1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:08,560 Season two of Love in Context podcast welcomes you. Get ready for engaging unscripted conversations 2 00:00:08,560 --> 00:00:14,240 with your hosts, Ben and Spencer. Our mission remains unchanged to explore the Bible through 3 00:00:14,240 --> 00:00:19,880 the powerful lens of love. In this new season, we'll embark on a journey together, unearthing 4 00:00:19,880 --> 00:00:24,000 fresh insights and gaining deeper understanding of how we can love God and live out our faith 5 00:00:24,000 --> 00:00:29,360 in practical ways. So let's dive into this season of Love in Context, where love in the 6 00:00:29,360 --> 00:00:34,760 context of the Bible intersect to transform our lives. 7 00:00:34,760 --> 00:00:37,320 Welcome to Love in Context podcast. You all excited? 8 00:00:37,320 --> 00:00:40,040 I'm excited. Okay. I'm sure they said yes too. 9 00:00:40,040 --> 00:00:43,720 I raise up in the morning and I'm like, woot, woot, it is time. 10 00:00:43,720 --> 00:00:45,720 Right? I actually say it exactly like that. And 11 00:00:45,720 --> 00:00:47,720 Tara's like, what did you say? And I'm like, nothing. 12 00:00:47,720 --> 00:00:50,720 Nothing. I said nothing. 13 00:00:50,720 --> 00:00:55,760 You see those reels where it's like, where it's like the tired one, one person's tired 14 00:00:55,760 --> 00:00:58,800 and they're like, oh, and they're like, and I married a morning person and they like come 15 00:00:58,800 --> 00:01:02,240 running in the room like, Hey. Yeah. That's my wife. 16 00:01:02,240 --> 00:01:05,640 Yeah. Yeah. She is. She is. I think we hit eight 17 00:01:05,640 --> 00:01:10,360 30 and she's like, Oh, I think I should go to sleep. And then four o'clock in the morning, 18 00:01:10,360 --> 00:01:14,920 she's up and she's like, gotta get my day started. And she's like, I just, I feel like 19 00:01:14,920 --> 00:01:18,240 my day is wasted. I was like, well, part of it is because you went to sleep before the 20 00:01:18,240 --> 00:01:23,400 day was done. Yeah. Like, like Lindsey works at, she leaves 21 00:01:23,400 --> 00:01:27,160 the house at three 30 in the morning for work. Yeah. And so a couple of times a week I'm 22 00:01:27,160 --> 00:01:31,000 like, I meet her on her lunch break at eight AM. 23 00:01:31,000 --> 00:01:34,920 Yeah. Yeah. There are, there are some people who are listening, who are going to feel that 24 00:01:34,920 --> 00:01:40,800 because they are morning people. Um, we, I, I personally am not one of those. Um, I do 25 00:01:40,800 --> 00:01:46,440 get up at the same time pretty much every day and I have worked to make myself functional. 26 00:01:46,440 --> 00:01:51,160 Now the interesting thing is I have two boys and one of them wakes up like Tara and one 27 00:01:51,160 --> 00:01:55,520 of them definitely wakes up like me. And the one that wakes up like Tara doesn't understand 28 00:01:55,520 --> 00:01:59,840 that the one that wakes up like me, you can't just come and start yelling in his face. It 29 00:01:59,840 --> 00:02:02,920 does not work well. Well, I mean you can, there's just consequences, 30 00:02:02,920 --> 00:02:08,440 right? See, my daughter woke me up this morning and I was like five more minutes. I need five 31 00:02:08,440 --> 00:02:12,360 more minutes and I'm sure she gave it to you. She actually did. Oh, that's surprising. Yeah. 32 00:02:12,360 --> 00:02:16,720 She actually went back to her room and got ready and gave me five minutes. That's great. 33 00:02:16,720 --> 00:02:20,720 So before we get into today's episode, uh, we're, we're doing, uh, there's going to be 34 00:02:20,720 --> 00:02:25,040 this episode and one other one that's going to come between our spiritual gifts. And then 35 00:02:25,040 --> 00:02:28,800 we're going to be talking into the book of James. Uh, we are currently lining up our 36 00:02:28,800 --> 00:02:32,920 times to sit down with the people who are going to be guests during the book of James. 37 00:02:32,920 --> 00:02:35,880 And that's why we decided to put a couple of extra episodes, things we thought were 38 00:02:35,880 --> 00:02:39,480 fun to talk about, but aren't part of a mini series per se. 39 00:02:39,480 --> 00:02:45,040 Fun fact about Alaska. People are horrible at texting you back. I'm talking about you, 40 00:02:45,040 --> 00:02:50,720 Kate King. They are horrible at texting you back. It's 41 00:02:50,720 --> 00:02:54,960 just, it's, I mean, and that, that's not a, uh, that's not like just a local to where 42 00:02:54,960 --> 00:02:59,120 we are thing. That's like across the state. Like I have friends all across the state and 43 00:02:59,120 --> 00:03:02,960 I'll text them and it'll be like two days later you get text back. Well, you also run 44 00:03:02,960 --> 00:03:06,920 the thing in Alaska. Summers are strange here because everybody loves being here during 45 00:03:06,920 --> 00:03:11,200 the summer, but for whatever reason, right when you hit the summer, everybody travels. 46 00:03:11,200 --> 00:03:14,920 Yeah. Right. Everybody loves the summer here, but we always travel during the summer, mostly 47 00:03:14,920 --> 00:03:18,560 because there's more flights, they're less expensive, all those different things that 48 00:03:18,560 --> 00:03:24,440 kind of come. But, uh, so trying to get people like lined up to sometimes difficult. Yeah. 49 00:03:24,440 --> 00:03:30,520 So today we're going to be talking about the idea of safe places, safe places, which, uh, 50 00:03:30,520 --> 00:03:35,480 it's like in baseball when you slide into home plate and like safe. Not at all, actually. 51 00:03:35,480 --> 00:03:40,640 Not at all like that, but, uh, uh, we might be upsetting the apple cart a little bit on 52 00:03:40,640 --> 00:03:45,440 this one. Um, so just, just note that this conversation probably is going to be most 53 00:03:45,440 --> 00:03:50,800 relevant for people who are in some sort of ministry leadership. Um, at this, but it's 54 00:03:50,800 --> 00:03:54,720 not going to be unrelevant for those who are not. Yeah. It's not exclusively for them. 55 00:03:54,720 --> 00:03:59,640 Yeah. It's not exclusively for them. First off is we want to disclaim saying that we're 56 00:03:59,640 --> 00:04:04,720 going to speak generally. Like there's, uh, you know, the situations in your ministry 57 00:04:04,720 --> 00:04:10,040 and your community, stuff like that. Uh, we are going to speak generally. So, so this 58 00:04:10,040 --> 00:04:15,600 might not directly apply to your specific location or it might. And then the second 59 00:04:15,600 --> 00:04:21,140 thing that I would just want to just cautious caution everybody on is even though we are 60 00:04:21,140 --> 00:04:25,280 upsetting the apple cart on this, we do want to do it and we were going to try to do it 61 00:04:25,280 --> 00:04:32,160 in a way to where it feels approachable. Yeah. Um, so just, just be warned on those two things. 62 00:04:32,160 --> 00:04:39,200 Yeah. So, uh, largely today we're going after this idea of should the church be a safe place 63 00:04:39,200 --> 00:04:44,520 and what does it mean to be safe? Yeah. Right. So in case you have not got, uh, turned off 64 00:04:44,520 --> 00:04:49,000 from us from their women in ministry and our talk about tongues and healing, we're, we're 65 00:04:49,000 --> 00:04:53,480 going to just make sure that we, uh, just go all out and just make sure like you actually 66 00:04:53,480 --> 00:05:01,360 want to be here at this point. Yes. And so, yeah. Uh, so let's dive into the idea of a 67 00:05:01,360 --> 00:05:09,600 safe place. So, uh, I have talked with pastors and ministers over the 16 years I've worked 68 00:05:09,600 --> 00:05:14,240 in ministry and a common thing that comes up is like, Oh, we're just trying to create 69 00:05:14,240 --> 00:05:21,800 a safe place. And the issue with that is the definition of safety means to be void of risk 70 00:05:21,800 --> 00:05:28,360 and the gospel is actually increases your risk in life. Right. It doesn't. So, so when 71 00:05:28,360 --> 00:05:32,160 you're saying, Hey, we want to be safe. You're actually saying you're actually limiting your 72 00:05:32,160 --> 00:05:37,360 capacity to deal with the mess in people's lives. And so we want to just kind of address 73 00:05:37,360 --> 00:05:41,460 that a little bit. And first thing I want to address is I think the heart behind what 74 00:05:41,460 --> 00:05:47,200 people are getting at here is good. Like they want to create a place where people feel like 75 00:05:47,200 --> 00:05:52,160 they can let their guard down and let the mess in their life be dealt with. Right. Which 76 00:05:52,160 --> 00:05:57,700 I think that is good. The problem is, is that's not safe because when you are dealing with 77 00:05:57,700 --> 00:06:02,200 mess in your life, it actually brings it. Oftentimes it brings up trauma, brings up 78 00:06:02,200 --> 00:06:10,000 things like addiction in the past or whatever. And often takes a lot of time to, uh, process 79 00:06:10,000 --> 00:06:14,840 through. So an example of this is I, there's a church I talked to about five years ago. 80 00:06:14,840 --> 00:06:18,680 Um, and they were like, yeah, we just want to create a safe place. And I'm like, awesome. 