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Taking questions from listeners about podcast length, Easter, festivals, and what day Jesus actually died and was burried. Visit wwutt.com for all of our videos!
Are there any Jewish festivals that we should still be celebrating? What do we say to a person who condemns us for celebrating Easter and Christmas? And how do we know Jesus was crucified on a Friday?
The answer to these questions, When We Understand the Text.
You are listening to When We Understand the Text, an online Bible ministry so that we may know all the riches freely given to us by God. For questions and comments send us an email to whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com.
Here's your teacher, Pastor Gabe.
Thank you, Becky. And greetings, everyone. Hey, we are on vacation right now. I think I mentioned that to you Monday last week. And at the time that this episode airs, we will be en route from Florida, where we spent about 10 days on the beach, to Atlanta, where my parents live.
They will be meeting their grandbaby for the very first time. Our daughter, Mariah, who was born in January. And then we're going to go from Atlanta back to Kansas sometime next week, between May 1st through the 5th.
I don't know exactly what day we're going to end up back in Kansas, but I don't have any episodes of this broadcast recorded for next week. So I'll be taking that week off. I haven't had a week off since August, and at that time, when I took a week off, I came back on the broadcast as a brand new program called East from West.
I'm not going to be doing that again. When you come back to hear devotionals in 1st John on May the 8th, it's still going to be called When We Understand the Text, God willing. Those of you who have been with me that long, you understand the joke.
Anyway, so yes, May the 8th is when we're going to resume our study in 1st John. Thank you for letting me have this time, letting us have this time, as my wife and I kind of do this together. And we appreciate your listening to When We Understand the Text.
Today is Friday, and on most Fridays, I respond to questions from listeners. If you would like to submit a question, email is the best way to get it to us, whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com. This first question comes from Ringgold, Georgia.
I think we passed by Ringgold when we're driving through Georgia. I can't remember. I will tell you this, though. I applied for a job in Ringgold. This was about five or six years ago. I was in between the associate pastor position and senior pastor position at the church where I serve, and my wife and I were kind of wondering if the Lord was leading us to go somewhere else.
So I applied for a job in Ringgold, Georgia, though the Lord would have me stay in Junction City, Kansas. Anyway, just random fact for you there. Michelle in Ringgold, she says, Dear Pastor Gabe, I am so grateful to have found not only what videos, but also the what podcast.
So I went all the way back to the very first study in Philippians. Thank you for your faithfulness to the Word of God. Well, that's awesome. I appreciate that, Michelle. I have a personal question, and I hope that you don't mind me asking.
When you started your study in Romans, you said that you were going to shorten up the devotionals to five-minute dailies, and you were doing this so you could give more time to your family. But I've noticed that now you're going back to 20-minute devotionals.
I'm sorry if this is too personal a question and you don't have to answer if you don't want to. But I was just curious as to what changed. I think that's your wife who opens and closes every episode. So I'm sure she approves.
Yes, she does. And as a matter of fact, she listens to this to this broadcast every morning when she gets up. She listens to what her husband is is teaching about in First John. And so, yeah, this is something that that we're passionate about doing together.
And as I said, there's going to come one of these episodes, one of these days where I'm going to plug in another microphone and she's going to be sitting next to me and we're going to do this together.
She's kind of building up her courage in the meantime to do that. But yeah, here's what changed. So you're right. When I started the study in Romans, I had shortened it up to five-minute devotionals.
And now I've gone back to 20 minutes. And I said when I was shortening up the program, it was so I could spend more time on my family. I was spending too much time doing when we understand the text, the videos and the devotionals and everything else.
So what changed? Well, what changed is I eliminated the time constraints on the broadcast. When I first started doing the podcast, it was 28 minutes long. And and that was that took too much time. It just took too much time to make sure everything was to time.
It was exactly 28 minutes. I was also answering a question every episode and to come up with the questions and do that. That was taking the most of the time. So then I started doing the five-minute episodes, but I was typing all of those out.
And so I was actually investing just as much time in doing that as I am now into doing the 20-minute regular Bible studies that you're hearing day by day. When I eliminated the time constraints, no longer doing it exactly to the minute, 28 minutes long or five minutes long, it freed me up tremendously.
And and I was not having to invest as much time in making sure that everything was exactly to time. This is a habit that I had picked up from the years that I was in radio. I spent 22 years in radio and everything had to be exactly to time.
