WWUTT 2050 Q&A Building a Foundation, Getting a Job in a Church, is Jeremiah 10 About Christmas Trees

How can a man get started with ministering to his family and laying a good spiritual foundation?

What are some things a new pastor should be looking for in a church where he wants to invest his ministry? And is

Jeremiah 10 about Christmas trees? The answer is when we understand the text. Season's greetings from your friends at When We Understand The Text, a daily

Bible commentary to help you grow in God's Word, that we may be fully equipped for every good work.

Tell all your friends about our ministry at www .utt .com. Here once again is

Pastor Gabe. Thank you, Becky. You're welcome. And I am sorry to everybody for the last couple of episodes coming in late.

That's my fault. Well. Ish. Yeah. It's because I haven't had much of a voice.

Yeah. You were sick. I was struggling to hold on to my voice there at the end of the week. So the Thursday study was late and then we're getting the

Friday study on right before midnight on Friday. Woohoo! So it's going to make it on Friday.

Barely. Yeah. It's just barely going to get on. Depends on your time zone. No, it matters what our time zone is.

It doesn't matter what everybody else's is. Those poor people. By the way, with our moves and everything, so our moves over the last three, four years, somebody had emailed,

I didn't copy this email, but somebody had emailed and said, you seem to be moving further west.

How long until you get to California? We actually don't. We have not been moving further west.

This is the first time we've ever moved west. That's true. The first move we made from the

Parsonage to our first house on Webster Street in Junction City was east.

Then when we moved from Junction City to Lindale, that was east. That was also east, more south, almost straight.

But it was east. Yeah. It was still east. Yeah. Almost directly south. Almost. But it was a little bit to the east.

Uh -huh. This move to Arizona is really the first time we've moved west. That's true. We're not progressively moving west.

We more like did the two -step. The two -step?

Yeah. Wait. Oh, because two steps east and then - And then one west. Well, we made, yeah, three steps east, but was that right?

No, two steps east. You're right. You're right. You counted it right. Uh -huh. Yeah. I'm on top of it.

So the two steps were - And then a huge step back to the west. Yeah. You know. That's what we did. Yeah.

But no, we're not moving progressively further west. We're in Arizona. We are in Arizona.

We are at Providence Reformed Baptist Church in Casa Grande. Come visit us. And very happy to be here. This is awesome.

And now Daryl and Melissa Harrison are in Gilbert, Arizona. Just north of us.

Yep. Just moved from California to Gilbert in the same month that we moved. Yes.

So we're looking forward to heading up there and seeing them sometime. Of course. Blessed to hear from you guys and glad you were able to get through that move safe.

And we're happy that you're our neighbors. By about 40 minutes, but yeah, we're a lot closer than we were before.

So this being the Friday edition of the broadcast, we take questions from the listeners when we understand the text at gmail .com.

I've been trying to start with a psalm. Okay. So let's do our psalm first. That's right. And we'll get to the questions.

Psalm 5. For the choir director, for the flutes, a psalm of David. This is one of my favorite psalms.

And incidentally, one of my favorite sermons that I did through a psalm was the sermon

I did in Psalm 5. Okay. And believe it or not, that was the Sunday right between Christmas and Easter.

This is not really a Christmas themed psalm, but that's what I did. That's what I did. That psalm right between Christmas and Easter.

Oh, yeah. What am I thinking? Was between Christmas and Easter, but it was between, I was going to say

Christmas and New Year's. There's more than just one Sunday in between, but that makes more sense.

Yes. It was the Sunday between Christmas and New Year's. Not Easter. Good grab. Good grab.

Yeah. Just clarifying, you know. This is a little longer than the psalms that we've done the last few weeks.

Give ear to my words, O Yahweh. Consider my meditation. Give heed to the sound of my cry for help, my

King and my God, for to you I pray. O Yahweh, in the morning you will hear my voice.

In the morning I will order my prayer to you and eagerly watch. For you are not a

God who delights in wickedness. Evil does not sojourn with you. The boastful shall not stand before your eyes.

You hate all workers of iniquity. You destroy those who speak falsehood.

Yahweh abhors the man of bloodshed and deceit. But as for me and the abundance of your lovingkindness,

I will enter your house. At your holy temple I will worship in fear of you.

O Yahweh, lead me in your righteousness because of my foes. Make your way straight before me.

There is nothing reliable in their mouth. Their inward part is destruction itself.

Their throat is an open grave. They flatter with their tongues. Hold them guilty,

O God, by their own devices let them fall. In the abundance of their transgressions thrust them out for they are rebellious against you.

But let all who take refuge in you be glad. Let them ever sing for joy and may you shelter them that those who love your name may exalt in you.

For it is you who blesses the righteous one, O Yahweh. You surround him with favor as with a large shield.

So this being one of those Psalms that would be categorized as imprecatory. Okay. Because you're praying a curse upon those who would do evil.

Yeah. But notice that the appeal of David here, since David is the writer of this

Psalm, is that they would fall by their own devices. It's not just God smite the people

I don't like. Right. But he says, hold them guilty, O God, by their own devices let them fall.

In the abundance of their transgressions thrust them out for they are rebellious against you.

It is asking that God's righteousness would prevail and that those who would do wickedly would not succeed by their satanic schemes, but that God's goodness would be done in the earth.

Yeah. Amen. It is, we always kind of war with those imprecatory

Psalms, like, is it okay to pray this kind of thing? Yeah. Against people? David is not saying something about someone in particular.

He's talking about all those who will do unjustly, wanting

God's justice to prevail in the earth. That's a good thing. But when we want God's justice to be done in the earth, we have to understand, we have to recognize that means that those who deal unjustly will be destroyed.

Right. Every time we pray, Lord Jesus, come quickly, as John does at the end of Revelation, we're saying something imprecatory.

Yep. I mean, you might be praying that from the standpoint of, Lord Jesus, come quickly and take me home.

Yes. But do you understand that when Christ returns, he's going to, yeah, he's striking down the nations with a rod of iron.