81 00:06:18,680 --> 00:06:21,480 And they're like, we're, and we're starting a new ministry. I was like, Oh, that's awesome. 82 00:06:21,480 --> 00:06:26,560 What are you doing? Like we're doing prison ministry. Yeah, it's not going to be safe. 83 00:06:26,560 --> 00:06:32,040 Do you know why those people are in prison? Yeah. I mean, because they broke some law. 84 00:06:32,040 --> 00:06:36,760 Right. Right. And, and I mean, and I want to have percent applaud them doing the prison 85 00:06:36,760 --> 00:06:40,280 ministry, right? But it's like, that's not going to be safe. Well, and it's, but it's 86 00:06:40,280 --> 00:06:45,360 a hundred percent appropriate. I think you should do. Yes. Right. Um, but like prison 87 00:06:45,360 --> 00:06:49,720 ministry is not safe. Like you have no idea why people are in there. No. Right. It could 88 00:06:49,720 --> 00:06:56,000 be anything from tax fraud to they murdered someone. Yeah. Right. Or anything in between. 89 00:06:56,000 --> 00:07:01,520 Yeah. Yeah. There's a, there's some TV shows. I think, I think, um, psych is one of them 90 00:07:01,520 --> 00:07:05,640 where he goes undercover in prison and then he comes up with some like ridiculous excuse 91 00:07:05,640 --> 00:07:10,280 of why he's there. And the person next to him was like, I killed someone or something 92 00:07:10,280 --> 00:07:15,040 like that. And he's like, Oh, it's much easier. Yeah. Yeah. It's much easier explanation. 93 00:07:15,040 --> 00:07:20,120 Right. Well, so if we can take a step back really quick, this idea of devoid of risk, 94 00:07:20,120 --> 00:07:27,600 uh, it's, I went into that in, uh, in financial things, right? Like that's actually a conversation 95 00:07:27,600 --> 00:07:32,120 that I have with people around the financial basis because, um, people will talk about 96 00:07:32,120 --> 00:07:37,440 what their money, they say, well, I want to grow, but I don't want to have any risk. The 97 00:07:37,440 --> 00:07:42,280 problem is there is no such thing as, um, risk avoidance. In other words, there's always 98 00:07:42,280 --> 00:07:46,440 going to be risk. So in money and in life, um, and let me explain like on a, on a, on 99 00:07:46,440 --> 00:07:50,160 a physical commodity, talking about money, why that's the case. If you invest in the 100 00:07:50,160 --> 00:07:54,200 stock market, you have risk of companies growing companies collapsing companies going out of 101 00:07:54,200 --> 00:07:59,320 business, right? If you don't invest in the market, you now have inflation risk and you 102 00:07:59,320 --> 00:08:03,800 have a, and a number of other risks as well. So whether you put the money in the market 103 00:08:03,800 --> 00:08:10,360 or not, you actually have risk. The question is which risk are you most willing to accept? 104 00:08:10,360 --> 00:08:14,880 Yeah. And you can mitigate risk. Correct. Right. So what we're not saying is we're not 105 00:08:14,880 --> 00:08:19,680 saying, Hey, just go willy nilly with your church and let everything fly. Right. Like 106 00:08:19,680 --> 00:08:22,120 that's not what we're saying. Like should you background check people who are going 107 00:08:22,120 --> 00:08:27,760 to work with adolescents? Absolutely. Right. Should you train up your congregation? Well, 108 00:08:27,760 --> 00:08:32,400 absolutely. Should you have like, should you have things like faith and conduct agreements 109 00:08:32,400 --> 00:08:36,440 where it's like, Hey, if you're going to volunteer, this is what we expect. Absolutely. Those 110 00:08:36,440 --> 00:08:39,880 are great. Those are great things. Like you can mitigate risk. Like same with, same with 111 00:08:39,880 --> 00:08:44,880 the stock market, right? Uh, if someone came up to you and said, Hey, I'm going to put 112 00:08:44,880 --> 00:08:53,000 $3 million in Tesla, we're going to get flagged on that one. You might get flagged on it. 113 00:08:53,000 --> 00:08:58,080 You also might be like, maybe we should diversify a little bit. Right. Right. Or a lot. Um, 114 00:08:58,080 --> 00:09:01,600 but, but maybe we should, maybe we should change up our strategy a little bit. Well, 115 00:09:01,600 --> 00:09:05,440 and it's, it's one of these conversation pieces where that may or may not be appropriate, 116 00:09:05,440 --> 00:09:08,840 but it's not going to be appropriate for everyone. Yeah. Which by the way, it comes back to your 117 00:09:08,840 --> 00:09:14,640 thing is that, uh, when you were talking about individual churches, you know, your situation, 118 00:09:14,640 --> 00:09:20,160 you know, your circumstance, like you're not going to be the same as us. Right. And so 119 00:09:20,160 --> 00:09:23,920 the way that we do our church is not necessarily going to be the same as the way you do your 120 00:09:23,920 --> 00:09:28,140 church because you know, the circumstances around it and what's important for mitigating 121 00:09:28,140 --> 00:09:34,180 risk, but also forwarding the gospel to make transformative places. Yeah. So a couple points 122 00:09:34,180 --> 00:09:40,120 of scripture that we can reference on this. So one is Matthew 10 and Jesus is sending 123 00:09:40,120 --> 00:09:44,840 his disciples out. He says, you're going to heal. You're going to proclaim the gospel, 124 00:09:44,840 --> 00:09:51,960 all this good stuff. Then he gives this call to be like sheep amongst wolves. I don't know 125 00:09:51,960 --> 00:09:56,560 about you. Uh, we don't, so we don't have sheep where we're at, but we've got mountain 126 00:09:56,560 --> 00:10:01,280 goats. Yeah. All right. We do have wolves though. We do have wolves and I can tell you 127 00:10:01,280 --> 00:10:05,280 right now, the mountain goats do not hang out with the wolves. No, they do not. Not 128 00:10:05,280 --> 00:10:09,640 intentionally. And when they do, it's usually not good for the mountain goats. It is not. 129 00:10:09,640 --> 00:10:14,640 No. So, uh, like generally it doesn't go well for anything that hangs out with the wolves. 130 00:10:14,640 --> 00:10:20,080 Yeah. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Wolves are mean. Um, so he calls us to be like sheep amongst 131 00:10:20,080 --> 00:10:26,360 wolves. That's not a safe place to be. Right. Right. Uh, and then he goes on and gets down 132 00:10:26,360 --> 00:10:30,640 to Matthew 10, 28 and he says, Hey, don't fear the one who can just condemn your body. 133 00:10:30,640 --> 00:10:35,440 Instead, fear the one who can condemn body and soul to hell. So we're referring to God 134 00:10:35,440 --> 00:10:39,800 and lots of times we read this passage, we're like, wow, that's a dark verse. But really 135 00:10:39,800 --> 00:10:43,080 what Jesus is saying is he's like, he's like, Hey, everything in this world has to throw 136 00:10:43,080 --> 00:10:49,200 at you. That's okay. Like this is going to be tough. Yeah. It's going to suck. And his 137 00:10:49,200 --> 00:10:52,400 commission to his disciples in here, he's saying that like, Hey, you are going to be 138 00:10:52,400 --> 00:10:54,520 imprisoned. You're going to, they're going to try to stone you. They're going to try 139 00:10:54,520 --> 00:11:00,040 running out of towns. Yeah. All this stuff. So he's giving this call to like, Hey, this 140 00:11:00,040 --> 00:11:04,160 is what it means to follow me and go proclaim the good news. And there's going to be times 141 00:11:04,160 --> 00:11:09,520 where it just downright sucks. Well, and I think, I think Jesus's statement is really 142 00:11:09,520 --> 00:11:13,600 about like, where's your eyesight trained on? Like, are you focused on the person who 143 00:11:13,600 --> 00:11:19,760 might affect your day? Yeah. Or the person who's in charge of your eternity. Yeah. Like, 144 00:11:19,760 --> 00:11:23,200 and the point is not for you. I think the problem when he talks about that is people 145 00:11:23,200 --> 00:11:26,560 focus in on the hell thing and they're like, Oh, if I don't do this, God's going to send 146 00:11:26,560 --> 00:11:30,280 me to hell. No, that's not what the point of the conversation is. The point of the conversation 147 00:11:30,280 --> 00:11:34,400 is why are you worried about somebody who could cause you a little bit of physical discomfort 148 00:11:34,400 --> 00:11:39,260 instead of focusing on this eternal life aspect, like this, uh, this kingdom that is going 149 00:11:39,260 --> 00:11:44,720 to continue to roll out to the entire world. Yeah. Right. And so like, where is your eyesight? 