WWUTT 2310 Q&A Parenting, Grounding, Bonhoeffer, Mary, The Chosen

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Is Dietrich Bonhoeffer's book on discipleship any good? What is grounding and is it something

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Christians can partake in? And can we be entertained by Bible movies and shows even when they aren't accurate?

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The answers to these questions, when we understand the text. This is

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When We Understand The Text, a daily Bible commentary in the word of Christ. He who became sin, who knew no sin, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.

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Tell your friends about our ministry at www .wutt .com. And once again, it's

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Pastor Gabe. Thank you, Becky. You're welcome. Merry Christmas. No, we got one more before Christmas. We have one more.

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Yep. Wait, do we? Yeah. This is the 13th. This is the episode for December 13th.

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Yes. You're right. So then 20th is next week. And we'll take some Christmas questions from you.

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Yes. If you want to submit a question to whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com or leave us a voicemail going to www .wutt

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.com and click on that voicemail tab, record us a message, tell us, tell us Merry Christmas.

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Yeah. Give us a favorite Christmas tradition or something. Oh, that'd be awesome. Yes. If you can record that in a minute and a half.

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What do you guys love to do every Christmas? Yeah. Yeah. That'd be awesome. Favorite Christmas story.

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Oh. Record it in two voicemails if it takes two. We'll play them both.

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To get it all. Of course. I'll splice it together. There you go. Make it sound all neat and everything. Yeah. Yeah. Well, let's get to our proverb here and then we'll get to some of those questions.

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Awesome. So, this is Proverbs 6 verse 20. My son, keep your father's commandment and forsake not your mother's teaching.

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Bind them on your heart always. Tie them around your neck. When you walk, they will lead you.

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When you lie down, they will watch over you. And when you awake, they will talk with you.

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For the commandment is a lamp and the teaching a light. And the reproofs of discipline are the way of life.

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I'm going to stop there because then we jump back into warnings against adultery that we had read in chapter 5.

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Right. And we'll come back up in the rest of this chapter and on into chapter 7. So let me end it there and then we'll pick up the reading.

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On the positive note. Yeah. We'll pick up the reading of Proverbs 6 at that point later. Perfect. But at least getting this word that the instructions that we receive are so important, it would be as though we wear them around with us.

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Well, I mean, you do. People notice your way of life and like your deeds and how you react to things.

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So you really do wear them in a way. And that's Jesus saying in Matthew chapter 5, let your light shine before men so that they may see your good works and glorify your

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Father who is in heaven. Yeah. Yeah. And even children are known by their deeds. Yes. It's in the

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Bible too. It's a Bible verse that I've taught the kids. Right. I don't remember which. I'm terrible.

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Are you talking about training in the discipline in the instruction of the Lord like Ephesians 6? No. It says even a child makes himself known by his acts.

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Okay. So that's Proverbs 20. Yeah. Even a child makes himself known by his acts by whether his conduct is pure and upright.

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Yeah. You were right. You were right. Okay. Yay. Hey, well done, babe. Thanks. That was good. And you may feel like as parents, these disciplines aren't working.

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Yes. My children just go right back to the same behavior. I am a living example. Over and over and over.

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Yes. I am a living example that it works. It does. Be diligent at it. It does work.

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Yes. I was quite a liar when I was a little kid. And my parents disciplined and disciplined and disciplined.

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And I don't know that I ever really became an honest young man at home. That's terrible.

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But then when I was finally out... You have four parents. Yeah. I know. I know. But then when I was finally out and living on my own, those disciplines finally took.

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And the convictions were there and I understood the value of honesty and to tell the truth and to live in that truth that my parents had taught me and instilled in me.

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So it gets in there. It does. It may not happen in the timing in which you expect it to take place.

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Or hope it to take place. Or hope it to take place. But continue in what you as parents should do faithfully and let the

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Lord do that work in their hearts. Yes. We remember the words that we have been built up in, in the discipline and the instruction of the

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Lord, which is Ephesians 6. Yes. Yes. Those things do become lifelong words, guiding words in the

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Lord, in the lives of your children. So be diligent in that. All right. Let's get to some of these questions here.

