Be With Me: 7 Minutes of Biblical Wonder

This is a MARVELOUS Podcast. Or it ISN'T. John 7:17 (Episode #197)

This is a MARVEL-OUS Podcast.  Or it isn't.  How might we know?

What is its' SOURCE?
Is is WORTHY of MARVELING at?
What are the DISCERNMENT criteria that make it worth listening to or not?
On whose AUTHORITY is it given?
Whose GLORY does it seek?

All these are great questions that those at the Feast of Booths were being asked and answered by Jesus.  Funny thing, we ask exactly the same questions today.  Listen as we use their concerns to examine whether you should listen to this podcast and event-stack it into your day.

With hats off today to C.S. Lewis, we conclude that Jesus is NOT a GOOD MAN.  Even some of the participants in today's account get that message.  A good man does not say He is LORD.

If you say you are Lord, there are three logical conclusions.  One of them is NOT "Jesus is a Good Man".  We are past that already.
You are a LUNATIC  (you are NOT the Lord, and you THINK you are).  

• this person deserves our pity

You are a LIAR (you are NOT the Lord and you KNOW you are NOT)

• this person deserves our scorn

You are the Lord (You ARE the Lord and You Know you are)

• this Person deserves our allegiance, our belief, and our worship

I welcome you who are disturbed by Jesus' message.  If you feel challenged, unseated, undone, crushed, elbowed in then you are a friend of mine.  If you want to scream, "I don't LIKE the Bible!", then perhaps that is the drawing of God.  I have prayed for you this morning.  If you want to read more, pick up MERE CHRISTIANITY by C.S. Lewis, as I stole all of this from him.  Listen to the One who CANNOT be (just) a Good Man.

Why might someone HATE JESUS?  Psalm 25:19 prophesies that Jesus will be HATED WITHOUT cause, but let me here make an argument why it does make a certain amount of sense.

If Jesus comes and tells me that my works are evil, and that "I am NOT OK", I have two choices:
1.  Bow down.  Agree.  Repent.  Reconsider. Reassess.
2.  Disagree.  Here is what that might look like:  I LOVE my pride, my thinking, the way I do conflict, my world-view, my man-view, my economic view, my relationship view, my sex view, my ownership view.  I like who is the boss of me.  

If I agree even to a single miracle, and His DIVINENESS, then this whole HOUSE OF CARDS crashes down.  I end up with I am NOT the boss, I am not in charge, I don't make the rules, My thinking is infected, my behavior is offensive and I am NOT OK.

Or, I can just HATE JESUS.  Hate the Messenger.  We LOVE the sin, and We HATE the Messenger.  Jesus HATES the sin and LOVES the man.

Listen and ask:  "If you were wrong, would you want to know it?"

Walk with me in prayer today as we:

Identify the wrongs done to me by men and women on earth

• and my desire to pursue, choke, seize, demand, refuse to have mercy, and imprison

Assess my tolerance for stepping on the toes of God and others in

• carelessness, anger, sexual wrongness, decisions, misusing liberties, taking liberties when there are none, entertainment choices, taking what is not mine, work
• failure to do the earlier Matthew 18 principles of discretion, of going to my brothers and sister, of not taking others, of not using the weight of the church to GAIN

Agree with God

• that my debt is big: 833,000 bigger than what I easily understand
• You are 833,000 times more HOLY than I knew
• that my view of YOU is too small
• that your pity and mercy and holiness is great

What if God is 833,000x HOLIER than I think He is? Matthew 18:33 (episode #193)
ACTIONS of the Heart towards PEOPLE, regarding their "indebtedness" to me
is based on
My UNDERSTANDING of the holiness of God and my incalculable inbebtedness to Him

Our semi-knucklehead in the story of the unforgiving servant gets one thing RIGHT and two things WRONG.
What he gets RIGHT is that we sin against each other here on earth.  Those sins are real and in light of the story, quite calculable.
What he gets WRONG ultimately is the HOLINESS, the separateness, the glory of God. 
The second thing he gets WRONG is just how bad his own fault before God is.  He thinks it is payable.  He thinks "it's not that bad", and "I got this".  Of course, he couldn't be further from the truth.  His debt is 833,000 times worse than the earthly sins he understands completely and wants to "seize, pursue, choke and imprison" for. His view of the holiness of God might be 833,000 times too small 

Listen today as we call that our view of our own sin would INCREASE, that our view of other's sin would DECREASE and especially:  That our view of God's majesty and HOLINESS would INCREASE.

Math here helps illustrate spiritual truth.

