1
00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:09,440
I pray and trust that you had a blessed week this past week. They say that if you end your day

2
00:00:10,160 --> 00:00:16,880
thinking of a couple of positive things that you can be grateful for, that you thank God for,

3
00:00:16,880 --> 00:00:25,120
that it does wonders in helping ease thoughts of negativity or bring a little bit of relief to

4
00:00:25,120 --> 00:00:34,080
maybe more serious depressions or something of the sort. So tonight would be a great time if you

5
00:00:34,080 --> 00:00:38,640
haven't done it yet before you close your eyes for your nightly rest. Eight hours they tell us.

6
00:00:40,080 --> 00:00:45,360
Offer up a prayer of thanksgiving. End your day on that positive note. Think and you will find it.

7
00:00:45,360 --> 00:00:53,040
Think about how God has made himself known to you today and how he's blessed you and recognize it.

8
00:00:53,040 --> 00:00:58,880
And just say thank you. It's a great way to end the night. It's a good way to begin your sleep

9
00:00:59,440 --> 00:01:06,160
because if you end on a good note you're more likely to begin on a good note. You wake up in

10
00:01:06,160 --> 00:01:13,920
the morning thinking of the last thing. I want to share with you one little bit of news before we

11
00:01:13,920 --> 00:01:20,240
get into our message. This has nothing to do with the news per se but last week we had inserts in

12
00:01:20,240 --> 00:01:26,640
the bulletin from our health ministries talking about the benefits of sunlight, vitamin D and

13
00:01:26,640 --> 00:01:35,520
energy and it makes you more alert and so on. There is also really really good evidence to say

14
00:01:35,520 --> 00:01:43,360
that if you can get a little bit of sun on you in the first hour of waking up that your alertness

15
00:01:43,360 --> 00:01:51,440
and and the motivation actually lasts well into the day and it helps start your your body's natural

16
00:01:51,440 --> 00:01:58,720
rhythms in a healthier way that it does better than a cup of coffee. That it it's good. It's good to

17
00:01:58,720 --> 00:02:04,240
do that. I also have another study I came across. This is not a new one but it was new to me because

18
00:02:04,240 --> 00:02:12,960
it got emailed to me this week. This is a study from 2016 done in Sweden so still very relevant.

19
00:02:12,960 --> 00:02:23,840
It was done with 29,500 and change women and what they assessed were the differences in sun exposure

20
00:02:23,840 --> 00:02:31,840
as a risk factor for all cause mortality. In other words what benefit do you have compared to

21
00:02:31,840 --> 00:02:36,000
other risk factors if you just get some sun? Just gets a little bit of sun.

22
00:02:36,000 --> 00:02:42,400
What they found primarily were three things. So this was a long term over many years with a large

23
00:02:42,400 --> 00:02:50,960
sample group 29,000 plus ladies and what they found first was that these women with active sun

24
00:02:50,960 --> 00:02:57,280
exposure so that's actually being outside. Don't be locked up in a basement or just indoors with

25
00:02:57,280 --> 00:03:00,720
artificial lights but get outside a little bit and it doesn't have to be long but a little bit.

26
00:03:00,720 --> 00:03:09,600
Active sun exposure habits were mainly at a lower risk of cardiovascular disease and non-cancer

27
00:03:09,600 --> 00:03:15,600
non-cardiovascular disease death as compared to those who avoided sun exposure. Well in the

28
00:03:15,600 --> 00:03:22,880
United States the top two killers are cardiovascular disease and cancer. Top two and it's

29
00:03:22,880 --> 00:03:29,040
actually not close. They're way up there especially the first one. So they found a

30
00:03:29,040 --> 00:03:33,680
little bit of active sun exposure can help reduce your cardiovascular disease risk. Wouldn't that be

31
00:03:33,680 --> 00:03:43,440
a good thing? I think so. Two, as a result of increased survival because what they find is that

32
00:03:43,440 --> 00:03:52,160
active sun exposure helps in your longevity. You'll live longer if you have active sun exposure.

33
00:03:52,160 --> 00:04:00,960
Live longer if you have active sun exposure. It's a good thing. As a result of this the relative

34
00:04:00,960 --> 00:04:06,560
contribution of cancer death increased. Now that might sound like you don't want it.

35
00:04:07,920 --> 00:04:14,160
What we know is that the longer you live the more at risk of developing cancer you have.

36
00:04:15,120 --> 00:04:21,280
Regardless of what causes you to live longer the longer you live the higher the risk. So if more

37
00:04:21,280 --> 00:04:27,840
sun means you live longer you just happen to have a higher increased risk of cancer. They did not

38
00:04:27,840 --> 00:04:34,800
find a correlation though that the sun exposure brought about the cancer. Just that you lived

39
00:04:34,800 --> 00:04:43,280
longer and that increased your risk. And then three and this is our last this is our last one. Three,

40
00:04:43,280 --> 00:04:50,960
the point about the longevity promoting properties of sunlight is driven home strongly by this.

41
00:04:50,960 --> 00:05:02,320
Non-smokers who avoided sun exposure had a life expectancy similar to smokers in the highest sun

42
00:05:02,320 --> 00:05:12,720
exposure category. If you don't smoke but you avoid the sun you're in the same risk in terms of your

43
00:05:12,720 --> 00:05:22,080
mortality risk as those who do smoke but they get their sun. So what they concluded is that avoidance

44
00:05:22,080 --> 00:05:31,680
of sun exposure is a risk factor for death of a similar magnitude as smoking. I had no idea.

45
00:05:34,000 --> 00:05:40,880
I think that's good to know. I wanted to pass that on to add a little supplement to what we were

46
00:05:40,880 --> 00:05:47,680
already blessed with last week with our insert. You can have everything right but if you just

47
00:05:47,680 --> 00:05:56,480
lock yourself up indoors you're putting yourself at risk. Go touch grass, go breathe the air,

48
00:05:56,480 --> 00:06:01,760
go let a little bit of sun hit on your face and your arms, expose your skin a little bit to it.

