Welcome to Season 3 of Love & Context. This season,
we're exploring the life of Jesus step -by -step
and uncovering what His story teaches us about
loving God and others. Here on Love & Context,
we're all about having real conversations about
how to live out that love in practical, everyday
ways, and understanding the Bible in its full
context. We're so glad you're here. Let's dive
into Season 3 of Love & Context. Welcome back
to the Love and Context podcast. That was less
singing. Welcome back to the love and... There
you go. Just for everyone else. Just for everyone
else. I mean, it's like, I think it's like four
weeks in a row, five weeks, maybe seven weeks
in a row. Indefinitely in a row, I'm going to
do that. Welcome back. It's me, Ben, and it's
that guy, Spencer. So part of the singing joke,
just so you guys know, Ben leads worship at our
church most Sundays. And then I'll fill in a
couple of times a year when he's not there. And
so Ben with the other vocals be like, Oh, if
you do this, this, this, and like, you know,
lay out all these parts. And then when I get
there, they're like, all right. I was like, you
know what? If it sounds okay, I'm okay with it.
And they're like, Oh, so do what we want. I was
like, yeah, just don't sound horrible. And they're
like, great. That is a, that is a general instruction
that you give to most people is don't sound horrible.
Don't sound horrible. Don't sound horrible. In
fact, listener, if this, is you today just don't
sound horrible this is such a uh so good all
right so we're at uh um a couple of things i
realized we're going a little bit out of sequence
but you know what we're it's our podcast we can
do whatever we want but we're in the life of
jesus and um Today, we just have on the calendar,
we're going to be talking about the transfiguration.
So the story about Jesus going up on the mountain
and being transfigured. Context -wise, I just
want to kind of sandwich this in here with what
we've been talking about. There's been the feeding
of the 5 ,000. There's been Jesus walking on
water. There's been him asking them, like, hey,
who do people say that I am? And Peter completely
nails it. And then he tells them, he's like,
hey, by the way, I'm going to be going to Jerusalem.
I'm going to be dying. And Peter is like, no,
you're not. And he gets called. Satan. So really
high highs here for Peter and some really low
lows here for Peter. And right on the heels of
that is going to be the story of the transfiguration.
So I'm going to read out of Matthew. There is
a couple of different places you can read this.
It's in Matthew 16, it's in Mark 8, and it's
in Luke 9. Starting in verse 1 of 17, it says,
After six days, this is after he just called
Peter Satan. Six days later. After six days,
Jesus took with him Peter, James, and John, the
brother of James, and led them up a high mountain
by themselves. There he was transfigured before
them. His face shone like the sun, and his clothes
became as white as the light. Just then there
appeared before them Moses and Elijah, talking
with Jesus. Peter said to Jesus, Lord, it is
good for us to be here. If you wish, I will put
up three shelters, one for you, one for Moses,
and one for Elijah. While he was still speaking,
a bright cloud covered them, and a voice from
the cloud said, This is my son whom I love. With
him I am well pleased. Listen to him. When the
disciples heard this, they fell face down to
the ground, terrified, which makes sense. But
Jesus came and touched them. Get up, he said.
Don't be afraid. When they looked up, they saw
no one except Jesus. As they were coming down
the mountain, Jesus instructed them, don't tell
anyone what you have seen until the Son of Man
has raised from the dead. The disciples asked
him, why then do the teachers of the law say
that Elijah must come first? Jesus replied to
be sure Elijah comes and will restore all things.
But I tell you, Elijah has already come and they
did not recognize him, but have done to him everything
they wished. In the same way, the son of man
is going to suffer at their hands. Then the disciples
understood that he was talking to them about
John the Baptist. All right. This story has a
lot. What are you talking about? Just a few things
going on here, right? So. Let's go ahead and
just, you and I, we're just going to point out
some obvious imagery that's going on. Jesus'
face is shining, like Moses when he's on the
mountain talking with God in the presence of
God, right? His clothes are white. Right. It's
going to be a symbol of purity. He's talking
to Moses and Elijah. You have the law and the
prophets. Right. You have Jesus, who is the very
friend of friend or sorry, Jesus, the friend
Moses, who is the very friend of God. And you
have Elijah who is taken up in a whirlwind. Right.
So you have like these these legendary figures.
And so that's a few things that are going on.