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This one comes from, oh no, I've got to start. Let me start with a voicemail message here. So this has to do with, as we've been talking about Christian liberty and things like that.

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James just had some thoughts to share. So this is from James. Okay. Hey, Pastor Gabe.

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I have a comment more than a question concerning your most recent

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Q &A on Christian liberty. So R .C. Sproul has a good sermon called

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The Tyranny of the Weaker Brother, and it's concerning Christian liberties and not offending our brothers, but I think it really does boil down to the communities that we're in, because we all know those people in our church or extended families, what have you, that use

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Christianity more as a club to always be right. And when they don't get their way, then these

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Bible verses come. But then we have the younger, weaker in the faith brothers and sisters who ask questions about why we do what we do out of concern, out of concern for their growth and obedience to God.

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And they want to make sure that they're not offending God in any way.

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So sometimes they actually walk on eggshells because they're scared of doing the wrong thing.

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Our conduct will help them mature as well. But I really do think it just comes down to the close community that we're in and knowing the heart of people who have issues with us, because if we love them, then we will lay aside our desires for them.

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Those are great thoughts. Yeah. And really kind of the outworking of that instruction in Romans 15.

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One, we who are strong have an obligation to bear with the failings of the weak. Definitely. And not to please ourselves, but to please our neighbor for his good to build him up.

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Yeah. Thank you for that sermon reminder. I do remember listening to that, but I cannot remember how long ago it was.

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It was, again, the sermon that was entitled The Tyranny of the Weaker Brother by R .C.

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Sproul. I'll have to go back and look for that one myself. But now everybody else has heard it, so you can look it up, too.

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Yeah. Look for The Tyranny of the Weaker Brother. Yeah. Some of the emails that I will get that push back on some of the things that we talk about on the program will be from somebody who was offended by a liberty issue that we discussed.

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I might share some of those things, not intending them to be conscience binding.

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And I certainly don't want to use language that might bind your conscience or make it sound like to you that I'm obligating you to have to do

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X, Y or Z. If we're talking about Christian liberty things, it may not be that I'm saying to you, you have to do it this way.

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I may just be offering counsel or suggestion on here's what you could do. Right. So that's as we've said many, many, many times and probably most every podcast that we've done, the

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Q &A, every situation is unique and different. Right. Case by case basis.

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It is. It's always a case by case. And we only know like one small portion of the situation as a whole.

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Right. And so we can only give what we know, advice on what we know. Yeah. And even that is with caution.

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Definitely go seek counsel from those around you who know you best and your pastor. Your pastor, especially.

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Yeah. Yeah. Right. Accountability partners and mentors and the people that you have around you that can that can really help walk with you through that.

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Yes. Right. So your advice. And whenever I rarely give my advice or opinion is is just based off of like very, very small portion of the scenario or scenario.

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That's what I'm looking for. Yes. Yeah. So thank you for your thoughts. James. Yeah. Appreciate that. This next one has to do with the video that I did on Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

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OK. This is a movie that's out now. I did not pull this question up. Somebody had emailed me and said, did

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I see the movie? The answer is no. I didn't go see Bonhoeffer. I've been to the theater.

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When was the last time I went to the theater? I took the kids to go see something. Oh, yeah. Right. I remember which one it was now.

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Yeah. Like around Thanksgiving or something. Yeah. And then there's a movie that our theater, our local theater shows classic movies on Tuesdays.

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Yes. So Becky and I are already like laying out our schedule for date nights. Yeah. And we can go see some of these classic films that we've never seen in theaters.

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Right. Maybe we were too young when they were out. Yeah. Or something like that. So we're going to catch some of those.

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But anyway, I did. I didn't go see Bonhoeffer. So I can't tell you about the film. But I did get a question about his really his most popular book that I, in fact, read a little over a decade ago.

