WWUTT 790 Q&A Reckless Love, Good Works, and Flat Earth?

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Regarding my criticism of the song Reckless Love, does the artist's explanation of the song change my mind about it at all?

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How does God work in our sanctification and does the Bible say the earth is flat? The answers to these questions when we understand the text.

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This is when we understand the text. A daily Bible study in the Word of God. For the Word of the

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Lord proves true. He is a shield for all who take refuge in Him. Tell your friends about our ministry at www .wutt

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.com. Here once again is Pastor Gabe. Thank you, Becky. You're welcome. Help us get to Atlanta.

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Please, please, please. The G3 Conference. Whoop, whoop. You can go to our website www .wutt .com,

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click on the Give tab, follow the instructions. Now, I just assume that most people are probably going to give online.

00:57

Mm -hmm. And most of the giving that we've received has come to us that way. Awesome, thank you.

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But we've also received a couple of checks. Have we really? Yes. That's awesome. So, folks have also dropped that in the mail to us.

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Aw, thanks, guys. And I appreciate that very much. Thank you, Betty. So, all of that goes to our church and then the church distributes it to us.

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So, you know, don't address it specifically to Gabe and Becky. If you do that, you can trust us. But if you send it specifically to the church and all the info is there on the website, then, you know, it's a nonprofit ministry.

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So, it's a tax deduction for you if you want to do that. And the church will be responsible with that money to make sure it's allocated in the proper way.

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So, that way, you know, it's going through the proper channels. Right. And then you can make a deduction if you choose.

01:47

I said that. You were scratching something. I was scratching. My watch was dirty. I'm sorry.

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I saw that you were looking down and fidgeting with your hand somehow. Sorry, I missed that. Normally, I catch everything.

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I was just really distracted. You were really distracted right there. You were clearly not following because I just said it like 20 seconds before.

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Well, you know, it's fresh in my mind. I am listening now because my watch is clean.

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Am I going to edit this out and make it an outtake for the end of the episode or is it just going to stay in there?

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It might stay in there. I wouldn't be surprised. Anyway, we already have our way paid and everything with the booth registration.

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I had to go ahead and submit that so we didn't lose the booth space. But that's not really in our budget to be able to do that.

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Nope. So, if you could help us out. And there's other costs that we have. It's not just paying for the booth space, but we want to put a booth together.

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Right. Also have, like, t -shirts or, you know, books. Something fun.

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Any of those things. Paying for our gas. Yes. Hotel. So, any way that you could help us out with that would be appreciated.

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And, oh, we did have a fellow that had sent us some information about putting a booth together.

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And that's what he does with his business. Oh, cool. And he wanted to be able to help us out with doing all those materials at cost.

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Aww. Rather than what we would have to pay, you know, like, if we went through the website or something like that. The embellishment. That's awesome.

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So, thank you for that extension to us. Thank you. That was very charitable. Hopefully we can come up with enough money to be able to utilize that offer.

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Yeah, that would be awesome. But, anyway, all of that online at www .utt .com.

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Nothing super fancy, just the basics. That's right. That's all we're going for. That's all we need.

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That's all we need. Yeah. Be able to meet folks at these conferences and also get the word out a little bit more.

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Put something in their hand. That's right. About when we understand the text. One of the other things I want to mention is related to the flash drives.

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So, it was a couple of months ago I had said if you want all of the what videos put on a flash drive.

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Oh, yeah. I'll upload the flash drive for you and send it back to you. Send me a self -addressed stamped envelope. Mm -hmm.

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I've returned quite a few of them. I'm sorry there are some of you that haven't received them yet.

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Uh -oh. I did not realize when I said that how much work that was going to be.

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Oh, no. And it does actually take a little while. Uh -huh. So, some of you haven't received those back yet.

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I apologize. I'm trying to get all that out soon this month so I can be completely caught up. We have also been very, very busy up until now.

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September was a real busy month. Oh, my goodness. It was crazy busy. So, I'm sorry about that and I'm trying to get back on top of that.

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It's totally my fault. I just didn't realize how much work that was going to be when I said. Yeah. I really thought

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I was doing something nice. Yeah. And simple. Hey, send us a flash drive. I'll send it back to you free.

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I won't charge you for any of that. And it was more work than I thought it was going to be. So, the reason why you haven't heard me say send a flash drive if you want all the what videos is because, well,

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I got to get caught up on what I'm on. Yeah. But then maybe after Christmas, maybe after the holiday season gets past us.

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We'll do that again. Right. Yeah. I'll have a chance to be able to do that again. But thank you for your patience. For those who have sent those flash drives.

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Thank you. And have not yet received them, I'll get them to you as soon as I possibly can.

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I'll poke them a little bit. Poke, poke. So, being Friday, we take questions from listeners.

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Yes. And those questions you can submit to us by email. Best way to get a question to us. When we understand the text at gmail .com.

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The most recent what video I've done was on the song Reckless Love by Corey Asbury.

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And it's been a couple of weeks. So, it's been a while since I've done a video. It kind of gives you an idea how busy

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I've been. Of course, I'm trying to finish a book, too. You are. I want to get the book out this month.

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25 Christmas Myths and What the Bible Says. And I want to put, like, teasers out of what's in the book.

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But I kind of feel like if I do that, I want to be able to put a link on there. Click here to get the book. Right.

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So, you won't get to see the teasers until the book is done. So, I'm working on that right now as well.