There's there's the cloud that is on the mountain.
The Shekinah glory is going to be very reminiscent
of what's going on in Exodus. You have God calling
down. This is my son whom I love. listen to him
is going to be very reminiscent of Deuteronomy
where Moses is continually saying, listen to
God, listen to God, listen to God, listen to
God. And so that's, that's a lot of, there's
a lot of steep imagery going on in this story.
So why these three guys? Why not? Why not? That's
helpful. Well, so just to give some context on
that, if you look at the rabbinic system of having
disciples that follow you, you typically, Typically
one thing we talked about this before, but typically
to have 12 disciples would be a little much,
right? Typically it'd be five or six. And now
that five or six, you would have one or two that
followed you more closely than the other ones.
Right. And so it's not uncommon for Jesus to
be like, Hey, you three, Peter, James, and John.
are going to go with me to places that the other
disciples are not. Right. So that wouldn't be
an uncommon thing. So just put, putting that
on the table. Uh, you also have with the, with
those three, you also have the, uh, Jesus does
a tremendous church planting through those three,
right? He calls, I don't know if he's done it
yet, but, uh, he calls G, uh, Peter the rock,
right? Of whom the church we built on. All right.
Um, John, uh, is probably the, Am I mixing my
Johns up? I don't think I am, but John. It's
possible, but sometimes it's hard to distinguish
which one we're talking about. Yeah. John is
also one of the most literate of the disciples.
Right. Coming from a priestly family would be
likely. Yep. Yep. Most likely the most literate
of the disciples. So most likely to be able to
record, to be able to help out on that front.
And then James. Now there is question on what
James we're talking about as well. Yeah. It tells,
it tells us that is James, the brother of John.
Nope, sorry. John, the brother of James. Okay,
so there's James and John, the brother of James.
So which James are we talking about? Is this
James and John, those two brothers? Or is this...
Yeah, so. Yeah, so we don't fully know. We don't
fully know on that. There's argument. There's
debate on that and all of that as well. But it's
not uncommon. But bringing back to the point,
it's not uncommon for a rabbi to have a couple
of disciples who follow him more closely than
other disciples. Well, and so the crazy thing
is, so with rabbinic, with disciples and rabbis,
like you said, it's typically only like four
or five. But Jesus has at least 72 because he
sends out 72 at one point. Then he has 12. that
are much closer and representing Israel. But
then he has three that he is pouring into on
a regular basis. And of course, then he's also
speaking to multitudes. So you actually see this,
like Jesus, one, he goes off into, we've talked
about this in the past, but he goes off into
desolate places, into wilderness places to pray
and commune with God. But then he's got these
three that he spends more time with. He's got
the 12 that he spends more time with than everybody
else. Then he has these 72 that are following
him and really spending more regular time. But
then he's still got multitudes that are just
showing up in different places. I think on a
very practical level, there is something about
how to build your life relationally there, right?
Because you cannot feed the way that Jesus fed
into the 12 into 500, right? You can't like there's
you can't actually there's you have a limited
amount of who you are. Like, I mean, like the
amount of time, amount of energy, amount of and
also like you can only become so close to so
so many people we've talked about in the past.
I have a lot of friends, but I have very few
friends that I let speak into my life. Yeah,
take Facebook, for example, right? Like how many
friends do you have on Facebook? I think it's
like a thousand or something like that. How many
of those do you talk to on a regular basis? Regular
basis. Let's say once a year, probably 200. Probably
200. Right. Okay. Out of those 200, how many
of those do you talk to on a monthly basis? 30.
30. Okay. What about weekly basis? Probably down
to 15. Right. So, so you guys see that this is
just a natural progression, right? Like we don't
have a time to, uh, you know, I, I don't know
how many, I'm not very active on Facebook. I
don't know how many friends I got on there, but
like, I mean, it's at least seven, at least seven,
but, but, um, but it's like, I don't talk to,
I don't talk to all the people who are quote
unquote friends on Facebook. And when it boils
down to the people I do talk to in my life, you
know, on a weekly basis, there's probably six
or seven that I talk to on a regular basis. Right.
And outside of, I mean, outside of people I work
with, right? Right. Right. It's a, it's a small
circle. And then there's other people I connect
with more on a monthly basis, other people on
a quarterly basis, other people on a yearly basis.
