross. And so God's like You're gonna have it's gonna be six hundred more years of this that I'm going to endure. But you're gonna have to go through it first. You're gonna go through this and then I've I've got a promise coming, I've got a Redeemer coming. But some things gotta play out. And every second I wait, I know that I'm going to feel all of that too. I'm gonna like that think about it, think about it from God's perspective, there is what I'm saying. Like dude, if it was me, Adam and Eve sin, two days later, hi, my name is Jesus. I'm here to save the world. Like that's that's the that's the sin I'm taking on, you know what I mean? Like I'll take that weight.

SPEAKER_03 22:40

Um but man, it is one I think something else that I wanted to point towards with this with this sermon, um,

Faith Seasons And Feelings

SPEAKER_03 22:51

is faith isn't just trusting God when everything's going right. Um, and this is the video that I was telling you that I just watched. Uh the lady was explaining it. I forget who she said drew it, but it was like a a scholar at some point. But it's like a curved line, right? So when you're coming into the faith and you're worshiping and you're praying and everything, like the line's going up. And then all of a sudden you kind of hit a lull where you kind of flatline for a minute, but then all of a sudden the line starts curving down. Um, and you start getting bored, you start getting, you know, what like things were going good, and you know, things stayed there for a while. So then you start kind of getting bored and it you start going down, you're no longer feeling the things that you used to feel. And um, the scholar was talking about it, like the seasons that we go through with in our faith, and how a lot of people think that just because that line starts curving down, that God's now absent for some reason. But the truth of the matter is is that even in that that downward curve, the same Holy Spirit that was with you in the upward curve is still there working out those bad situations in the downward curve. Um, and that like it that gave me inspiration in the fact that like I I've been through those those ups and downs, and I feel like in the downs I did feel that way. I did start to question like where is God in these moments? Like, why am I not feeling that joyous feeling that I used to feel? Um, but honestly, I like looking back on those times now, I can actually see where the spirit was working in those moments, and ultimately that's what brought me back on that upward pattern. Is you have to start realizing what the spirit's doing and work with the spirit to try and bring yourself back up out of that. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:26

It's like it's like love, it really is. I love Allison more in this moment than I've ever loved her before. And it doesn't matter if we're breaking this morning, like the with the outside circumstances, it might be a little downward, right? It could be we're stressed, whatever thing, we're we're not getting along perfectly in that moment. But the love doesn't ever change, right? Right? It's not like it's it's it's it's a I'm trying to coin a term for it. It's like an existential emotion, is what how what I've been leaning towards. And honestly, if Brian and Tim are writing so much books, that's what I should write a book about. I'm doing a master's degree in pastoral counseling. I should probably lean into the whole feelings thing and write a book about that.

SPEAKER_03 25:15

There we go.

SPEAKER_02 25:15

It's my idea. If anybody tries to take it off, fight you. That's not the point of the book.

SPEAKER_03 25:20

That's the whole book. One sentence, just feelings suck.

SPEAKER_02 25:23

Children's book. Put a picture on and call it good. No, it's these emotions that are almost like forever, where it's like these things are ongoing, and it doesn't matter the circumstances around you. Um, grief, love, uh those are those are some of them where it's like the grief, love, joy are like the top three. Where it is this it doesn't matter what's going on around you, it doesn't matter how you feel, you still have that emotion. Right. Um, you can angrily love somebody, or you can laugh in the midst of grief. But I almost said in the midst of Greece. I laugh when I watch Greece. Should I break out in a song and dance? All right, that's a good segue into moving on for something else.

SPEAKER_03 26:11

Um, I mean, I had uh I had notes too for I know we usually don't go sermon by sermon, but there's only three, so I mean it doesn't really matter.

SPEAKER_02 26:19

Then let's jump to

Grace Over Performance

SPEAKER_02 26:20

three. No, I'm kidding. All right.