He comes in war, as Revelation 19 describes. Right. But, I mean, we can take comfort in the fact that the

Lord knows the heart, and so he will not be judging a person that...

Didn't deserve it. Right. Right. Exactly. And so he would not be casting,

I don't know how to say that, his judgment upon... He's not dealing with anyone unjustly.

Right. So I think it was yesterday, yesterday's episode going through Isaiah, might have been that one, where I made the comment that everyone, when we are brought before the great white throne of judgment, everyone receives justice.

No one will receive injustice. Right. So for those who will enter into the kingdom of God for eternity, we receive justice in the sense that Christ took the penalty for us, for our sins.

When we reference 1 John 1, 9, if we ask forgiveness for our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

He is just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness, because Christ took the penalty for us.

Right. So we receive justice in that sense, that the justice we deserve or the judgment we deserve was taken upon Christ when he died on the cross for our sins.

Those who will perish in judgment, who did not believe in Christ and therefore his blood is not upon them, they receive justice too.

They get what they deserve. It's true. Because of their sins and no one to atone for their sins, since they did not put their faith in Jesus.

So the judgment of God, it rightly falls upon those who do wickedly.

And this is something we need to recognize in the scriptures, Psalm 5, 5, the boastful shall not stand before your eyes.

You hate, God hates all workers of iniquity. But share that with somebody who is in sin, who is walking in sin, that they may fear

God and hopefully get away from that, you know, common American evangelical trope.

God loves you. God loves everybody. Yeah. God's wrath is upon you if you are not in Christ.

If you become a follower of Jesus, then you come to recognize he loved you enough not to destroy you where you were in rebellion against God.

And that's Romans 2. Do you not realize that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?

And so the kindness that he exercised toward you is that you wouldn't perish in your sin, but then turn to the

Lord Jesus Christ. And so we recognize that aspect, that attribute of God in Psalm 5, 5, you hate workers of iniquity and share that with somebody who's not a follower of Christ so that they will not come into the wrong understanding.

God just loves me. God loves everybody. He loves me where I am. I remember that being part of your testimony about, you know,

I just thought God loved my beautiful face. He just wants me to be happy because God wants me to be happy.

So I'm going to do whatever makes me happy. How could God not love me? I'm so lovable. Yes. Lovable.

Lovable. Yeah. And then I grew up in my faith to recognize I'm not very lovable.

Oh, I am so lovable all the time. No, I'm really not.

It's okay. I love you all the time. Well, I'm glad you do. That's different than saying you're lovable all the time.

Exactly. I know it swings back on this side of the table too, though. So yeah.

We all have our faults. That's right. I had to apologize to my wife for childish behavior just the other morning.

She didn't get mad at me, but I knew I was not acting in a way that was... Lovable. There you go.

That's exactly it. Yeah. So this being Friday, we take questions from the listeners, and you can send those questions to whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com.

As you will see by some of these emails that I'm going to read here today, we get more than just questions. We do.

So we love getting the little things you send to us, sometimes gifts in the mail.

We get gifts in the mail. We do. I always love it when that happens. Yes. Scott, thank you for the

Christmas ornament you gave us. Oh, yes. It's beautiful. I put it on the tree and have taken a picture of it.

I can't remember if I sent the picture to Scott. I'll have to double check. Yeah, definitely. We'll send you a picture. So it's an ornament that says,

Hughes Family 2023, our first Christmas in Casa Grande. That's what's printed on the ornament.

It's so pretty. Thank you very much. This first question, this is from James. Well, this first email is from James, and he does have a question in here.

Okay. Hello, Gabe and Babe. I was looking at my Spotify wrapped. So remember, we talked about this last week.

Oh, yeah. Spotify will send you, here's the podcast that you listened to the most this year.

Yeah. And he says, what was my number one podcast this year? Yay. I'm a local fuel delivery driver in the

Kansas City area. Oh, I'm so sorry. Kansas City is not one of my favorite towns to navigate.

That's a tough city to drive. I listen to your podcast as part of my daily rotation of podcasts. Thank you for the time you dedicate and the sacrifice you make to continue putting out episodes all week.

I included a screenshot of my listening for you. My wife and I had our first baby two months ago.

Oh, congratulations. And I was wondering if you had any tips for setting a good foundation now to lead a godly family.

Thank you again for all you do, your brother in Christ. This is the number one piece of advice that I give to anybody, especially a dad, a husband, a head of a household.

It is never too soon for you to begin reading the Bible together as a family.

Amen. Even if it's just you and your bride as the head of your household, as the one who is the spiritual leader of your house.

If your household only consists of your bride, have time in the day, whether it's in the morning before you get started with things or when you're gathered around the dinner table in the evening, open up a

Bible and just read from it. Do your devotions together. For us, it's usually been at supper time when we gather as a family.

I'm trying to move that into the mornings so we can all do that together in the morning. Mornings are just rough.

Mornings are hard. Because, I mean, it's not like we're always available. There's some days of the week.

We'll have different morning schedules. That differ. But we're all home at the same time to do supper.

For the most part, yeah. So that's why it's easy most of the time in the evening. What I'm trying to do, since we've moved to Casa Grande, what

I'm trying to do is move it into the morning so we can start with prayer and Bible study. And then in the evening, since I'm giving the two older kids guitar lessons of doing worship songs in the evening together, and so this becomes their practice, too, so that we can play.

We'll have a chorus of guitars. We have a lot of guitars. Aria wants to be included in that.

She's our nine -year -old. She does, yeah. I've not messed with her guitar enough. I know it'll hold a tune.

Sometimes you get those little kid guitars and they don't... They start toying in about halfway through.

They don't really tune right. No. Because they're made to just be toys.

They're not really made to play. I'm pretty sure that that was a real guitar.

We bought it from a friend, so I know that it does. I've just not messed with it or changed strings on it or anything like that.

I got to change strings on mine. Well, I have two, but I'm giving one of them to Z, just he's moving into a larger guitar.