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So before getting to that question, here's the video that I just did on Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

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Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a German Lutheran minister most known for his involvement in a plot to assassinate

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Adolf Hitler near the end of World War Two, for which Bonhoeffer was imprisoned and later executed. This became the focus of a movie about his life that came out in 2024 entitled

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Bonhoeffer Pastor Spy Assassin. His most famous work was The Cost of Discipleship, published in 1937, examining what he called cheap grace versus costly grace.

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Cheap grace would be like preaching forgiveness without repentance, whereas costly grace is the call of Jesus Christ at which the disciple leaves his nets and follows him.

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Bonhoeffer taught that salvation should radically change a person's life, for faith without obedience is no faith at all.

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As said in James 217, unfortunately, Bonhoeffer's theology was rather liberal. In his book,

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Christ the Center, he cast doubt on the fact that Christ really existed. He wrote, as a subject for historical investigation,

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Jesus Christ remains an uncertain phenomenon. His historicity can neither be confirmed nor denied with the necessary absolute certainty.

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Bonhoeffer said of Christ's resurrection from the grave, empty or not empty, it remains a stumbling block.

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We cannot be sure of its historicity. Whereas the Apostle Paul provided numerous proofs for the resurrection and said, if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins.

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Bonhoeffer denied the inerrancy of Scripture, calling the Bible flawed. He went as far as denying the power of the gospel itself, saying, we must finally break away from the idea that the gospel deals with the salvation of an individual soul.

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But Romans 116 says, I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to all who believe.

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Though regarded as a courageous hero of the faith, one should be very careful with the theology and life of Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

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When we understand the text. So there was the video. And of course,

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I've been getting numerous different responses to that, because for some people, it was like,

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I never knew this about Bonhoeffer. Yeah. And it could have been that the only book that they read was

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The Cost of Discipleship, which is his most well -known book. That was a book that I read.

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It was over 10 years ago. I don't remember exactly what year, but another pastor friend of mine who very sadly is apostate now, he's not even a believer anymore.

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Yeah. But it was another pastor friend of mine that encouraged me to read it. And we read it together and discussed it.

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So there's not a whole lot I remember about it. I will say this. I do not recall anything in the book popping out at me as being blatantly heretical.

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And though I was much less mature at that time, I still would have picked up on something like that.

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Right. So I went back and looked for The Cost of Discipleship, like a review.

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Somebody who was sound that reviewed the book and was looking for, is there something in there that I might have missed?

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There was a footnote, apparently. And I didn't start reading footnotes until maybe a dozen years ago.

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Right. So there apparently was a footnote in the book where he said something to the effect of doubting the actual presence of Christ.

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Or no, no, no. It had to do with the resurrection. So the authenticity, the legitimacy, the confidence that we can have in the resurrection is like in question, basically.

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So you can doubt the resurrection and it doesn't really cost you anything in your conviction.

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And again, I don't remember that. If that was a footnote, I certainly didn't pick that up in the book. There was something that I do recall.

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And again, I'm not even going to be able to say it right because I don't have any quotes in front of me or anything like that.

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There was something I remember it being fairly early on in the book where he said something to the effect of how difficult it is to follow

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Christ. And when I read it, I thought, well, I understand that.

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Yeah, you probably put it through your filter. Exactly right. You know, it's hard to follow Jesus. Yes. But then in light of things that I read later about his liberal

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German Lutheran theology, that when I thought about that quote again, that I remember catching my attention in the cost of discipleship,

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I wonder if what he meant was we can't even really be certain of the person and work of Christ, that the words we're reading about in the

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Sermon on the Mount were really his words, because that's what the cost of discipleship is. It's about the

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Sermon on the Mount. OK. It's notes and thoughts from the sermon, from reading and studying the

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Sermon on the Mount. So therefore, it could have been that he meant the reason why you find it so difficult to follow

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Jesus is because we can doubt if any of this stuff was actually what he said.