SPEAKER_03 26:21

No, you're no, I think uh I think it was from the second one. Um I just had a point that for a lot of years, like I misunderstood what Christianity really was, and um more so now than before. Uh, because Ryan made a an illustration during that sermon about a ladder um trying to explain the difference between attempting to earn God's acceptance and receiving salvation through Christ. Um so I I like that it was a hard thing for me, like first coming into the faith, because and I don't know, maybe everyone goes through it, maybe everyone doesn't, but I went through this phase where it was kind of like uh I'm not doing enough, I'm not performing high enough. Like I did feel like I had to earn his love or earn uh his grace. And the longer I started reading and and understanding, and obviously coming to church where I have a great group of pastors that's you know giving a good word, and you know, I started to really see scripture for what it was, and just even in my own personal reading, um, and diving into God's word and letting the spirit kind of move through me as I'm reading, I start to come to that understanding that it's not it's not my performance. Like he paid it all on the cross for one. Um but for I think for years I really didn't understand the true depth of the gospel. And I think that honestly, we're going through that phase again right now with society. That's what me and Ryan were just talking about with uh me teaching the last class on the ordinances. You know, we were out there talking about baptism and how there's this new, you know, not new, but it's like ramping back up again this fire of people saying that it's you know, faith alone doesn't save you, you know, you have to get baptized too. And it's all these things are coming back up that's now starting to put emphasis back on the people. And I feel like that's putting us back in that that trap, back into slavery of having this constant, you know, weight on our shoulders that we're not performing high enough or we're not doing things high enough. And honestly, that just takes away the emphasis of why we're doing it, and not you're you're trying to put the emphasis on doing it for salvation and not the true heart posture of why you're doing it.

SPEAKER_02 28:30

Yeah. And I know you would agree when I say that doing the things is good. Yeah, we're supposed to, we're supposed to follow the law, it's not open season, you're not saved, and now you can do whatever you want. You're supposed to do these things, God's calling you to do these things, but it's the uh what's the opposite of humble arrogance, pride, the pride. That's the word I was working for. It's the pride of it, of the of the action where, well, I give I give 15% on Sundays. Like, yeah, I'm a I'm a big deal, you know. God doesn't care about 15 cents. 15. God's got the cattle, the house on a thousand hills. Like cattle, is it cattle or a house? I'm confusing myself this way. You know what?

SPEAKER_03 29:17

I have no idea what you're talking about, so I'm just gonna let you say whatever you want.

SPEAKER_02 29:20

All right. Um I'm twisting stuff up, but anywho.

SPEAKER_03 29:26

I think it's and so I did like for that lesson, I did put together like um, because Ryan also thought it would be a good idea to put together the scripture that kind of combats the idea of like I don't know if you want to use the the phrase like baptismal regeneration or or whatever, that putting the sole emphasis on baptism. But I put together like a scripture list in terms of like combating the idea that baptism saves. Um and it just like in a nutshell, like my whole point behind the thing is coming to the faith is what's producing the fruits inside of you, which then those fruits is what calls you to the obedience. Yes, and I do understand that like in the Great Commission it was a command to go out and baptize. So I don't I would never tell anybody not to get baptized.

SPEAKER_02 30:12

Bapt baptized baptisms, baptizing, whatever baptism is good and we should do it a hundred percent. But does it save you? The answer is no, right?

SPEAKER_03 30:23

And that I only said that one because I feel like that's the easiest one, and I think that's the one that's at the forefront of like every video I see right now is like baptism, baptism, baptism. Um, and that's I just I bring it up more so just in my daily walk. Like I struggled for the longest time of feeling like I had to do things in order to earn it, and I think that's what was like kind of separating me in a sense, because I was misunderstanding the whole thing, and that's why I brought up to you in Life Group the other day the whole verse about depart from me, and I thought about it a lot, and I thought about like what they were saying to him in that moment, and it was the pride of I did these things, yeah. Whether they claimed it was in his name or not, they were claiming it as I, I, I, and they were missing the whole point. Yeah, so it's even if you're out there like the disciples were out there doing these things, and it the thing is that you should never come to his feet and say that I did these things. It's like, no, it's by your power that I could do these things and thank you for that.