150 00:11:44,720 --> 00:11:51,300 Like, what are you looking at? Yeah. And so re rewind this and look at the history of 151 00:11:51,300 --> 00:11:57,380 how the Lord has led his people. I can tell you right now, it doesn't take a lot of research 152 00:11:57,380 --> 00:12:04,600 to see that he led them to what seemed like earthly unsafe places. So, uh, let's just 153 00:12:04,600 --> 00:12:09,920 start in Egypt. So you have the Israelites enslaved, right? But they have roofs over 154 00:12:09,920 --> 00:12:14,180 the head. They have food. It might not be a lot, but they have some. And then God comes 155 00:12:14,180 --> 00:12:18,400 in, frees them. And while they also have, they, they know what's coming. Yeah. They 156 00:12:18,400 --> 00:12:24,840 know what to expect. Then God comes up and frees them. And where does he take them? The 157 00:12:24,840 --> 00:12:30,620 desert. Okay. What's in the desert? Nothing. Pretty much. I don't know if you know this, 158 00:12:30,620 --> 00:12:35,360 but the desert is really hot. True. It's very hot. It's very hot. That's for you, Jamie. 159 00:12:35,360 --> 00:12:39,560 I think the, they sent us a picture when they were in Hawaii of them wearing their shirts 160 00:12:39,560 --> 00:12:42,880 in Hawaii in the middle of the desert. And yeah, that's pretty sweet. Yeah. Though I 161 00:12:42,880 --> 00:12:46,960 mean, Hawaii, I mean, that's really hard to call that a desert. Yeah. Yeah. So, but, but 162 00:12:46,960 --> 00:12:50,880 anyways, like continuing on with Israel's journey, like then they get to the point where 163 00:12:50,880 --> 00:12:55,320 they're going to enter into the promised land and they send, send scouts over and the scouts 164 00:12:55,320 --> 00:12:59,240 look and they're like, there are giants here. Yeah. And it's only Caleb who's like, let's 165 00:12:59,240 --> 00:13:05,080 go. Like everyone else. Joshua, Joshua. Yeah. But yeah, but Caleb, Caleb is the old man 166 00:13:05,080 --> 00:13:11,440 who's like, let's go. Yeah. He's like, I got this. Yeah. Okay. Then you, then you continue 167 00:13:11,440 --> 00:13:17,400 their journey, say to Jericho. Yep. Right. They're like, Oh, you know, town big walls, 168 00:13:17,400 --> 00:13:21,560 we're gonna have to fight them. Tell you what, here's the strategy. Walk around it and dance 169 00:13:21,560 --> 00:13:26,080 and sing. Uh huh. Right. Then the last day, do it seven times, but then yell at those 170 00:13:26,080 --> 00:13:30,000 walls and they're going to fall down. Yep. Yep. Fast forward a little bit further to, 171 00:13:30,000 --> 00:13:33,720 uh, let's say Gideon. Yep. Where it's like, Hey, I know you're going up against a hundred 172 00:13:33,720 --> 00:13:40,080 thousand plus, but Hey, you only need 300. Okay. That's one of those moments where I 173 00:13:40,080 --> 00:13:44,600 come again. Like is that, is that, am I hearing you correctly? Um, well, or let's even go 174 00:13:44,600 --> 00:13:49,720 to a book of that is a meant to be a satirical book, but it's the book of Jonah, right? Uh, 175 00:13:49,720 --> 00:13:54,440 where the prophet acts like a heathen and all the heathens act like righteous people. 176 00:13:54,440 --> 00:13:58,840 Right. Uh, Jonah is told, he's mad when they act like righteous people. Right. Well, Jonah's 177 00:13:58,840 --> 00:14:02,000 given this instruction. He says, Hey, you know, those people who just invaded you and 178 00:14:02,000 --> 00:14:05,920 completely wiped out your people and took them into slavery. I want you to go and preach 179 00:14:05,920 --> 00:14:09,880 to them because I don't want to wipe them out because they're, I don't want, I want 180 00:14:09,880 --> 00:14:15,600 them to turn from their evil. And like, he's like, well, they just wiped us out. Uh huh. 181 00:14:15,600 --> 00:14:20,640 Yeah. Yeah. That's, that's not a comfortable place to have to go. No. You know, and uh, 182 00:14:20,640 --> 00:14:24,480 or uh, which, uh, which prophet is it that had to lay on their side for like three years? 183 00:14:24,480 --> 00:14:30,960 Ezekiel. Ezekiel. Yeah. Not great. Yeah. Uh, so let's just jump ahead to the new Testament 184 00:14:30,960 --> 00:14:36,920 a little bit. Like, so this is post Jesus book of acts. Um, you have the disciples getting 185 00:14:36,920 --> 00:14:41,520 stoned within an inch of their lives being thrown out of city, beaten repeatedly, beaten 186 00:14:41,520 --> 00:14:46,520 repeatedly and what do they do? They, as soon as they can get up, they get up and they go 187 00:14:46,520 --> 00:14:51,680 back into the city or the next city, depending on, yeah. Yeah. Does they just go in? They, 188 00:14:51,680 --> 00:14:58,160 they continue on with the mission. Yep. They continue on with the mission. You have, um, 189 00:14:58,160 --> 00:15:02,240 there's the guy who tells Paul, he's like, Hey, I just had a vision that if you go here, 190 00:15:02,240 --> 00:15:05,880 you're going to get bound up. And Paul's like, yeah, I'm still going. Uh huh. Like I, I'm 191 00:15:05,880 --> 00:15:11,680 aware that I'm probably going to get arrested, but I'm still going anyways. Yeah. You have, 192 00:15:11,680 --> 00:15:19,160 uh, 11 of the 12 disciples being killed in horrific, horrific ways. Right. Um, so like 193 00:15:19,160 --> 00:15:24,840 what were their lives safe? No, they were imprisoned. They were beaten. They were, uh, 194 00:15:24,840 --> 00:15:29,720 I mean, they were stoned, all these things. Peter was crucified upside down. Um, these 195 00:15:29,720 --> 00:15:34,200 are the physical things that happened to them too. There was a lot of like, um, you think 196 00:15:34,200 --> 00:15:38,640 about even like Paul, who was a, one of the great apostles, right? He had people in each 197 00:15:38,640 --> 00:15:44,320 of the cities who were like talking smack about him when he wasn't there. Yeah. Right. 198 00:15:44,320 --> 00:15:47,880 That he has to clarify. He's like, no, this, these are my credentials. This is, this is 199 00:15:47,880 --> 00:15:51,200 the authority that I've been given. Yep. And when I come here, we'll see if you have the 200 00:15:51,200 --> 00:15:56,680 same snark when I come here to talk to you. Uh huh. Yeah. And then, and then you also 201 00:15:56,680 --> 00:16:03,560 have like, you also have the, the difficulties of disagreement between the disciples. Like 202 00:16:03,560 --> 00:16:08,160 you have a whole section in Galatians where Paul's talking about how he confronted Peter. 203 00:16:08,160 --> 00:16:13,240 And then you have Peter in his book saying, Paul is quite difficult to understand. Yeah. 204 00:16:13,240 --> 00:16:18,480 Right. Like you have, you have these buddy, buddying of heads of prominent church leaders. 205 00:16:18,480 --> 00:16:22,000 Barnabas and Paul had to split ways because they had a disagreement about how things should 206 00:16:22,000 --> 00:16:27,600 go. Yeah. Doesn't seem to be that they, uh, disliked each other. They're just like, Hey, 207 00:16:27,600 --> 00:16:31,480 it's more important that we go forward with this than we sit here and bicker. Yeah. And 208 00:16:31,480 --> 00:16:37,640 so following Jesus is not easy. No, it's not like, uh, and so we have, we need to put that 209 00:16:37,640 --> 00:16:41,520 in context there of like, it's not easy. It's not safe. We're called to be sheep amongst 210 00:16:41,520 --> 00:16:45,560 wolves. Um, another, another passage that you can look at this, and this is a little 211 00:16:45,560 --> 00:16:50,480 bit of different interpretation on this, but is in the Beatitudes or Jesus says you're 212 00:16:50,480 --> 00:16:57,240 the light of the world. So don't hide your light under a bushel. Yeah. Okay. In wartime, 213 00:16:57,240 --> 00:17:04,800 what do you do to be safe? You hide, you hide your light. Yeah. So world war two, when the 214 00:17:04,800 --> 00:17:10,560 blitzkrieg was happening over London, they had mandatory blackouts across the city so 215 00:17:10,560 --> 00:17:14,120 that it was harder for the city to be bombed. And they actually set up, they actually set 216 00:17:14,120 --> 00:17:20,160 up fake, fake communities around the city to try to lessen the impact on a city. Yeah. 217 00:17:20,160 --> 00:17:25,240 Stuff like that. Right. So in ancient times, like if you know someone's coming to attack 218 00:17:25,240 --> 00:17:31,240 you, you don't leave all the lights on. You, you actually hide