If Only We Had Known

Automated transcript of the sermon audio, generated with OpenAI Whisper (small.en). It has not been checked against the recording and may contain errors, especially in names and Scripture references.

Well good evening. Thanks for coming out tonight being a part of this before I get started just This will be a little bit of a different kind of message. It’s still in our build battle and bless series It’s just something that God’s been laying on my heart. It’s kind of a different way of thinking about things It’s gonna be again a little different than what you’re used to hearing. It’s not gonna be particularly long We’ll see what the discussion is afterwards and in some ways the wrong audience is before me tonight I say that because people usually show up on a Sunday night or people that really care a lot, they care enough at least to come out on a Sunday night. And my message is really targeted at good Christian brothers and sisters, but who I would suggest may not have the level of care that they ought to have. And yet that will hopefully be more clear why I say that. I’m not saying it by way of of condemnation, my way of judgment, but I’m trying to say it by way of kicking myself

in the pants and trying to kick all of us in the pants, that I think God’s doing something. And I don’t think we care as much as we should care about what he’s doing. And again, hopefully that will be clear as we go into the message. But again, thanks for being here and listening to these words tonight.

If only I had known, how many times have you heard that statement or you have said it to yourself. Most of us, on at least one occasion in our life, regretted not knowing something in advance that would have altered the decisions that we made. Some very simple examples from life that you can all identify with. Students, if I had known the teacher was going to give a pop quiz, I would have read the chapter. If I had known traffic was going to be like this, I would have chosen a different route. Mickey Mantle, the baseball legend, said if I had known I would live this long, I’d have taken better care of myself. And Chuck, that one was for you.

I put that one in there. Many a parent has thought if I had known the years would fly by so fast, I’d have spent more time enjoying my kids. Those who have lost a loved one unexpectedly often say if I had known our time would be cut short, I’d have created more memories together and spent less time focusing on the mundane. The number of reasons people have for saying if only is countless, and those reasons typically fall into one of three categories, procrastination, indifference, or ignorance. When I agreed to take this session in our Build, Battle, and Bless series, I wasn’t really sure where I wanted to go with it.

We’ve already covered a lot of good and practical ground regarding the need and opportunity to apply a Kyperian square inch principle in every area of life. But it seems like there is still a lot of questions in people’s minds about why there’s There’s so much emphasis on Kyperianism, dualism, the future of Israel, getting our eschatology right, all of those theological debates and discussions we have, and there’s a fair number of our people within our own flock who are still scratching their heads and saying, aren’t we majoring in the minors? Can’t we just get on with the real important stuff? Some even get a little irritated and think all of this talk is, like I said, just majoring on the minors, and that we should be focusing on some other things.

I suggest to those who feel this way that they are being too short-sighted and one of my missions tonight is to try to explain why I say that. If we don’t understand God’s grand plan and how we fit in, it’s gonna be hard to know what the best use of our talents are. Our life becomes a make it up as we go, sort of life. Worse, it’s possible that what we think is a productive life is in fact counter-productive to God’s purpose. And more on that later. We all know the basics. Obey the 10 commandments. Love your neighbor as yourself. Share Christ with unbelievers. But beyond that, we aren’t guided by any bigger vision.

For many, the only goal is to get to the finish line and enter that eternal rest. Just kind of want to keep my nose clean and get to the finish line. But beyond that, it’s sort of a just muddle through life. Confusion over all the theological wrangling going on leads us to ask ourselves, who can know? Or does it really matter in the final analysis? And so our theology becomes, it will all pan out in the end, so don’t sweat it. and we don’t bother ourselves with the discussions. Jesus loves me, this I know, that is all I need to know, is the sum total of our theological position. What if we could know more? What if we could anticipate more of the future, such that it governs what we are now doing and how it affects the level of care we have right now?

And that’s one of my hopes for this message, is that it will amp up our level of care. What if not knowing has some big implications? What if we could avoid feeling sheepish in the end, thinking to ourselves, if only I had known? I think these questions scratch at a big reason why we lack more fire under our Hyperion keisters. If you don’t know what a keister is, You can look it up later. To flesh out what I’m getting at, let me give you a proposition. Follow, you’re not sure what a keister is? It’s your behind, in case you’re not okay. Under our kyperian keisters. To flesh out what I’m getting at, let me give you a proposition followed by a thought exercise based on that proposition.

So I’m gonna give you a proposition. This is just an exercise in my brain that I’ve been meditating on for some time. And then we’re going to discuss some implications from that. So here’s the proposition. Before the world began, God determined to create a people for his own glory and allow them to share in that glory through his son, Jesus Christ. You OK with that much so far? That’s actually 2 Thessalonians 2.14. I have a verse to back that one up. God’s glory is being manifested through marys of divine attributes like love, justice, mercy, et cetera. Romans 1, 20, if you need a verse. To showcase those attributes, He has spoken into existence creation.