Right. It all, it just depends on that depth
of relationship, how much time has been invested
in that relationship. Right. And I think a lot
of the thing about that, when you start to talk
about going from a rabbi disciple perspective,
I think sometimes we overwhelm ourselves when
we were like, we need to go preach the gospel
to all nations. Yes, we do. You also need to
find a few people that you're investing heavily
into. Yeah. Yeah. The other thing about these
three disciples is, and this is a, this is one
theory I've heard because we, like I said, there's
still debate on which James or which James we're
talking about. Right. But there is a theory that
these are James and John, the sons of Zebedee,
which were a fisherman family. So to have your
three closest disciples be fishermen would also
be another, would tie into the least of these
comment. Poor Andrew. Yeah. Poor Andrew is left
off on that one. It's like you get James and
John and Peter and Andrew's out in the back going,
hey. I fish too. What are you guys doing? I'm
good with a net. By the way, there's one detail
in the Gospel of Luke that somebody mentions
on this. It's in Luke. nine or verse 31, uh,
two men, Moses and Elijah appeared in glorious
splendor talking with Jesus. Okay. That part's
in Matthew. They spoke about his departure, uh,
which he was about to bring to fulfillment at
Jerusalem. Um, the word departure there is not
departure. It's actually, uh, the, the same Greek
word that they use to translate Exodus. Um, so
not surprising that Jesus is talking to Moses
about an Exodus, right? He has some experience
with that, you know? Um, But yeah, so you got
the least of these being heavily invested in.
And these guys are also going to be the ones
who take up the mantle of really leading the
church. This is indeed the James and the John
and the one that ends up going into Asia. And
then there's Peter who's going to be traveling
and leading in the church. But then there's going
to be James who's in charge in Jerusalem. That
makes a lot of sense why these three would have
showed up in that capacity. A little beef here
that I have with maybe how quick we are to just
get on to Peter. I don't know how many sermons
I've sat in here where they're like, and Peter
just didn't get it. Now, to be fair, prior in
this, like the next previous chapter, he didn't
get it and he got called Satan. But Peter's quoting
Zachariah. Um, because in the, in the, in the
book of Zachariah, they have this, uh, especially
in rabbinic times, uh, in the times of Jesus,
this, this quote from, uh, Zachariah is, has
to do with being on the mountain and that they're
going to, it's going to be, be, uh, a time of
Sukkot because it's going to be a time of an
Exodus. So he sees Moses, he sees Elijah. They're
talking about departure. Jesus is shining with
glory on a mountain. He says, let's build a Sukkot.
Right. He's like, I see what's going on. This
is, this is Zachariah. And God just goes from
him and he's like, Hey. This is my son pay attention
to him It's also a thing about hospitality, right?
Where Peter ties back to Genesis when Abraham
welcomes the angels in and Peter's seeing these
holy figures and he's like, we need to do something
to make them feel welcome. Right. Make them feel
home, make them feel hospitable. It's part of
their culture. Right. So nothing culturally that
Peter is saying right here is off. Well, and
honestly, he doesn't even get rebuked. Neither
by God speaking from heaven or by Jesus or by
Moses or Elijah. Nobody rebukes him because they're
like, yeah, but no. Like, yes, yes, you're actually
seeing that. But the tabernacle is not what you
think. Right. And because I think Peter in some
capacity gets that Jesus is the son of man referenced
in Daniel. Right. Because he's just said that,
hey, you're the Christ, the son of the living
God. But also he doesn't quite think they understand
what's about to happen, but they have no idea.
Well, and we face that tension in our lives,
too. Yeah. Right. Where it's like where we will
hear something. We'll even say it like, yes,
I hear it. I believe this. But when the rubber
meets the road, you're like, oh, OK, I'm going
back to my old ways. Yeah. Right. So you have
that here where Peter is like, yes, Jesus is
the son of God. He's the Messiah. And then these
other holy. figures show up and Peter's like,
Oh, he's on the equal plane as Moses and Elijah.
Right. These figures he's heard about his whole
life. And, um, and then that's where God interjects
and is like, wait, no, no. That's where God has
something to say. Yeah. And it, and like, it's
not, it's not necessarily like we said, it's
not an admonishment. It's, it's a correction.