those lights. Well, and 219 00:17:31,240 --> 00:17:35,200 for two reasons. One is that one, they'll be able to see you from a long ways off because 220 00:17:35,200 --> 00:17:39,640 it's not our modern infrastructure. Like we've talked about this in the past, but about how 221 00:17:39,640 --> 00:17:45,080 night is dark. Yeah. I mean, you got maybe stars moon, like, but depending on, you know, 222 00:17:45,080 --> 00:17:48,880 of course, like clouds and those type of things, but it's, it's dark, dark. Yeah. Like, so 223 00:17:48,880 --> 00:17:52,880 it's not like, uh, when you walk around your city and there's still street lights and no, 224 00:17:52,880 --> 00:17:57,800 there's none of that. It's dark. You only have that light from people's houses. And, 225 00:17:57,800 --> 00:18:03,160 uh, and so like, if you have your light on one, another thing that happens is that you 226 00:18:03,160 --> 00:18:08,400 also can't necessarily see into the darkness because your eyes aren't adjusted to the dark. 227 00:18:08,400 --> 00:18:15,280 Yep. Right. So you let everybody see you and you can't see them. But on the flip side of 228 00:18:15,280 --> 00:18:19,720 that, if you're also going to be a city of hope for people who are lost or wandering 229 00:18:19,720 --> 00:18:25,680 or on the road, then you also have to have your light shining. Yeah. And if you hide it, 230 00:18:25,680 --> 00:18:32,200 then they're not going to know where you are. Yep. So, so for us to shine our light, to 231 00:18:32,200 --> 00:18:37,200 shine the light of Jesus and community around us is an unsafe thing to do. Right. It'll 232 00:18:37,200 --> 00:18:43,160 lead to in American context, it'll lead probably the more like ridicule shame, like people 233 00:18:43,160 --> 00:18:47,120 trying to shame you, guilt you, make fun of you, stuff like that. But there are contexts 234 00:18:47,120 --> 00:18:51,560 around the world where it leads to imprisonment and death. Correct. Yeah. We have brothers 235 00:18:51,560 --> 00:18:55,720 and sisters in Afghanistan and a lot of the middle Eastern, uh, regions that are going 236 00:18:55,720 --> 00:19:00,360 through that right now. Um, I was actually watching an interview with, um, a pastor X 237 00:19:00,360 --> 00:19:05,160 who is, uh, has to remain anonymous and, uh, he made a statement. He says, you know, people 238 00:19:05,160 --> 00:19:10,800 are encouraged by the fact that we're willing to die for crisis. As I often wonder, like, 239 00:19:10,800 --> 00:19:17,040 are you willing to live for him though? Yeah. And I was like, ow, pastor, that hurts. 240 00:19:17,040 --> 00:19:23,200 Ouch. Right. So it hurts in a good way because it, it's like, it's not a, it's not a piece 241 00:19:23,200 --> 00:19:27,200 of shame. It's a piece of conviction. It's motivating me to be a better version of myself. 242 00:19:27,200 --> 00:19:31,920 Yeah. So what we want to do as churches, we want to actually create a transformative place, 243 00:19:31,920 --> 00:19:36,080 correct? A place where people can come for healing and they can be transformed. They 244 00:19:36,080 --> 00:19:40,400 can experience the redemption that Christ offers. They can experience the forgiveness, 245 00:19:40,400 --> 00:19:48,320 the salvation that comes through Christ. Um, but in order to do that, we have to be willing 246 00:19:48,320 --> 00:19:54,620 to accept the mess. Correct. Well, we talked in, um, a number of our series, we talked 247 00:19:54,620 --> 00:19:59,760 about the mess that is equipping people for ministry too, right? We've said, how many 248 00:19:59,760 --> 00:20:02,920 times have we said that if you let people speak on a stage for any period of time, they're 249 00:20:02,920 --> 00:20:07,520 going to spot heresy. If you put, uh, people to train and worship leading some days, they're 250 00:20:07,520 --> 00:20:11,520 going to be out of tune, out of key. You know, it's not going to be good. Yeah. Uh, you could 251 00:20:11,520 --> 00:20:17,640 be like this last week at our church was, was kind of, uh, it was just a house of cards 252 00:20:17,640 --> 00:20:21,200 of everything went wrong. Uh-huh. But one of the main thing was we couldn't get logged 253 00:20:21,200 --> 00:20:24,960 into the computer so we couldn't even put words on the screen that I don't know if you 254 00:20:24,960 --> 00:20:28,080 know that if you don't put words on the screen, people have a hard time, like, cause people 255 00:20:28,080 --> 00:20:36,060 don't typically memorize the songs, you know? So it makes it difficult. Yeah. Um, it's going 256 00:20:36,060 --> 00:20:40,720 to be messy like that. There's just a process and all of that. Uh, we, I know that whenever 257 00:20:40,720 --> 00:20:47,080 you train a new sound person, it's messy. Uh-huh. Yeah. I mean, you, and look at the 258 00:20:47,080 --> 00:20:51,720 more like social justice side of church too. Like if you're going to say, Hey, I want to 259 00:20:51,720 --> 00:20:58,320 adopt. You're entering into trauma. It's going to be messy. Guaranteed trauma. Guaranteed 260 00:20:58,320 --> 00:21:03,520 trauma. If you're, if you have, if your church has like a alcoholic anonymous ministry or 261 00:21:03,520 --> 00:21:08,640 a narcotics amount, anonymous ministry, uh, it's going to be messy. Right? Like when you're 262 00:21:08,640 --> 00:21:14,080 talking to people who are in active recovery, yeah. Like that's messy. Right. Right. Like 263 00:21:14,080 --> 00:21:16,560 there's, there's going to be times where they're going to want to relapse. There's going to 264 00:21:16,560 --> 00:21:20,320 be times where you're going to see relapse. There's going to be, and how, what do you 265 00:21:20,320 --> 00:21:24,880 do in those moments? Right. Well, and there's also a bleed in from that night, not just 266 00:21:24,880 --> 00:21:29,760 alcoholics and narcotics, but like people who are forgiven by Christ and are being, 267 00:21:29,760 --> 00:21:35,760 um, continually formed into his image are going to have relapses too. Yeah. Right. And, 268 00:21:35,760 --> 00:21:40,000 uh, I was actually just listening to, I'm going to recommend a mini series that's on 269 00:21:40,000 --> 00:21:44,720 walking the text right now. It's flora and fauna from, uh, Brad gray. Yeah. And they 270 00:21:44,720 --> 00:21:48,080 were talking about the fig tree when, when Jesus comes out and he curses his fig tree. 271 00:21:48,080 --> 00:21:50,720 And I'm not going to give you the whole spiel because there's a lot of good stuff in there. 272 00:21:50,720 --> 00:21:56,160 Yeah. Uh, go check out the episode. Uh, Jesus come, he curses this, this fig tree. And one 273 00:21:56,160 --> 00:22:01,040 of the things, make statements that they make is that, um, how often is God coming to your 274 00:22:01,040 --> 00:22:07,840 branch and it's all leaves and no fruit. And, uh, and he quoted from Josea when it says, 275 00:22:07,840 --> 00:22:12,800 um, that when you, when you have inauthentic worship, right? When you, when you're saying, 276 00:22:12,800 --> 00:22:15,680 trying to say the right things, but you're not doing any of the right things. When your 277 00:22:15,680 --> 00:22:20,560 orthodoxy doesn't line up with your orthopraxy, right? Uh, with your duology does not line up 278 00:22:20,560 --> 00:22:24,400 with your theology that he's going to put an end to your parties and end to your worship 279 00:22:24,400 --> 00:22:30,480 and end to your Sabbaths and, uh, and redirect. Yeah. Right. And it says like your fig fig trees 280 00:22:30,480 --> 00:22:34,960 will not produce figs, which is actually the connection into, um, that portion in Mark. But, 281 00:22:34,960 --> 00:22:40,480 uh, I was sitting there thinking, I was like, man, how crazy is it? Like, cause we, it's, 282 00:22:40,480 --> 00:22:44,720 when you're talking about creating a safe space in the church, I feel like sometimes what you end 283 00:22:44,720 --> 00:22:49,280 up with is you end up with a branch with all leaves and no fruit, right? If we want it to be 284 00:22:49,280 --> 00:22:54,000 safe, that's the risk is we end up with all leaves and no fruit. Yeah. I want to even say 285 00:22:54,000 --> 00:22:57,760 that's a risk. I would say that's a guarantee. Yeah. Cause the more you step into that, the more, 286 00:22:58,320 --> 00:23:05,280 the more that you realize that you limit, you lose your ability or even know how to get out 287 00:23:05,280 --> 00:23:14,480 in the community and reach the lost. Right. Cause, um, being a church that is transformative is, 288 00:23:15,840 --> 00:23:21,760 I would even say dangerous, right? Because some of the people you're going to be welcoming in are 289 00:23:21,760 --> 00:23:27,200 going to be people that, that your neighbors might look at you and be like, are you sure you want them 290 00:23:27,200 --> 00:23:34,240 in the same building as your children? Right. But the reality is, is the gospel is for everyone. 