Oh, yeah? And then the other one that I have not regularly played, that's the one I need to change the strings on.

Gotcha. Anyway. Yeah. Is this answering the question? Not really.

Never too early to start reading the Bible together. And don't feel like, too, that you have to do it every single day, because you can get really discouraged with that.

Yeah. Oh, man, we missed today. And then the discouragement turns into, we haven't done it this week at all. Right.

You know, that sort of thing. Just don't think that it has to be perfect. But schedule that time and decide this is when we're going to be together to do devotions, to read the

Bible, pray. A good way to grow in prayer, and this is not something that I've done lately, but I want to move into, is doing a prayer journal.

So have a family prayer journal. And that also will help you, you know, it's not just prayers at bedtime where you're, okay, who are we praying for?

Who's got medical needs? Yeah. Kind of sporadic. Right. You're just kind of throwing it together, and it's not very intentional.

But if it's during your devotion time, whether that's in the morning or evening or wherever that is, you have a prayer journal where you're writing down those things you've prayed for.

And then you can even go back and see how God has answered those prayers. And so that's, especially if you have kids, that helps the kids to see, wow, prayer works, you know?

Yeah. And this is what the Lord has been doing for us through prayer. And I wouldn't sweat too much about the kids not being able to read it.

You can explain and point to the words when they're like really little, when they're starting to understand.

Because, I mean, there's so many things that our two -year -old picks up that one would not expect at all.

Yeah, I know. It's pretty amazing. And so, but that's because we constantly talk to them, we constantly explain things, constantly read things to them.

And I think he just, he's flourishing underneath that. For him, following example seems to be a bigger deal.

Oh man, no joke. Tonight, I was impressed by when we were praying, he folded his hands on the edge of the table and put his head down.

And I'd never seen him do that before. Yeah, he does that. So usually he's folding his hands, he's looking around at the rest of us.

And he's like, what are you all doing? You know? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. So, and that's good example or a bad example. They follow them, follow you when they're young.

Right, they follow your habits. Yeah. It's true. They'll amplify all of your habits.

Yeah. Especially the bad ones. But it all has to be intentional. You can't just expect that these things are going to happen.

And that's especially the case for us because it's very easy as a pastor to just think, you know, my kids are getting it,

I'm a pastor. Right. We're at the church all the time. Yes. But we have to be, we have to be deliberate about those family times.

Yeah. That we're together. Well, I mean, there's no telling. They might not have a pastor husband or be a pastor themselves.

So they would need to know how to do it in their daily life. Yeah. Yeah.

I'm just saying that like for us. You set the example for them on how to do it when they're old.

I'm just saying for us, it seems that it's, we can get into the mindset or somebody in ministry can get into that mindset.

Easily. Next question is from Jake, dear Gabe and yawning babe.

As your 10 years of what videos is coming up. Right. Yeah. So that's

April. Oh yeah. 10 years of doing 90 second what videos. Yeah. Eight years of doing the podcast is where we're at right now.

So he said, I thought of a gift that I could give both of you to celebrate. I took all of the outtakes from 2017 up until December 1st of this year.

Oh my goodness. And edited them together by year. Oh, that's going to be awesome.

So he put, he puts in parentheses here, I plan on finishing this year. So have you been doing this for three years?

Well, I guess it'd be six years. Have you been doing this for six years? I don't know. Wow. So every year you're grabbing our outtakes, but that's hilarious.

That's amazing. Well, I mean, it would have to be like 200 episodes or something. Yeah. Yeah. That's a, but I, you know, and then given that you haven't been on every

Friday episode, if it's just me, I don't throw an outtake on there. What? I feel,

I feel a little. There was one time I was doing a what video.

Like I was recording the script to a video and I saved the whole thing. Cause I was like, this would be funny to do this same video with the unedited audio.

So you can hear like all the mistakes that I make to do a 90 second. Yeah. How long it really takes you.

Right. And I saved that, but I don't remember where it is. I got to try to find that and I can turn that into a what video.

What behind the scenes? That's right. Remember this video? Here's what the audio originally sounded like.

You could do like, um, uh, what extended or EXP? No, it'll be the director's cut.

There you go. Or, uh, or I do a what video with a director's commentary behind it.

There you go. That'd be hard to do. Anyway. He says, I got the idea from another listener who recently found out about the outtakes.

Yeah, that was a few weeks ago and went to go back and listen to them. What would be the best way to send this to you right now?

The folder is 357 megabytes. Can that be sent by email or a small flash drive and mail it to you or something else?

God bless you both and congratulations on 10 years. Uh, yeah.

What's that called? The Dropbox use the Dropbox option or the, I think there's something called a whale file.

I have no idea. You can use it. It's a one time use thing. So you can just sign a quick account, drop it in there.

And I have to, I have to download it within like a week or something like that. And then it, it deletes. Oh, that's interesting.

So try something like that. Uh, one of those services where you can send a large file to somebody,

Gmail will do it. I've not had any luck with them sending like large files, pictures and videos and stuff.

I guess they've gotten better about the videos, but maybe it's just because my email is too full.

I don't know. But my brother's done pretty good with sending me large files through Gmail. Oh really?

Yeah. It's another one of those things where you have to download it within a certain period of time because then Google will, uh, they'll delete it to free up the space.

But anyway, I'm sure there's, you know, a couple of different options you can find. If you want to send me the flash drive,

I mean, you can just mail it to the church. The address info is on the website.

Let's see. Uh, hang on. Trying to remember that off the top of my head again, providencecasagrand .com and you'll find the church address right there.

If you want to send it to me that way, folks that have sent us gifts, that's how they're doing it. They're sending it to the church.

Yeah. And we're getting our, uh, our listener mail that way.

That's the easiest way to go. This next one is from Travis in Oswego, New York. Ooh. He says,

Dear Pastor Gabe, I loved hearing that you almost voiced Captain America in a movie. That was a few weeks back.

We did that a couple months ago. Yeah. So I was trying to do a little math based on what little information you gave.