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Yeah. And again, I didn't pick that up when I read the cost of discipleship. It is considered a classic

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Christian book. Interesting. Yeah. But anyway, all that to say, I don't think you're picking up something bad if you read the book.

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It's not really something that I recommend. And haven't recommended it for years. Yeah. Since I came to discover just how liberal

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Bonhoeffer was in his views. Yeah. I'm really answering the question here before I've even read the email.

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Yep. But this is from this is from Long in Minnesota. He said, I, Pastor Gabe, I saw your recent

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What video on Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Couple of brothers in Christ and I are going through his book, The Cost of Discipleship.

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We've had our own personal concerns of his theology based on how he was arguing for his points in each chapter.

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Some paragraphs seem totally convoluted. We gave the benefit of the doubt. It was a translation issue from German to English.

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I do remember that being an issue. Oh, yeah. So I remember reading certain things and wondering, well, I wonder if I'm just not picking up what he means because it's a it's a translation problem.

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Sure. It is a difficult read. I did not think of it as being an easy read. But Long goes on.

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We only considered reading the book because of its high circulation and evangelical influence. I was never made aware.

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He held on to some progressive and heretical doctrines. I was curious to know your review of the book and if there's time, your opinion on why there isn't a wider and harsher critique on Dietrich Bonhoeffer and his theology.

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The Cost of Discipleship is made out to appear as a modern Christian classic. And you're right, it is.

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And I think the reason why there's not as much pushback on Bonhoeffer, there's two reasons, really. One is the popularity of the book

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Bonhoeffer by Eric Metaxas. OK. And if you get a good, honest review of that book.

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It really is taking Bonhoeffer and kind of Americanizing him for an evangelical audience.

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So Metaxas really does bolster Bonhoeffer. OK, like buffers, all of those.

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Yeah, kind of. We're going to hide some of the skeletons. OK, OK. It's a big book. I did not finish the whole thing.

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Oh, OK. I was going to say I have it over there, but I guess not. It's probably in my big book box.

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But anyway, it is a thick book. It's not a quick read at all.

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I was not really all that compelled by what I was reading, so I didn't ever finish the book. But again, if you get a good review of it, there will be people that will push back on.

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This really is not a good take on Bonhoeffer and definitely doesn't expose some of his more liberal leanings.

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The movie itself, as I understand it, because the subtitle of the movie is Passer Spy Assassin, you know, they really do lean into the plot that he was involved in to assassinate

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Adolf Hitler. That's the reason why he was thrown in prison, because he was part of that plot.

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Right. He was not thrown in prison because he was a heroic preacher of the gospel. And didn't you tell me at one time that he's considered a martyr?

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Yeah, right. He's considered a martyr. Yeah, because not what that means. The perception or the perspective of that is

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Bonhoeffer was executed because he was a preacher of the gospel. So that therefore makes him a martyr.

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But that wasn't the reason why he was executed. Right. Now, I'm not making some sort of moral claim as to whether or not anybody should be involved in such a plot as Bonhoeffer was.

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All I'm saying is that this is what he was executed for. He did have a strong desire to protect and defend those people who were being executed by the

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Nazis. That is that's honorable. That's why he was involved in that plot.

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Yeah. You know, I'm not just saying he just wanted to off the leader of Germany. Right. The leader of the

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Nazi Party, Adolf Hitler, because he just didn't like him. He was trying to protect.

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He was defending those people that were being put to death by the Nazis. Yeah. So, of course, great heroic heart and put his life on the line for their sake.

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He knew the danger that he was entering into. It's just not the same as saying that Dietrich was put to death for the faith.

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Yes. There were a lot of people that were executed by the Nazis for helping

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Jews that had nothing to do with their theological convictions. What's another book that you could read other than the cost of discipleship?

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Like I said, I don't really think you're going down any dangerous road by reading that book, but there are a couple of other books that I've read include

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Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life by Donald Whitney. There's Disciplines for a Godly Man by R.