49
00:06:01,760 --> 00:06:06,640
Don't burn, don't do those things we know that that aren't healthy but a little bit. It'll help

50
00:06:06,640 --> 00:06:13,200
it'll help your hormone balance, it'll help your energy and it helps your longevity and keeps you

51
00:06:13,200 --> 00:06:23,200
out of the higher risk categories. So now we're going to get into our message that was a freebie.

52
00:06:25,040 --> 00:06:31,520
If you'll indulge me in one more brief word of prayer then we will dive in. Lord God now that

53
00:06:31,520 --> 00:06:39,520
we are turning our attention in a focused way on your word we thank you that you inspired the authors

54
00:06:39,520 --> 00:06:45,520
and you preserved it through time so it's not only a blessing and a benefit for instruction and

55
00:06:45,520 --> 00:06:51,200
encouragement to those that have lived in the past but also to us right now in the present.

56
00:06:51,920 --> 00:06:56,800
And we pray that that would be our reality. May we learn of you, may we learn more of ourselves

57
00:06:56,800 --> 00:07:01,680
and may we appreciate the plan that you have for us. We pray this in your name amen.

58
00:07:03,040 --> 00:07:10,400
The last time I was here I greeted you with a Shabbat Shalom, a Feliz Sabado,

59
00:07:11,040 --> 00:07:21,280
right? A happy Sabbath, a Ton Sabaton, that's Greek. They say that there are about 7,000

60
00:07:21,280 --> 00:07:29,440
spoken languages in the world. I'm assuming they're including some dialects but we'll just go with

61
00:07:29,440 --> 00:07:40,000
about 7,000 spoken languages and about 300 writing systems. Mandarin, English, Spanish, and Arabic

62
00:07:40,640 --> 00:07:47,200
make up the top 10 and Bengali is also among them. So you can just kind of look at the countries

63
00:07:47,200 --> 00:07:52,720
around the world and that makes sense. Mandarin, there's a lot of people that speak Mandarin in

64
00:07:52,720 --> 00:07:59,600
China and elsewhere. Lots of people speak Spanish. The countries that have Arabic as their main

65
00:07:59,600 --> 00:08:06,960
language, there's many many many of them and then English in addition to those places that speak it

66
00:08:06,960 --> 00:08:14,560
proper like England and otherwise like American, it's also the world language. If you happen to

67
00:08:14,560 --> 00:08:19,120
do anything in business, any kind of real international travel, you can generally find

68
00:08:19,120 --> 00:08:26,000
people who speak English. That's the accepted international language. I am not very good at

69
00:08:26,000 --> 00:08:31,520
most languages. I do like them. I find some of them more confusing than others. I have heard

70
00:08:31,520 --> 00:08:36,640
that American English is one of the hardest to learn because we just wear a hodgepodge of so

71
00:08:36,640 --> 00:08:42,400
many different other languages kind of come together and then in America we have slang and

72
00:08:42,400 --> 00:08:46,160
we have other things and then you go to the south and just you know forget about it.

73
00:08:49,280 --> 00:08:57,120
Of the languages in the world, it seems though that aside from spoken languages, we have other

74
00:08:57,120 --> 00:09:04,400
languages that we can consider. I'm thinking of Morse code. That's a language. I'm not up on my

75
00:09:04,400 --> 00:09:10,080
Morse code but I believe it's a standard. I think Morse code is a standard. They don't do Morse code

76
00:09:10,080 --> 00:09:20,560
in Mandarin. You know that's the same dashes and dots for their words. That's a universal language.

77
00:09:20,560 --> 00:09:31,200
I think of music as a language and a universal language at that. You can express beauty and

78
00:09:31,200 --> 00:09:39,440
sound and rhythm and all of what comes with music anywhere around the world, no matter what you look

79
00:09:39,440 --> 00:09:46,240
like, no matter what you talk, no matter about your family background. Music is universal.

80
00:09:47,600 --> 00:09:53,840
You have different flavors but the notes and what you can do with it. And then there's also math.

81
00:09:55,280 --> 00:10:01,760
I've heard it mentioned that math is a universal language. We can thank the Egyptians for much of

82
00:10:01,760 --> 00:10:08,400
how we do math today and then the Babylonians for adding on to it and then it goes on from there but

83
00:10:08,400 --> 00:10:17,360
they kind of gave us a lot of our foundational mathematics. I was never really exceptional at

84
00:10:17,360 --> 00:10:24,000
math. I did okay. I passed my grades and I did well enough on the ACT to go to college but it was

85
00:10:24,000 --> 00:10:32,080
not my best. Reading, English, science. I liked those. Math I just kind of did. In large part

86
00:10:32,080 --> 00:10:41,360
because I think I'm I looked at it too rationally. You know math is very fixed. One plus one equals

87
00:10:41,360 --> 00:10:50,400
two and so on and then you get into the more complicated stuff. Algebra and calculus and trig

88
00:10:50,400 --> 00:10:57,920
and college algebra and I just I got to a point in my education fairly early on and I decided I am

89
00:10:57,920 --> 00:11:05,280
never going to do this again. That's not going to help me. I'm not going to use it. I have no

90
00:11:05,280 --> 00:11:13,040
ambitions of being an engineer or an astrophysicist or anything like that but I guess I need the grade

91
00:11:13,040 --> 00:11:20,400
so I'll do it and then like many many students you finish your last exam and out the back of your head

92
00:11:20,400 --> 00:11:30,160
all of it just dumps out. My last math class was in 1999. I haven't had to inverse a matrix since

93
00:11:31,360 --> 00:11:39,120
or find the angles on planes since. I'm sure some of it I use without even realizing it

94
00:11:39,120 --> 00:11:47,760
but arithmetic now that's math I can get behind. Arithmetic you need day in day out. Pluses,

95
00:11:47,760 --> 00:11:53,520
minuses, multiplication, division, sometimes some squares and cubes,

96
00:11:55,520 --> 00:12:02,080
spatial relation maybe with the arithmetic and geometry but that will get you mostly through life.