Be honest with me now. Was this the movie? And so he sends the title of the, of the film that I said, no,

I'm not going to give, but was he right? He was right. Yeah. Awesome. He guessed it right.

So, you know, as I, I, I had, how did we bring this up? It was a, we were talking about it with the kids one night, so they wanted me to throw it in as a trivia question on the podcast.

And so I said, Oh, it was the, we were playing the game. Twitter. No, no, no, no, no.

I didn't put it on Twitter. No. Cause we played with the kids. We were playing like two truths and a lie.

Oh yeah. That's right. Okay. And so I gave them three pieces of information and they had to guess which one was the lie.

You didn't put that on Twitter? No, I don't think so. Okay. I may have posted it on X, whatever it is,

Twix. I may, I may have done that. I don't, I don't remember now.

Oh yeah. I think I did do it, but it was after we did it with the kids. Yeah. I knew it was after.

And then somebody wanted to know the story behind it. Yeah. Was what it was. Yeah. That may have been what happened. But anyway.

Anyway. Yeah. The, so as I said, when we recounted that episode, I don't know why

I turned it down. I just know that I did. It was a contest that I won and there wasn't anything in the contest about like, you're going to get to be captain

America. It wasn't like that. Yeah. It was a, you have a chance to play a bit part in an Avengers animated movie.

And I, this was before the, the, you know, Marvel cinematic universe. So Marvel was still kind of struggling at the time.

Cause I know they had declared bankruptcy at one point and all of their properties were dispersed to different movie companies.

Yeah. Cause you know, one company had Iron Man, another had Spider -Man and all this other kind of stuff.

Right. So I think this was in a period where Marvel was trying to get out of debt and they were, I used to be a comic fan back in the day.

This is why I know all of this stuff. What gave you away? I gave away the last of my comic books and we were moving to Casa Grande.

I just, I don't need these anymore. But anyway, the, uh, uh, when Marvel was trying to get out of debt, they're doing these animated films and, uh, uh, you know, stuff that was just like straight to DVD.

And so I entered this contest and I won and it was to play a bit role in the, in the movie, but they loved my audition.

And so they started saying, we think we got a bigger part for you. And they had me reading for Captain America, Iron Man and Thor.

And I don't know why I skipped the last audition, but I just didn't do it. Yeah. And I just decided

I wasn't going to do it. And like I said, in that episode, whatever it was that was in my head, you know, it was from God because my life would have taken a completely different course.

Yeah. Had I gone to the last audition and decided that I wanted to be in the film. And I'm, you know, I'm kind of grateful that you didn't go that route.

Of course. Not sure how we would have met up then. Yeah. I would have been taken out of Kansas a lot earlier, probably would have been the case.

Yeah. But anyway, I, you know, so we said with the kids, your dad was almost Captain America in a movie.

The reality though, was that I was probably going to be Thor because that was the part they had me reading the most.

And looking back on that, it's like, what would that have been like? So I become a pastor and I used to play a false

God in a movie. The Lord saved you from that.

Yes, that's right. I don't remember any of the lines I read except one of Thor's lines.

Oh, yeah. And after all that practicing. Yeah. Well, I mean, I didn't memorize anything. They gave me a script.

So I just read it off the script. But I can't do that. I have to practically memorize it. Oh, yeah.

No, I wasn't memorizing because. Because I don't, I don't read that smoothly. But if anything, it's, you know, it's a fun story to tell the kids.

It is. Your dad was almost Captain America. I'll leave it at that instead of Thor. This question is from TJ in South Carolina.

Dear Pastor Gabe, I thank you for your videos in your ministry. I've been listening to the podcast for a long time.

At the present, I'm an associate pastor in an independent Baptist church, which

I've been doing for two years, much like you did when you first began. But I'm getting to a point where I believe

I'm ready to take on a senior pastor role. I know I'm still young. I have good counsel around me to help evaluate my worthiness and my qualifications.

My question has to do with how to find a good church. Since you just moved from associate pastor back into a lead pastor role, what advice could you give about how to find a church to pastor?

What to look for and what to avoid? What are some red flags? What are some potential pitfalls?

Are there good websites you'd recommend for a job search? How do I prepare my family? How do

I prepare the church that I would be leaving? Any advice that you could give would be appreciated.

Oh, man. So I've emailed DJ some things. Well, that's good. Trying to answer like each one of these questions in particular.

Right. And then some other things that I could think of on top of that. So he says, what kind of advice would you give about how to find a church to pastor?

What to look for and what to avoid? So the first thing I shared with him is talk to people that you know.

Try to see if you can't go through the channels of the people that you know to find out if there's a church that's in search for a pastor, in search of a pastor, or maybe a church that's wanting to plant.

Is your church wanting to plant? Yeah. Use your resources. Exactly. Use those things that are available to you.

Don't immediately think that, you know, blank slate. I'm going on a job site to try to find something to do.

But if it comes to that, then you need to know your priorities first and foremost.

That was something that was hard to think about, narrow down.

Like, what is the most important thing for you as a pastor? Right. And there's some things that we didn't know was important, but ended up being very important.

Just to know your priorities and what you're looking for. And then that's your baseline to go off of.

Because any church you can mold into where it needs to be at a slow process, of course, depending upon where it's at.

Right. But your priorities have to be there to have any...

You have to have the shared priorities. Yeah. Yeah. To help them in that. Yeah.

Do you want to be in a church where you're looking for a certain statement of faith, and then that's the church

I want to be in and pastor? Or are you looking for a kind of a church that's actually in a growth process?

So you're really going to find somebody that's mostly immature. Yeah. And then you're going to come in and help to kind of grow that church.

Right. That was what First Southern Baptist was for us in Junction City. So I'm stepping into a senior pastor role in a church that was very immature, and then bringing it up, which included changing the constitution.

Yeah. Statement of faith, things like that. There were numerous things that we went through. And even trying to move the church in the direction of leaving the

Southern Baptist Convention and becoming Reformed Baptist, which I didn't get to accomplish while I was there.