And from day one of creation, up until the time when all things are brought into complete subjection under Christ, He is authoring a glorious story. This story birthed every other story that’s ever been known or ever will be known. In a sense, you can say he is showing off his glory. This is totally appropriate, of course, when you’re God. You get to show off. Now up to this point, if you adhere to Orthodox Christian teaching, you shouldn’t have any major theological points to quibble over what I just said. That’s pretty cut and dry. Now, if God is showing off his glory to creation by displaying his attributes in the context of this story, are you following me?

God’s putting on this big story to show off his glory, his attributes. It’s likely he really cares about the story and he wants us to really care about the story and pay attention to what he’s doing. That’s my proposition. And then here’s a thought exercise based on that proposition. Imagine a time in the future when the story is over and God asks you, what you thought about it? What’d you think about the story? Will you be able to recall with relish the details of the story or will you have to admit that you fell asleep during parts of it? Maybe you’ll have to admit that you didn’t track the story because that well because parts of it were frankly difficult to follow, and all of your Christian friends are always fighting about what was really going on anyhow.

And so you just sort of like tuned out. Hopefully, you’ll remember the parts where you got saved and other bits and pieces from your own life. But will that be enough reminiscing to appreciate the story the way God wants you to? Consider how you feel when you’re trying to make an important point, but your listeners just aren’t that engaged. Wouldn’t it be embarrassing to have to admit that you missed the story, knowing then how important it is to God?

If only you had known, adding to what I’ve said thus far, what if God had intended you to play a part in that story, but you flubbed your part because you didn’t know what it was or even considered that you really had a role to play in it. Wouldn’t it be especially embarrassing in light of the fact that he gave you a pretty good written outline of the story that you could refer to as it was unfolding? And if you didn’t get that, that’s the Bible. I think you see where I’m going with this. If God is telling a story about his glory and he is, who’s he telling the story to? Obviously we along with the rest of creation are the audience. If ever there was a story that needs paying attention to, this is it. Now for all you good Calvinists in the crowd you might be thinking, wait a minute, since God is sovereign I can’t flub my role. I did exactly what he determined I would do. And in one sense that’s true, but I don’t believe you’re going to be able to shirk your accountability for not knowing and

try to play that card with him. Romans 14 12 says, so then each one of us will give an account of himself to God. In 2nd Corinthians 5 10 reminds us, we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body whether good or evil. Now this is a judgment every believer must go through where his life will be examined. Those deeds deemed good will result in rewards and those deeds deemed evil will be burned up even though our salvation is still secure. 1st Corinthians 3 13 through 15. The Bible affirms that God is telling a story. Psalm 19 1 through 4 you know it well. The heavens declare the glory of God and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours forth speech and night to night reveals his knowledge. There is no speech nor are there words whose voice is not heard. Their voice goes out through all the earth and their words to the end of of the world.

And then we’re told in Hebrews 1, 1 through 2, long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets. But in these last days, He has spoken to us by His Son. God is telling His story. So what are the implications? If my proposition and thought exercise have any merit to them, then there are some important implications for us to consider. Some of them have already been touched upon by the other elders in their messages in the series. The first implication that comes from asking ourselves whether being indifferent to or ignorant of God’s story is to ask ourselves, is that an affront to God?

Is it an affront to God for us to be indifferent or ignorant of the story that he’s telling. We know from Malachi, and in fact, can we say, are we robbing God? We know from Malachi 3.8 that it is possible to rob God by withholding tithes and offerings. It’s said right there, you’re robbing God. So I asked the question in the same way, is it possible to rob God of the glory that’s due him by missing the story? If he’s telling a story and he’s saying, wake up, pay attention, this is awesome, and we’re indifferent or we’re ignorant, are we robbing God of glory?

Does he care if we’re paying attention to what he’s doing in history? Do we rob ourselves of being able to fully bask in the glory of this story in the same way someone who skips watching the big game can’t revel in the victory the same way those who were engaged in watching the game. God tells Ezekiel in 38-23, I will show my greatness and my holiness and make myself known in the eyes of many nations. Then they will know that I am the Lord. In this passage, he’s speaking of something yet to happen, but it reveals his intentionality of getting creation to pay attention more than just a casual acknowledgement that he’s doing his thing while we are doing our thing.