It had to be exactly 30 seconds long or exactly 60 seconds long when you're doing your spots and the programs were exactly 25 minutes long to the second or 26 minutes long or 28 minutes long. And so it was just those habits from radio that I felt like I had to do everything to time.
But then I realized, you know what, I've got no other radio stations that are picking up this program. It's folks that are just subscribing on iTunes or Podbean or wherever else. And so it doesn't matter how long it is.
And so once I stopped trying to do it to the second, then it was a lot easier to do. I was a lot more free to either do it long or short. And so once once I made that decision, I'm spending just as much time doing a 20 minute Bible study as I was doing the five minute episodes and typing all of that out to make sure that I was going to be able to stay to time.
So anyway, still still investing a lot of time in my family. As a matter of fact, I'm spending more time with my family now than I was during that period of time because I've taken Thursdays off from working at the church and I work from home.
So I'm downstairs in my study working from home and instead of being at the church, you know, five days a week or something like that, I have one day that I'm I'm here at home as well. And also I take Fridays off.
And so I'm not at the office at all, nor am I working down here in my study. So anyway, it's a genuine question. And I appreciate you asking that, Michelle. It was not it's not anything that has to be private.
And and yes, Becky does approve. All right. This next question comes from Lindsey. She says, Hi, Pastor Gabe, I started listening to your podcast and what YouTube videos a few months ago and have really enjoyed your teaching.
Thank you for your passion and commitment to solid teaching. I was raised in a Southern Baptist church, but was not taught to have a Christ centered approach to scripture. Over the last two years, God has opened my eyes and given me some discernment to realize that many of the things I was taught growing up in New Apostolic Reformation and charismatic were not biblical.
I have gained so much freedom and I am thankful for it. And I can testify that there are some Southern Baptist churches out there that lean charismatic. As a matter of fact, Stephen Furtick is one of those churches that that is closer to being New Apostolic Reformation than it is to being a sound Bible teaching church.
My question for you, Lindsey goes on. My question for you is in regards to Jewish fall feasts and festivals. I understand that Jesus fulfilled the spring feasts, Passover, unleavened bread and first fruits during his first coming.
I was raised to believe that Jesus would fulfill the fall feast during his second coming. However, if this is the case, shouldn't we as believers be observing all these feasts if we are still waiting for them to be fulfilled?
But from what I've studied, the New Testament does not advocate this. Has Christ fulfilled all of the fall feasts? If so, how? Thank you for your advice in this matter. Happy Easter, Lindsey. It was an email that she sent to me before Easter.
Is there a reason for us to have to keep any feast? And the answer is absolutely not. There is no reason for us to keep any feast, none of them. You don't even have to celebrate Christmas or Easter. It's just a Christian tradition that we do.
And so those are generally the Christian holidays that we celebrate. But there is no Jewish feast whatsoever that you need to be keeping. This from the Apostle Paul in his letter to the Colossians. He says in Colossians 2 16,.
Therefore, let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath. These are a shadow of the things to come. But the substance belongs to Christ.
All of these festivals, feasts, everything was a shadow, a type in a shadow of what was to come. The substance belongs to Christ, who fulfilled all the law and the prophets. Let no one disqualify you, insisting on asceticism and worship of angels, going on in detail about visions puffed up without reason by a sensuous mind and not holding fast to the head from whom the whole body nourished and knit together through its joints and ligaments grows with a growth that is from God.
If with Christ you have died to the elemental spirits of the world, why, as if you were still alive in the world, do you submit to regulations? Do not handle, do not taste, do not touch, referring to things that all perish as they are used according to human precepts and teachings.
These have indeed an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body, but they are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh. So I read that whole section, but but namely here, Paul says in Colossians 2 16, let no one pass judgment on you in regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath.
These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ without going through every single feast and festival and showing how Christ has fulfilled all of these things. There's the statement.
If you don't participate in any feast or festival, let no one pass judgment on you in any of those things. For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.
And so there it is quite plainly. Now, in Romans chapter 14, the the apostle Paul says that we should not argue with one another in regards to days and food and drink. So some are going to see those days as holy and they're going to celebrate those days in honor of the Lord.
Fine, if they want to do that, but but Paul does make clear in Romans 14 they're doing that because they're immature in their faith. However, we are not to quarrel over opinions, but not put a stumbling block in front of each other.
One person believes he may eat anything while the weak person eats only vegetables. Let not the one who eats despise the one who abstains and let not the one who abstains pass judgment on the one who eats.