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Kent Hughes. And there's also, though I haven't read this one, Disciplines of a Godly Woman by his wife,

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Barbara Hughes. Yeah. So you can check out those as well. And if you have the

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Monergism e -book library, we've plugged this a few times. But the

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Monergism e -book library, you can download it from Monergism .org. It's a free e -book library.

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It really is a library. Over a thousand books, I think, they have in this library now. Yeah. When we were first promoting it, it had 900.

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Yep. But now there's over a thousand added to it. They've added. Yeah, they add to every time I open it, it will say updating library and like, here's what's new.

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And it's got six or seven new books listed in it. So they're adding to it. Yeah. Adding to it all the time. But there's a book from Horatius Bonner.

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You really want to go classic like Bonhoeffer would be considered classic. How about Horatius Bonner?

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Not Bonhoeffer, but Bonner. The hymn writer. He's got a book called Follow the

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Lamb. I've read portions of it. And some of the chapters include Be Strong in the

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Grace that is in Christ Jesus. Keep the conscience clean. Hold fast that which you have received.

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Deal honestly with yourselves. Keep company with God and with his people. Study the

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Bible. Take heed to your steps. Those are just a few chapter headings that you'll find in there in Bonner's book,

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Follow the Lamb. Those are awesome. Something to check out. And it's free. Just download the

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Monergism ebook library and you have all of that for you right there. There you go. All right. Last one comes from Paula.

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She says, Hey, Pastor Gabe and Becky, Merry Christmas to you and your family. Merry Christmas. Praying this blessed season is finding you all well.

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I have a couple of quick questions. Question one. We live about 50 miles from Tulsa, Oklahoma.

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We have a Christian college that each year puts on a beautiful light display. The problem is the college is

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Rima Bible College, founded by Kenneth Hagen, who's a heretic. We've visited prior to knowing all this, but now that we do know,

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I'm not really sure if that's something that we should go to. They don't ask for donations or anything. So no money is ever given.

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Am I overthinking this? My husband wasn't really concerned since we are not giving money. Well, since we're on the subject of Christian liberty.

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Yeah. If you can keep your conscience clean and go,

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I don't see why it's any big deal. Right. I mean, you're going to movies at the theater that are made by godless people.

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Yeah. And we don't necessarily think so much about the movies that we watch. But if we attend something that had been assembled by a

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Christian heretic, then suddenly we're going, oh, I don't know if I should participate in something like that.

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Yeah. So what you're pointing out is don't have a double standard. I'm just saying, like, is it going to be a guilt on your conscience?

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Oh, OK. That's really all I'm coming at it from. OK. If it is going to be, then don't go to land the plane.

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Yeah, just we'll just get right to it. Dancing around anything. OK, OK. If it doesn't bother you, you can still enjoy the light show without thinking about who it was that was behind all of this.

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I mean, Hagen is obviously not alive anymore, but his understudy, Ken Copeland, is certainly alive and well and doing his thing.

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Well, I don't know about well, but he's alive. And even that's a little debatable. But obviously it's not benefiting them in any way.

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It might just be something that you're putting on. It does kind of seem to be PR oriented. You know, the name of the college gets out.

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Sure. Your attendance or not attendance. Does that really hurt or affect anything that's going on? Does it affect you?

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It just depends. If you feel guilty about attending it, then don't go. Right.

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If you would have a guilty conscience by attending. But I don't see anything right up front that would make me go.

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Yeah. Yeah. I mean, except at the name, Kenneth Hagen. So there's because I think if you were having to pay, would you go?

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No, I wouldn't. OK. Yeah. But but not having to pay, would you go? Yeah, I might.

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Yeah, I might check it out. And if somebody says, hey, we're doing this light thing. Do you want to go? Sure. And I look it up and I find out that it has something to do with Kenneth Hagen.

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That's going to make an antenna go up. OK, I'll be a little. Right. I'm going to be aware of some things that are going on now, knowing that.