Does it matter to God if we watch, quote unquote, the game as he plays it or is it okay to wait for the highlight reel later? This first implication then leads directly to a second one. The second implication is that we need to try to get our theology right about things like eschatology and Israel. The reason I say this is because if we don’t get it right, we could find ourselves working at cross purposes with what God is trying to do. For example, if God wants to use his church to make the Jews jealous, which helps trigger their repentance as a nation, but we’re supercessionists, people who believe that God is done with Israel as a nation, we’re supercessions when it comes to Israel. How is that supposed to work?

In this situation, we are at odds with God, and we are basically our sand in the gears of what God is doing. Remember my proposition. God is trying to show off His glory, and and he wants us paying attention. Therefore, it is wrong to be indifferent to what he is doing, and it’s wrong to be wrong about what he’s doing. Now, before you tie me at the stake, let me say that these theological issues that I’m arguing we gotta get right are not the dividing line between Christians and non-Christians. These issues are disagreements brothers and sisters in Christ and we should treat each other as such and I’m of course right now I have in mind a big cubby dispy as an example that debate that goes on these are brothers in Christ having these debates and we should treat Jars Christians I have much appreciation for those who are on the other side of the debate for me provided they are equally concerned about not being sand in the gears of what God is doing.

My concern has more to do with those who wish we’d stop talking about this stuff because it’s too hard to figure out and they see these debates as non-essential. My argument against this is that God is doing something and we are supposed to care about that something and work with it, not against it, nor be indifferent to it. So if you have found yourself ever in the situation where I can’t figure it out, can we just stop talking about, can’t we just say we all love Jesus and just have a big kumbah service and be done with it? And I say that’s wrong thinking. We need to keep working hard to try to figure out what it is God is doing, because he’s given us his word.

I believe we can figure it out, and then I think it dictates what we’re gonna be doing with our lives and amping up our level of care and what we need to be doing to try to play our part in that process. I don’t want to be indifferent or opposed to what God’s doing and I assume you don’t either. Ultimately it comes down to caring about what its word is revealed and doing the hard work of understanding it. There’s a third implication to consider if you are dispensational. This This life is basically a job interview for our future in the eternal state. Think about this life now is your job interview for the eternal state.

Now I’m not saying if you fail the interview that you lose your salvation. That would be heresy. But our time on earth is a time of testing our faithfulness which will affect rewards and responsibilities in the new earth. And I think Philip did a pretty good job of emphasizing this in his recent message. Now we’re not told with exacting precision what life will be like in the new earth, but there are clear indications that our roles in it will partly be based on how we use our talents in this life. In Jesus’ parable found in Matthew 25, he tells the faithful servant, well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little.

I will set you over much, enter into the joy of your master.” And then in a similar passage in Luke, we find these words, well done, good servant, because you have been faithful and a very little, you shall have authority over 10 cities. In addition to these parables, there’s the passage already mentioned in 1 Corinthians 3, 14 that talks about only the works that are good will receive rewards in the eternal life. The conclusion from this third implication is that what we are doing now has significant bearing on what our experience will be in the new earth. Now we know that there won’t be any sin there, so we’re not going to be feeling envy or greed.

But is it possible we’ll have a moment at least where we’ll think, if only I had known? Will we have that brief moment? Boy, I wish I had known. Might have done something different in this life. If it isn’t clear already, the point I’m trying to make is that we have every reason, even duty, to concern ourselves with God’s purposes beyond the basics of personal holiness and evangelism. He is showing off his glory right now in the form of a story we all have a part in. Because they believe a proper reading of the Bible leads to dispensational theology, the elders have been doing their best to try and call each one of us to consider what it means for us personally to live a kind of blessed life that makes the Jews and others who are called of God jealous.

I mean, it’s obviously, if you’re surprised that our elders take a dispensational view, you’ve really been asleep. You’ve been really indifferent.

That’s the position we have taken, and as a result, that’s a reason why we’re beating the drums we’re beating about us getting out there and living the kind of life that is jealous of all that living that yeshaun’s awesome messages on living the blessed option and so we’re trying to get our people to amp up their level of care and saying what does it mean to me personally to live a life that looks blessed in such a way that the community says wow that’s different it’s their attention it’s incumbent on every believer to work to the best of their ability in as many spheres of life as they can so that God will pour out his blessing on those efforts. It requires tremendous vision and faith and work to set, as Sean again used the term, imaginative coordinates and ask God to do more than we can ask or think. Again, if I’m just checking off 10 commandments, check. Sharing Jesus with my neighbors, check. You know, trying to be personally holy, check. There’s more that there’s more that we’re called to do. I

have often repeated the statement that the Bible can be summarized as boy comes kills the dragon and gets the girl. I first heard it from Doug. I’m not sure if that’s where he if he originated or not. I still like the statement but it does not go far enough. That makes it sound like winning souls is God’s end end game. But Revelations in 21 and 22, if read literally, especially 22, shows the true end game of a perfected creation freed from the curse, endlessly enjoying the glory of God forever. The end game is God’s glory and thus living in a perfect new world, new earth, free from sin. Let me just encourage you, as I’m beginning to close, just read from a revelation 21 verse 22 through 22.3. Just listen to the vision. You’ve read it before, but just just imagine this. And I saw no temple in the city for the temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb. And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it for the glory of God gives it light and its This lamp is the lamb, but by its light will the nations walk.