For God has welcomed him. And then in verse five, one person esteems one day is better than another, while another esteems all days alike. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind. The one who observes the day observes it in honor of the Lord.
The one who eats eats in honor of the Lord, since he gives thanks to God, while the one who abstains abstains in honor of the Lord and gives thanks to God for none of us lives to himself and none of us dies to himself.
So let us pursue what makes for peace and for mutual upbuilding. So thank you for your question, Lindsay. These next two questions actually go along with that. This first one is anonymous. It was sent to me by a phone number.
So it's like phone number at something dot com. So I don't know who this is, but they emailed it to when we understand the text. And here's simply the question. What do I say Christian? What do I say to a Christian who condemns other Christians for celebrating a holiday like Christmas or Easter?
Well, the advice is given to us right there in Romans 14 that I that I just read. Encourage them not to quarrel over opinions. Romans 14 one. As for the one who is weak in the faith, welcome him, but not to quarrel over opinions.
If a person is quarreling over whether we should or shouldn't celebrate Christmas or Easter, they're weak in their faith, but that's not for you to to lord that over them. Don't tell them, hey, brother, you're immature and I'm more mature than you.
So you need to listen to me. That's not the way that we approach or confront those kinds of things, but rather that we realize that they're immature in their faith. And so we are patient with them, not quarreling, but helping to guide them in an understanding of the word of God in a patient and loving, compassionate manner.
Don't quarrel over days. Don't quarrel over food. Lovingly welcome one another and pursue what makes for peace. Maybe they're not peaceable in the way that they condemn others for not celebrating the days that they think that they should or shouldn't celebrate.
But you need to be peaceable. They may not be. You need to have the patience that they are not displaying. And so thus demonstrate by your actions the way that we should confront these issues lovingly with our brothers and sisters in Christ.
All right. Last question that I have here, but still going on with this same theme. This is from David in Dallas, and he says, Recently, I came across this video on YouTube. Not sure how I feel about this, but just wanted to know what your view of this is.
Did Jesus really die on Friday? Common controversy that Jesus didn't actually die on Friday, but he died on Wednesday or he died on Thursday. And there's differing opinions even concerning that. So here is a snippet from the video that David sent me.
This is a YouTube channel that is called Unlearn the Lies. The ironic thing is I watched about three or four videos, and they were all not true. So that's the irony of this particular YouTube quote unquote ministry.
But anyway, here's the guy in this video in his Unlearn the Lies series talking about Jesus being crucified on a Thursday. So first of all, he establishes that Jesus rose on Sunday. He agrees with that, but does not agree that Jesus was crucified on Friday.
And I'm going to pick up the video here.
Now that we have established that He actually rose on Sunday, the day of firstfruits, but if He died on Friday, that does not give us three days and three nights. At best this only gives us three days and two nights, Friday night and Saturday night.
But the Bible tells us that He would be buried for three days and three nights. In Matthew 12 .40, Messiah said,. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
It is impossible to get three days and three nights from Friday to Sunday. This is because He did not die on Friday. If we examine the Scriptures, we can easily determine what day He actually died. We know that Messiah was crucified on the preparation day for Passover.
John 19 .14 says,. Now it was the preparation day of the Passover, and about the sixth hour. And He said to the Jews, Behold your King. The confusion comes because the other Gospels say the preparation day for the Sabbath, and many people mistakenly assume this is referring to the regular weekly Sabbath, when it is actually referring to Passover as the Sabbath.
But John clarifies this for us. John 19 .31 says,. Therefore, because it was the preparation day, that the body should not remain on the cross on the Sabbath, for that Sabbath was a high day. The Jews asked Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away.
So, we see this is not a regular Sabbath. It was the high Sabbath, also known as Passover.
No, see, that's just incorrect. He's reading something into the text that the text doesn't say. I don't know if this guy has Hebrew roots or not, but just based on some of the videos of his that I watched, he seems to lean that way.
He had one video where he was talking about how it's still a sin to eat bacon. So, for a person who tries to adhere to Jewish tradition and custom, he doesn't understand it very well, because it's according to Jewish definition that we understand Jesus was crucified on a Friday and risen again on a Sunday.
He was not crucified on Thursday, and definitely not crucified on Wednesday. There's some even Hebrew roots tradition that tries to convince us that it was Wednesday when Jesus was crucified, which is crazy, because if you're trying to keep the statement in Matthew 12, 40, three days and three nights in the heart of the earth, if he's crucified on Wednesday, that's four nights.