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That's why I haven't been able to do a video in a while. But the Reckless Love video had some interesting responses.

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Oh. To no one's surprise. Because I believe, as it was mentioned last week when we were talking about music, people really love their music.

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They do. They do indeed. They're not real happy when you criticize the songs that they love so much.

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No. So, a lot of people love this song, Reckless Love by Corey Asbury. Because they're emotionally attached to it.

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That's true. So, you're kind of digging at them, and that hurts. Yeah, there's an emotional investment there.

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There is. Yes, most definitely. I feel like my heart's being expressed in this song. Yes. So, when you criticize the song, you're criticizing me.

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That's right. Don't judge me. So, I'm going to go ahead and play the video. Sorry. I'm criticizing the song, but you're going to say, don't judge me.

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Right. Yes. So, I'm going to play the video, and then we got a lot of comments about it.

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But I think that this one email that I'm going to read here is the most balanced, without being too terribly critical.

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Okay. And I'm able to respond to the concerns expressed in this email, and hopefully this responds to everybody who has written in about the song.

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So, here's the video that was done about the song Reckless Love. There's a popular

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Christian song entitled Reckless Love, sung by Corey Asbury of Bethel Church in Redding, California.

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The first verse goes like this. Before I spoke a word, you were singing over me. You have been so, so good to me.

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Before I took a breath, you breathed your life in me. You have been so, so kind to me.

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So far, or should I say, so, so far, the song is all right. Psalm 139 .4

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says that before a word is on my tongue, O Lord, you know it all together. Romans 2 .4 says that God shows his kindness toward us to lead us to repentance.

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But then we get to the chorus where he sings. Oh, the overwhelming, never -ending reckless love of God.

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Uh, what? The love of God is reckless? A word that means without thinking or caring about the consequences of an action?

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Not only is that an unbiblical description of God's love, the artist contradicted himself. In the first verse, he's saying, before I spoke a word and before I took a breath, you were good and kind to me.

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But then he sings that God's love is thoughtless and careless. The Bible says that God chose his elect before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him.

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In love, he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace.

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That's not reckless. That's foreordained. Don't sing this reckless fluff. Praise God for who the

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Bible says he is when we understand the text. Okay, so this question comes from Kenneth related to that song.

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All right. And he says, allow me to preface this email with two points. Number one, I understand that the format of what can make it difficult to go in -depth on any particular topic.

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Number two, I'm not attempting to be argumentative or raise any points for debate. I'm just genuinely curious about the questions

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I'm asking. With that out of the way, I have two questions regarding your latest video on the song

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Reckless Love by Corey Asbury. Number one, I've seen the video of Asbury telling the story behind the song.

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Or I'm sorry, have you seen the video? No, I had never watched Asbury explain this song.

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I think it would be unfortunate not to address the story in any way, given that it is one of the top results when searching for reckless love on YouTube.

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As of this writing, it is the second result. The story starts about five minutes, 57 seconds into this video.

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Yeah, the first six minutes of this video is the song. All right.

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So skipping past all of that, then it gets to Corey Asbury doing his explanation of the song, which we're going to play in just a moment.

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Okay. Number two, Kenneth says, are you familiar with John Piper's analysis of the song?

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In particular, where he analyzes an older, older in this case, meaning widely accepted, song along the same lines to demonstrate consistency.

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In closing, I'd like to thank you for all the videos that you make. It's really great being able to reference bite -sized videos on important theological topics that don't require seminary to understand.

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Well, wait for the book, 25 Christmas Myths, and you'll wish you had gone to seminary to understand it. I'm just kidding.

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It's been a crazy amount of research to put this book together. That's all I'm saying. So there have been some books that I've had to read that are real heady.

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Yeah. And I have to kind of bring it down to - To my level. Okay. There you go. Yeah. Becky gets tested on all the chapters that I finish in this book.

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So if she can understand it - Then I know that you'll be able to understand it. Well, I'm a lay on the plane kind of person. That's right. So you just got to break it down for me, bare minimum, and just give it to me as it is.

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And if you're doing too many circles above my head, it's like you lost me.

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That's right. All right. We're quite a rabbit trail here. We've gotten off topic. Yes. So what

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I want to do here in response to Kenneth's question is I want to play Corey Asbury's explanation of the song

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Reckless Love. Okay. We'll see how much time that takes. If I'm able to do that in a timely enough manner, then

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I'll get to John Piper's analysis of the song. If I don't, I'm going to explain to you why

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I don't see it as being that important. But I do have another couple of questions today that I want to get to. So I don't just want to talk about Reckless Love on this whole episode of this podcast.

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So anyway, here is Corey Asbury. I want to read this scripture to us.

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Is that a Luke 15? Sometimes people get confused by it.

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Okay. So maybe I should have prefaced this a little bit more. So he's going to start by reading the parable of the lost sheep in Luke 15.

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Okay. Because part of the lyric of the song talks about that, you know, leaving the one or leaving the 99 to find the one.

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I almost did that backwards. So I'm going to let him go ahead and read through the whole parable.

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Okay. And then I'm going to jump in at the end. And it's kind of funny there where he said coming into the parable, he said some people misunderstand this.

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Yeah, he doesn't get the point of the parable either. All right. So here we go. I feel like the

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Lord's all over it tonight. I want to read it to us. Says now the text collectors and sinners.