But my successor, Ryan, finished that work and did a great job within two years,

I think even less than that, of us leaving. He had brought the church out of the Southern Baptist Convention and adopted a

Reformed Baptist statement of faith, the London Baptist 1689. Yeah. So that was where I was attempting to go with that.

But then when it came time for me to leave First Baptist and become pastor again in another church.

No, First Baptist. First Baptist. I'm going to First Baptist of Lyndale now. Got it. Okay. So when it came time to leave First Baptist and step into a church,

Becky and I start talking about what are we looking for? Right. And one of the things that I was sure that I was not going to do was come into a church with a dispensational eschatology.

And not to knock anybody who believes dispensationalism. John MacArthur, for example, is a dispensationalist.

Right. But I have enough experience in churches that I've been in over the years to know that this tends to be a pretty divisive issue.

Yeah. Well, because you don't hold that view. I don't, I'm not a dispensationalist. Right. It will eventually come about.

Yeah. In your preaching and everything that it will be an issue because that's, I mean, that's what we had at First Southern Baptist Injunction is there were some people who were and it caused conflict there a little bit.

Yeah. And pretty early on. Had to work out. Yeah. That was one of the first doctrinal conflicts

I think we had. Yep. When I first stepped in is some of the people that were dispensationalists and found out

Gabe doesn't believe in a pre -trib rapture. Yeah. So yeah, there was some controversy there.

There was a church that was actually very mature, had done incredible work and made significant progress in establishing their statement of faith and growing their body and things like this.

This would have been at the end of last decade. And they had contacted me and really wanted me to become their pastor.

And I loved this church. We knew a lot of people there. It was very ideal.

It was a church that was kind of, it was out in the country. So nice and quiet. They had a parsonage. Yep. So we didn't even have to worry about selling the house and -

It was close by family. Yeah. We were close to family and things like that. It really was an ideal situation. Yeah. But when

I talked with the elders of that church, I could not seem to get them to understand, I don't think this is gonna go as well as you think it will.

Like we would love to do this. Don't get me wrong. We would love to come in. I'd love to come in and pastor. There's such differences between our eschatologies.

You don't realize the problems this is gonna cause until we get into it. Right. Until you start wanting me to teach on the return of Christ, the relationship between Israel and the church, what

I believe about that, the temple, the rebuilding of the temple, and all these other kinds of things. When we start stepping into those doctrines, they're gonna be so radically different from the paradigm that you're used to.

I just don't think you're prepared for the kinds of conflicts that will arise.

As a result of those differences in doctrine. And so I kind of took myself out of the consideration.

Yeah. Just based on that. And that was honestly, that was out of love for that church. Yes. You guys are doing well.

Let's not upset the apple cart, so to speak. We still want that friendship.

Yeah. And we still have it. We do. Still love that church dearly.

It's always great to see how successful they've been and the accomplishments they've made and things like that.

They were committed to that eschatology. Yes. And if they wanted to change it, I would not have had a problem with coming in and saying, okay, here's what needs to change.

But we just were not there in those conversations to find out if that was the way the church wanted to go.

Right. So they're still where they are, and that's fine. And so these are the kinds of things you need to evaluate. And do you want to put in the hard work as if it was a new plant, or do you want one that's already there, ready to step in and like a brand new house?

Yeah, right. And Becky and I had talked about when we were leaving Junction City, it was the time for us to at least consider it.

We weren't really thinking in the sense of, it's time for us to go. We just need to go.

That wasn't the way we ever approached it. But is it time for us to now consider something else? And so when we were talking about that, it was, we always wanted to be part of a reformed

Baptist church. We were trying to move this in the direction of a reformed Baptist church. So is this the time?

Now's the time for us to find a reformed Baptist church. I can go be a pastor there. But ultimately, the opportunity that came up for us in Lyndale was just too good to pass up.

Right. And so we went there, even though the leadership there is Calvinist, but the statement of faith there was not reformed

Baptist. We've talked about that in the past. But then when we left Lyndale and came here, then

I was specifically looking for a reformed Baptist church. Yeah. And by the way, we connected with Providence Reformed Baptist here in Casa Gran through Founders Ministry.

Yes. And if you are a church that's looking for a pastor, if you're a reformed

Baptist church looking for a pastor, please use the Founders website. Yes. Because there are not many churches that are listed on there.

Yeah. But I'd love to see more churches utilizing that. Yeah. What Founders has on their website.

Again, use your resources. Right, exactly. Yes. So that's founders .org. Now, I would tell you to look in the connections that you have first.

Yes, first and foremost. Yeah. If you think you need to be on a job site looking for something, top two recommendations would be

Founders and then TGC's website. I know TGC doesn't have the greatest reputation, especially among the reformed right now.

But that aside, they have a great jobs page. Yeah. Whatever problems some of their articles have been over the last few years, that's a different discussion.

Right. But they have a great jobs page that I think is a good church search option.

So far. Yeah. So then what's another question that he has?

What to look for and what to avoid? What are some red flags? You want to know why the previous pastor left.

Yes. That's a good question to ask. Can you even contact him and talk with him and ask him why he left?

If they're reluctant to let you do that, that could be a red flag. Yeah. But at the same time.

Definitely look into it. Yeah. I mean, at the same time, there have been some pretty dramatic stories that I've witnessed in churches and I didn't find it necessary to have to contact the former pastor.

I think the situation was pretty well established what had happened, that it wasn't necessary for me to have to contact the previous guy.

You know what I mean? Right. Are there any good websites you'd recommend for a job search? Answered that one.

How do I prepare my family? Well, I was not going to do this move without Becky's approval.

I told Becky I would be looking for a potential church that we would become a part of.

I would start those conversations and get the ball rolling. But I told her at any point in this process, you have veto power.

So Becky could have said, this isn't going to work. Right. I don't like where we would be moving to.

I'm just not feeling it myself. There's red flags about the church that she can see that I can't see.