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But I don't know that it necessarily keep me from going. Now, if it's something like Transformation Church, which is a very charismatic church, very laser light show kind of church that's right there in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

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OK, if somebody's inviting me to Transformation, I'm probably going to go. No. Attending church where people are worshiping.

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Oh, yeah, yeah. That's a completely different matter. Definitely. But where this is for entertainment, to enjoy some lights, to kind of reflect on the season in most cases, like you said,

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Paula, you didn't even know Kenneth Hagen had anything to do with it. Right. For a while while you were attending.

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But now you do know something about it. And that makes you doubt it a little bit more. It kind of goes into the principle that Paul lays out in Corinthians.

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If somebody lays meat in front of you, don't ask any questions about it. Just eat the meat. Right. But now if somebody says, oh, this was offered by a false god, well, don't eat the or offered to a false god.

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Don't eat the meat for the sake of conscience. Yours, not just yours, but the person who had offered it to you.

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So, you know, those are things you have to think about when it comes to participating in these kinds of things. Am I communicating something with this?

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Oh, yeah, sure. Now, Paula's second question is, have you heard of? And if so, what are your thoughts on grounding?

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Not the punishment of children, but like the bare feet on the ground.

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Exactly. And like, like, yeah, like the electric currents from the earth, electric in your body, stuff like that.

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So she says, my oldest stepdaughter is all hyped up about it. And so she's getting benefits from it. And and feels like she's gaining more energy and less pain.

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She is a Christian. But this all sounds kind of new age to me. She always seems to be swayed by the latest trend.

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Any info and wisdom would be appreciated. Have a wonderful holiday with your beautiful family. You are all in my prayers.

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Thank you. So appreciate it. Well, really, if going outside and laying in the grass makes you feel better.

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By all means, that's right. Praise the Lord while you're doing exactly. I don't think you're doing anything pagan.

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It's almost like stuff that we enjoy that makes us feel good. Walking in the ground barefoot. Yeah. Laying in shallow water like like the shallow end of a lake or pool or something like that's also part of earthing or grounding.

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OK, it's kind of like we enjoy these things because they feel good. And then you find out it's got some weird new agey thing attached to it.

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Yeah. And now suddenly it's like I just like walking in the grass barefoot. Why does it have to be some sort of pagany connect with your roots sort of connect with the ground that you came from or whatever?

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I mean, the Lord has has created things so beautifully that they're all interconnected.

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And really, there could be some beneficial things that the

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Lord has put for in the ground for us to like, you know, make us healthier.

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Like the sun gives us vitamin D. Exactly. Go outside and enjoy the sun. To go get vitamin

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D. Nobody does that anymore. You're not a sun. You're not a sun worshiper just because you went out and got your afternoon sun.

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Right. Or go for a midnight stroll in a full moon or something like that. Yeah. But the wicked world just twists things and twists

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God's beauty of things and that it makes it makes us as believers feel like what we're doing is sinful when we're enjoying something that God made for us to enjoy.

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And so it's something that, you know, you're just going to have to keep her let her do that, but keep her mind on God.

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Yeah. And be thankful to God for gifting us with things that make us feel better and not hurt as much or or whatever her benefits are.

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Yeah. It's a beautiful thing to appreciate God's creation. Right. It's like in 1

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Corinthians 10, where it says whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it to the glory of God. Amen. So if you want to do whatever gets called earthing or grounding or whatever else, and it makes you feel good, fine.

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Do it under God's glory. Right. Don't do it. Just make sure your her focus is there and doesn't isn't that part is not swayed to what's around her.

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Exactly. Yeah. So good word. And I appreciate your questions, Paula. And Merry Christmas to you and to your family as well.

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Yeah. Enjoy some Christian Christian. Yeah. Christian lights. Christmas lights. Yeah. We like going around and looking at Christmas lights.

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We'll surely do that again this year. Now, if you're listening on the radio, we're we're coming to a close here.