291 00:23:34,240 --> 00:23:39,040 Right. You know, it's interesting. We have this concept of dangerous, right? Uh, cause people are 292 00:23:39,040 --> 00:23:43,760 like, why wouldn't do anything dangerous? It's like you drive a car, you drive a car 60 miles 293 00:23:43,760 --> 00:23:48,560 an hour down the road. Yeah. Right across the line from a person driving 60 miles the other way. 294 00:23:48,560 --> 00:23:52,320 Uh huh. If they, they forget what they're doing for one minute and cross over you, 295 00:23:52,320 --> 00:23:56,240 you're hitting each other at 120 miles per hour. And it hurts. Uh, one of the things we do a lot 296 00:23:56,240 --> 00:24:01,680 in Alaska is we get in these like big metal tubes and we go up in the air and we go from one place 297 00:24:01,680 --> 00:24:10,080 to another. Like, uh, that's dangerous. It's just, uh, they've mitigated risk inside of that. 298 00:24:10,720 --> 00:24:17,200 But if, if the engines fail and we're 10,000 feet in the air, I got news for you. It's not good news 299 00:24:17,200 --> 00:24:22,480 for us. Right. It's a dangerous thing. Um, there's a lot of things that we do that are dangerous, 300 00:24:22,480 --> 00:24:27,600 right? Even down to, uh, like our eating choices. When we talk about fast food, eating fast food is 301 00:24:27,600 --> 00:24:32,960 really dangerous because of the saturated fat and everything that is inherently in there. People do 302 00:24:32,960 --> 00:24:38,560 it though. And yet when we get to the church, we're like, well, it needs to be completely safe. 303 00:24:39,440 --> 00:24:44,640 Yeah. It's, uh, so I worked in the challenge course industry for like 14 years. And one of 304 00:24:44,640 --> 00:24:49,920 the first things they teach you is they're like, do not say the word safe. Like they're like, 305 00:24:49,920 --> 00:24:54,960 talk about how you really mitigate the risk. Right. Because if you are putting someone 50 feet off the 306 00:24:54,960 --> 00:24:59,280 ground, tethered from a harness, some ropes, some cable, whatever, however they're doing it, 307 00:24:59,280 --> 00:25:04,560 because there's a bunch of different systems, there's going to be risk. Right. Right. And, 308 00:25:04,560 --> 00:25:07,680 and so mitigating, like even coming back, let's come back to the Bible because, uh, 309 00:25:07,680 --> 00:25:12,480 let's talk about the new Testament, right? Jesus does mitigate risk. One, he's taken these disciples 310 00:25:12,480 --> 00:25:17,040 and they've walked with him. He's taught them, they've walked through tense situations with him. 311 00:25:17,040 --> 00:25:21,760 Yes. So it's not like they've never been in tense situations before. Right. But now they're going 312 00:25:21,760 --> 00:25:26,320 without him. They're going by themselves. Or you take, for example, after Jesus ascends, now there 313 00:25:26,320 --> 00:25:32,960 is the, um, there is the council, right? Uh, there's the three apostles that, uh, Peter, James, and 314 00:25:32,960 --> 00:25:38,240 John. And when Paul is going and he's actually ministering to all the Gentiles and they're like, 315 00:25:38,240 --> 00:25:41,760 Hey, we need to figure out exactly what we need to do for them. They come back and they have a 316 00:25:41,760 --> 00:25:46,240 conversation and Paul says himself, I'm going to submit to whatever they have to say. Right. Yeah. 317 00:25:47,360 --> 00:25:52,480 There is, uh, there is things set up for the safety of the people, right? Like for, 318 00:25:52,480 --> 00:25:56,880 to mitigate the risk, uh, in that conversation. But what it's not going to do is it's not going 319 00:25:56,880 --> 00:26:02,400 to mitigate the risk, uh, to the point where you're not actually moving out and doing. Yes. 320 00:26:02,400 --> 00:26:07,280 Right. Coming back to our idea of a car, like I drive my car, I, but if I stick within the speed 321 00:26:07,280 --> 00:26:14,240 limits and also I put on my seatbelt, I'm still engaging in something dangerous, but I'm also 322 00:26:14,240 --> 00:26:19,280 mitigating the risk to my body as I go into it. Yeah. You also fix what's broken when, when like 323 00:26:19,280 --> 00:26:22,640 parts of your car fail, you make sure it gets fixed. Yeah, exactly. Stuff like that. Right. 324 00:26:22,640 --> 00:26:27,360 A hundred percent. You mitigate the risk. Yeah. Um, so this kind of rolls into our next thing, 325 00:26:27,360 --> 00:26:33,680 which is reputation. Um, and so the idea there is oftentimes we put on this guise of safety for the 326 00:26:33,680 --> 00:26:40,800 sake of the reputation we want to maintain. Um, so like to put on it, to just give a really practical 327 00:26:40,800 --> 00:26:46,160 example of this, a lot of times I'll hear churches say like, we want to have a good reputation in the 328 00:26:46,160 --> 00:26:51,200 community. So we want to be safe, which is like, okay, I hear what you're saying there, but there's 329 00:26:51,200 --> 00:26:54,880 a couple of things wrong with that. Right. A couple of things that maybe you should think. I like the 330 00:26:54,880 --> 00:26:59,440 first half. Yeah. I don't know if I love the second half. Yeah. First half with the reputation 331 00:26:59,440 --> 00:27:04,480 is who are you trying to please? Right. Right. Paul addresses this. He's like, am I trying to please 332 00:27:04,480 --> 00:27:10,000 man or God? Right. And, and he redress, he, spoiler alert, he addresses it as a rhetorical question. 333 00:27:10,640 --> 00:27:16,800 Right. There is a, there is a correct answer to that. This is, this is a, as a friend of mine 334 00:27:16,800 --> 00:27:21,200 likes to say, Paul was being sarcastic in this moment. Yeah. Well, he's like, am I trying to please 335 00:27:21,200 --> 00:27:25,280 man or God? He's like, come on guys. And then Paul also addresses this. He's like, who are you 336 00:27:25,280 --> 00:27:30,320 following? Like, are you following, like where he's like, some of you say you follow Apollo's, some 337 00:27:30,320 --> 00:27:35,360 say you follow Peter, some say you follow Paul. And he's like, well, spoiler alert, we all follow 338 00:27:35,360 --> 00:27:41,840 Jesus. Right. Like let's follow Jesus. Um, I think, I think a lot of times churches, but actually what 339 00:27:41,840 --> 00:27:48,240 they want is they want a reputation of doing good. Yeah. Right. Like not a good reputation, but they 340 00:27:48,240 --> 00:27:53,200 want a reputation of doing good, you know, and being a place where people can come if they're 341 00:27:53,200 --> 00:27:58,000 broken. Yeah. Right. People can come if they're hurting. Yeah. People can come and they're going 342 00:27:58,000 --> 00:28:04,960 to be accepted. Yeah. But not, uh, left where they are. Right. Are you going, are you going for the 343 00:28:04,960 --> 00:28:09,680 Christ like reputation? Like, do you want to be a church that's known for being Christ like, right? 344 00:28:10,480 --> 00:28:16,720 Cause if you do, you're going to enter into some messy places. Right. Like to your point is Jesus 345 00:28:16,720 --> 00:28:23,440 was known to socialize with tax collectors and sinners. You know, it was not shocking for there 346 00:28:23,440 --> 00:28:29,440 to be prostitutes at his table. No, he partook in the forbidden free time activity of laying hands 347 00:28:29,440 --> 00:28:35,280 on lepers. Yep. Right. Like, um, he was known for pushing the envelope and going to places where 348 00:28:35,280 --> 00:28:39,680 people were like, are you sure about that? Yeah. His, his reputation with the Pharisees was not 349 00:28:39,680 --> 00:28:46,080 good. No, his reputation with the, with the people was really good, but it wasn't, he did not, he 350 00:28:46,080 --> 00:28:50,800 never let people stay where they are. He invited them to a deeper reality. Yeah. Right. A good 351 00:28:50,800 --> 00:28:57,440 example of this is John four, the woman at the well, right. Where, where I, I like to view it as, 352 00:28:58,320 --> 00:29:01,920 as kind of like a first reaction video from the disciples point of view, cause they're like, okay, 353 00:29:01,920 --> 00:29:05,440 we're going to get some food. And then they come back and here's Jesus sitting with a Samaritan 354 00:29:05,440 --> 00:29:10,960 woman and they're like, what do we do about this? And they don't know what to say. So then they go 355 00:29:10,960 --> 00:29:16,400 up and they're like, are you hungry? You want some food? You want some food? I have food that 356 00:29:16,400 --> 00:29:22,240 you didn't know about. Did he go in and get bread without us? Right. Right. Uh, and so, uh, but that 357 00:29:22,240 --> 00:29:27,600 woman did not stay where she was at. She was transformed because Jesus sat down with her. 358 00:29:27,600 --> 00:29:32,240 Well, and, and Jesus was never going to force you to come with him, but he is always going to extend 359 00:29:32,240 --> 00:29:36,720 this invitation. Cause she's like, Hey, I recognize you're a prophet. And then she puts out the big 360 00:29:36,720 --> 00:29:39,920 dilemma that was between the Samaritans and the Jews. That time you're like, we worship on the 361 00:29:39,920 --> 00:29:45,200 mountain. You worship in Jerusalem, like which one is right? And he's like, well, that's actually 362 00:29:45,200 --> 00:29:48,960 not the point. Cause when Messiah comes, you're going to be able to worship in spirit and truth. 