Something about it doesn't seem right. Becky's got good intuition with stuff like that. And so I trusted her judgment, but I also did not want to move somewhere that she just wasn't going to be happy.

Yeah. So Becky had veto power. And we prayed during that entire time.

We did. It was praying together, asking that, Lord, if this is it, swing that door wide open.

Yep. If not, let there be something that shuts it in our face. Yes. And every time we prayed for something like that, it happened.

There was a clear sign that we're supposed to continue or no, that's it.

We had our answer given to us. There wasn't any reason to have to continue forward with this.

Yeah. And we made sure that the kids were well -loved.

Yeah. Especially how our 15 -year -old moved in the middle of the semester.

Yeah. And that was going to be hardest on her because of how old she is. Yeah. So we made sure that everybody was prepared.

And just to know that the things that they miss, we can make sure that those things still happen.

And that they need to figure out what's priority in their lives. Because, I mean, they're old enough to talk about it.

Like, I need more time with you guys, or I need more time with my friends. Or just to make sure that they have those people to help them keep accountable.

And not just from us, but from others. Because everybody listens to somebody else.

That's true, right. There might be something they would not be willing to tell their parents that they're willing to share with somebody else.

Right. And we would tell our kids, it's okay for you to be sad about leaving your friends. Yeah, it is.

Because there's things that, as parents, we tell them, don't cry over that. There's no reason for you to act up and behave the way that you are because of this.

Right. But when it came to moving, we told them, if you - Because we're sad, too. Right.

Yeah. We didn't want to leave our friends, either. We wish we could take everybody with us. Yes. Oh, my goodness, yes. And it's great that even -

And our family before that. Yeah, right. And it's great that even where we're coming into here in Casa Grande, we've got friends from back in our church in Kansas.

We do. That are actually nearby. Yes. And we're able to connect with them and spend some time together, though we haven't seen each other in years.

Yeah, I love it. Absolutely love it. And so we just made sure that the family was prepared as far as we're expanding our church family.

There are Christians all over the world, and we're just expanding our church family. Right. Because in Kansas, they came and went because of the military.

And so we made that a big thing of they're all over the world. Our family is all over the world now.

And so then when we moved to Texas, it was, okay, now we're just expanding the family. It's more family.

Yeah. So now we're just expanding it a little bit more. That's right. And made sure that they kept their eye on Christ and just to know that it is a real thing that the church is all over the world.

Yeah. And that you can feel at home with Christians no matter where you are. Right. And cultural differences and stuff.

Yeah. Well, I mean, Jesus said with his disciples in Mark 10, you'll have many more mothers and fathers and brothers and sisters and lands.

Yes. Yes, exactly. And we all have that common connection. It's just like,

I can be in a room full of strangers and still feel at home because I know they're in Christ, you know?

Yeah. Right. And you just feel that deeper connection. That's just amazing. Absolutely. Well, one of the last questions here, how do

I prepare the church that I would be leaving? Yeah, that one's a tougher one. That depends on circumstances.

Yeah, there's a lot of different things that, I mean, it's never an easy thing to do. I remember when

I was leaving Lyndale, there was a friend of mine had relayed to me that someone else in the church asked him, is this the way this typically goes?

Like a pastor interviews with another church and he doesn't tell the church that he's leaving?

And this friend of mine that this member was talking to was like, I mean, how else would you do it?

Yeah. What do you do? Now, there was a pastor before me who was there at the church that actually told the church, listen,

I want to be a pastor. That's what I want to do. And so now I'm leaving this congregation. I'm going to be looking for another.

Can you be praying for me and for my family that we're finding the right fit? You don't have to keep it from everybody.

Yeah. If you feel like you're in a spot, especially as an associate pastor like that, that you can share that kind of information, then yeah, go ahead and do that.

But for me, I did not want, I didn't want to get it in anybody's head that I was unhappy or unsatisfied there for any reason, especially when there was a possibility that we could have been doing a church plant there in East Texas.

So if my conversations with another church didn't work out,

I didn't want to leave the impression that I wasn't committed or dedicated to this area that would harm the possibility of doing a church plan.

So that was why I kept those things pretty close to the chest, unless I knew for sure we were going to go. I just wasn't sharing it with anybody else.

Yeah. But I mean, it's imperative to have people praying for you. Yes. So yeah, you can't keep it so secret that, you know, the only person that knows is you.

Right. So whether it's a small group or whether it's the whole church, but you need people praying for you and giving you advice and bouncing ideas off and that sort of thing.

So that way you have guidance through it because you're going to have that for the rest of your career.

So right. And the rest of our lives as Christians. So yeah, definitely. Well, and like TJ said, he does have, see,

I'm looking for where he said this. I have good counsel around me to help evaluate my worthiness and my qualifications.

That's good. Perfect. And listen to their counsel. If you've got somebody in that group of men that you trust, that's telling you, we just don't think you're ready for this yet, or you need to give a year or two more to this, then listen to them.

Listen to what it is that they have to say to that. Yeah. Yeah. Because I mean, God grows you through your circumstances.

Right. So. And the people around you. Exactly. I mean, sanctification is a community project. Amen. So we grow and help to sanctify each other in the church.

But good question. I'm glad you're seeking those things out, TJ. And I want to pray for you here at the end as well, as you're in that process.

This is from Cy in Iowa. Dear Gabe and babe, a friend of mine. Was that every email?

No, just TJ's was dear Pastor Gabe. Yeah. I was like, is everybody calling you babe now?

So dear Gabe and babe, a friend of mine is an anti -Christmasist.

Oh, oh yeah. I haven't heard that term before. That's good. I love this man.

I have known him my whole life, but I wish he would fly South for the winter. So I didn't have to deal with his anti -Christmas ranting.

Every year, everyone within a 10 mile radius has to hear him gripe about how godless

Christmas is because every tradition is repackaged paganism. His favorite seasonal versus Jeremiah 10, three through four, which he says is exactly about Christmas trees.