SPEAKER_02 31:22

Yeah. And that's in a nutshell what we're trying to portray here, and it's where so many people get in arguments about this is that God won God calls for our obedience, God demands our obedience, and we should do those things. If God's calling you to give 15%, give 15% because you need to be obedient, and that's good, that is good stuff to do, and it's important, and you should do it. However, it does not make you any more saved than if you didn't. That's that's the thing that matters. Now, can you make the argument well, if you're saved, you're gonna obey God and do those things a whole lot more? Yes. And that argument is made that if you are saved, there's going to be fruit, right? Clear, clear as day. But it's not the act that saves you. Right. You're kind of putting the cart before the horse. The salvation is the horse. That's that's why everything moves in the first place. The cart full of all the good things you do is because you were saved, is because you knew God. Um, and that's super important to know that we we should do those things not out of fear or worry that we're not good enough, but because we know that God's plan is good, and if He has called us to do it, we should do it.

SPEAKER_03 32:47

But I think for me, like the real struggle with this one in particular was like coming to the understanding that it's not everyone's different in the sense that like not everyone's gonna have this like giant instantaneous change the minute they come to God in the sense of like the work side of things. So for me, like when I I had to like really chew on a lot of stuff and do like some self-examination and and prayer and to really start to see like where my shortcomings were, and then as I like went through this process, then I started seeing that inward change that pushed towards these things, and it wasn't me trying to earn it, like this was just the that inward side of me that you know the man that I put off to bring on the new, that is where the change started taking place. Like, as I was changing, so were my actions. So it's like I I only bring it because like I felt the weight of that, and I know that there's probably other ones out there too that are also feeling that weight. And for me, I felt like it was a really dangerous situation to be in because I was putting the emphasis on me and I wasn't relinquishing that and letting you know putting it at God's feet and asking him to show me and help me.

SPEAKER_02 33:58

And yeah, but I I'm happy that Pastor Ryan had this week when he was preaching.

Why Only Jesus

SPEAKER_02 34:05

Because if you asked me this question, why only Jesus? Well, first I'd point you to I believe it's John 14, 8, where he says I'm the way, the truth, and life. Um, someone quote me on that and yell at me on a Sunday if I got that quoted wrong. But Jesus says that he is the way, right? Why only Jesus? Because he said so. Well, then the next part of the question is, why why do we believe what this Jesus guy said? And then I'd hand you a copy of A Case for Christ by Lee Strobel. Uh, that's a good one.

SPEAKER_03 34:36

I have it on my shelf and I read Ryan's book first. It was good. Um, I read Ryan's book. I that is the next one on my list to do.

SPEAKER_02 34:46

I'm still not convinced you just didn't just put a bunch of little sticky.

SPEAKER_03 34:51

I had full conversations with Ryan. He is more than aware that I read that book. You listen to the sermon series. Uh but anywho.

SPEAKER_02 35:00

All right. How much what time are we at here? Oh, we got to move to the last one. We're running out of time. We got 10 more minutes or so.

SPEAKER_03 35:06

Let me let me move to the last sermon.

Reasons To Trust The Bible

SPEAKER_02 35:08

This is the one that I wish, dude. If I could pick a sermon, this one's it. This is where Super Nerdy Jared comes out and gets all different kinds of excited about why we can trust the Bible. This is not so much a sermon as welcome to class. We're gonna go over all the nuances, we're gonna touch archaeology, we're gonna touch literature, we're gonna touch all of it, get into it and explain why the Bible is valid. And one of the bit, and while Ryan was preaching this, one of the arguments that is made as to why the Bible is inaccurate was just screaming at me throughout the whole thing. You hear so often. Well, the Bible was trans uh translated from ancient Hebrew to Greek to Aramaic to Arabic to German to Latin to French to English, and that's how we finally got this last book wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong. We have the notes, right? And I love that Ryan brought that up.

SPEAKER_03 36:17

We have all the we have massively ancient texts that just in reverence of like all the manuscripts, yes, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 36:24

We've got all of it, and yes, we can translate it from ancient Hebrew to this, to that, to this, to that, to that, whatever. And if that's initially like, all right, let's say that's initially how it played out, like they didn't have the older, like assuming that they did that in that order, which okay in my mind, if you're gonna translate a bunch of stuff to a bunch of different languages, whoever knows the original language would then translate it to the another language that they know, right? They'd kind of go back to the homework. We know enough about language to begin with that words change when we're swapping languages over and over. We know that. Um but let's assume that that's how it initially was translated. When we found the Dead Secretary scrolls, we went back and looked. And it was and wow, what did Ryan say 500,000 uh changes or 500,000 points of conflict within the within the text? I believe it was 500,000, half a million. And all of them are just because they spelled words wrong.