And the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it, and its gates will never be shut by day, and there will be no night there. They will bring into it the glory and the honor of the nations. But nothing unclean will ever enter it, nor anyone who does what is detestable or false, but only those who are written in the Lamb’s book of life. Then the angel showed me the river of water of life, brightest crystal flowing from the throne of God and of the lamb through the middle of the street of the city, also on either side of the river, the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit each month.

The leaves of the tree were the healing of the nations.

No longer will there be anything accursed, but the throne of God and the lamb will be in it and his servants will worship him. If this scene is literally true and God’s redemptive plans includes national Israel and the Church’s job is to enjoy the spiritual promises made to Abraham, thus provoking the Jews’ jealousy, then we have a lot of work to do now, we have to level up our care and our work and our efforts. This is more than just keeping the lights on in our homes and our churches. It’s doing hard things that often seem really crazy, like trying to start a college in this dinky little church and beyond. But more importantly than doing more, we need to be more. We need to be a people who across the board are characterized by sincere worship, genuine thankfulness, and sacrificial labors. Each one of us needs to be praying and seeking God to show us what is the next square inch where we can bring the lordship of Christ to bear along with its blessings. If we miss the story, we miss the glory. I told you it would be short, hopefully

hard-hitting. And with that, I’ll open it up for any comments or questions. And again, And I understand that my argument on the theology side of things were we have to keep the debates going, the discussions, because we’ve got to get it right so we get the story right so that God gets the glory and we don’t get to heaven and he’s like, y’all missed it.

And I don’t really personally want to be working against his purposes because, again, if I’m right that the dispensational understanding that the future of Israel is the proper understanding I don’t want to be a super sessionist working against God’s purposes even though I love my super sessionist brothers who are trying to get it right but I’m gonna keep arm wrestling with them till the day I die that that day I think they got it wrong so you said the promises of Abraham we should be working on and what I’m in the Old Testament reading, but like what are those? There’s one time just referring to their spiritual blessings. When God made his promises to Abraham said to Israel and into other nations, you know, through Israel then the blessings would flow out to the other name all the nations of the earth and so that’s us and so those spiritual blessings. There were other kinds of blessings that were specifically made to Israel, certain land promises and other things that are not for all of us, but these spiritual blessings, Ephesians and other passages

that come to mind that also refer to these spiritual blessings. Obviously our salvation is a big one, but and so I’m not saying we’re not working for those. Those are being given to us and so are we living the kind of blessed life that would then cause our community, our neighbors, the Jews, others to say, oh, these people are obviously blessed. What is it? We’re never going to appeal to those who are perishing. There’s a set of people that are just not going to be saved, and we’ll stink to them. But there are the Jews, and then there are the people who are yet to be saved that God has called. And those are the audiences that we’re trying to get their attention through us living that blessed option, that blessed life.

But that blessed life has to get out into the world, out into the community, again, in many forms, many ways, building better businesses, better schools, running for political offices, you name it. Just our nation’s history. It was Christians building everything. And somewhere along the way, we handed it over to the unbelieving world. and they’ve really screwed it up. And so we’re now content largely, our community involves our stained glass aquarium, as I like to call it, and then our homes. And beyond that, we’re safe. I mean, if I was Satan, I’d say, you know, okay, I surrender, there’s X number of Christians, they’re safe, they’re in their little stained glass aquariums, I know where they’re at, they’re not a threat.

I’m saying we have to figure out how to get out there into our communities where we’re a threat to Satan. We’re intimidating. I hope this church annoys the bejeebers out of Satan, which is also to invite a lot of attack. Okay, so we have, you’ve quoted Doug a few times. So you have Doug who you love him and he’s sanding God’s ears. And say the last thing. Doug? The last part you just said. By your what you’re saying like he’s sanding God’s ears. Years. Okay so he’s sanding God’s ears but Gary. Here’s. But is he more, is he like, is that body of believers in Idaho more jealousable than we are? I would say in many ways yes. But how can they be if they’re in in your view if they’re wrong?