97
00:12:03,280 --> 00:12:09,680
It really will. I like how simple it is. I like that I don't have to really

98
00:12:10,480 --> 00:12:16,080
try to plug in the x's and the y's or Greek letters that are supposed to mean something

99
00:12:16,080 --> 00:12:25,920
and so on. Arithmetic one plus one equals two. Simple. I like that.

100
00:12:29,200 --> 00:12:40,320
There was a book I've mentioned before in a previous sermon 1984 where the the ruling class,

101
00:12:40,320 --> 00:12:49,360
part of how they controlled people, was to get them to accept a non-truth as truth and one example

102
00:12:49,360 --> 00:12:56,160
in it was, what was it, two plus two equals five. I believe that's the example in the book. Two plus

103
00:12:56,160 --> 00:13:04,480
two equals five and the moment they could get the population to accept an arithmetic calculation

104
00:13:04,480 --> 00:13:12,320
that was incorrect as truth that was absolute dominance. They could control people, they could

105
00:13:12,320 --> 00:13:18,720
manipulate, they could you could start to break down other things in society if you can get at

106
00:13:18,720 --> 00:13:26,800
the most basic of understandings and fracture it apart. One plus one does still equal two. Two plus

107
00:13:26,800 --> 00:13:39,680
two does still equal four and three squared is nine. It is nine. Did you know that there's math

108
00:13:39,680 --> 00:13:46,080
in the Bible? And I'm not talking about prophecy. Of course there's math in prophecy. You count your

109
00:13:46,080 --> 00:13:52,240
years from the time that Artaxerxes made this declaration, four word four hundred and ninety

110
00:13:52,240 --> 00:14:01,600
years and who do you find? Messiah. And then you go the 2300 days and what do you find? The beginning

111
00:14:01,600 --> 00:14:10,640
of the judgment. You have math in the Bible. You also have math in the Bible when it comes to humans.

112
00:14:11,920 --> 00:14:20,800
Are you aware of that? If you have your Bible turn to our scripture reading but go a little bit

113
00:14:20,800 --> 00:14:29,680
before that. We are in Genesis chapter two and we are picking up where we left off in our sermon

114
00:14:29,680 --> 00:14:38,320
series from the beginning to the end and today it is anthropology arithmetic. The study of humans

115
00:14:38,320 --> 00:14:45,440
anthropology. The languages, the behaviors, the how they live, how they build, how they dress,

116
00:14:45,440 --> 00:14:51,840
just the study of humanity, anthropology and arithmetic. We are going to learn about God's

117
00:14:51,840 --> 00:15:00,800
original math plan if you will for mankind today and we're going to touch a little on how some of

118
00:15:00,800 --> 00:15:09,600
those equations like 1984 are being adjusted and telling you a different solution. Let's begin with

119
00:15:09,600 --> 00:15:18,240
the first one we come to Genesis chapter two and verse seven. Leading up to that is it's just simply

120
00:15:18,240 --> 00:15:23,120
a brief historical record where Moses penned that these are the generations of the heaven and the

121
00:15:23,120 --> 00:15:28,880
earth when they were created. He repeats that and he kind of tells you that at that time there were

122
00:15:28,880 --> 00:15:36,960
certain plants not there because rain hadn't fallen and man hadn't come about yet. That's it.

123
00:15:36,960 --> 00:15:46,560
And then we get to our verse. Then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed

124
00:15:46,560 --> 00:15:55,040
into his nostrils the breath of life and the man became a living creature. If you're reading from

125
00:15:55,040 --> 00:16:02,320
the King James that would be a living soul. If you have another translation it might say living being

126
00:16:02,320 --> 00:16:10,240
or something like that. Living being, living creature, that's the more accurate translation.

127
00:16:10,240 --> 00:16:15,440
There's been some confusion with the soul but did you notice the arithmetic in this verse?

128
00:16:16,880 --> 00:16:26,720
In a very personal anthropomorphic way God is being described like he's relatable to us in this

129
00:16:26,720 --> 00:16:33,760
context. He's present. He's on this earth that up until now he has just spoken into existence

130
00:16:33,760 --> 00:16:39,520
and he's kneeling down in the dust. He's moving about it. He's about to do something with it.

131
00:16:40,320 --> 00:16:48,640
The dirt and the dust are about to be his medium for not speaking into existence but crafting

132
00:16:48,640 --> 00:16:59,120
into existence. He formed the man of dust from the ground. That's very personal and that gives us our

133
00:16:59,120 --> 00:17:07,040
first part of the equation. The dust. Elsewhere in the Bible Job is an example we're told that when

134
00:17:07,040 --> 00:17:14,000
you die your body returns back to the dust. From dust thou art and unto dust shalt thou return.

135
00:17:14,000 --> 00:17:20,560
We're familiar with that. So our first part of this equation in our study of humanity is that

136
00:17:20,560 --> 00:17:29,600
there is a physicalness to you and I. The dust, the earth, there's physicality to humanity that

137
00:17:29,600 --> 00:17:37,520
we shouldn't overlook and it's very important. There are times throughout history where the

138
00:17:37,520 --> 00:17:44,320
physical nature of who we are or about our world has been looked at as purely negative. The Greeks

139
00:17:44,320 --> 00:17:51,440
were very good at doing this. They believe that you didn't have to preserve the physical or look

140
00:17:51,440 --> 00:17:59,120
at it with any kind of care and not really reverence but importance about the physical world.