363 00:29:48,960 --> 00:29:53,920 And I'm going to invite you into that. Right. And he's like, spoiler alert, spoiler. That's me. 364 00:29:53,920 --> 00:30:02,320 Yeah. And she's like, Oh, and, uh, and then he also makes, gives that invitation of living water. 365 00:30:02,320 --> 00:30:05,760 Yeah. Right. It's like, there's living water. That's going to bubble up inside of you. 366 00:30:05,760 --> 00:30:11,680 Yeah. Do you want to be a part of this kingdom that is quite different? Yeah. And now in her case, 367 00:30:11,680 --> 00:30:16,800 she is quite enthusiastic about it and runs back and tells everybody about him. Uh, one of the best, 368 00:30:16,800 --> 00:30:21,920 uh, evangelism stories in the New Testament. I love it. And there's other times where Jesus puts 369 00:30:21,920 --> 00:30:28,000 this invitation out where like the, the richer young ruler, which doesn't specifically say like 370 00:30:28,000 --> 00:30:33,920 rich, like that's, that's a whole nother conversation. Yeah. But likely a landowner 371 00:30:33,920 --> 00:30:40,800 of significant quality quantity. Yeah. Likely. Um, and, and Jesus is like, he's like, well, 372 00:30:40,800 --> 00:30:44,000 what do I need to do to follow you? Jesus lays down, he's like, well, I've done all these things. 373 00:30:44,000 --> 00:30:50,640 He's like, all right, now go sell everything you have. And then he's like, uh, okay, hard pass. 374 00:30:50,640 --> 00:30:56,080 Sorry. Yeah. Um, and so you have these, you have instances where people say yes, 375 00:30:56,080 --> 00:31:00,800 and you have instances where people say no. Yeah. So, but the question, but the coming back to 376 00:31:00,800 --> 00:31:04,800 reputation is like, whose reputation are you going to follow? Right. And if you say Jesus, 377 00:31:04,800 --> 00:31:09,760 okay, then you really need to look at who Jesus was and how he lived. Yeah. Coming back to the 378 00:31:09,760 --> 00:31:14,320 idea of Samaritan to Jesus tells the story of the good Samaritan, right? And it's in response to the 379 00:31:14,320 --> 00:31:18,320 teacher of the law about who is my neighbor. And he tells a story that the Samaritan was the guy 380 00:31:18,320 --> 00:31:23,600 who gave mercy, right? And he says to the teacher of the lies is go and do likewise and you'll live. 381 00:31:24,960 --> 00:31:29,680 Right. Which to a teacher of a lot to have someone say, go be like a Samaritan. 382 00:31:29,680 --> 00:31:35,440 Yeah. It's like, it is, it is not a, not a fun conversation, but it is, it is an invitation 383 00:31:35,440 --> 00:31:40,560 once again, which we don't actually know what the teacher of the law does now. Uh, and, and I, I 384 00:31:40,560 --> 00:31:44,720 think there's a, there's a good, uh, learning lesson is that there's a tension in like this 385 00:31:44,720 --> 00:31:50,080 invitation is given, but what actually happens. Yeah. Right. Yeah. So there's that, there's that 386 00:31:50,080 --> 00:31:54,560 piece of reputation, right? Whose reputation do you want? Are you, are you just trying to 387 00:31:54,560 --> 00:32:00,800 look like nice people in the community where you're actually trying to be like Jesus? Yeah. Now 388 00:32:00,800 --> 00:32:06,960 Jesus, that was probably poor turn of phrase. Jesus was a nice guy. Yeah. Okay. That's it. I'm 389 00:32:06,960 --> 00:32:11,680 cutting that out and, and snipping it and being like Spencer is saying that Jesus was not a nice 390 00:32:11,680 --> 00:32:16,880 guy. Not at all what I'm saying. Yeah. Um, well, nice doesn't always mean that you're going to say 391 00:32:16,880 --> 00:32:22,640 things that people always want to hear either. No. Right. Because it's not nice to not tell 392 00:32:22,640 --> 00:32:28,880 people truth. Yeah. But it is also not nice to tell people truth in a really despicable way. Yes. 393 00:32:28,880 --> 00:32:32,000 Hence, if you don't know what I'm talking about, go back like four episodes and check out the 394 00:32:32,000 --> 00:32:37,520 kingdom of trolls. Yes. Um, so those are, those are a few thoughts on that. And then kind of the 395 00:32:37,520 --> 00:32:44,800 last piece of this conversation is stewardship. And so how does stewardship tie into this? And 396 00:32:44,800 --> 00:32:49,520 really the answer that I would have for you on that is that stewardship is not just how well you 397 00:32:49,520 --> 00:32:53,040 take care of money, but it's how well you take care of everything that's been entrusted to you. 398 00:32:53,680 --> 00:32:58,480 Look at the parable of the talents, right? The people who were like, Hey, I took, I took five 399 00:32:58,480 --> 00:33:04,400 and I multiplied it and here's 10. I took 10. Now here's 20. And then the person who was like, 400 00:33:04,400 --> 00:33:11,440 I took the one and I buried it. That was a person where the king was like, why? Well, and the whole 401 00:33:11,440 --> 00:33:15,840 idea of, um, because this comes back to a Roman idea. If you don't mind me going on to tangent 402 00:33:15,840 --> 00:33:19,760 here really quick with the, um, the talents, because I think this is really going to help us 403 00:33:19,760 --> 00:33:25,680 understand the stewardship idea. Um, Jesus is using a very Roman idea because, uh, Israel is 404 00:33:25,680 --> 00:33:30,240 under Roman occupation at that point. So the way Rome, um, did things is they would come and they'd 405 00:33:30,240 --> 00:33:34,560 conquer an area. Then they leave behind a bunch of people to change the area that they came to, 406 00:33:34,560 --> 00:33:38,560 to look more like Rome, right? And they would give them a certain amount of money and then they 407 00:33:38,560 --> 00:33:42,640 would move on and they go conquer in the next area. And then a leader would come in and, and 408 00:33:42,640 --> 00:33:47,360 travel around in this, in this different areas, right? They come back in a certain amount of time 409 00:33:47,360 --> 00:33:53,360 to check what you did with what you were given, right? Did you actually do what you were supposed 410 00:33:53,360 --> 00:34:00,960 to do with what you were given now? That's called a, um, and, um, um, by the way, these people that 411 00:34:00,960 --> 00:34:04,400 are left in these places to make it look like the place they come from, they're called apostles, 412 00:34:05,360 --> 00:34:11,200 right? Uh, it's a borrowed word from Roman culture. Uh, apostolic means that you're taking 413 00:34:11,200 --> 00:34:14,400 where you come from to make it look like, or where you're going to look where you came from. 414 00:34:14,400 --> 00:34:21,920 And if we come from heaven, then we bring heaven to earth. Right. Um, so this idea, and then this, 415 00:34:21,920 --> 00:34:26,160 this really would come out and you'd go and you would meet them halfway out from the city or you'd 416 00:34:26,160 --> 00:34:29,840 have all the people come out and greet them. It's a thing called a Perusia. You would actually come 417 00:34:29,840 --> 00:34:34,000 and meet them. And then you would bring them back to this area and you would talk to them about all 418 00:34:34,000 --> 00:34:39,840 that you did with what they left. And, uh, in the story of the talents, you have the guy with the 419 00:34:39,840 --> 00:34:44,640 10 talents. He goes and he puts it to work and it creates 20 more. Right. And you have this guy's 420 00:34:44,640 --> 00:34:48,800 given five talents. He puts it to work and it creates five more. There is no distinction in 421 00:34:48,800 --> 00:34:52,720 the way that the master treats either one of them. They were both faithful with what they were given. 