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We're all gathering around to hear Jesus. The Pharisees and teachers of the law mutter.

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This man welcomes the sinners and eats with them. Religious people are mad. It sets the stage and Jesus pipes up.

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He told them this parable. So suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them.

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Doesn't he leave the 99 in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it.

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And after he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders and he goes home.

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He calls his friends. He calls his neighbors together and says, rejoice with me because I found my lost sheep.

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And I tell you that in the same way, there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over 99 righteous people who don't.

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So remember, when he started reading that, he said, I feel like we're kind of confused by this. Right. And Corey Asbury is a little confused by this.

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Right. In Luke chapter 15, there are three parables, but there's only two of them that really get any recognition.

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Okay. So the first parable is the parable of the lost sheep, which is verses three through seven.

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And then, of course, the most famous parable is the parable of the prodigal son. Right. Which, by the way,

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I think is misnamed. We give it that name. That term prodigal son actually doesn't even appear in the

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Bible. Oh, that's true. So we're the ones that have named that parable that way.

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But that's not actually the name. I like Votie Backham's take on it. He said it should be called the parable of the older brother.

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Right. Because that's who the parable is addressing. Yeah, put the focus on where it should be. That's right.

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So let's go back to the start of chapter 15, where it says, Now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to hear him, to listen to Jesus.

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And the Pharisees and the scribes grumbled, saying, This man receives sinners and eats with them.

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So Jesus told them this parable. So these three parables are in response to the

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Pharisees grumbling. And the point of the parables is this. In every one of these parables, there's rejoicing.

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Right. The shepherd finds his lost sheep. He rejoices. The woman finds her lost coin.

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She rejoices and gets her friends together to rejoice. The shepherd gets his friends together and they rejoice.

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Right. The father loses his son. He comes back and he throws a big party.

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Right. And there's rejoicing. But the older brother. See, there's a figure that we have in that third parable that we don't have in the previous two.

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Right. There's an older brother who's upset at all this rejoicing. And he goes, Hang on a second.

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I've always done everything right. And you don't throw a party for me. Right. And so the point of this is supposed to be that the

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Pharisees, who are of the children of Israel, they're the descendants of Abraham, they're included in God's invitation to join his kingdom and celebrate in the righteousness that we have received in Christ.

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Not a righteousness that we receive by our works. Right. But that we have our sins forgiven in Jesus Christ.

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Amen. The Pharisees are part of that inheritance if they would follow

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Jesus. And everything that belongs to God would belong to them also if they were followers of Christ.

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That's right. But instead, they're choosing to grumble and complain. Right. They're not rejoicing. They're grumbling.

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Grumble. Grumble, grumble. Grumble, grumble. So the subject of this is more about the

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Pharisees than it is about the sinners and the tax collectors. Right. The Pharisees should be celebrating that the sinners and the tax collectors are coming to listen to Jesus.

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Right. They're hearing the word of God. But they're not. The sinners are being saved. The Pharisees should rejoice over this.

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But no, they're not. They're thinking, hey, I deserve more than they're getting. Right. So why am

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I not getting that? This reminds me of the quote that I posted just the other day from Burt Parsons where he said, the legalist wants to glorify himself.

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The Christian wants to glorify God. And so the Pharisees, they desire themselves to be glorified.

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Yes. Okay. Why isn't there more recognition on me? Right. Why are we rejoicing over these lost sinners?

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So that's the point of the parable. But the squishy touchy feeliness of the lost sheep, that's where Corey Asbury puts himself.

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It's fine to know that you were lost and now you are found. But there's other texts that talk about that.

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Oh, yeah. The context of Luke 15 verses 3 through 7 is specifically about rejoicing over those who are found and not being like the older brother.

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Who thinks I deserve more. Beware becoming like the older brother.

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That's the point of Luke 15. Right. Matthew 6 1 says, beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them.

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For then you will have no reward from your father who is in heaven. Amen. Yeah. All right.

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More of Corey's explanation of the song Reckless Love here. Man, he's that good.

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I want to just read a couple of thoughts. Just share a little bit of the story behind the song. And then we'll sing that bridge one more time.

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And we'll go nuts. We'll see what happens. So when I use the phrase, the reckless love of God, when we say it, we're not saying that God himself is reckless.

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He's not crazy. We are, however, saying that the way he loves is in many regards quite so.

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What I mean is this. He's utterly unconcerned with the consequences of his actions with regard to his own safety, comfort, and well -being.

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Right. That's the definition of reckless. And that's exactly what I said. We're not saying

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God is reckless, but just that his love is. And then he goes on to explain that God is reckless.

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Yeah. If he was reckless, why? I mean, what is there to lean on?

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What is there to have comfort in or peace or anything? Because it's all haphazard.

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Right. It's all just by chance. Right. Which, by the way, in this explanation, he actually uses that word.

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Oh. He actually talks about this being by chance. Oh. No. Yeah. There's no safety or comfort or anything that the

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Bible promises us from God that if he's haphazard and by chance about.

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No. Yeah. There's nothing to take refuge in. There's nothing secure. Nothing secure there.

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So Kenneth is not the only one that sent me this video. Okay. And said, have you seen

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Corey Asbury's explanation of this? He's just the only one who did it the nicest way possible.

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Oh. Well, thank you. Yeah. Thank you, Kenneth. But when I watched the explanation from some people who were like, no, you're wrong about this song.