141
00:17:59,120 --> 00:18:07,280
You could use and abuse the resources and of the person at will with zero repercussions in the big

142
00:18:07,280 --> 00:18:14,160
scheme of things. That's why they were a really debaucherous society. 1st Corinthians gives us a

143
00:18:14,160 --> 00:18:23,280
clue to that. Use the body however you will. It doesn't matter. But God is telling us in this

144
00:18:23,280 --> 00:18:31,680
passage that our physicality is important because with his own hands he shaped the forms that we

145
00:18:32,400 --> 00:18:39,600
still have. The human form hasn't changed over the thousands of years. The arms, the legs, the feet,

146
00:18:39,600 --> 00:18:48,560
the uprightness and so on. So part one to our equation is our physicalness, our form.

147
00:18:48,560 --> 00:18:59,600
Then God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. You can imagine if you will

148
00:19:00,960 --> 00:19:10,160
a potter with his clay shaping the body there on the dirt and in only the way that God can.

149
00:19:10,160 --> 00:19:18,320
He can take dust and earthly particles and actually make it look really human and like it's alive but

150
00:19:18,320 --> 00:19:27,040
it's still just kind of there. But it's inanimate. It needs something and our second part to this

151
00:19:27,040 --> 00:19:35,280
equation is that breath of life. You have the dirt plus God's breath, the only giver of life.

152
00:19:36,560 --> 00:19:46,080
You need it. You and I need to breathe. We need that spark of life that can only come from he who

153
00:19:46,080 --> 00:19:55,120
exists without another source of life. He is that source. You have to have it. The Bible regularly

154
00:19:55,120 --> 00:20:01,120
talks about our life as being represented by the breath in the nostrils. The breath in the nostrils

155
00:20:01,120 --> 00:20:09,600
is how the Hebrews talked about being alive and are your arteries working, your blood pumping,

156
00:20:09,600 --> 00:20:15,600
is digestion going on. All of that is kind of represented by the existence of God's breath

157
00:20:15,600 --> 00:20:26,560
in your nostrils. So you are also alive. But then our final is what we become. So you have one,

158
00:20:26,560 --> 00:20:32,720
the dust from the ground plus two, the breath of life from God equals three, a living being.

159
00:20:34,080 --> 00:20:42,480
We could dig deep into what it means to be a living being as humans. You can't divorce your

160
00:20:42,480 --> 00:20:51,360
physicality from being a living being. You can't do it. You have to be physical. We do not exist

161
00:20:51,360 --> 00:20:59,200
as purely metaphysical or spiritual beings. You have to have that breath. You have to have the

162
00:20:59,200 --> 00:21:04,640
air that we can't see but we can feel and we inhale and we exhale. You have to have that. You

163
00:21:04,640 --> 00:21:13,520
take that away. It's not a good day but you're also not only that. To be a living being also

164
00:21:13,520 --> 00:21:24,320
means that you have a mind, an intellect, you have a will, you have a conscience, you dream.

165
00:21:25,600 --> 00:21:31,680
To be a living being are all of those things that happen up here and it's not only physical,

166
00:21:31,680 --> 00:21:39,200
meaning that it's not only firing synapses, but there is also, because we're made in his image,

167
00:21:39,200 --> 00:21:45,680
a spiritual nature to what we don't see, to what we think, to what we feel, our morality.

168
00:21:46,000 --> 00:21:54,400
All of what makes up the mind of humanity is very much a real part of our being a living being.

169
00:21:55,440 --> 00:22:00,000
You can't divorce the one from the other. We're all together. Humans have tried to do this.

170
00:22:00,000 --> 00:22:07,360
We've come up with a couple of different ways of undoing this equation. Two main ones. One would be

171
00:22:07,360 --> 00:22:14,640
monism, meaning that you are only one thing. You're not comprised of separate different

172
00:22:14,640 --> 00:22:21,120
elements that come together as one, but you're only one. You're either only spiritual or you're

173
00:22:21,120 --> 00:22:27,280
only physical or you're only whatever the case may be. It's usually only physical. You're only

174
00:22:27,280 --> 00:22:32,800
physical and by perfecting your physical self, then you're perfecting who you are.

175
00:22:33,600 --> 00:22:39,920
That's where you get into, well, it doesn't matter about my physicality. I'm just going to die and

176
00:22:39,920 --> 00:22:43,760
I'm going to go back to the worms. It's rather nihilistic, so I'm going to abuse myself and off

177
00:22:43,760 --> 00:22:51,200
you go. Or a more ascetic way of doing things. I'm going to isolate myself physically from all of

178
00:22:51,200 --> 00:22:57,600
the other temptations around the world. I'm only going to drink water. I'm not going to listen to

179
00:22:57,600 --> 00:23:02,560
anything corrupting. No music, no nothing because I need to really get my physical self perfect. I'm

180
00:23:02,560 --> 00:23:07,120
going to be great at exercise and I'm going to be great at everything else because if I

181
00:23:07,760 --> 00:23:13,280
physically am perfect and I don't have to see the doctor or a dentist, then I'm good.

182
00:23:14,800 --> 00:23:20,160
Another part of it is dualism. This is the one that seems to have really grabbed hold and this

183
00:23:20,160 --> 00:23:29,200
is the idea that you have a spiritual self encapsulated by a physical self, but they're

184
00:23:29,200 --> 00:23:40,080
separate from each other. The one doesn't affect the other. From Egypt to Greece to Rome to modern

185
00:23:40,080 --> 00:23:48,080
day kind of understandings about that, that dualism, just the two. You can die and then maybe

186
00:23:48,080 --> 00:23:55,040
you go into a reincarnation cycle or your soul goes back, your spiritual self goes back to heaven

187
00:23:55,040 --> 00:23:59,520
or you know we have, we hear about this. That's dualism. Neither one of those are correct.

188
00:24:01,120 --> 00:24:07,920
Because what we see in our equation is that we are physical. We know that we have

189
00:24:09,120 --> 00:24:16,160
a mind that we can't quite really map even with our best technologies, the emotions, the dreams,

190
00:24:16,160 --> 00:24:21,680
the morality. You can't map that. You can't really see it, but it's very much there.

191
00:24:22,320 --> 00:24:26,320
And we are made in God's image. We are spiritual creatures. We have a spiritual element to us.