There’s a lot of ways to go here and I want to be careful because I want to take the most charitable approach to all of it. Yes. You knew I was going to ask. The Moscow mood is very jealousable. I mean it’s very attractive. Yes. Okay. But again, I’m going back to my opening supposition, my opening proposition. If a big part of God’s master plan is to go full circle and bring the nation of Israel back around into the fold, which I believe, and our elders believe, then in that way, you know, Doug is missing it. And so at that particular point, which is a big point, Doug’s going to have to stand there and look a little sheepish and say, wow, I miss that part of the story.

And so I’m just saying that I want to, I just want to know what God’s doing. There’s lots of ways we can go have attractive looking lives and still be at cross purposes to what God is doing. So I don’t know if you’re trying to draw a line. I don’t think you can go so far as to say, if we don’t get all of our theology perfect, it’s not an all or nothing proposition. It’s like, well, your life’s gonna just look miserable if you get some of your theology wrong. I don’t think that’s a true, I don’t think you can go there, that’d be a true false statement. But I’m just saying to my focus and my brain is simply, God, what are you trying to do?

And I just, it stands to reason that maximum blessing from God will come from maximally cooperating with what God’s trying to do. That seems like a very reasonable statement to make. Yeah, I mean, I’m not disagreeing with that. So I totally believe that God cares about everything. Everything. And so there’s lots of aspects of our life that we don’t really give a rip about that God actually cares about.

And so if you’re in business, what the first thing that you need to solve. You know, so like let’s say the school right now, the ECS, we have two things that we need to solve. We need to have either more students or less payroll. So like there can be a whole bunch of other things, you know, like what is the, what if, what is our uniform code? Like those don’t really matter even though they matter to God. There’s things that we have to address first, right? And so if if God cares about everything and it seems like we’re putting a bunch of our effort into just making sure that we have all of this dispensational versus covenantal dialed in to the letter, but then we forget 20 other things that we should be actually concerned about, which which is first? Yeah, well I would say the covenantal dispensational theology is on a first order of importance. Now again not from a salvific standpoint, okay, but in terms of working with what that the big picture of what God’s trying to do. Now any given, back to your earlier

comments about school focus on school issues or whatever else, God cares about everything but we’re finite so we can’t care about everything at the same time.

But we should constantly be looking for ways that we can personally be expanding what we care about. You and I are at an age where a lot of the world says time to just take it easy and get your Winnebago and head to Florida. We’re the kind of people that are saying no to the day we die. What next Lord? Next opportunity? Next square inch? That’s the mindset we’re trying to get into our people is constantly asking yourself, I can’t do everything but what can I care about next and care about more and that caring though can’t be divorced from what God’s doing so to the best of my ability I have to take this and say what God what are you doing and then how do I how do we fit into it and so you know big my my exhortation to us as our churches when I do hear people say these theological debates are non-essential, we’re all going to go to heaven anyhow. That’s, to me I say that’s wrong thinking. We should keep trying to figure that out so that we can best align ourselves with what God’s purposes are. And then again what that means to Trinity Evangel Church, what

our little piece of that equation is, God will hope, you know, He is revealing, He’ll continue to reveal. So I would not, I don’t believe there’s a, for me it would be Ron in my head to say well you know we’ve got challenges to make sure the school is viable for another two years so I don’t have time to think about these theological issues. I said no I’ve got to be wrangling with the theological issues because again part of what we’re trying to do with our ragons is we’re trying to make them the kind of people that are working with with God’s plan, God’s vision. So if they’re not clear, they’ll go out there and be nice people.

Maybe someday there’ll be a Mary’sville mood, but if it’s still this unclear, not really knowing what God’s doing, is that really maximizing God’s glory? If we’re still ignorant when we don’t need to be ignorant of what God’s doing, I’m not sure I’ll admit it. I’m not saying I’m trying to move to Idaho or to be a covenantal. I’m really more saying there’s so we it feels like and I could be the only one that thinks this it feels like we are trying to actually go and you can throw stones at me that we’re going we’re trying to have our truth tubes exactly in line and at the expense of being super jealousable in all the areas.

And like I don’t know what we get, like I want all of it. I have a theory about that. Okay. Alright, so at Jealousable Lordship we’ve talked a lot about worldview, So, Veltanshong, meaning life operating system, and I think what you’re talking about, about the truth tube, what we’re trying to do is we’re trying to align, so how we read the Bible does actually affect then what we go do right after reading. So, depending on how you read your Bible is going to influence how you live.