Like it's, it's just like, it's like, Hey, uh,
no, you think, you know, listen, listen to what
he's saying. Now, why is that important? Because
what's happened in the previous chapter, Jesus
said, I'm going to son of man has to go to Jerusalem
to be, to be tried, crucified. And, you know,
he's going to be put to death. And Peter's like,
no, this is not what's going to happen. And right.
You're not listening. Yeah. Like, you have ears,
but you don't hear. Like, you have eyes, but
you're not seeing. Yeah, and don't think you're
any different than Peter. No. Because, I mean,
we do the same thing. Something profound will
happen at church, in the sermon, in the music,
whatever, and you'll be like, oh, man, my eyes
are opened. And then when rubber meets the road,
you'll be like, okay, I need to go to church
on Sunday, but my football team is playing in
the morning. Maybe I'll just watch, quote, unquote,
watch online. my phone off to the side with the
servant playing. So I can be like, I was at church.
The, uh, I might've just called a few people
out there. Yeah. There's, there's, it's weird.
I it's, we haven't even posted the episode and
I can see our viewership dropping. It's weird.
At least we didn't talk about hockey. Um, yet
we don't, we don't have time to do that today.
Yeah. This, uh, this story is, um, it's, it's
so, it's so important because there's, there's
not a lot of things that Jesus, well, there's
a lot of things that Jesus does that are overtly
divine, but there's not a lot of things where,
where Jesus like just shines with glory in his
ministry because, um, he is, um, tormented flesh,
God in human self, uh, Philippines is going to
say he empties himself to, to be human, right.
To, to walk on the earth and suffer as we suffer
and, um, experience as we experience. But there's
like, This is one of those times where he goes
up on the mountain. It's almost like it's like
the last huddle before they go to what they're
going to go do. Since we're talking about football.
It's the last huddle. And referencing Luke says
they're going to be talking about the Exodus.
Right? I also wonder how that works. You know?
Like, I sit here and I just wonder. I'm like,
so you go up the mountain and you're like, hey,
I'm going to talk to representative of the law,
representative of the prophets. I was like, well,
what is that? Yeah. Another another theory I've
heard on this is that Peter was trying to get
them to stay because you have Jesus and Moses
and Elijah talking about Exodus. And so there
is a theory that in Peter's mind or Peter, James
and John, probably, but in their minds that it
was happening right then and there. Yeah. Like
these figures showed up. Let's talk Exodus. And
they're like, whoa, let's get you to stay. That's
another theory now. Well, I mean, and if you're
thinking that like in their thinking in turn
of the century, Israel. Their thinking is, yes,
we do need an exodus. We need the Goliath that
is Rome to be toppled. We need to walk through
the Red Sea and see all the Roman legions put
into that sea. And when you have that mentality,
you're always going to paint everything through
that lens. But what is an exodus really about?
I mean, even in the exodus. God is leading his
people out, but he's also placing judgment on
the gods and the things that Egypt is trusting
in and inviting Egypt into this relationship,
which was something we referenced back in season
one. Yeah. And God is always extending an invitation
for people to come and follow Yahweh. And so
even the Exodus wasn't about just crushing Egypt.
It was about crushing all the things that Egypt
trusted. Yeah. When there's a God not bound by
geography, there's a God not bound by time, there's
a God not bound by circumstances, there's a God
not bound by anything that this world has to
offer because he's the one through whom all of
it comes to be. Yeah. And he says, man, I just
want you to come and be with me. Yeah. So you
get Peter wanting to make these memorials and
then you get God speaking. And this is a new
living translation, but even as he spoke, a bright
cloud overshadowed them and a voice from the
cloud said, this is my dearly loved son who brings
me great joy. Listen to him. Disciples were terrified,
fell down on their face. A couple of things just
to note here. Nowhere does it say God was angry.