192
00:24:27,680 --> 00:24:35,120
Even the most hardened atheist looks for something spiritual to fill that need in his life or her life.

193
00:24:36,720 --> 00:24:38,080
We're all of that combined.

194
00:24:38,080 --> 00:24:43,840
And I would encourage you that if you are considering your anthropology that you would take

195
00:24:44,400 --> 00:24:53,360
your creator's word as it says and don't make it something else. You are physical, dirt. You are

196
00:24:53,360 --> 00:25:00,960
breath, life, and that means you become something more than both of those on their own. Intellect,

197
00:25:00,960 --> 00:25:11,680
will, morality, etc. Let's look at our second equation. After we look through and we're skipping

198
00:25:11,680 --> 00:25:19,760
many, many, many verses. The rivers that flowed, the stones that were present, the fact that God

199
00:25:19,760 --> 00:25:24,720
took the man, at this point only one human on earth, put him in the Garden of Eden to work it

200
00:25:24,720 --> 00:25:30,800
and keep it. That's why in landscaping I always said I was carrying a stone, a stone, a stone,

201
00:25:30,800 --> 00:25:34,160
carrying on the tradition of the longest career that ever has been.

202
00:25:39,040 --> 00:25:47,760
God says in verse 18, the Lord God said it is not good that the man should be alone. I will make him

203
00:25:47,760 --> 00:25:54,560
a helper fit for him or comparable to him. You might think this doesn't sound very much like

204
00:25:54,560 --> 00:25:59,440
an equation because it's written in the negative. That throws us off a little bit.

205
00:25:59,440 --> 00:26:10,720
This would be like saying one plus zero, one plus zero equals zero. That's the equation that God is

206
00:26:10,720 --> 00:26:19,920
saying. Man plus being alone, one plus zero equals not good. That's a negative, a zero, a null outcome.

207
00:26:19,920 --> 00:26:27,840
We're social creatures. God is a social God and we are made in His image. Three members, the Godhead,

208
00:26:27,840 --> 00:26:35,200
a whole array of heavenly hosts, other created beings. Then God makes man in His image and

209
00:26:35,200 --> 00:26:42,000
clearly there's something personal about it. He wants that interaction. There's a social fabric

210
00:26:42,000 --> 00:26:50,240
to who we are. You can't escape. You can't escape. We know you can't escape. We also know that it's

211
00:26:50,240 --> 00:26:55,680
still not good that man should be alone because if you're in prison and you break the rules and

212
00:26:55,680 --> 00:27:01,680
you're put in solitary confinement, we have laws that say you can't do that for a certain period

213
00:27:01,680 --> 00:27:07,600
or longer than a certain period of time. It hurts the psyche. It makes people very depressed and

214
00:27:07,600 --> 00:27:15,520
so on. Whether people follow those laws or not, that's on them, but we know this for a reality.

215
00:27:15,520 --> 00:27:33,680
It is a truth. You cannot be all alone and have a good life the way that God intends it. We know this

216
00:27:33,680 --> 00:27:43,040
in recent application. In April of 2020, March of 2020, when everyone was sent home and told to stay

217
00:27:43,040 --> 00:27:47,280
in their houses and you couldn't go out and socialize and you couldn't go talk to grandma or

218
00:27:47,280 --> 00:27:54,560
grandpa in the nursing home, you couldn't bury your dead, you couldn't have marriages, you couldn't

219
00:27:55,280 --> 00:28:01,040
all of that. Even if you did go to the couple of places that were open like Walmart, weren't you

220
00:28:01,040 --> 00:28:09,040
supposed to stay apart from each other and cover up your face? All of that speaks to the social

221
00:28:09,040 --> 00:28:18,320
nature that humans are. Communication broke down. Kids weren't learning how to speak at the proper

222
00:28:18,320 --> 00:28:26,160
rate. Education on our youth, they believe that this is going to take much longer to write itself

223
00:28:26,160 --> 00:28:32,400
than the months or the year to two years that it impacted them.

224
00:28:34,480 --> 00:28:40,080
Rates of, I have to think, what do they call it, rates of deaths of despair

225
00:28:41,600 --> 00:28:53,120
rose significantly during and shortly after that time. People became anxious and tense and can we

226
00:28:53,120 --> 00:28:57,920
trust one another? I can't hear what you're saying. I don't even know who you are because I've only got

227
00:28:57,920 --> 00:29:06,960
your eyes to go on. All of that as social creatures creates an edge. It creates something in our psyche

228
00:29:06,960 --> 00:29:15,040
that is not healthy. Some people, many people might have had good intentions with what they

229
00:29:15,040 --> 00:29:22,320
were doing or suggesting, but the reality is that as social creatures, God has said it is not good

230
00:29:22,320 --> 00:29:31,120
that they should be alone and any time that we have tried to forcefully separate, it doesn't end

231
00:29:31,120 --> 00:29:37,840
well. That's why people who really struggle with depression really kind of get in on themselves and

232
00:29:37,840 --> 00:29:43,200
the more they just isolate and get in on themselves, the worse the depression gets, not the better.

233
00:29:45,040 --> 00:29:51,360
That's why as a punishment, I might take my kids and put them in timeout, but only for a handful of

234
00:29:51,360 --> 00:29:59,520
minutes because then they need to be reunited with the family. We need those social aspects and it's

235
00:29:59,520 --> 00:30:08,400
baked into our spirituality. You cannot have the most fulfilling spiritual experience as a Christian

236
00:30:08,400 --> 00:30:17,360
on your own. You are saved one-on-one between you and God, but we are the body of Christ.

237
00:30:17,360 --> 00:30:24,160
The body has many components. The body has many parts. The body necessitates those parts

238
00:30:24,160 --> 00:30:30,960
being attached to one another. You take a finger and you separate it from the body and you set it

239
00:30:30,960 --> 00:30:39,440
off over there. What happens to the finger? It dies and then it decays and it's good for nothing.