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Did you watch Corey Asbury's explanation? Right. I was going, yeah, it's worse. Yeah. It's way worse than the song.

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I don't know. I mean, maybe it's the ambiance or whatever, but I just don't understand. Well, yeah, that's what it's all about at Bethel Church.

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Right. It's creating atmosphere. Getting people to stir them up to a certain emotional response.

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And that's why he uses the song. Oh, okay. Is that why his voice is all shaky and stuff, too?

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Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. And oh, boy, this has been great. Okay. I don't mean to make fun of it. It just gives that extra, like,

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I'm supposed to make you feel extra about this. And what you don't see because you're not watching the video is that Kim Walker -Smith is on stage and also

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Bill Johnson's daughter or two of the other singers that are up there on stage.

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Okay. They're both heretics. And I've used quotes from both of them in previous What videos about how they just don't get it.

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They don't understand God. They don't understand what the scripture says about God. Yeah. They don't get it at all.

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Kim Walker -Smith is the one who said, you know, I was praying and Jesus came up behind me and tapped me on the shoulder.

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Oh, okay. And I turned around and I saw God the Father. Yeah. It's like, no, you didn't. Who are you, Joseph Smith? Anyway, what was

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I going to say now? That's a whole other rabbit trail. Yeah, I know. Well, he claimed that, you know, the

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God the Father appeared to him. That's a whole other rabbit trail. Anyway, I can't remember what

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I was going to say. So let's continue on with Corey Asbury's explanation. His love isn't crafty or slick.

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It's not cunning or shrewd. In fact, all things considered, it's quite shot like. And might

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I even suggest sometimes downright ridiculous. Oh, hey, I remember what I was going to say now.

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Oh. I was going to say he's going to use a bunch of words to describe

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God's love that are really just touchy -feely and not actually straight from Scripture. Because that's what he did right there.

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He's like, oh, yeah, that's what I was going to say. Yes. So he says that God's love is childlike.

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Yeah. Again, I just don't take comfort and security in the fact that all of those descriptions.

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I don't know. Jesus said that we need to have. Yes. A childlike faith.

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God is not childlike in his loving. He's a father. Right. And that's why it's not adding up.

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Yeah. I don't know. It's totally leaving the description that we have given from Scripture.

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And Corey's just saying what he feels like he wants to say. And this is why

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Bethel Church has fallen into many of the heretical statements that they have made.

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And I'm not the only one that's pointed that out. I mean, Costi Hinn, Justin Peters. Yeah. There was even an article that was written by Nine Marks earlier this year in which they pointed out statements that Bill Johnson has made that are heretical descriptions of the

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Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. So they are heretical right down to the core of the fundamentals of their doctrines.

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It's not just that they're saying things that's like, oh, that's kind of off. I get why you could kind of say it that way.

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But that's not really what the Bible says. No, they do this with such consistency that it's heresy that comes out of Bethel Church.

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It's not just a difference of interpretation. Right. They're wrong in the way that they explain

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God. So everything that they say about God, whether you could excuse it as, well, okay, that's your opinion.

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And I wish you would stick with Scripture, but I get why you think of it that way. Even those descriptions come from a heretical base.

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So it's all bad. Dismiss all of it, which is why it bugs me so much when somebody will take a song that comes out of Bethel like Reckless Love.

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And they'll try to say, well, these parts are okay. No, it's all bad. Right. Because even from the fundamental level of what they say, because one of the things

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Corey is going to say here in just a moment is Jesus died on the cross for our sins. Yeah, of course, that's true.

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Right. But when you go to Bethel's explanation of what that means, it's not orthodox. Well, it's kind of like baking a cake with bad eggs.

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I mean. It looks like a cake. It looks like a cake. It may taste like a cake. But you're going to get salmonella.

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Exactly. Your stomach is going to be rotten after. It's going to be really terrible. Okay. And once again,

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I've forgotten what I was going to say. Sorry. But that's okay. Probably need to go back to his explanation on this anyway.

24:54

His love bankrupted heaven for you, for me. His love doesn't consider himself first.

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It isn't selfish or self -serving. He doesn't wonder what he'll gain or lose by putting himself on the line.

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He simply puts himself out there on the off chance that you and I might look back at him and give him that love in return.

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God does not need our love. Doesn't need us. He does not need us, period.

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And there you have him saying on the off chance that he will love us in return. No. That we will love him in return.

25:29

Yeah. On the off chance that we'll love him in return. Yeah. You said that backwards. Oh, what did

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I say? That he will love us. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. So he says he simply puts himself out there on the off chance that you and I might look back at him and give him that love in return.

25:44

No. See, that term, off chance, is even worse than the term chance. No joke.

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Because off chance means something that may be possible, but not likely. Oh, guys, don't fall for this.

25:58

Seriously. Yeah. So he's saying, well, I'm going to go ahead and die for them. They may not love me in return, but I'm going to do it anyway.

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And that's not what we have in Scripture at all. No. It was prophesied. It was done in fulfillment of what

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God had prophesied through his prophets. Yeah. It was all foreordained by the sovereign hand of God.

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Nothing was ever out of his control. And it was all for the purpose of accomplishing something. It was to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.

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And this was all under God's sovereign plan. Even to the point of putting

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Pontius Pilate and Herod together with the Romans and the

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Christ, put him to death Jew and Gentile together, the crucifixion of the son of God, the most heinous evil that has ever been perpetrated by mankind.