Yep. Nowhere does it say God was mad. We've hinted
at, we've talked about this. Nowhere does it
say God was yelling, right? Right. It just says,
but a voice showed up and said, this is my son
who brings me great joy. Listen to him. And then
the disciples were terrified and fell face down
on the ground. And just so we're clear, there's
a tie back there to Isaiah. Isaiah did that when
he had an encounter with God in the temple. Ezekiel
did that. There's also a, it's also a. precursor
to John in Revelation who fell down as if he
couldn't move. Right. Uh, the idea of falling
down in fear when you physically encounter the
presence of God is a common thing. Yeah. And,
and I'm, I'm, and yes, fear is in light, but
it's more of, it's, it's, it's when you actually
get an accurate representation of the disparity
between who you are and who God is. Um, I'm going
to use the word kavod. It's the, the weight,
the weight of the presence of God. Um, they talk
about like the face of God was always before
me. The presence of God is before me. It is,
you're, you're getting a true representation
of just how small you are. And it, it's, it's,
it presses you to the ground sometimes literally,
right? Not because God is overbearing, but because
there's just a recognition that, oh man, I'm
an ant bowling, balling up my fist. well when
you have that encounter of a perfect holy deity
right and you a broken you like you feeling broken
and small and tiny like there's you that's just
one of those things where it's like so overwhelming
that puts you at a loss for words there was i
mean that i was um in high school. Um, so, and
I grew up, I grew up Southern Baptist, which
by the way, a lot of my good friends are Southern
Baptist. And, uh, um, but we just didn't have
words for what God did in my life in high school,
um, because there's not as much of a exposure
to the spirit. but we were in a prayer meeting
during high school and, um, I got hit and, you
know, like, uh, we were just praying and I asked
God to fill us, to move, move in our presence,
to make our faith come alive. And, uh, where
they talk about when you're filled with the Holy
spirit that you almost like, it's like you get
electrocuted. People talk about like coursing
electricity. I was like, it was like, I got static
shocked in my body. And it was from that point
forward. Like I know the day, I know the moment,
like it's, it's not that my faith was, uh, it's
not that it was, it became effective. It was
effective long before that it came alive. And
from that moment forward, I started to like,
I would have like visions and I would have dreams
and God would speak to me and like, and like,
but like the presence of God was moving in my
life. And, and it was when the presence of God
comes into your life, it's like, sometimes it
has like a physical reaction. Um, now can that
be abused? Of course. Right. I mean, we probably
we could easily go off on a bunch of those things.
But just because it's something you don't understand
doesn't mean it's not something that's legit.
Yeah. Right. Yeah. I when they were walking away
at the end, they asked Jesus about why did they
say Moses has to be the one to come. Right. Or
Elijah has to come first. Right. I was actually
going to pull this up, and they're referencing
actually back to Malachi. I know that book that
all of you have read so many times, right? When
was the last sermon series we did on Malachi?
Us? It was not that long ago. Well, no, we did
a minor prophet, so it wasn't specifically Malachi.
We did like a brief overview of all the minor
prophets, and sometimes more than one minor prophet
in one sermon. Yeah. In other words, I think
we're due for a sermon series through Malachi.
Okay, let's do it. All right. So in chapter four,
it says, surely the day is coming. It will burn
like a furnace. All the arrogant and every evildoer
will be stubble. And the day that is coming will
set them on fire, says the Lord Almighty. Not
a foot, or sorry, not a root or a branch will
be left of them. But for you who revere my name,
the sun of righteousness will rise with healing
in its rays. And you will go out and frolic like
well -fed calves. Then you will trample on the
wicked. They will be ashes under the soles of
your feet on the day when I act, says the Lord
Almighty. Okay. Read that again. Or else. I will
come and strike the land with total destruction.
And so what, who do we see Jesus on a mountain
with Moses and Elijah, as he's talking about
being the son of man referenced in Daniel. And
they're like, Oh, but what, wait, why did they
say Elijah has to end that? Cause like, they're,
they're like, well, where's Elijah. Right. And
he's like, well, Elijah already came. Like that's
who John the Baptist is. He's here to preach
a message of repentance. Repent for the kingdom
of heaven is here. It's ready for you to interact
with it. I was like, this was the message that
was preceding. He was the, the read that was
also echoes Elijah's message all throughout his
ministry. So it's almost like, and this is, this
is, this is not something that's surprising to
you, but sometimes it's surprising to Christians.
This book is not. an old Testament, new Testament
is one story. And Jesus is stepping into a context
of things that have been going on for generations.
And God has been doing in the hearts of people
since the very beginning. Yeah. Right. That's
not to say that it's not a new covenant and not,
that's not to even say that you shouldn't call
it old Testament, new Testament. I don't think
that's, that's inappropriate. But I think sometimes
when we do that, we're like, well, it's old.