240
00:30:39,440 --> 00:30:45,760
You can take a separated finger from an accident, put it on ice, get to a doctor who knows what

241
00:30:45,760 --> 00:30:52,960
they're doing and what can they do? Reattach it. When the finger that's been separated by one means

242
00:30:52,960 --> 00:31:01,120
or another is reattached back to the body, is that a good thing? Can you save the finger?

243
00:31:01,920 --> 00:31:06,000
Can it retain its function and its purpose? Absolutely.

244
00:31:06,000 --> 00:31:12,000
And that's true for any body parts. My kids seem to be doing well without tonsils, but we're not

245
00:31:12,000 --> 00:31:22,960
talking about them. You are a social creature. Humans are that and it impacts you not just in

246
00:31:22,960 --> 00:31:30,400
your personal life, but your spiritual life. In Hebrews it talks about there are some of those who

247
00:31:30,400 --> 00:31:36,320
don't come and meet and worship together with the congregation and the writer says don't be like them.

248
00:31:37,040 --> 00:31:43,360
Don't neglect the gathering of yourselves one to another. Throughout the New Testament church,

249
00:31:43,360 --> 00:31:47,680
what were they doing? Coming together, worshiping together, eating together,

250
00:31:47,680 --> 00:31:53,520
staying up so late at night together that kids are falling out of windows. But together,

251
00:31:53,520 --> 00:31:59,920
one of the first things that the enemy tries to do to fracture that is to start separating one

252
00:31:59,920 --> 00:32:08,400
from another. Many different tools at the disposal force physical separation, gossip,

253
00:32:09,360 --> 00:32:17,040
slander, unhealthy prejudging someone because you don't like their shoes that day or that they sat

254
00:32:17,040 --> 00:32:26,400
in your pew. The enemy has different ways of interrupting that social fabric of ours that

255
00:32:26,400 --> 00:32:33,200
ingrained a part of our being and setting us against one another or telling us that we're

256
00:32:33,200 --> 00:32:40,960
better on our own. The United States is a immensely hyper individualistic society.

257
00:32:40,960 --> 00:32:52,240
And it's not been good. It's not been good. So in this equation rather than what God is saying one

258
00:32:52,240 --> 00:33:01,360
plus zero equals zero, that's what God has said the equation is. It really is one plus any other

259
00:33:01,360 --> 00:33:09,280
number equals good. So in this equation, God is saying that one plus zero equals zero.

260
00:33:09,280 --> 00:33:19,120
Another number equals good. You need more added to you than just you. It's good for you. It's for your

261
00:33:19,120 --> 00:33:31,040
benefit. For Adam who was alone, God wanted him to find this out for himself. I don't know why. I have

262
00:33:31,040 --> 00:33:37,200
a thought. But God wanted Adam to find this out for himself. So he gave him a task to do. And in

263
00:33:37,200 --> 00:33:44,240
the task of naming the animals, Adam noticed that every animal had a pair. A male and a female. One

264
00:33:44,240 --> 00:33:50,240
went with the other. You never found one all by itself and you never found two exactly like one

265
00:33:50,240 --> 00:33:58,480
another. But they were same in kind but different in purpose or makeup if you will. Two dogs, two

266
00:33:58,480 --> 00:34:06,880
elephants, two platypies, platypuses. Everything had a pair and I can imagine, I can picture in my

267
00:34:06,880 --> 00:34:11,760
mind Adam doing this. Oh you're this animal and you're that and oh that's funny. Long neck, long

268
00:34:11,760 --> 00:34:19,680
legs. Wow. This is your name. This is that name. And after you go through, I don't know, 50 or 100

269
00:34:19,680 --> 00:34:24,560
or 200 of them and you're giving names to all of them, maybe he just started looking around.

270
00:34:26,400 --> 00:34:31,440
Maybe he looked behind him. Maybe he wanted to wander and kind of look behind bushes or see if

271
00:34:31,440 --> 00:34:38,560
a tree was hiding something. Maybe he started calling out Marco. Maybe he wanted to find who

272
00:34:38,560 --> 00:34:48,800
would respond with Polo. Here I am. But the man didn't find his other half. He didn't find who was

273
00:34:48,800 --> 00:34:57,200
supposed to be his complement. He didn't find the other part of the equation that he discovered he

274
00:34:57,200 --> 00:35:03,600
was missing. God had already said that it wasn't good for him to be alone and now God fixes that

275
00:35:03,600 --> 00:35:10,240
broken equation. In verses 21 and 22, the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man while

276
00:35:10,240 --> 00:35:17,520
he slept. He took one of the ribs, closed up its place with flesh. From the rib, the Lord God made

277
00:35:17,520 --> 00:35:24,320
into a woman. That's the same word as like building a house. God is a builder in this. He's fashioning

278
00:35:24,320 --> 00:35:32,800
this woman for him and brought her to the man. You were looking for your other half. You were

279
00:35:32,800 --> 00:35:43,360
looking for someone like you but not exactly like you. Here you go. God brought that missing part of

280
00:35:43,360 --> 00:35:49,440
the equation to the man and the man immediately recognized this at last as bone of my bones and

281
00:35:49,440 --> 00:35:56,400
flesh of my flesh. She shall be called a woman because she was taken out of man. Even in the names

282
00:35:57,200 --> 00:36:06,160
you have that super close relationship between the sexes. You need it. So in other words, the equation

283
00:36:06,160 --> 00:36:19,440
is M plus F equals capital F. Male plus female equals family. The core social structure for

284
00:36:19,440 --> 00:36:31,040
humanity. Male plus female equals family. You have to have it. It's been, it's been, you can read so

285
00:36:31,040 --> 00:36:40,560
many different types of takes on what it is to have someone, a helper fit for him or a helper complement

286
00:36:40,560 --> 00:36:49,600
to him. When we look at men and women, we know that they're not exactly the same. We know this.