Now, we want to read our Bible in a way that’s going to, well, we think that reading our Bible a certain way produces a certain kind of person that produces a certain kind of jealousable behavior and lifestyle. So we do actually have to get that is the first priority is to get our worldview lined up first. Well also we’re still swimming with the school and the college and everybody else’s stuff that we’re trying to do. So it might feel like we’re drowning and it seems like a weird thing to connect to but that is our that’s the boat. So you You know, an analogy, we’re already on a boat, we’re in the water, and it is, we’ve got a lot of holes in the boat.

The worldview is the thing that’s gonna keep patching up the boat, keep making it better, so we can keep going faster and farther and not keep sinking. So we do need to actually have our worldview lined up before we can just go out and make things jealousable. So I get like where you’re coming from, but our, that is what has to happen first, is we have to get our standard set up first and people want to stop talking about the standard. Just, well, everybody loves Jesus, Jesus loves us, we can move on. That’s, is that enough though for us to live jealousably? So we do have to have some more conversations about our theology in order for us to keep having a jealousable community and to start doing those things.

Because enough people are just like, let me live my life, don’t bother me. Well, God is not interested in just not bothering his people. He likes to bother us because we’re his creation. But, I mean, yeah, this is why we’re here having conversations about it, because it’s good. Jim, I think I hear you talking about the difference between the important and the urgent.

And as finite creatures, can you hear me okay? Yeah. As finite creatures, it seems to me over my lifetime, as I watch people and I watch myself, that we tend to get more tied up over the urgent, which maybe is not the important. It might be for a time, it might be for a period, it might be for some people in some situations, in some ages, in some stages, but the overall. So in a way it’s a lot more than worldview. I think you’re getting at it when you’re talking about the big picture of what God is doing. And for us as finite human beings, that’s pretty tough to understand. And yet that’s exactly where he wants us to be, is to be open to that and looking for that.

But you and I and everybody else here has a whole lot of stuff in their lives that is urgent. I mean, it seems life shattering. I got to deal with this tomorrow and this the next day and this next week. But how does that fit into the big picture? As well as how I am doing it. Do I run over somebody? Do I railroad somebody in order to accomplish what I think is really urgent, even maybe if it’s something that’s basically very important. How I do it makes a whole huge difference. Don’t you think? Well, yeah, the principle of the urgent versus the important. OK, go back to the basics. I think we all agree in this room.

We want to glorify God. would that be a fair statement? Okay, okay, hey, let’s go home, we agree. My proposition is to glorify God. I have to try, I have to do the best of my ability, understand what he’s doing, and enter into that. Now that is partly filling up my truth, well it starts with filling up my truth tube. You know, the criticism we have about truth tubers in this church is not that truth tubing is bad. That is necessary, but that’s not the end game. We fill up our truth tubes for a purpose, for a reason. But if our truth tube is incorrect, that’s going to then lead to activity that while it’s not maybe damnable, as far as I send you to hell, it is not working according to God’s purposes.

So I say doing my best to figure out what God’s doing and to cooperate with it is both urgent and impotent. And I’ve got it, that’s what my energy has to go in. So that’s why when people say, ah, all this theology, who can understand it? Just I love Jesus, you know, Jesus, you know, that’s what they dumb down their theology to just, I love Jesus, I gave my life to Jesus when I was four years old and I’m going to heaven and I’ll tell people about that and that’s good enough. I’m saying that’s not good enough. And so when I hear people kind of get frustrated and irritated because we keep having these discussions, don’t get frustrated and irritated.

Just say, I’m still lost, I still don’t get it. So I want to avoid that ditch and I do want to avoid the ditch of those who would paint somebody like the Wilson camp as like the enemies. They’re not the enemies. There’s a lot we’re learning from them, a lot we appreciate. But I think, again, there’s some important things they’ve gotten wrong.

I have to be fair. It’s always possible I and our elders are wrong. We don’t think so. I’ve shared with some of you. I mean, it doesn’t make me a scholar. But I purposefully, a few years ago, set on a quest to say, to inundate myself with the word of God, to see what would happen if I just flooded my soul with it. So I’m on a personal reading three times a year through this thing. I’m on about my 10th pass in the last three years right now. And every time I start, I say, OK, Lord, I want to try to not approach it like a dispensational, like a covenantalist, I just want to approach it like a letter, like I just wrote it, and I just read it. Let it speak. I keep landing on the dispensational viewpoint. I get more and more convinced of it. When I read a plan, that’s where I land. And again, I respect people who don’t, but if they’re saying, we want to get it right too, we want to maximize and glory of God, then we are definitely brothers in Christ, but we’ll continue to arm wrestle till one of us persuades the other person.