422 00:34:52,720 --> 00:34:56,880 Yep. Some was given a lot and some were given a little, but they were both faithful, which does 423 00:34:56,880 --> 00:35:02,080 suggest that the guy who's given one would also have been recognized provided he had put it to 424 00:35:02,080 --> 00:35:07,600 work. But instead what he did is he buried it in the ground. And there's a couple other like fun, 425 00:35:07,600 --> 00:35:11,760 uh, things that are going on, but I'm not going to get into it. He buried it into the ground 426 00:35:11,760 --> 00:35:14,960 because he was afraid of losing what he was given. Yeah. 427 00:35:17,520 --> 00:35:20,560 And the master's like, man, you could have at least pop that puppy in the bank and earn some 428 00:35:20,560 --> 00:35:26,320 interest, but instead you're like a tree that has a bunch of leaves and absolutely no fruit. Yep. 429 00:35:27,440 --> 00:35:30,880 And I'm going to take this coin away and I'm going to give it to somebody who's actually going to use 430 00:35:30,880 --> 00:35:35,760 it. Yeah. And so in your idea, like conversation about stewardship, we have been given a deposit 431 00:35:35,760 --> 00:35:41,360 of a changed life by the grace of Jesus Christ and a deposit of the Holy spirit, which we just 432 00:35:41,360 --> 00:35:46,880 talked about all these spiritual gifts, right? Yep. And what are we actually going to do if we 433 00:35:46,880 --> 00:35:51,760 don't, we can't take our talent. Yeah. Can't take our deposit and bury it in the dirt. Yeah. 434 00:35:53,120 --> 00:36:00,000 It's actually meant to be used. And at the very least, you should pop that puppy in the bank. 435 00:36:00,000 --> 00:36:04,400 Yeah. Right. At the very least, you should be popping that puppy in the bank. 436 00:36:04,400 --> 00:36:12,320 At the very least. But there are segments of our faith that people just buried in the dirt. 437 00:36:12,320 --> 00:36:18,800 Yep. Very true. And so the idea of stewardship is like, are you actually taking care of what's 438 00:36:18,800 --> 00:36:27,040 been given to you? Right? If you're a church leader and you are a ministry leader and you have 439 00:36:27,040 --> 00:36:30,800 a group of people who are trying to spread the gospel and you're not doing that, 440 00:36:30,800 --> 00:36:38,080 are you taking care of what the Lord's entrusted to you? Are you taking care of that? And so coming 441 00:36:38,080 --> 00:36:42,320 back to the idea of stewardship in safe places is like, if we're stewarding the gospel well, 442 00:36:43,040 --> 00:36:46,560 it's not actually going to be safe. Correct. There's going to be risk involved. 443 00:36:47,280 --> 00:36:51,200 If you're managing money well, there's going to be risk with the money. Yeah. There's just no way 444 00:36:51,200 --> 00:36:55,360 around it. There's no way around it, right? Even if I buried in the dirt, there's risk. There's risk. 445 00:36:55,360 --> 00:37:03,280 All of these things have risk. Okay. They all have risk. We can mitigate the risk best we can, 446 00:37:03,280 --> 00:37:08,080 but we need to steward the gospel well into our community to the point where we are saying, 447 00:37:08,080 --> 00:37:12,160 okay, there's going to be risk this, but we're going to do it anyways. 448 00:37:12,880 --> 00:37:16,720 And I think maybe a good question that you have, because there's a lot of churches that do this 449 00:37:16,720 --> 00:37:22,240 really well. Yes. They do it really well. But healthy churches, healthy organizations have 450 00:37:22,240 --> 00:37:27,520 conversations that are uncomfortable. Yeah. So I think one of the questions that you can ask is 451 00:37:28,240 --> 00:37:33,280 in our church, are we taking enough risk? Right? I think sometimes the question is, 452 00:37:33,280 --> 00:37:37,600 are we being safe enough? Right? But the other question you should be asking is, 453 00:37:37,600 --> 00:37:42,880 are we taking enough risk? Yeah. Is there a place in our life that we could afford 454 00:37:44,560 --> 00:37:50,240 to just lay it out just a little bit further on behalf of the gospel? Because God is a 455 00:37:50,240 --> 00:37:54,720 looking for fruit. And I want to really stress this. If God moves on your heart in your church 456 00:37:54,720 --> 00:37:59,120 to make a transformative difference in the way that you're going to do things overnight, sure, 457 00:37:59,120 --> 00:38:05,440 go and do that. Trust God. But more likely what he's going to do is over the next year, five years, 458 00:38:05,440 --> 00:38:10,560 he's going to take you from where you are to closer to where he wants you to be. And you can't rush 459 00:38:10,560 --> 00:38:15,520 that because you need to be able to steward that through everybody. Yeah. I have a tendency in my 460 00:38:15,520 --> 00:38:19,520 life to be like, here are all the changes we're going to make to our church. And I think that's 461 00:38:19,520 --> 00:38:27,520 the only changes we're going to make. We're going to do it all at once. Right? And it always works 462 00:38:27,520 --> 00:38:33,200 wonderfully every time. So then oftentimes when I get into ministry positions that I've worked in, 463 00:38:33,200 --> 00:38:39,200 I will look back after year one and be like, man, nothing got done. I'll look back after year two, 464 00:38:39,200 --> 00:38:43,680 be like, man, it feels like nothing got done. I look back after year three and it's like, man, 465 00:38:43,680 --> 00:38:46,640 it feels like I didn't do anything. But then it's like, okay, let me just pause, look back 466 00:38:46,640 --> 00:38:53,840 three of those years and a lot of things changed. Right? The Lord moved, He worked in His timing. 467 00:38:55,280 --> 00:38:59,360 So it's okay. And it's okay to step out and be like, hey, we're going to try something new. 468 00:39:00,160 --> 00:39:04,480 And if it doesn't work, it's okay to be like, all right, that didn't work. Maybe that's not for now. 469 00:39:04,480 --> 00:39:09,200 Maybe we just need to put a pause on it. Maybe we need to never do that again. Right? But you 470 00:39:09,200 --> 00:39:15,280 got to take risk. You got to step out and take some risk. When I am interviewing people for 471 00:39:15,280 --> 00:39:20,960 volunteering with ministry, I've had people ask me, well, how do you make sure they're trained up? 472 00:39:20,960 --> 00:39:24,880 And I'm like, well, I don't. To start off, I was like, one, I want to make sure their heart 473 00:39:24,880 --> 00:39:29,680 posture is great. And that's where I want to start. We'll make sure their heart posture is great. 474 00:39:29,680 --> 00:39:34,480 And they're like, okay, well, how do you make sure they're spiritually mature? I was like, 475 00:39:34,480 --> 00:39:38,880 I want to see that they're growing. And they're like, well, what do you mean by that? I was like, 476 00:39:38,880 --> 00:39:44,160 well, I want to see that they are continually growing in their walk with Jesus. That's how 477 00:39:44,160 --> 00:39:48,720 I know they're spiritually mature. If they are being stagnant, then I actually have some red, 478 00:39:48,720 --> 00:39:52,720 I have some questions I want to ask. Right? If they're like, hey, I got this all figured out. 479 00:39:52,720 --> 00:39:59,520 It's like, let's talk. Right? That's not a place. And there's the other side of the two is like 480 00:39:59,520 --> 00:40:05,120 in a conversation with a person in a coffee shop or in an office or something like that, 481 00:40:05,120 --> 00:40:08,960 you're not really going to have an idea of who that person is. Now, if you put them in a situation 482 00:40:08,960 --> 00:40:13,040 that's tense, you're going to have a much better idea. I think it was Sun Tzu in the, in the art 483 00:40:13,040 --> 00:40:18,480 of war, which I'm not by the way, endorsing his book, but that he just has a statement that it 484 00:40:18,480 --> 00:40:24,400 rings true. It says, if you live with a man and his family for 40 years and you eat with them and 485 00:40:24,400 --> 00:40:29,440 you dine with them and you work with them and do all these things, and you really know this person, 486 00:40:29,440 --> 00:40:33,520 and then take that person to the edge of a volcano and, and dangle them over it on that day, 487 00:40:33,520 --> 00:40:39,280 you'll truly meet the man. The point being is that adversity actually shows you who you are. 488 00:40:39,280 --> 00:40:42,560 Yeah. And so your point is like, how do you make sure somebody's spiritually mature? I was like, 489 00:40:42,560 --> 00:40:46,720 we go out and do ministry and we see what happens. Yeah. I keep an eye on them because I am okay with 490 00:40:46,720 --> 00:40:51,200 the mess because I'm going to come in and pastor it. Yeah. Right. Right. I'm going to, I'm going 491 00:40:51,200 --> 00:40:55,120 to come in and know that there's, it's going to be messy, but the only way to actually understand 492 