I swear the guy is more passionate about hating Christmas than he is about sharing the gospel. You have probably covered this before, but can you please debunk this foolish myth that Jeremiah 10 has anything to do with Christmas trees?

Merry Christmas to you and your family. Sigh. And that's that's

Cy. S Y. He's sighing. That's hilarious.

So Jeremiah 10, beginning in verse one, hear the word that the Lord speaks to you.

Oh, house of Israel, thus says the Lord, learn not the way of the nations, nor be dismayed at the signs of the heavens because the nations are dismayed at them for the customs of the peoples are vanity.

A tree from the forest is cut down and worked with an axe by the hands of a craftsman.

They decorate it with silver and gold. They fasten it with hammer and nails so that it cannot move.

Going on to verse five, their idols are like scarecrows in a cucumber field and they cannot speak.

They have to be carried for they cannot walk. Do not be afraid of them for they cannot do evil.

Neither is it in them to do good. What is Jeremiah describing there?

An idol. An idol. He's not talking about a Christmas tree. Nope. But man, people just love that.

Yeah, they they cut down a tree and they cover it with silver and gold. Oh, that's a Christmas tree.

No. It's how you'll cut a piece of wood. You'll shape it into the shape that you want it to be in.

It's like the golden calf, you know, they melt it down the gold and. Exactly. And then they pour the melted gold or silver over it.

The wooden thing that they've made. And now they have a gold or silver idol. There you go. That's what it is. Has nothing to do with the

Christmas tree, which is why they have to carry it around. Yeah, right. It's it's it's not it's neither human nor an actual

God. Nope. So they have to pick it up and transport it from place to place. Yeah. And I mean, you read this in Isaiah, you read it in Ezekiel, you read it in Jeremiah.

The rebuke that's given to the people because they worship these idols and their foolishness displayed in things like this because they're bowing down to something they had to make and they have to carry it.

But yet they think it will do something for them. Yeah. Good or bad. Yeah.

And and that's the right. Sometimes they're afraid of it. Yep. If I don't give this thing an offering today.

Yeah. Yeah. I'm going to be cursed. It's not going to give me anything. Something to that effect. But yeah, so that's the absurdity that gets highlighted in passages like this.

It's not about a Christmas tree. And listen, if somebody doesn't want to celebrate

Christmas. That's fine. That's one thing. Scripture doesn't tell us that we have to.

Right. Jesus birth birth date isn't even recorded in Scripture. Nope. So December 25th is is a guess.

So what he should do is buy your 25 Christmas myths book. There you go.

OK, there's my book over 25 Christmas myths and what the Bible says, by the way. So last week

I said we've got the updated version out. So it's an intro in it. I got the scripture index at the end and all this other kind of thing.

If you had ordered it that day when I said that you didn't get the updated version with the intro in it.

Oh, because Amazon had not yet approved. Oh, no, the new manuscript actually goes through.

There's a waiting period because they have to approve the content. Yeah, they don't just let anything get posted.

So the new manuscript, when I submitted it, had to go through the approval process again.

Oh, man. So if you ordered it, then try again. You did it right. You didn't get the updated version.

So you got to buy it again. Now, what do they really? Excuse me.

Yeah, I'm just I'm kidding. I was going to say, I thought you said they didn't have to. You still have the same content in the book.

You just don't have the introduction. And it still says that I'm a pastor in Kansas rather than a pastor in Arizona.

And then I have four kids. Yep. Not five. Yeah, yeah.

Because in Kansas, you didn't have four. That's right. Kansas only had four kids. Yeah. Now we have five.

We added one when we went to Texas. Are we going to add one in Arizona? No. You're not ready for number six, babe.

I am too old. So, yeah, that book, because I do cover Christmas trees in that book.

I covered Santa Claus and many other things, even, you know, as you brought up, Cy, that your friend says that Christmas is just repackaged pagan myths.

It's not. Nope. I mean, there may be a few traditions in there that have pagan origins to them, but they're not any of the significant things that we recognize at Christmas time, because we're celebrating the incarnation of Christ.

There's nothing pagan about that. Well, see, that's where I kind of get a little irritated with Christmas is because they sometimes don't focus on the incarnation of Christ, and they're really focusing on Santa Claus.

And that's it. It's all about Santa. Right, which, by the way, I cover that in the book also.

Yes. And studying some of those things with regards to Santa Claus, I did not realize how much that myth is, it's almost purely

American. Oh, really? So the thing about, you know, Santa Claus with St.

Nicholas, the Dutch children would put out their shoes and they brought that tradition over to the

United States with them. Or the gold, rather. That actually is a myth that feeds into the myth. Really?

So the origin of Santa in America really does not have anything to do with the tradition of Dutch kids.

It is purely an American invention. Okay. But you have to get the book to find out.

Yeah. To read about that. I'll have to reread it. Yes, there are some St. Nicholas things that go on in the past, and some of that was brought into this myth of Santa Claus, but it wasn't some evolution of things that turned into what

Santa Claus is today. Santa Claus as you know it, as you see him in his red suit and all that, you know, holding a bottle of Coca -Cola and everything, whatever you...

That's how I picture it every time, actually. Every time, I know. That image as you know it, it's purely an

American invention. It is not the evolution of all of these different Santa myths that originally, or eventually arrive at this.

But you have to read the book. Yeah. I would just read that chapter for you here, but we're out of time.

Yeah. We've been doing this for an hour. So what I wanna do right here, I'm gonna play the what video about Christmas trees. Okay. And how

Jeremiah 10 is not about that. And then we'll close, we'll get to the close here.

All right. So here's the video that I did a year or two ago on various myths surrounding

Christmas trees. Did you know

Christmas trees are forbidden in the Bible? Jeremiah 10, three to four says, for the customs of the people are vanity.

A tree is cut down and worked by the hands of a craftsman. They decorate it with silver and gold.

What could that be but a Christmas tree? Well, verse five says it's describing an idol. And Christmas trees symbolize that we don't worship idols.