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Right. But yet this was by God's sovereign hand to bring about the salvation of his elect chosen from before the foundation of the world that we might believe in him.

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According to his plan and purpose, to the praise of his glorious grace.

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Amen. To the glory of God, the father, Philippians 2 11. So all of this was very purposeful and intentional.

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It's not by accident. And it's certainly not on the off chance that somebody might actually end up loving him as a result of this.

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Oh, if it were up to me, I would not love him at all. I would love myself precisely. And no left up to us.

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We're not going to reciprocate his love. So anyway, before we get too far on our rant.

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Yes, sorry. I'm getting a little worked up here. His love leaves the 99 to find the one every time to many practical adults.

27:52

That's a foolish concept. But what if he loses the 99 and finding the one right?

27:57

What if finding that one lost sheep is and will always be supremely important?

28:03

Yeah. So again, he clearly doesn't understand the parable of the lost sheep. No. So because he gives this explanation.

28:10

Well, what if he loses the 99 to go find the one that doesn't matter to him? He's going to go after the one every time.

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What wasn't even mentioned in the parable. Jesus said in John 10, my sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow me.

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I give them eternal life and they will never perish and no one will snatch them out of my hand.

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My father who has given them to me is greater than all and no one is able to snatch them out of my father's hand.

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I and the father are one. And I'm not trying to connect that with the parable. I'm saying that in response to what

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Corey Asbury just said. Yeah. Well, what if what if he loses the 99? No, he won't lose the 99.

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Maybe that's how he's looking at the lost sheep is that the lost sheep was saved and then was gone. But who knows who knows what they're thinking whenever Bethel church guys say anything.

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I'm not. That's the best I could come up with. His love isn't cautious. It's a love that sent his own son to die a gruesome death on a cross.

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There's no plan B with the love of God. He gives his heart so completely so preposterously that if refused, we would think it irreparably broken.

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Yet he gives himself away again and again and again and again time and time again.

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Roman 610 for the death. He died. He died to sin once for all but the life he lives.

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He lives to God and then Hebrews 727. He has no need like those high priests to offer sacrifices daily.

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First for his own sins and then for those of the people since he did this once for all when he offered up himself.

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So I don't understand what he's trying to get at with. He does this again and again and again and again time and time again.

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I don't know if he's meeting it from an extremely, you know, Arminian standpoint of well, he puts himself out there and we reject him and we break his heart, but he just continues to do it over and over again.

30:03

I don't know. But if that's his explanation, if that's what he's trying to say, then he's trying to ascribe a human view of love to God, right?

30:12

Which is not the way God loves, right? So, yeah, projecting our feelings onto God, trying to humanize

30:18

God, right? But my saying that they would say I'm the one putting God in a box. Yes, don't put

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God in a box. Yeah. Anyway, make no mistake. Our sins do pain as hard and 70 times seven is a lot of times to get your heart broken.

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And yet he opens up and allows us back in every single time. His love saw you when you hated him and all logic said, they'll reject me.

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He said, no, I don't care what it costs me. I lay my life on the line as long as I get their hearts to make it personal.

30:49

Penny for your thoughts, babe. We haven't gotten personal yet. Becky's got her eyes closed.

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She's, she's trying not to, you're trying to keep a poker face with your eyes closed. Well, you know, she's not going to share with you what she's really thinking.

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I don't think probably not. All right. Are you ready?

31:13

Can you finish this? I think we got like 20 seconds left or something here.

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Okay. I'll tap through it. His love saw me broken down kid with regret as deep as the ocean.

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My innocence and youth poured out like water and he found me and he put me on his shoulders and he carried me on.

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Cause he's just that good. He's just that kind. He's a father that never gives up.

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So as we sing this bridge and chorus one more time, just let it, let it break down those walls.

31:54

Next question, please. So in doing this, I, you know, somebody is surely upset by us making fun of the fact that a guy is pouring out his heart.

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But I, I think that you're being a little naive. Generous. You're being generous.

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Yeah. Okay. Like give it. Yeah. But I'm saying that all of this is put together to elicit an emotional response, right?

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That's why Bethel church is doing this. So if you're sympathizing with him doing that and you're upset at us for critiquing the fact that what he's saying is contrary to what the scripture says, then you've, you know, been pulled into this emotional wooing that they are doing with the music and the lights and the sound.

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And there's women on stage swaying back and forth with their eyes closed, just listening to him talk.

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Cause this is all supposed to be spiritual and meditative. And, and if somebody's pouring out their hearts like you can't criticize their heart, well, yeah,

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I can. I can because he's on the stage at a church. Yeah. He is leading people.

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He is preaching and he is not saying stuff from the Bible. He's saying what he feels, which is fine.

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If he's not on the stage, then you can talk with him about that and correct him. But he's on the stage.

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He's leading all these people to understand nonsense about God. Most of that.

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He was reading from his phone. What? There was a point where he put it down and he, he was reading these thoughts.

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That's what he said in the beginning. Right. There was a part where he put his phone down and then he was just kind of speaking off the cuff, but these were, they were meditated.

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These were prepared thoughts. Yeah. They weren't from the scripture though. They weren't.

33:40

Right. And he would, he would say things in there like, you know, he, he forgives us 77 times or something.

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Seven times, 77 times, seven. Right. He would pull little things in there like that that comes from the scriptures, but he would not have tested the comments that he was making.