SPEAKER_03 37:28

Yeah, and that's like I feel like that's where one of my biggest arguments come into place is when people are questioning like the different translations and everything else. I was like, most of the errors you will ever find are like transcriber errors in the sense of like pronunciation or uh one character being off or missing a comma or what like it's the small things, like the message and what was written is all the same. Most of your errors dial down to like something minute, the smallest little transcribal error. But I like when I think about scripture and and how I've learned to trust it, is it I don't know, I'm sure everyone's seen the video, but where they tie all the books together and it's almost like this rainbow effect of all the cross-references throughout scripture, and you have all these different authors over the span of however many years, and they're all linking back in like I don't care how good of a writer you could ever, you could be the best writer in the world. You'll never have anything that links like that. Even if you brought all the greatest minds together on earth and tried to pair, it would never come close to to how scripture interacts with itself.

SPEAKER_02 38:34

Yeah, you're 100% correct. There is there's been so much time spent with scholars and authors and people who don't believe in it, studying this stuff and studying the book to get to where we can assume that this is the original text at this point. And I know if you don't study it and you don't know all these nerdy little facts because I don't know, you were great at sports and not like me, uh, and that took up your time. I don't know. Okay, I nerve off too.

SPEAKER_03 39:07

When I watched that video of the cross-references, my draw was like on the floor the whole time just watching it because I get the good, like I get so nerdy and giggly when I watch like nerdy videos like that. I just I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 39:17

Oh yeah, because it's it is in my opinion, when it comes to things like this, it is the few ways that God has given us to make our faith more tangible, if that makes sense. Yeah, like if faith is believing but not saying this is seeing, seeing God's work done, yeah, and seeing how this all connects, that we get excited because it is reassuring. And as people, we need that, right? And not that it's like, oh, I need this reassurance or I'm not believing in God. But when you believe in God and you're you're you're in on that, you're sold, and you've given your life to Christ, and then you learn this and you're like, whoa, that is exciting. Like, yeah, it's like, ooh, I'm not crazy because I do believe this happened, and now there's more evidence for it. Um but that's why that's one of the reasons why this is one of my favorite subjects, that there is so much evidence as to why we can trust the Bible. And even considering like he brought up old accounts of Alexander the Great, where, like, granted, yes, you're not giving your life to Alexander the Great. The cost, uh the cost gain, whatever, is far less to be like, yeah, that's what Alexander the Great did. Nothing's gonna happen. But um, we just give all this validity to the validity to the accounts of Alexander the Great that were in 600 years, 400 years after it.

SPEAKER_04 40:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 40:51

Like no one knows if any of that's actually what happened. That's a mostly word of mouth.

SPEAKER_04 40:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 40:56

And if you what did they say about history? The winning army determines the history?

SPEAKER_04 41:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 41:03

Like, no, we just go ahead and give out all of our shortcomings. That yeah, we uh we want you to believe us, but we're gonna let you know that it was women who found it when at the time of writing, not appropriate. I know it's wrong, women are equal to men. They weren't equal to men. Right. Like, why is that going to be your argument?

SPEAKER_03 41:25

And I'm really glad you brought that up because I like you bringing up this whole point from that sermon is funny because I just was having this conversation with Erica today, because she asked a question about like other faiths when they're looking into um Christianity, you get these comments from from people that's like, oh, well, you're just following Paul or this, that, and the other. And I told her, I was like, if you look like for me, if you can't trust all of scripture, then you have to throw everything out. Like, you can't just trust this part, not trust this part.

SPEAKER_01 41:57

Exactly.