So, you're still, you're way off on that one. Anyway, Chris Roseborough responded to this question, piratechristian .com, and he posted a blog about it, his captain's log. I love the name of that. He posted it about a week before Easter.
And so, here's what Roseborough writes. Now, first of all, he references Matthew 12, 40, for just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
And Roseborough says when someone quickly sums up the days and nights that Jesus was in the heart of the earth, if he died on Friday, the math just doesn't seem to add up. In order to resolve this problem, it is helpful to know that Jews do not count days according to a 24-hour time period.
They count days according to night and day cycles. This way of counting days is revealed in Genesis 1. And there was evening and there was morning the first day. There was evening and there was morning the second day.
Evening and morning the third day. On and on it goes. Note. Scripture reveals that a new day begins at sunset, not midnight. But even knowing this information doesn't totally solve the apparent contradiction.
The reason is that when you count up the days and nights that Jesus was in the heart of the earth, if he died on Friday, you come up short by one night. Friday. Jesus dies during the day. That's one day.
Saturday. Jesus is dead during the night and during the day. There's one night and now we have two days. Sunday. Jesus is dead during the night and rises shortly after sunrise. There's two nights and three days.
So right now we have a total of three days and two nights. No matter how you add it up, we're missing a night. Yet Jesus said he would be in the heart of the earth three days and three nights. Some have tried to resolve this seeming contradiction by postulating that Jesus had to die on a Wednesday and that there had to be some type of special high Sabbath brought about by that year's Passover.
This attempt at resolving the seeming contradiction is overly complex and results in an excess of days and nights, which requires one to believe that Jesus rose from the grave at twilight on Saturday night.
This explanation actually creates more contradictions than it resolves. However, the solution to the apparent contradiction is actually very simple and it's hiding in plain sight. Remember that scripture reveals that a new day begins with night.
That's all you need to remember. Now let's look at a few passages of scripture. We'll begin with Amos prophecy relating to Jesus' crucifixion day. Amos 8, 8 and 9. And on that day declares the Lord God, I will make the sun go down at noon and darken the earth in broad daylight.
Yep, you read that right. God, all the way back in the Old Testament, told us that he was going to cause on that day, the sun to go down at noon. What time of day during Jesus' crucifixion did the sun stop shining?
Answer. It was about the sixth hour noon, according to Jewish tradition. And there was darkness over the whole earth until the ninth hour, which is three o 'clock while the sun's light failed. If God caused the sun to go down at noon, and there was a darkness from 12 to three because the sun's light failed, did Jesus die at night or during the day?
Answer. Since God called the light day and the darkness he called night, the answer is obvious. Jesus died in the sunless darkness caused by God when he made the sun's light to fail at noon on that day.
God calls darkness like that night, according to Genesis 1, 5. With this data in hand, we now accurately make an accounting of the sequence of day and night, which took place on Good Friday. And here is what it looked like.
Now, here's where it gets complicated because Chris Roseborough has a graphic Friday, Saturday, Sunday, displaying night, day, night, day, so that we can see where Jesus died and where he rose from the grave.
But in short, I just summarize it for you. When we add up the days and nights, the math works out perfectly. Jesus dies during the night created by God. That's one night. And the sun resumes shining after Jesus' death one day.
Jesus is dead during the night and during the day on Saturday. Jesus is dead during the night on Sunday and rises shortly after sunrise a day, total three days and three nights, just as Jesus predicted.
The solution to the problem really is that simple. Now you can have confidence that when you attend church for a Good Friday service and you remember Jesus' bitter suffering and death on the cross for your sins, that you're doing so on the same day that he was crucified.
There's the answer to the question, David, and I appreciate you writing it. Thank you so much for listening to When We Understand the Text. Again, if you want to submit an email, our address is whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com.
Once again, I state to you, as I did on the Friday episode last week, I am grateful to every listener that we have. And I thank you so much for listening to the Bible teaching that we offer here. I'll be taking a break all this next week and we'll resume on Monday, May the 8th.
God bless.
Gabriel Hughes is the pastor of First Southern Baptist Church in Junction City, Kansas. For all of our podcasts, episodes, videos, books, and more, visit our website at www .utt .com and let your friends know about our ministry.
Join us again next week as we grow together in God's Word when we understand the text.