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He, they were thought out, they were written out, but he didn't test them against the scriptures because a lot of what he was saying didn't line up with the scriptures.

34:07

Right. And then he would try to qualify by saying, I don't mean this, but what I mean is this. Okay. Well, that explanation was just as bad as what you said the first time.

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Just as confusing, just as bad, just as it's just not what the

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Bible tells us. God is. The scriptures tell us not to go beyond what is written. So even if somebody wants to take the song reckless love and say, well, can't we sing relentless love or whatever?

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If you're driving in your car and you want to sing that fine. I don't think this song should be sung in churches at all because it's

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Bethel church. They're, they're heretics. And to sing that in your church and to lead a person to find out where that song came from.

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I mean, it says it on their CDs. You get Corey Asbury's CD. It says Bethel church. Right.

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And they have a logo on there and everything. So they find out about this church. They start looking into the doctrine.

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They think it's okay because your church was singing it. We should not be singing these songs from these guys at all.

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It does not come from orthodoxy. When you try to break down what it is that they actually believe, all we find is garbage.

35:14

I thank you for your question, Kenneth, and I thank you for presenting it so charitably as well. The second part of your question was, are you familiar with John Piper's analysis of the song, but I'm not going to go through it word for word like I did with Corey Asbury's explanation.

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And the reason is because John Piper tends to be really, really charitable with this stuff.

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Even like when Joel Osteen says something and people start going, oh, well that's terrible.

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That's heresy. What Osteen says and Piper will go, but is it really? He, he gives them too much.

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I think whenever John Piper will break down statements like this. So I, I don't really want to go into his explanation of reckless love because again, the song needs to be discarded.

35:56

It shouldn't be used and it shouldn't be sung in your church. So for Piper to apologize for it is unnecessary.

36:05

This comes from Russ. And he says, when a person has been saved, they confirm their faith by obedience.

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If they do not obey the commands of Christ, they're still dead in their sins. This is what

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James meant when he said faith without works is a dead faith. James 2, 26. What are the commands of Christ?

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While works are not part of any justification, are they part of sanctification?

36:32

Thank you, Russ, for your question. So Jesus said in John 14, 15, you will show me that you love me when you obey my commands.

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Right? So what are the commands of Christ that we're supposed to be obeying to demonstrate the love that we have for God?

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Well, it's everything that he said in the whole Bible. So Genesis to revelation.

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Now, of course, there's a certain context in which we're meant to understand certain commands. Like for example, let's just, let's just take the fourth commandment.

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For example, you will honor the Sabbath and you will keep it holy. Now, if you come from the reformed Baptist persuasion, you believe in the continual

37:09

Sabbath, that there is a Sabbath day that we're still supposed to be keeping. And that day is

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Sunday. When Jesus rested in the tomb on Saturday and he rose from the grave on Sunday, the

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Sabbath went from being Saturday to Sunday. So on that day, we still keep the Sabbath. But I don't believe that.

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I don't believe in a perpetual Sabbath. I believe that all the laws pertaining to the Sabbath were fulfilled in Christ.

37:32

We've talked about that in a different podcast. I'm not going to go into that again, but that's, but that's just to say there's a certain context in which we understand that command.

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And so we, so likewise, there's going to be some other commands in the old Testament, like related to dietary laws and things like that.

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Right. These were ceremonial in context. Like we don't sacrifice anymore. Right. So we don't have the sacrificial system anymore.

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All of that was fulfilled in Christ. Right. So there are certainly some things that we recognize in context, and we understand them differently now on this side of the cross.

38:04

Amen. Then they were understood on the other side of the cross. Right. We need to have that in mind since we have the word of God more fully confirmed old

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Testament and new Testament together. But nonetheless, that doesn't mean like you go through the list of 10 commandments that there's no reason for us to ignore.

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I am the Lord, your God, you will have no other gods before me. Right. Or don't murder. Right. Honor your father and your mother.

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All of these are commands. Right. Well, yes. Right. He repeated these in the new

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Testament. Like you take Mark 10, for example, when the rich young ruler came to him and said, what must

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I do to have eternal life? What Jesus starts going through with him are the 10 commandments. Right. So Jesus repeated these things.

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They are the commands of Christ. It's not that Jesus gave us something completely different than what we have in the old

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Testament. So we can unhitch ourselves from the old Testament. Right. But, but everything is the word of God.

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Genesis to revelation is the word of God. This is all from Christ. It's not just, he showed up Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John is all that we have to pay attention to.

39:08

Oh yeah. And then what his apostles said in the epistles, that's all that we have to obey. Right. We're certainly going to get confirmation of what we read in the old

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Testament through what the apostles repeat in the new Testament. Like for example, in Ephesians chapter six,

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Paul comes back to that fifth commandment. You will honor your father and your mother.

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And this is the first commandment with a promise that it may go well with you. And you may live long in the land that God, your father is giving to you.

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So, so there, there's, you know, those commandments from the old Testament that get repeated in the new

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Testament. Of course, we're supposed to be keeping those. It helps us to understand the old Testament better as, as Votie Bacchum has said,

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I think I've quoted him twice now. Haven't I? Yes. As Votie Bacchum has said, we understand the old

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Testament when we read what the new Testament writers say about it. So they help us to understand the old Testament.