SPEAKER_03 41:58

So when I look at the Bible, and I think Ryan talked about it too, but when you look through the whole Bible, and even historians and theologians have all talked about it in the sense of when you look at other ancient cultures and they write anything down, it's usually only the good stuff. Like they don't make themselves look embarrassing, they don't put in their shortcomings, they don't it it's usually like anything that tries to prove them right, and most historians and theologians will claim that to be some sort of falsehood. Because if there's nothing that indicates any troubles or whatever, usually it's a group of people that came together that just wanted to write a really good story. Yeah, that's a bias. But when you look at the Bible from Genesis all the way to Revelation, it shows every every um downfall, every you know, stupid decision, everything embarrassing that happened to anybody who held any light in scripture is in the Bible. So it wasn't like uh, hey, you should come to Christianity because here's a Bible and it only shows all perfect things. And if you believe in God, all these perfect things are gonna happen to you. It's like, no, these people struggled just like you're struggling. Look at how many times that you know, look at this bozo turned away from God after he just saw a pillar of fire. And it's like, so all the way through script, like that's how I can trust it. Well, and one of the ways is you look through it and it's like, why, if they wanted me to come to the faith, why would they include all these shortcomings?

SPEAKER_02 43:15

Yeah, like give your life to Christ, you're gonna get crucified upside down. Right.

SPEAKER_03 43:19

It's like, wait a minute, what did he just tell them?

SPEAKER_02 43:22

Our fathers of the faith didn't gain. No, they didn't. Their lives were more difficult exponentially, right? They were hunted. Other religions, you can't say that.

SPEAKER_03 43:33

Like, could you picture the conversation between Jesus and the disciples before he got crucified? He's like, Yeah, I want you guys to follow me, but I'm just letting you know every one of you is gonna die.

SPEAKER_02 43:42

Just imagine wait a minute, put that in any other context. All right, guys, this is what we're gonna do. We're gonna we got this business plan for our new company, it's all gonna crash and burn, right? But then eventually things are gonna come up good, just so you know that that's the this is the plan we have for everyone.

Evidence, Martyrs, And Real Costs

SPEAKER_02 44:00

No one would buy it.

SPEAKER_03 44:00

But you gotta get past the crash and burn first. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 44:03

Like, and if you talking about how talking about faith and early church leaders and all of that stuff, it makes me think back to the first century. These people who were one or two people removed from the disciples, just welcoming death rather than giving up their faith. People who were who were there. When we look at um the Coliseum and the Gladiatorial Games, like no one talks about how many Christians were killed there for no other reason that they were Christians. Like that's one of the key people that were killed there. They would burn them at stakes and crucify them and feed them the lions and do all of these terrible things to them because it was fun. Like they wouldn't give up their faith, they wouldn't make Caesar Lord, and so go ahead and uh you'll kill him. There's an old story, I can't remember who the the guy was, but he was on the pillar, the pilar or pile or whatever, the pot wood pile, about to get burned, and they gave him an opportunity. Renounce your faith and you can get off. All right, we'll call it, we'll be done. All right, just renounce Jesus. And his response was literally like, I can't do that. But what I can I talk to you about my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ? Like hit him with one of those, like, let's talk about it. Let me just explain to you why you're wrong, even though there's a thousand people here and you'll probably die too. You're gonna kill me, cool. But let me tell you about Jesus before you do kill me. Like, you have to believe it at that point. You have to be sold on this, and that is within the time that they could have known these people, or they their parents knew them. You know what I mean? Where it's like, we're not talking hundreds of years, we're talking they say that the whole Bible was the old New Testament within 70 years of Jesus' death and resurrection. That is wild. 70 years, that's it.

SPEAKER_03 45:56

Uh there was another story too that I just read. I don't know if it was in my gospels class or if it was in the chaplain leadership one, but uh I think it was chaplain leadership. But it was talking about I think there were five guys that were prisoners of war. Four of them were Christian, one was not, and they were brought out to be executed. And they went one by one and was trying to get them to denounce their faith. And obviously, all the four Christians would not denounce, and they got to the one that was atheist or whatever he was, and after hearing the testimony of the other four, he said, I believe in their God, and he wouldn't denounce it either. So in this moment, he's watching all of them one by one not be able to denounce their faith, and he's like, I want that. And like to me, like that, I don't that it's powerful in the sense of like, I think those testimonies and those moments is it I think it's like the living word in action. Yep. Um, and that's one of the points that I had on here too, is um scripture for me uh isn't just giving me information, it's changing how I live. And I've had these conversations with other people of other faith, and a lot of them don't have any sort of uh, and I'll just say good news. Like when you if I were talking, you know, there's a guy that I work with um that is Muslim, and I've talked to him about like, you know, what promise or assurance do you have? And they don't. Like he can't guarantee me that he'll be in any sort of paradise. You know, he believes that honestly he might go to hell first and have to pay for his sins and then possibly, you know, make it to paradise. Um but when I look at scripture, I I can see it actively changing my life, and I can also see the the promises and assurances. Um but I think the thing that tr has me trust the Bible so much is the fact that it is a living word that's working through you and it does change your life. Yep.