We don't need it anymore. Well, no, the old informs
the new. Was it you that was telling me that
the first Lord of the Rings movie you watched
was Two Towers? Yeah. Hadn't read any of the
books. And I walk into this movie and I see little
people walking through the woods. And then it
ends with little people walking through the woods.
This is a bad description of Lord of the Rings.
And I was like, what just happened? I went into
the movie like, cause I had no idea. Nobody had
told me anything. I went into the movie or thinking
like gladiator ring, people fighting it out type
thing. Perfect. And so like I was, yeah, I was
way off. I wish that at some point, like with
that being your first movie. If you had like
sat down right there and tried to guess what
the beginning of the story and the end of the
story was about. Yeah. Just jumping in the middle.
Yeah. So then after I watched that, I went back
and I was like, I need to get some context. And
I read all three of the books and I was like,
this makes a lot more sense now. Right. So interesting
thing. I was actually watching a video from a
token scholar. So this is not really related
to the podcast, but you guys get to listen anyways.
Apparently Lord of the Rings actually should
be split into six books, not three. That token
actually wrote it as six but because they were
having printing issues during the time that it
was being published They actually formatted into
three books because it was easier to publish
Okay. Yeah, just random because they said there's
actually that actually makes a lot of sense because
one of his writing partners was actually CS Lewis
Yeah, who did his series in seven books? Yeah,
so it actually that actually yeah, especially
when you factor in like with this what's that
what's the other collection of books that he
has it's a similar simirelian yeah something
like that yeah i'm gonna say simirelian and somebody
you can correct me only if you can pronounce
it correctly we just lost like half our followers
because like you mispronounce that how dare you
there is yeah so but jesus jesus comes into a
context and so like he goes and takes him on
the mountain and he takes these these boys that
have been steeped in torah Yeah. They've been
steeped in messianic prophecy. They've been steeped
in this world to come. And he says, come and
take a look at what's going on here. And I don't
know why Jesus needs to talk to Moses and Elijah,
but he takes them along so they can see what's
going on. Because they're about to enter a place
where you're going to need some hope to hold
on to. The story of the last week of Jesus, which
we're coming in on pretty soon. We got a few
more weeks of different things that we're covering.
But the stories of the last week of Jesus, he
does a lot of confrontation. And the crucifixion
and when they have to sit there for three days
while they're waiting to figure out what to do
next. Yeah. It's going to be important to have
hope. Right? And it's interesting because he
says that they're not even allowed to talk about
this until he resurrects. And he's told them
he's going to resurrect. He's like, you can't
talk about it until then. Well, yeah. So what
are the takeaways for us here? And I think one
of the big ones is, well, a couple of things.
One, you don't always know how the Lord's working.
Correct. Right. You might think you see one thing
and be like, this is what's happening. And then
God might show up and be like, actually, let's
do a little bit of a turn here. We're going to,
this is what we need to focus on. Right. And
so sometimes we will enter into a situation where
we'll be like, this is how it's going to be resolved.
This is how I'm going to fix it. And then you'll
hear the story and you'll see what's actually
happening. And you'll be like, maybe I don't
know as much as I think I do. Yeah. And that's
okay. Like, it's okay to sit back and be like,
okay, that didn't go my way. I didn't get to
set up my three, my three tents for these three
amazing people. Right. But I do get to focus
on this one person who's actually leading me
down this path. Who's actually leading me into
a life with him. And so it's okay to be like,
okay, that didn't go my way. Lord, what do you
have for me? I think also you can, you can have
a biblically framed mindset on what events are
happening and still miss what God is doing. Right.
And that's why it becomes more important to have
that relational perspective. Right. Yeah. We
have this time where we're just chatting with
God and being like, I mean like, Hey, I think
this is what I should do. And he's like, yeah,
I hear you. Also, you need to go do this. Yeah.
You're like, that doesn't have anything to do
with what I wanted to do. And he's like, that's
okay. It absolutely does. Actually, it absolutely
does. And tell you what, after, after you're
going to recognize exactly why you had to go
do that. How many, how many times in your life
do like, God is like, putting, you're going through
something and you know, like you're right in
the middle of where God wants you to be and it's
not great. But then like later you look back
and you're like, oh yeah, that's exactly where
I needed to be. Right. Like today I can look
back and be like, oh, absolutely. I even think,
um, when we, when, uh, this is, I'm going to
close this story real quick here. Yeah. You're
good. Um, Tara and I served at a church. We've
talked about, there's a church that we served
at that we got kind of chewed up and spit out
out. Right. And it was a, it was a really like
bad experience. And, but I was like, I knew for
a long time that God wanted us there. Now I overstate
God's call there. Right. Because I was like,
Oh, you know, we can fix this. You know, we couldn't.