40:00

Right. And in the new Testament, you don't have a command to keep the Sabbath. It isn't there. So, you know, that's just kind of coming back to that particular law.

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We understand it a different way now, because all of the laws pertaining to the Sabbath have been fulfilled in Christ, but all of it is the law of Christ.

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You can't say I love Christ, but this whole thing about not coveting, you know, can't

40:24

I covet a little bit? Right. Well, then you wouldn't be, you wouldn't be obeying the law of Christ.

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So if we love Christ, we will confirm that love that we have for Christ. It's verified in the fact that we live holy lives that are pleasing unto

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God. Romans 12, one present your bodies as a living sacrifice unto the Lord.

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And this is your spiritual act of worship with everything that we are and all that we do.

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We demonstrate the love of God in obedience to his commandments.

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If we trust God, then we're going to obey him. Right. And we'll, we'll show that in our very lives.

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Right. The person who doesn't love God is not going to obey his commandments. It doesn't mean that obeying his commandments leads to justification.

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Just as Russ said, works are not part of any justification. Well, not our works anyway. Right. The work of God certainly is.

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Right. The second part of his question is, are works part of our sanctification only in terms of confirmation, not necessarily in terms of we do something to make ourselves holy.

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Right. God is the one who makes us holy. Right. He is the one that is working in justification and also sanctification.

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Our works are merely verifying that God is working in us to make us more holy and shape us more into the image of Christ.

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And judge them by their fruit. Exactly. Right. And then we can judge them by the fruit that we see demonstrated in their lives.

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Matthew 7 20, I believe is the reference there. So in Philippians chapter one, Paul said to the Philippians, I am confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will be faithful to complete it on the day of Christ.

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So God didn't just bring you to justification and left it up to you for your sanctification.

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He's also the one who sanctifying you, the works that you do verify that you are being sanctified in Christ, as well as the fact that you've been justified in Christ.

42:20

Right. So thank you for your question, Russ. This next one comes from Steven. Here's our last question. I forgot about this question.

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And I want to apologize in advance for not doing the what video on a flat earth.

42:32

I still haven't gotten to that yet. Oh, because remember, I know, because remember I said that a few weeks back. You did.

42:38

Yeah. Yes. So Steven has a question about that very thing. I wanted to start off by saying

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I'm a big fan and I support the work that you guys do. Continue to glorify the name of Jesus Christ through your work.

42:50

Thank you. One thing that it seems many people are talking about now, especially within Christendom is the concept of flat earth.

42:57

Many people say that the Bible clearly teaches a flat earth. They cite passages such as this one in Job.

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It is he who sits above the circle of the earth and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers who stretches out the heavens like a curtain and spreads them like a tent to dwell in.

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They say circle here literally means a flat circle. Others say this is not true.

43:17

And this passage is poetic. This is one I'm currently struggling through and would appreciate your take on it.

43:24

You often bring in interesting views and references that I did not consider solely day.

43:30

Oh, Gloria, Steven. Well, first of all, Steven there's nothing in the Bible that says the earth is flat. There's just misinterpretations of passages believing that the

43:39

Bible is saying that the earth is flat. So for example, let me see if I can pull out another one.

43:46

Another one from the book of Job, Job 26, seven, he spreads out the Northern skies over empty space.

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He suspends the earth over nothing. So they say somehow that means the earth is flat.

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Okay. I don't know how, but somehow that's what they get. So let's see.

44:06

Oh, Job 37, three, he unleashes his lightning beneath the whole heaven and sends it to the ends of the earth.

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Well, how could the earth have an end? If it's round, it has to be a description of the earth being flat.

44:21

If God is sending his lightning to the end of the earth. Okay. So you get how they would interpret that as okay. But, but again, a lot of, a lot of what we describe related to the earth is simply from our perspective or vantage point.

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Right? For example, all of us say, whether we believe in a round earth or a flat earth, all of us say,

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Hey, I saw the sunrise this morning. I saw the sunset. Well, no, you didn't see the sunrise of the sunset.

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Right. The earth turned and the sun moved across the sky, according to the earth turning.

44:56

Right. But we're still describing it according to our vantage point. Right. It's what we perceive and what we see according to where we're standing.

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So it appears as if the earth or the sun is rising and then the sun is setting or the moon is rising.

45:10

And it also appears that the earth is the center of the universe because everything goes around us. Right. It looks like everything's going around us.

45:17

Right. Which is also not true. Oh, that's a thing too. Oh yeah.

45:22

There are people that believe that too. Oh yeah. In fact, I'm going to pick on Fred Butler. So he sent me a website where he was showing me all the stuff about flat earth.

45:31

It was the last time we mentioned this a few weeks ago. So he sent me this website and he said, this is fun because it's this guy that goes through all this flat earth myth stuff and showing according to science, according to what we can observe standing on planet earth, proof that the earth is round and not flat.

45:46

Okay. But then as you keep reading through that guy's website, it's very clear that he believes in geo -centrism, that everything is revolving around the earth.

45:54

Oh. Rather than the earth revolving around the sun. Okay. And so I replied to Fred because I'm like,

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Fred doesn't believe in geo -centrism. Does he? So I asked him about that and he's like, you know,

46:08

I totally didn't even get that. He gets to that point on the website because apparently there wasn't a point where he had all of that explanation in there related to geo -centrism.

46:17

He added it later. Oh, okay. So, but I had to pick on Fred for that because he sent me this site about geo -centrism.