SPEAKER_02 47:51

And you can shift in gears

Catholic And Protestant Bible Differences

SPEAKER_02 47:55

a bit to the actual text. One of the genuinely good questions that come from can we trust the Bible is why are the Bibles different? Why is there the Catholic Bible and then the Protestant Bible? And the the reasoning for that, just for sake of answering the question, is there were texts written after that 70 AD part point. And at some point those were thrown into the mix. Um some of them claim to be things that they're not, a lot of them claim to be written by people that weren't alive at that point. Gospel of Thomas was written like 200 AD. That's a couple hundred years after Thomas was walking around. All right. And so you're gonna claim that it was Thomas, and there's no way Thomas could have written it. All right, that's not scripture. There's a clear lie present. And so we took that out. We said, hey, we disagree with this, and we took this that out hundreds of years ago. Now, yes, I disagree fundamentally with Catholics keeping it in. I believe it is wrong. Um but there's all kinds of extra biblical text that might have some good things to say. It's just a question whether or not that's the inherent word of God. Um and that's important, and that's a very big question to ask. Um, but as Protestants, you ask us that, and that's our that's our reasoning, that there's there's clear signs that these aren't from God, these aren't scripture, these were in after the fact, these are um these have major contradictions that can't be leveled up and made made sense of. And that's an issue. And um that isn't that isn't something that hasn't been addressed. It has been. And so it's very important to keep that in mind that where there might be some gaps within the term scripture between Catholics and Protestants and um Mormons, that's the word. We need to keep in mind that as Protestants, we've eliminated a lot of those. And we can't answer for what the Catholics consider scripture. We can't answer for what the Mormons believe to be scripture. There's some differences there, but don't argue that. Don't argue that case. And so that's my thought of it.

SPEAKER_03 50:19

And I would agree, I think, and I I've read arguments and I don't know. Um, you know, like talking with with Ryan and Tim. Like obviously when I read arguments, it's not scripture. I don't, you know, take these arguments into my doctrine, but I've read arguments like in the New Testament, there's times when Peter and them are talking, and there's references they make that people try to tie back to like the book of Enoch and stuff like that. And I think a lot of times, like watching these arguments and people not they're not arguing for the validity that you know Peter believed in the book of Enoch, they're arguing that in that time when you had like the corruption going on in these churches, they were following false doctrines and false uh writings of other people, and Peter was using these as a way of like correcting the church in the sense of like this is not our doctrine. Um but I don't know. But I I I see what you're saying because like I've read the book of Enoch and I don't hold it as scripture. Um, I think that it does try to paint some light of like what's happening in Genesis, what is that Z six? I can't remember. I think so. Um I think it tries to paint some light there, but I don't hold it as doctrine, I don't hold it as biblical truth. I think if if uh there was supposed to be meaning to that, it would have been included. Um, so I don't try to interject an idea that was painted from a book that came however many years later. Same thing with like the book of Maccabees and stuff in the Catholic book. I think it tries to paint like a historical record of what happened um during the times that's not written about, but I don't hold it to anything that should be canonical in the sense that it should be included in the Bible. Um I don't know, those are my thoughts. I think some of them do try to paint some sort of light, but I don't there's also parts in those books too that I've read that don't align with what the Bible teaches. And I think that if if there's any sort of like opposing idea to what's in scripture, then it was most likely never intended to be in there. Yeah, it was written by someone who didn't understand or someone who wasn't a part of the discipleship or whatever the case may be. But if if you have a book that you know looks real good from like the outside edge, but then once you start diving into it is is fundamentally pulling away from the rest of scripture, then it obviously was never intended to be in there. Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 52:28

And Ryan pointed out where there's footnotes of when these when our scripture has some discrepancies, has some differences, of saying, hey, these the Dead Sea Scrolls in this book, the ancient Greek text, have this ver this word in this other one that we've used for 400 years didn't have it. And it doesn't make a massive contradiction of belief. If there like we don't root our beliefs on contradict or on these discrepancies, and it's not like we chose that, it's just how they played out because God protected it. Like God was like, We're gonna keep we're gonna make sure this stuff is good, and who knows? Um another thing that I just quickly addressed because we're running out of time is if if we're all reading the same book, if this book is perfect and if this book is true, why is everyone walking away believing something different?