287
00:36:52,000 --> 00:37:00,080
It doesn't take long. We know that men, broadly speaking, and that's how we're talking, in broad

288
00:37:00,080 --> 00:37:08,480
terms, men are more oriented to spatial relations. They're more interested in mechanical things.

289
00:37:08,480 --> 00:37:14,320
Their minds tend to be just much more logical in just how they go and they're just like, oh,

290
00:37:14,320 --> 00:37:21,760
that makes sense. ABC. That's what I'm going to do. We also know the faults of men. We also know

291
00:37:21,760 --> 00:37:28,720
that the greater tendency towards the mechanics means that they sometimes often miss the softer

292
00:37:28,720 --> 00:37:36,000
parts to life. You get so caught up in just the machines and fixing and doing and building and

293
00:37:36,000 --> 00:37:40,800
conquering, you forget to actually settle down and have a life sometimes.

294
00:37:43,280 --> 00:37:52,320
Men get so focused on the logical that we often hurt others not thinking about the empathy part,

295
00:37:52,320 --> 00:38:00,080
that compassionate part. Sometimes we're so caught up in just being strong that we forget

296
00:38:01,280 --> 00:38:08,800
to protect. We hurt men are just wired that way. At times men don't talk as much. We don't share

297
00:38:08,800 --> 00:38:16,080
as much of our feelings. We prefer a lot of alone time and the list can go on what men are like.

298
00:38:16,080 --> 00:38:25,120
Women on the other hand, well, we need women. I need my wife to balance me out. She's perfect at it.

299
00:38:27,120 --> 00:38:36,560
She brings an energy to our marriage. I appreciate she is so much more empathetic to what other

300
00:38:36,560 --> 00:38:42,480
people are feeling and kind of going through. She surprises me. Are you sure? They don't seem

301
00:38:42,480 --> 00:38:48,400
that way to me. I have to take her word at it. She has and ladies, I think you're going to know

302
00:38:48,400 --> 00:38:52,000
what I mean and men you're going to know this too. There's a female sixth sense.

303
00:38:53,520 --> 00:38:59,120
How many of our ladies here have known something but you couldn't quite express that you know what

304
00:38:59,120 --> 00:39:08,880
you know about a person? I don't have that. My wife has it in spades and I've talked to many other

305
00:39:08,880 --> 00:39:15,760
ladies that can say the same thing. I can't really tell you but I know about so and so.

306
00:39:17,280 --> 00:39:26,320
We need that. We need women with their more nurturing side to be the child bearers because

307
00:39:26,320 --> 00:39:34,880
little kids need the nurturing. Remove moms out of that equation. Men can kind of do it.

308
00:39:34,880 --> 00:39:39,920
Dads can kind of do it. Not like a mom. Absolutely not like a mom.

309
00:39:43,200 --> 00:39:48,480
You remove a dad from the equation and kids moms do it and there are

310
00:39:50,720 --> 00:39:59,520
heroic mothers that have raised their kids on their own. You remove a dad from it. Our society

311
00:39:59,520 --> 00:40:06,480
tells you what fatherless homes turn into on a broad scale. Increased crime, increased depression,

312
00:40:06,480 --> 00:40:16,000
a fracture in the home, less trust, etc. That's just born out by data. Dads add to the family unit

313
00:40:16,000 --> 00:40:22,960
something that moms at their best efforts can do but it's not like a dad. It's just not.

314
00:40:22,960 --> 00:40:28,480
And then of course we have to look at if God had just led another Adam to Adam,

315
00:40:30,000 --> 00:40:32,000
our family tree would have been really short.

316
00:40:35,200 --> 00:40:40,880
There's also just a basic necessity for different but complementary on the biological level. We

317
00:40:40,880 --> 00:40:47,920
know what I'm talking about. You have to have men and women for the continuation of humanity.

318
00:40:47,920 --> 00:40:56,320
You can't do a different equation and have a continuation of humanity. Not going to happen.

319
00:41:01,040 --> 00:41:03,760
I find that this equation,

320
00:41:07,360 --> 00:41:11,280
more so than the breaking down of our social aspect,

321
00:41:11,280 --> 00:41:21,440
this equation is most under attack. In who men are as men and women are as women

322
00:41:22,960 --> 00:41:28,880
and one cannot be the other or vice versa. No matter how hard you try,

323
00:41:29,840 --> 00:41:37,440
you cannot. You might gain the appearance of a man who is a woman.

324
00:41:37,440 --> 00:41:44,240
You cannot. You might gain the appearance of one. We're really good at some of our surgeries.

325
00:41:44,880 --> 00:41:58,160
You might gain the appearance of one but you can't be one. It is anthropologically incorrect

326
00:41:59,440 --> 00:42:01,680
to suggest anything other than a binary.

327
00:42:01,680 --> 00:42:06,720
It's teleologically incorrect. That's the philosophy of being

328
00:42:07,760 --> 00:42:13,840
to suggest that men can be women or women can be men. You can't.

329
00:42:15,600 --> 00:42:22,720
And on a broad scale, it's under attack and it has not been good.

330
00:42:22,720 --> 00:42:30,800
For longer, the equation of man male plus female equals family has been under attack.

331
00:42:32,240 --> 00:42:36,960
Many, many, many years ago, it was proposed that a woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle.

332
00:42:38,320 --> 00:42:44,720
That started the inevitable trend towards a fracturing of God's original equation.

333
00:42:44,720 --> 00:42:52,400
Because one men and women are not perfectly identical in all things at all times. Men need

334
00:42:52,400 --> 00:42:57,440
women. Women need men. You take one of those away because the other way is true. Men. You can't say

335
00:42:57,440 --> 00:43:04,400
a man needs a woman like a fish needs a bicycle. That also doesn't work. Then you have the

336
00:43:04,400 --> 00:43:09,920
redefinition of marriage in recent years. That also breaks apart God's equation.