46:23

Poor Fred. Yes. He can't use that one anymore. Bummer. Oh, this one,

46:30

I've heard this one used before too. So Matthew 4, 8, the devil took Jesus to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor.

46:39

Oh, right. So that must mean that the earth is flat because they got to a place high enough that they could see all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor.

46:49

Let me ask you this. Where is that high point on the earth that you can go to and see all the kingdoms of the world?

46:55

That's what I was wondering too. Yeah. Yeah. Clearly that means something else or that this was put in like a spiritual perspective rather than literally taking

47:04

Jesus to the highest mountain so that they could see every kingdom on earth. Psalm 104, five.

47:11

He set the earth on its foundations. It can never be moved. This, this one's very popular and this is probably one of the most common revelation seven, one.

47:19

After this, I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth. Oh, right.

47:24

Holding back the four winds of the earth to prevent any wind from blowing on the land or on the sea or any tree.

47:30

So see, the earth must be flat because it has four corners. Right. But let me ask you this. How can the earth be flat with four corners?

47:37

If it's also round, according to job, it's either a flat disc or it's a flat square, right?

47:43

It's, it's like, what is it? Pick, pick your poison. Right. A flat earthers.

47:50

Which one is it going to be? Four corners of the earth simply means North, Southeast and West. That's all it means.

47:56

It means that it came from all directions, right? And not one particular direction. So anyway, yeah, there, people will take these verses out of context and use them to explain that the earth is flat.

48:07

And even according to the Bible, the earth is flat, but it's not. In fact, it is a scientific impossibility that the earth is flat and we can observe that from nature, very simply just looking up into the heavens.

48:22

Every body that we look at into the heavens is round and not just round. It's spherical, right?

48:29

You know, there are periods in history in which people will say, well, the church used to believe that the earth is flat and they taught it from scripture.

48:35

Not true. There has never been a time in history. In fact, everything that we glean from scripture indicates that the writers of the

48:44

Bible understood that the earth was suspended in space. According to what we have in Job, that it is round.

48:51

Also, according to what's described in Job and David in Psalm eight, even looks into the depths of the heavens.

48:57

Right? So it's not just that he's looking at all these sparkly things in the sky like Ptolemy did.

49:02

And Ptolemy is just kind of trying to point, you know, with his finger and he counts, you know, 1500 stars.

49:08

So that's what he concluded was in the universe. Jeremiah says the stars in the sky are uncountable, right?

49:14

We cannot count the stars in the sky. And even to this day, as scientists theorize, how many stars are in the universe, they still haven't come up with an exact number.

49:24

Right? So Jeremiah and what we have in the scripture is still true. Yeah. Where everybody's other worldly and naturalistic claims are constantly changing.

49:34

The Bible remains true on every aspect of scientific discovery.

49:40

Astronomer and physicist, Robert Jastrow wrote a book entitled God and the astronomers.

49:47

And he concluded his book with this famous line for the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason.

49:56

The story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountains of ignorance. He is about to conquer the highest peak as he pulls himself over the final rock.

50:07

He is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries.

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Shall we pray? Yes. Let's our great God and heavenly father.

50:20

We thank you for the kindness that you have shown to us in your son, Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us that we might be forgiven our sins redeemed from all lawlessness, purifying for himself, a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.

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And I pray that the things that we do would be honorable and pleasing to you that we would delight to worship

50:47

God with all that we are and everything that we do, giving praise to your name and with all the saints singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, making melody in our hearts to God, our hearts, which have been filled with the word of Christ.

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Help us to know you and worship you. According to what you have said about yourself in your word that we submit to your word, love and cherish your word, not try to impose our own words onto what you have said, but humbling ourselves under the great authority of God and what you have proclaimed over us in your son,

51:27

Jesus Christ, that we would not be ashamed of these words to read them, to apply them, to live them out.

51:34

And then also to share them, to proclaim them to the world, that others may hear the gospel of Jesus Christ and turn from their sin and be saved.

51:44

Continue to work in us this salvation with fear and trembling as we remain steadfast, holding true to the word that has been given to us regarding the day of the

51:58

Lord and the kingdom that we will inherit on the day of his coming. And we pray these things in Jesus name.

52:05

Amen. Yeah. He explained it to me.

53:12

I don't remember what it meant now. It wasn't, it wasn't as emo as that looks.

53:20

Okay. Do I need to move that closer to me? Yeah, you do. The kids have been playing with it.

53:34

What? Not our children. Definitely. Text a daily

53:40

Bible study. Text a daily

53:46

Bible study. Text a daily Bible study. This is when we understand the text, a daily

53:53

Bible study in the word of God for the word of the Lord. For the word. Oh my goodness.

53:59

The war. What did I say? I don't know. That was weird. I got to go over here for a second. What? Bye.

54:06

Uh, babe. Come back. All right. I'm coming back here.

54:11

The creaking chair. I couldn't even record. Hang on.

54:20

Where's the passage I need to go to Luke 15. All right. Hang on. Hang on.

54:25

Hang on. Hang on. Hang on. Hang on. Hang on. Hang on. Hang on. Hang on. Hang on. Hang on. Hang on. Hang on. All right. Ready?

54:32

Go. This is when we understand the text, a daily Bible study in the word of God for the word of the

54:38

Lord proves true He is a shield for all who make, who take refuge in Him.