The story goes that in the eighth century, a man named Boniface went throughout Germania, sharing the gospel, a very dangerous mission.

He came upon a group of heathens who sacrifice babies to Thor under the thunder Oak grieved by such barbarism.

Boniface chopped down the tree and put an end to human sacrifice. The people were amazed. Thor did not strike him down upon the stump.

Boniface declared that Jesus Christ is God and their pagan gods did not exist. He pointed to a small fir tree that pointed up to heaven.

It's leaves evergreen like the everlasting life we have in Christ. No longer worship the false gods in the wild wood, he said, but worship the true

God at home with family. That was the meaning of the first Christmas tree. So again, a

Christmas tree is not pagan. It's a reminder that we used to be pagan. Besides, there's no difference between having a

Christmas tree and any other kind of plant. Whether you have a Christmas tree or not, let your testimony be that of first Thessalonians one nine to 10, how you turn to God from idols to serve the living and the true

God and to wait for his son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead. Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come when we understand the text.

All right, folks, thanks for joining us for another Friday edition. Yes. And you can send your questions to when we understand the text at gmail .com.

What do we got coming up in the near future? Next week is, what is the date? Today's the 8th.

9th. Next week, no, no, it's the 8th. Oh, it is the 8th. You're right. Because remember, I'm getting this on before midnight.

It will be December 8th when this uploads. Then the 15th. Then the 15th.

Then the 22nd. 22nd. Okay, so we got two more episodes before Christmas. I don't know if we're gonna do a

Christmas episode or not. It depends on how many Christmas questions I get. Sure. Yeah.

And then on the 29th, we are going to do a year -end review.

So we typically on that last Friday of the year, we look back over some of the biggest events that happened in the year.

Yes. And then something usually happens after that. After that, right. Still in the same year.

Last year, I actually made the joke because it was on the 30th. And I made the joke, these are the biggest events that happened in the year.

So barring something like the Pope dying, there won't be another big story. And then it happened.

And then it happened. The Pope died on December 31st. Man, I could have been a prophet there.

I could have called that one and - I don't know if you want that title. It's a pretty scary title to me.

Yeah, right. Yeah, not a prophet. And then the next week, so then January 5th, we'll go back over our biggest videos of the year.

Oh, awesome. And then do a countdown of the top 10 and kind of talk about why this video was so popular.

Right now, it's looking like all the chosen videos that I did earlier this year are going to be the ones that have been viewed the most.

I don't doubt that. It was pretty popular. I haven't heard so much about it anymore.

Well, because season four is coming out. Oh, got it. So I think that's either - In between seasons.

Yeah, it's either February or March. Got it. That's season four. And then you're going to hear it all over again. Then all the chosen stuff will just explode again.

Good to know I can brace myself. All right, let's pray. I want to lift up TJ in prayer here and as we close things out.

Heavenly Father, we thank you for this time together. And we come together like this because we are just overjoyed by the forgiveness that we have received in Jesus Christ.

Our sins are forgiven. We've been made right with God. We have fellowship with God. And so what a great thing to be able to talk about all the different theology that's wrapped up in our being forgiven and in relationship with God and the promise of eternity, eternal life that we will have with Jesus Christ.

Though we have differing opinions on how some of those last things are going to come about at the end of time.

Yet we all agree that we who are in Christ will be together with the

Lord in glory. And then we can look at our brothers and sisters and say, ha, I was right or you were right or whatever else.

But may Christ be glorified in the midst of all of this. As we've had some of these questions that have come in here,

I pray for Si and the friend that he has to tolerate with his anti -Christmas rhetoric.

But I pray that you give him patience and you give him wisdom and how he may respond to his friend and teach him to be a little bit more charitable and maybe understand, hey, my friends at Christmas like to celebrate the incarnation of Christ.

And so that is something worth celebrating together any day of the year, of course.

But what a great thing that it gets marked on all of our calendars, the birth of Christ, the reminder that God came into the world.

1 Timothy 1 .15, Christ, Jesus came into the world to save sinners. And so we remember that all the time, of course.

But what a great thing that it becomes on the lips of people throughout our culture right around Christmas time.

I also want to pray for TJ and anybody else that might be looking for a pastor role.

Give them wisdom in that search. And may the desire be to simply preach

Christ and his gospel that the people of God may be edified and built up in whatever area you put

TJ in. He has that opportunity through evangelism to even witness to and minister to the area where he will live and invest himself and his ministry so that others may come to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ and have the guarantee of eternity with our

Lord. Come quickly, Lord Jesus. We pray that your justice would be done in the earth and that righteousness will dwell forever.

It's in Jesus' name that we pray. Amen. Today begins, dear

Gabe and yawning babe. You've, you've developed a reputation.

I have. For being a babe and yawning. Is that like the equivalent of sleeping beauty?

I think it's, I think it's pre -sleeping beauty. Yeah, about to be sleeping beauty.

I am always prettier after I have slept. That is for sure. At least my attitude is.

Yeah, I was gonna say it's good. It's more like, I mean, your hair is all like up here. Yeah, it's great.

It's like you have an 80s do. Severe bedhead. You wake up with an 80s do. I do.

Oh man, I've got so much hair. It is all over.

You and Annie both. You got really long hair right now. Yep. I like it. And thick. Yeah. It's a lot of hair.

That's a lot of hair. Exactly. I think of Rapunzel every time I'm pushing it. That's a lot of hair.

But what did she have? 80 feet of hair? 70. 70 feet of hair. Yeah. All right.

You ready? I think. Isn't it 70? That's gonna bug me now. I think it was 80. Is it?

I'm pretty sure it was 80 feet of hair. I don't know. Look it up. It's gonna drive me crazy. I have to do this before we start the show.

How long was Rapunzel's hair? No, you were right.

70 feet of hair. There we go. But then it didn't sound right after I said it.

Like my head knew it. But then it was like, well, maybe. Rapunzel's hair in Tangled is approximately 70 feet long.

It took more than 30 animators and engineers to animate it. I'm not surprised.