Along these lines, I’m wondering, we’ve talked a lot, Shawn’s talked a lot about having grace for our brother or sister who maybe has a different conviction about what goes into to the body, having grace for the weaker brother who maybe has something with his conscience that doesn’t allow him to eat something. And I’m just wondering, does that cross over into the theological, weaker, stronger brother situation, knowing that God made us all, and we’re all going to have different experiences and perspectives and opinions about how we see the word of God. And I just wonder, I’m not saying it’s wrong to be pursuing clarity for what God wants.

Absolutely, I want clarity. But it can come across to maybe someone who is less interested in that as more divisive when it’s pointing fingers at our fellow brothers of like they’re getting this wrong, but I’m getting it right. And I guess I feel like there’s so much in, we’re in lockstep with communities like over in Moscow because we’re passionate about Christ, we’re passionate about people coming to a knowledge. And I guess I’m just wondering if we can have grace for people in their diets and what they put in to their bodies, like shouldn’t we also have and understanding that God covers over, like he will ultimately clarify for us, without it being like a, it shouldn’t make us be pointing the finger at another brother.

We should have a grace that covers over that. Well, where I would agree with what you’re scratching at is, if I were to take a position that I cannot have fellowship with our brothers and sisters over in Moscow because of this, I would be wrong. I can absolutely have fellowship and receive them and be glad. I’ve been able to spend some time with Doug. I had dinner, we were at a dinner and I sat right next to him and very enjoyable guy.

So absolutely, and even in these theological discussions and debates that I am advocating for, it’s always gotta be done in a spirit of love gentleness, understanding that the good men will disagree, but just because we disagree means one of us isn’t reading it right. One or both of us aren’t reading it right. It is the Word of God, so we need to keep wrestling with it until we try to get it right. That’s what I’m arguing for, but to do it in a gracious, kind, not judgmental, harsh way, but for the sake of us trying to hopefully get to the end and God says good job you paid attention to the story you understood what I was doing you worked with the story his glory was maximized in our lives as opposed to Jesus loves me this I know that’s all I care to know you know kind of thing yeah I mean obviously people can do a lot of good things and not know why they’re doing it. Chuck, why do you care so much about politics? That’s not even Jesus. Why do you care so much about trying to get people to eat right? Well, it’s because you’ve learned that actually people can

go about doing a lot of things that might not actually be good for them in in the long run. So actually our country ran decently well and ran well enough that people stopped learning how it worked and stopped caring, somebody else will do it. And then Here we are, here we are in the story of people weren’t paying attention. So lots of people in their health, well there they are. They weren’t paying attention.

Maybe they weren’t even sinning, but they weren’t paying attention. When we think about if Jesus doesn’t come back for another 50 years, We’d actually like some people to be paying attention so that they don’t have the same problems that we have, so that we don’t have the same problems that we have had to repent from, from missing the part of the story. And even with the, well, can’t we just be nice to them? I mean, to have listened to what you just said tonight, Jim, and conclude that your exhortation was for us to not be nice and poke them in the eyes every time you see them. Like, that’s not what you said. Yeah, you weren’t paying attention.

We’re, we are, we are trying to answer faithfully and build wisely. That is our job. And so like sometimes it’s helpful to point out what we’re not doing on purpose. Sometimes it’s helpful to say, and these are the steps that we’re taking, and some people are going to just enjoy it and not be able to describe it. That is both okay and dangerous in the long term. We can’t actually reproduce if we can’t explain what we’re doing. So we’re talking about it so that we can get it right. And even the truth tubes illustration, the contrast in my mind is with a quote that Bunyan gave about how we’re like flowers in a garden.

So, rather than just collecting up water in a rain gauge, a tube, we are like in a garden and the rain comes down and it nourishes the soil for our roots, but also some of it goes off of the leaves and goes into our neighbor’s roots that’s beneficial. So we’re living and we’re sharing. We’re all together. We’re not isolated and we’re not just trying to win by having more than somebody else. But, I mean, there are certain theologies that I would say are actually trying to put a rain cover over top of the goodness of God’s Word that then are prohibiting some of the good blessings from getting down to us and getting into the soil.

So we’re actually trying, super sessionism, whether you care about that word or not, that is a cover over the garden that is keeping certain blessings out. It is a cover over the garden that is actually limiting thankfulness and praise and blessing. So yeah, I think we should want to get that cover off and be able to explain to other people why we don’t like that cover, why we’re trying to get scripture as opposed to default, like the number of conversations where the appeal to the authority is a book other than scripture. Like not just where the other book is a help to understand scripture, but where the other book has become an authority that is appealed to first.

is actually that’s putting a cover over top of the garden and keeping rain out. So we’re trying to, we’re trying to get ourselves in the right position to have a good answer to God and so that our grandkids also have a good answer for why they are where they’re at. Why they are seeking God’s blessings and seeking it from God’s word the way that we’re trying to talk to them about to do. So we talk a lot about worldview and that our worldview in our theology is why we do the things we do. And then we talk about being inconsistent. So I was going to ask, how does that actually happen for people to be inconsistent? Is it where you know something but you don’t actually believe it because what you believe is what you actually do?