00:40:55,120 --> 00:41:00,400 what you're learning and what you're putting into practice is to actually take a test. Yeah. Yeah. 493 00:41:00,400 --> 00:41:05,920 And so doing life with them, like that's just a big part of it. Yep. Um, I have a, I have another 494 00:41:05,920 --> 00:41:10,160 friend, he went to ministry, he went to ministry school, got his M.D.V. all this stuff, got his 495 00:41:10,160 --> 00:41:13,920 first pastorate. And I was, and I was like, and he was like, do you know what ministry school taught 496 00:41:13,920 --> 00:41:18,880 me? I was like, what? He's like, that I know nothing. Like that's what, that's what he's, 497 00:41:18,880 --> 00:41:21,840 he's like, that's what it taught me. He's like, I came out with all these fancy words that I was 498 00:41:21,840 --> 00:41:27,440 like, these guys are, don't know that I have to now simplify all these terms that I learned. And 499 00:41:27,440 --> 00:41:34,160 I have to essentially unlearn what I learned to a degree. Right. But so often we're like, well, 500 00:41:34,160 --> 00:41:38,400 we need people to be super well trained before they can go proclaim the gospel. It's like, actually 501 00:41:38,400 --> 00:41:42,560 we need to just walk alongside them while they do it. Yeah. We need to let them mess up a little 502 00:41:42,560 --> 00:41:48,320 bit and be there in those moments and do life with them and pastor and shepherd them. That's the way 503 00:41:48,320 --> 00:41:52,800 of Jesus. Yeah. That's what Jesus did with his disciples. Right. One of my favorite stories 504 00:41:52,800 --> 00:41:57,680 about Jesus doing this. Okay. So James and John, they're coming out of Samaria and the people 505 00:41:57,680 --> 00:42:04,160 treat them poorly and they're like, all right, Jesus, burn it down. You want us to call fire 506 00:42:04,160 --> 00:42:11,840 from heaven. Right. And he's like, no, that's not what we're going to do. You know, that's not, 507 00:42:11,840 --> 00:42:16,560 that's not what's going on here. And immediately after that, he commissions people to go out and 508 00:42:16,560 --> 00:42:23,360 preach the gospel in pairs. James and John included. Yeah. And Jesus was okay with a little 509 00:42:23,360 --> 00:42:29,200 bit of a mess, but he was willing to step in and pastor that. Yeah. And to, and to teach that. 510 00:42:29,200 --> 00:42:33,280 And, and there's going to be mistakes. I mean, shoot, Peter rips out a sword and chops off a 511 00:42:33,280 --> 00:42:38,400 guy's ear and he's like, Peter, that's not what we're doing. That is not what we're doing here. 512 00:42:39,040 --> 00:42:44,080 You know, or, uh, and like there's a lot of those, those occasions, right. In the, in the 513 00:42:44,080 --> 00:42:48,000 gospel, I mean, we could go forever. Like Jesus has a lot of these occasions. He's okay with the 514 00:42:48,000 --> 00:42:51,760 mess and he's fine with just stepping in and being like, no, this isn't what we're doing. This is why 515 00:42:51,760 --> 00:42:57,600 we're doing this. Yeah. Right. Yeah. So if I was to boil this conversation down to three things, 516 00:42:57,600 --> 00:43:03,120 it'd be this, that one, we don't want to be a safe place. We want to be a transformative place. 517 00:43:05,120 --> 00:43:08,000 Second is we want to have the reputation of Jesus. 518 00:43:10,080 --> 00:43:14,960 Nothing else matters. We want to put on the reputation of Jesus. We want to put on 519 00:43:14,960 --> 00:43:21,520 the armor of God, everything that displays Christ to the world. Right. And then third is we want to 520 00:43:21,520 --> 00:43:26,800 steward what we've been given well. So we want to be a place that takes risk. We put on the armor 521 00:43:26,800 --> 00:43:32,160 of God. We're ready for what the world throws at us. And we want to steward what Christ has given 522 00:43:32,160 --> 00:43:39,040 us well so that our communities can be transformed. I love it because if we're playing it safe, 523 00:43:39,040 --> 00:43:43,600 I hate to break it to you. Our communities aren't going to be transformed. At least, I mean, 524 00:43:43,600 --> 00:43:47,280 let me take them back. They might be transformed. Jesus still might do something miraculous, 525 00:43:47,920 --> 00:43:50,240 but it's not going to be with you. It's going to be in spite of you. 526 00:43:50,240 --> 00:43:58,000 Yeah. One of my favorite quotes from a pastor was he was having a conversation with some of 527 00:43:58,000 --> 00:44:02,240 his students and they were talking about their city and they're like, our city, our churches, 528 00:44:02,240 --> 00:44:08,720 they're just so dark. And the key note of darkness is everywhere. And he's like, 529 00:44:08,720 --> 00:44:11,440 well, you're the light of the world. Why don't you flip on a light switch? 530 00:44:13,280 --> 00:44:18,320 Which sounds like really simple, but you physically being present in the midst of 531 00:44:18,320 --> 00:44:25,040 chaos brings peace. But for that, you have to go into chaos. And that's the hard thing to do. 532 00:44:26,640 --> 00:44:30,880 And one other caveat, I would say this, you're not called to do it alone. 533 00:44:30,880 --> 00:44:33,280 Correct. Called to do it in community. 534 00:44:34,560 --> 00:44:39,360 If we're talking about creating a transformative place, putting on the armor of God, putting on 535 00:44:39,360 --> 00:44:46,480 the reputation of Jesus, and being a place that stewards what's given to us well, we're doing this 536 00:44:46,480 --> 00:44:54,160 as a community. All too often churches put the full load on the pastor. But that's not what the 537 00:44:54,160 --> 00:44:59,920 body of Christ is supposed to do. They're supposed to do it together. And I do have one final caveat 538 00:45:00,640 --> 00:45:05,760 before I stop talking. Thinking about something we talked about earlier is that we're going to 539 00:45:05,760 --> 00:45:08,800 send you sheep among wolves. It's going to be a dangerous place. People aren't always going to 540 00:45:08,800 --> 00:45:13,680 like what you stand for. I've made this statement before and I just think it bears repeating again. 541 00:45:13,680 --> 00:45:17,840 If people don't like you because you look like Jesus, that's called sharing the gospel. 542 00:45:19,120 --> 00:45:22,960 If people don't like Jesus because of the way that you behave, that's called sin. 543 00:45:26,640 --> 00:45:30,480 Make sure that people don't like you because you look like Jesus, not because you're just a jerk. 544 00:45:31,760 --> 00:45:36,400 Right. And if you need clarification on what we mean by that, do we have a couple episodes ago, 545 00:45:36,400 --> 00:45:46,880 Kingdom of Trolls? Yep. Right. So this has been a fun talk. I like this. I think it's good. We have 546 00:45:47,920 --> 00:45:51,760 an episode coming up next week. We're going to be talking about hypocrites. That's going to be fun 547 00:45:52,560 --> 00:45:56,400 where this word doesn't quite mean what you think it means. And some things that we can learn, 548 00:45:56,400 --> 00:46:01,360 it actually applies a lot to what we're talking about today about how we actually live in this 549 00:46:01,360 --> 00:46:05,520 world and not of this world. And hopefully we're going to have a guess for that, but I'm not going 550 00:46:05,520 --> 00:46:11,280 to say a name just in case we're not able to get them scheduled. But we will see you guys next week. 551 00:46:11,280 --> 00:46:18,240 Next week. Till next time. And that's a wrap for today's episode of Love and Context. We hope you 552 00:46:18,240 --> 00:46:22,240 enjoyed this engaging conversation and gained valuable insights into the powerful message of 553 00:46:22,240 --> 00:46:27,520 love within the Bible. We'd love to hear from you and continue the conversation. Connect with us by 554 00:46:27,520 --> 00:46:33,840 sending us your questions, thoughts, and suggestions to loveandcontext at gmail.com. We greatly 555 00:46:33,840 --> 00:46:39,600 appreciate your feedback and ideas for future episodes. Stay connected with us on social media 556 00:46:39,600 --> 00:46:44,480 for updates, behind the scenes content, and additional resources. You can find us on Instagram, 557 00:46:44,480 --> 00:46:49,440 TikTok, YouTube, and Facebook at loveandcontext. Don't forget to hit that follow button to stay 558 00:46:49,440 --> 00:46:54,080 up to date with the latest episodes and join our growing community. Thank you for being part of the 559 00:46:54,080 --> 00:46:59,760 Love and Context family. Remember, love is at the heart of it all. Until next time, keep seeking 560 00:46:59,760 --> 00:47:05,360 wisdom, embracing love, and living out your faith in the context of today's world.