Why Christians Disagree

SPEAKER_02 53:20

It's not that we are always completely believing something different, but if you give any if you give 100 people the same book and you ask them to explain it, explain the point of it, there's gonna be differences. And there's gonna be things they disagree on. Oh, this person is a terrible person. Well, no, I think this person's actually misunderstood or whatnot. And so when you when you magnify this and make it as important as our faith is, these issues more often than not seem much larger and much more emotional than they really are. There, I mean, our church has always taken the stance of major and on the major, minor and on the minors. We there's some things that we're not gonna agree on fully as a leadership um within the church, but as long as it isn't the big things, salvation and a few other doctrines, then it doesn't really matter at the end of the day. We can have some different interpretations of some random things. Um whether or not like one thing that I initially thought was wild is Tim has said it at the pulpit. Like, did um I believe he has, and I could be miscontributing this, so bear with me. People are like, some people believe that there's no set answer on evolution and things. Like, dude, that was early Genesis, whether or not it was interpreted how we should interpret that as a literal day or uh whatever.

SPEAKER_03 54:44

Like one day is a thousand years.

SPEAKER_02 54:46

Yeah, there's some there's some room there that doesn't mean everything's false about it, you know what I mean? Um, choosing not to make a hard stance on everything be like, well, I'm gonna be sure to ask God that once I get to heaven isn't saying that the whole thing's faith, fake. It's that I've heard some good points and uh I'm gonna let God clear that up for me. And that's okay. You know, you get what I'm saying? Am I portraying that correctly?

SPEAKER_03 55:10

Yeah, and I think, and I can say this with confidence just in the experiences that I've had here, um, in past experiences with past churches, I've I've gotten the impression a lot of times that like if you let's say you do come across a verse like that, um, and you're struggling with it, you don't understand what it is, and you try to take it to a pastor. I've had the experience where the pastor would say something along the lines of, well, that really doesn't matter, we're not gonna talk about it. Um, whatever, and they shove it off to the side. And a lot of times I feel like that leaves people in this this area of not knowing or not understanding, or whatever the case may be. But since I've been here, you know Tim. Tim's a nerd too. Um, Ryan likes to get into conversations, you like to get into conversations. And I know for a hundred percent Tim would be like if I had one of those like really deep spiritual questions, like if something I read in the Bible that just no one else would ask, Tim would love to sit there and talk about that.

SPEAKER_02 56:02

He'd be up all night.

SPEAKER_03 56:03

Oh, yeah. So I would just say that like if you find yourself in that situation, don't be afraid to talk to the pastors about it. Yeah, um, I think it's extremely healthy to have those kinds of questions, and even if you don't talk to a pastor, you know, pray about it, take it to God. Um, but I I've noticed like that is one thing that I really love about being here is just how open everybody is to to have those kinds of conversations. It doesn't take change doctrine, it doesn't change how you obtain your salvation, but it is like a good spiritual question. Sometimes people just need to ask it.

SPEAKER_02 56:32

Oh, yeah. We always want to learn more and know more about our faith and our scripture and all of that good stuff.

Final Takeaways And Goodbye

SPEAKER_02 56:40

Um, but man, it was great talking with you. We are at 56 minutes, we're about 10 minutes over.

SPEAKER_03 56:45

I love it. You know what? It's we'll just paint it as an hour, you know. This is our us trying to atone and repent for not being here. We're giving you more time. That's what it is. Good call. Good call.

SPEAKER_02 56:57

I like it. But thank you for listening to the Blue Chair Podcast, where we take the last month's sermon and give you our perspective from the blue chairs. And it was great talking with you. Charles, say goodbye. Have a great week, guys. Talk to you.