Or can you somehow believe something and then do something that doesn’t fit with that? So like when we talk about inconsistency in our work and in our knowledge, is that because they actually don’t believe it, or how are they inconsistent? How can you describe that?

I mean, there’s probably lots of ways to be inconsistent. I mean, probably in this particular arena of this debate, of these theological debates, I would put it more in the camp of sincerely held beliefs that when probed are inconsistent. I think they’re inconsistent with a literal reading of the Bible, and they’re even inconsistent in the practical application without diving into a whole other series.

If I’m a person who, again, hues more to the covenantal view of things, but I’m really advocating a Kyperian life and really enjoying the things of Earth, okay, which we’ve got friends that do that, and they do it admirably. But their theology says, but that stuff is all just shadow and type. It’s not the real deal. It all just points to you to something, an eternal reality. We would suggest that there’s some inconsistency in that way of thinking and operating that the goodness and the gift is not in the loaf of bread you just pulled out of the oven, you know, that that what you just pulled out of the oven is just a type of a spiritual reality yet to be realized even though they still enjoy the loaf of bread. We’re saying a better understanding is that no God gave you that loaf of bread and it in of itself is an end point of receiving God’s goodness and God’s glory and enjoy it And it can certainly make you think of other spiritual realities, but it in itself is good to be enjoyed.

And Philip, if he was here right now, he’d be jumping up saying amen. But that’s just one example. So now there are other people out there who will say one thing and then do something else. And those are inconsistent, but they know they’re inconsistent. They’re not doing what they say they believe. But we’re more concerned with making sure that what we believe is then consistent with what we’re actually doing with our fingers and toes. But again, the the big takeaway, so I don’t want you to lose them, is we all care about the glory of God. He is telling a story. We have a role to play in it, so you have to ask yourself, what’s he trying to do? What’s What’s he trying to do?

If as our leadership teaches, if the dispensational thing is true, we need to then consider in what way are we trying to live a kind of jealousable blessed life that God is using to help make the Jews jealous. None of the elders today, as far as you know, They’re going, they’re not taking Israel today and their government and saying, Rah-rah, everything that Israel today does is admirable. And we can still criticize what their government’s doing today. But then as a nation, we can love them because God loves them. And we can be excited and praying and again saying, hey guys, we’re enjoying the fruit. We’re enjoying the blessings that was first given to you.

those blessings were supposed to come down through you to us and you blew it and now we’re reaping the benefit and we’re hoping they’re gonna wake up and say oh we want some of that and we believe that in time God will actually do that he’ll universally change our hearts so but that’s again a part of what we’re trying to do what we believe it’s not that it’s not the sum total of what we’re all about because I believe that same blessed life is also what’s going to make those who are being saved, the Gentiles, also want to come to Christ. But we’ve got to get back to where the Christians are the shakers and movers in our community, and that we’re just not kept safe in our stained glass aquariums.

You know what I mean by stained glass aquarium? Our little church buildings, we have our little social. That is a dispensational error that is inconsistent with what a dispensational liturgy of the Bible’s written about. So if anything, we’re actually trying to repent from our group’s kinds of sins. Dualism, yeah. Not make other people repent necessarily. Yeah. We are trying to identify it so that we are repenting where we need to repent before other people are repenting where, or whatever their issues are. Yeah, good, good, you can go on. so that we can not justify our virtuous hiding out in our bunker, waiting for Jesus to rapture us out of here in the last home country out of Vietnam.

So like our group is the kind that we keep talking about it. Yeah, and thank you, because that is a huge important point, because it really is, our bigger beef is with ourselves in our broader dispensational camp, the hunker in your bunker, wait for Jesus to come group, is we believe is dead wrong. Okay, well hopefully if nothing else, I’ve been able to amp up your little level of care, maybe more care to not affirm me as an elder next time, but yeah.

We need to be a passionate people that really, we are a good people. We’re a sweet fellowship. There’s not a church on the universe that I’m aware of I want to be anywhere else than here. But I’m also, Shawn has referred to the term that I’ve used often, we’re a YAC, which stands for Yet Another Church. Just another nice little stained glass aquarium at 9015 44th Drive, Northeast Marysville, that Satan says, okay, I got those 300 souls corralled. They’re contained, they’re safe. I want us making Marysville a place that you know where Satan is annoyed, the pagans that hate God out there are very upset with us and the blessings of God are just pouring through the veins of our community. So alright.