Um, but while, while we were there, like, um,
I was like, we, we were very definite that our
call was there. But it was hard and it was rough.
And like we had a lot of like just things that
we had to deal with. And I'm like, I don't understand
like why I'm going through all these things.
Except now, you know, 12 years later, I've actually
run into very similar situations that churches
are going through on a regular basis. Yeah. Because
I was in the middle of that. I recognize signs
and I'm able to talk to people and have real
conversations about like problematic behavior.
Yeah. problematic things, um, because I sat in
rooms where I was berated for 45 minutes to an
hour, uh, for everything under the sun that you
can think of. Um, it just doesn't really bother
me when people speak badly about me. Um, as far
as like being able to talk love back to them.
Yeah. Right. Um, it just, I guess, especially
when it comes to like leading in faith and following
Jesus, like, I mean, it's just, it's not, But
I didn't, in the moment, I was like, what's the
purpose of this? But now there's so many times
that even like this year where God has used the
experience of what I went through in order for
me to effectively lead now. Yeah. And knowing
that, I still don't like the pain. I still don't
like the turmoil. I don't like the stress and
everything that we had to go through. But I'm
like, was it worth that to be able to help with
what's going on today? Yeah. And the answer is
usually yes. Yeah. You know? Sometimes I'm like,
I don't know. But most of the time the answer
is yes. Yeah. Oftentimes the Lord works in ways
we don't understand. Actually more often than
not. I was going to say most of the time he works
in ways we don't get. Yeah. Right. And that's,
let's just be real in American culture. That
can be hard because we have our plans. We have
our desires. We have our dreams. We have our,
this is how it should be. Right. And when Jesus
enters in and is like, pulls a little bit of
like, well, you know, Let me reframe this for
you. Let me reframe what it means to be loving.
Let me reframe what it means to follow me. I
was listening to a guy talk a while back and
he, I say a while back, it was like two weeks
ago. It's just been a really long two weeks.
There are some weeks that feel like years. Yes.
The last couple of weeks have just been crazy
for me. But I was listening to a guy talk a couple
of weeks ago and he was talking about the, Church
split that happened around a thousand years ago
where you had the Western part of Europe, they
shifted to a practice based theology where they're
like, this is about what we can do, what we can
produce. And then the Eastern part of Europe
switched, focused more on just being in the presence
of God. And, and he was saying, he's like, yeah,
unfortunately he's like. We as a church, we still
like to live in this practice -based theology
of what do I have to do? He's like, maybe we
need to step back and just focus on being still
and being in the presence of God. It comes rarely
back to this teaching of Jesus when he talks
about, I am the vine and you are the branches.
If you remain, you produce fruit. We're like,
oh, we need to go and produce fruit. No, you
need to remain. You need to abide. You need to
be present. You need to be connected. And when
you do that, you're going to produce fruit. Right.
Well, and just in the transfiguration too, you
have Peter who's like, here's these people. This
is what we need to do. Yeah. And God's like,
here's Jesus. Be with him. Yeah. Right. And so
that's actually, let's just close with that idea.
Listener this week. I'm here. Jesus says, I'm
here. Just be here. Yeah. be present, be present
with God. Yeah. Right. Um, you might be driving
on your way to work. You might be, uh, running
on a treadmill. You might be, um, hurting cats
because, uh, just talking about teachers, um,
you know, whatever it is. I was like, wherever
it is, you can be present and just be present,
listening and engaged with God wherever you are.
Yeah. I was like, you never know when you're,
you're like, Hey, I want to build boosts. And
he's like, Nope, just want you to be here and
see what's going on. Yep. We're going to leave
it there on that note. Bye. Have a great week.
And that's a wrap for today's episode of Love
and Context. We hope this conversation encouraged
you and gave you fresh insights into how we can
better love God and others through the powerful
truths of the Bible. We'd love to hear from you.
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