337
00:43:09,920 --> 00:43:15,680
And it does break down the family. And if we're looking at continuing the species,

338
00:43:16,720 --> 00:43:22,400
it also breaks that down. That's not to say that people can't love and that's not to say that we

339
00:43:22,400 --> 00:43:29,280
are unkind and that's not to say any of those other things. I'm just simply looking at God's

340
00:43:29,280 --> 00:43:36,560
design for humanity. God's equations in our lives are not just about the definition of

341
00:43:36,560 --> 00:43:44,880
humanity. God's equations in our anthropology. Because if we are to understand who we are in

342
00:43:44,880 --> 00:43:54,640
the big picture of things, we have to see how God our creator made us and designed us with that

343
00:43:54,640 --> 00:44:02,960
purpose in mind. And that purpose is to be a combination of the physical, the spiritual,

344
00:44:02,960 --> 00:44:11,120
the mental, and the breath, the life. God's equation he intended. He designed us to be

345
00:44:11,120 --> 00:44:20,960
social creatures. Even into eternity, we're all gathering together like a great multitude on the

346
00:44:20,960 --> 00:44:28,800
sea of glass. That's social. God says, I want to be with them. I'm going to dwell in their midst

347
00:44:28,800 --> 00:44:35,920
and be their God and they will be my people. That's social. Can't break it apart. They will

348
00:44:35,920 --> 00:44:42,160
come together from new moon to new moon, from Sabbath to Sabbath to worship God, Isaiah says.

349
00:44:43,200 --> 00:44:52,400
That's a social worship. God intended us to be that way in our anthropology arithmetic.

350
00:44:52,400 --> 00:45:02,320
And then God also purposefully designed male and female to complement each other. Not one superior

351
00:45:02,320 --> 00:45:12,880
or one inferior, but equal and different. And we need the differences and the equal. We need it all.

352
00:45:14,000 --> 00:45:18,880
The moment we start to break apart any of these equations, you're going to end up with a failing

353
00:45:18,880 --> 00:45:25,840
grade in the anthropology arithmetic test. Something's going to go wrong. Something's

354
00:45:25,840 --> 00:45:31,760
going to get messed up and God's original intention and design is not going to be realized.

355
00:45:35,360 --> 00:45:42,160
I don't have the answer for all the other many reasons or studies or philosophies about us and

356
00:45:42,160 --> 00:45:50,000
what makes us up. But when I look at these three sections of Genesis chapter two, these five verses,

357
00:45:52,560 --> 00:46:04,160
four verses, I can't help but walk away with not an overly complicated calculus equation or even

358
00:46:04,160 --> 00:46:13,040
inverting a matrix that takes forever to do. This is simple arithmetic. This is one plus one equals

359
00:46:13,040 --> 00:46:22,480
two. And God knew all along what he had in mind. And it was perfect. In its original design,

360
00:46:23,040 --> 00:46:29,920
in its original fabrication, in its original purpose. At the end of the sixth day, after

361
00:46:29,920 --> 00:46:39,280
mankind had been made with all of this built into us in his image, God didn't just say it is good.

362
00:46:40,240 --> 00:46:47,840
What did he say, my friends? It is very good. Our anthropology arithmetic

363
00:46:50,320 --> 00:46:56,320
is at the heart of God and not just saying good, but very good.

364
00:46:56,320 --> 00:47:04,880
And I would encourage each one of you to thank God for those truths, to defend them where you can

365
00:47:05,680 --> 00:47:14,640
and to praise him that he knows best. I believe and the Bible tells us that even though we won't be

366
00:47:14,640 --> 00:47:21,120
marrying and giving in marriage, Jesus says when we get to heaven, the rest of it stays the same.

367
00:47:21,120 --> 00:47:32,720
Men and women will be there. Our social fabric remains. Our composition of physical, spiritual,

368
00:47:32,720 --> 00:47:45,120
and breath is still there. From beginning to end, our anthropology arithmetic stays the same.

369
00:47:45,120 --> 00:47:54,960
Our anthropology arithmetic stays the same. I would encourage you all to praise God that that is true.

370
00:47:55,920 --> 00:48:01,600
Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word. We thank you that you knew what you were

371
00:48:01,600 --> 00:48:07,840
doing when you fashioned us. And I pray that you would forgive us where we try to break apart

372
00:48:07,840 --> 00:48:13,760
what you intended as a very good and what you declared as such. I pray that where we stumble and

373
00:48:13,760 --> 00:48:22,560
fall, where we fracture our families, where husbands and wives are unkind or cruel to one another,

374
00:48:23,600 --> 00:48:29,120
where we don't respect one another or love as you have loved us, I pray that you would forgive us

375
00:48:29,120 --> 00:48:39,840
and put that bond back together. Lord, I pray where we have abused our bodies different than you intended.

376
00:48:40,880 --> 00:48:47,440
Overworking, not enough sleep, gluttony in its various forms, substance abuse in its various forms.

377
00:48:47,440 --> 00:48:56,080
Lord, I pray that you would forgive us and set us again on a right path. And Lord, where either by

378
00:48:56,080 --> 00:49:02,240
our own choosing or by what is forced upon us, when we have separated one from another,

379
00:49:03,600 --> 00:49:09,520
Lord, I pray that you would bring us back together. I pray that we would be called your sons and

380
00:49:09,520 --> 00:49:19,920
daughters saints of Jesus, united by, in, and through the Holy Spirit. Lord, I am so grateful

381
00:49:19,920 --> 00:49:28,560
that Jesus Christ saw fit to become one of us, to unite humanity with heaven, not just for those

382
00:49:28,560 --> 00:49:38,240
years he was here, but for eternity. I am grateful that you know us in and out and you are compassionate

383
00:49:38,240 --> 00:49:46,880
towards our needs. And Lord, we praise your name for all of us. May we not forget it, but may we be

384
00:49:46,880 --> 00:49:53,920
true and faithful to your intent and purpose. Lord, we pray all of these things in Jesus Christ's name.

385
00:49:53,920 --> 00:50:20,960
Amen.