Here is how I figure this about an ungrateful servant.

• he owes his King $10 BILLION debt
• he doesn't realize the extent of his debt and thinks it is in the realm of repaying
• the first servant also has a servant that owes him $12,000 (not an insignificant amount)
• the first servant's debt to the King is 833,000X bigger than the debt the second servant owes to the first servant
• Even if the first servant forgives the second servant 7 times, (Which is what Peter's first question proposed) the first servant's debt to the King is 119,000X bigger

Unless this first servant gets the math right, and appreciates his massive, unpayable, disproportionate debt to his KING, he won't get the motivation for the right actions to his fellow human.  Without good ACCOUNTING (to God) spiritually, we are apt to err in our ATTITUDES and our ACTIONS (to others).  Listen with your calculator.

Peter inquires about how much FORGIVING a Christian has to do.  Jesus' answer is A LOT.  Darn, we still have to live amongst a bunch of knuckleheads who will wrong us.  Darn, a response from me is going to be required and I could do this wrong.

To help with understanding, Jesus tells the story of a King and a Servant who meet to "settle accounts".  The problem here is the servant owes a unit of monetary reckoning SO BIG it is best understood in WEIGHT.  They don't make coin or currency that big.  About $10 Billion.  Unfathomable.  ( I recently read a true story about a very rich man whose goal was to give away a similar amount of money before he died.  He had to hire a staff of 300+ people to get it done! link below)

How did the servant get into so much debt?  The spiritual answer is sin.  But the "funny" part of the story is that he still doesn't see it.  "Have patience.  I'll Pay everything.  I got this".  But no, he does not.

Today's simple message is to feel the weight of our spiritual problem.  Listen and just carry it around for a day.  Come back tomorrow to get it off.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/stevenbertoni/2020/09/15/exclusive-the-billionaire-who-wanted-to-die-brokeis-now-officially-broke/#291f8f4e3a2a

100% Participation in Church Discernment/Discipline Matthew 18:20 (episode #190)

What are we then Loosing?
We are loosing our hold on his sin if he repents.
We are loosing our hold on HIM if he does not repent.
We are binding him to the consequences of his sin.
We are binding him to his decisions.
We are binding him to life OUTSIDE the protections of the Body of Christ.
We are binding him to the PROCESS of trying to get him back.
We are binding ourselves to the borrowing of His authority.

If he continues to not listen, and refuse to listen and reject authority and then reject the PROTECTION of being in the church, then the Lord says to give him what he wants.  Perhaps the consequences of these choices will be the turning point for him to be GAINED back.  Though DEFCON 4 is rare, DEFCON 1 is UNIVERSAL.  We ALL should be doing it regularly.  It is the kindest thing.  If you were playing in the street, wouldn't you want someone to come and get you?  Listen and feel the burden.  

WHAT do "2 or 3 GATHER and AGREE" ABOUT? Matthew 18:19 (Episode #189)

You have heard this passage before.  That is always a danger.  A fun rule of Bible study is to "whatever you do, DON'T READ AHEAD" and let YOUR surprise of the account parallel the surprise of the person IN the account.  Its' corollary today: "Whatever you do DO READ BEHIND."  ie:  what is the context of the verse you are studying?  In what Soup does it lie?

The famous "wherever 2 or 3 are gathered and agree" passage is in the context of Church discernment/discipline in trying to GAIN a brother back.  It is in the soup of DEFCON 1, 2, 3, and then 4.  They are measured, discrete, defined, progressive steps that are likely THE most difficult part of being a member of a church.  It's probably even doubly worse if you are a Pastor of the flock.  This passage is not so much MIS-Understood, but understood in too LIMITED a way.  This is to gather and agree and discern and discipline in the HARDEST of situations.

We are all to be using these tools of Borrowed Authority (Episode #188) to try and get your wayward Sister home.  Listen.  God promises to Be With US in this passage.  Yes, it is in the Podcast's title.

In heaven, all authority will be given to its rightful source and owner.

In the meantime, He allows us to participate in this godly responsibility and duty.  Think of the "offices" of this world:  Parent, Husband, Wife, Captain of the football team, Policeman, Pastor, Elder, CEO, Foreman, or even "line-leader" of the second graders on their way to the cafeteria.

Who is the Boss of me?  What are my duties and to whom are they owed?

If I am the authority:  then be sober minded about it.  The authority is BORROWED FROM HEAVEN.  If I am under authority:  then be sober minded about it.  The authority is BORROWED FROM HEAVEN.

Listen and find out who is the boss of you. ;-)