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If you listen to the podcast, we're going to extend it to an hour. I'm going to respond to some questions to other what videos, including recent reviews of a sneak peek of season five of The Chosen and also the new

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Mary movie that came out on Netflix. So I'm going to respond to comments, to videos that I've made of both.

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I came to bed real late the other night and Becky goes, why are you coming to bed so late? And I said, well, I was watching The Chosen.

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She's like, oh, my goodness, you are watching The Chosen. Why would you waste your hours?

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This is what I get in trouble for coming to bed late. It's not watching stuff I shouldn't have been watching.

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It's doing research. So, yeah, you shouldn't have been watching it. I should have been watching it anyway. It was

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The Chosen. God bless you guys. Merry Christmas. And we'll talk to you again next week. Merry Christmas.

29:44

Netflix made a movie about Mary, directed by Roman Catholic DJ Caruso, who made Redeeming Love, the dreadful romance based on the book of Hosea.

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The movie Mary begins with her saying, you may think, you know, my story. Trust me, you don't.

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So this will be a bunch of extra biblical nonsense. After all, it's produced by Joel Osteen. The angel

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Gabriel appears to Joachim and Anne and tells them they will have a daughter who must be given to serve God in the temple.

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When she is older, they take her to the prophetess Anna and Mary is presented in the temple as the vessel of the promise.

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There's a weird scene where Satan tries to seduce Mary and then Mary stares down the brutal

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King Herod, played by Hannibal Lecter. Mary's parents agree to marry her to a man named

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Joseph, and she argues with their decision as if they're selling her off. She meets Joseph and is immediately belittling of him, just like the

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Mary in the previous year's journey to Bethlehem. This trope is already tired. The angel Gabriel appears to Mary and says she will be with child.

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And while he does say the child will reign over the house of David, he does not mention the Holy Spirit or that the child will be the son of God.

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He says all the world will know him because she is blessed among women. Since Mary is found to be pregnant, she's kicked out of the temple.

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She meets with her cousin Elizabeth, who's really not all that old. And she tells her, trust the strength inside you.

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And she doesn't mean Jesus with whom she's pregnant. So this is one of those believe in yourself movies.

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When she gives birth to Jesus, she tells him, I choose you just as you chose me. And in the very last line of the film, she says,

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Love would cost you dearly. It will pierce your heart. But in the end, love will save the world.

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No shepherds or magi come to visit Jesus. Joseph kills a guy. Yes, really. And there are many other problems.

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But in short, the Netflix movie Mary is an unbiblical mess with no gospel, no message that Jesus Christ has come to save his people from their sins, avoid these rewrites of history and stick with the truth when we understand the text.

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Yes. Directed by the guy who did Redeeming Love. I almost almost forgot about that movie.

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I never saw that film because it has sex scenes in it. It was a

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PG -13 movie, but it still has two people getting nude, though you may not see sensitive areas and doing with one another what only a husband and wife should be doing.

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You should not be putting anything like that before your eyes. And yet this man was filming those scenes.

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In creating that movie, and he becomes the guy who directs this movie for Netflix, Mary, which is, as mentioned, executive produced by Joel Osteen.

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On Joel Osteen's ex account, he had a specialized trailer, a trailer you couldn't see anywhere else on any other social media platform except on Joel Osteen's so that the trailer of the film could say it's produced by Joel Osteen.

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None of the other trailers were plugging that, as far as I know. Any of the other ones I saw or whatever was airing commercially, but that one was made for Joel so that he could claim to be the executive producer on this film.

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So you should not be surprised at how unbiblical it is. Just given those variables, who directed it, who produced it, and it's on Netflix on top of that.

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I don't want to say everything on Netflix is bad, though, like that's an instant tell that what you're watching is going to be bad because I've actually

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I actually have watched some good things on Netflix. Now, in the comments that I got to this video, Cynthia said

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I would never waste a dime supporting Netflix. Neither would I. We actually unsubscribed from Netflix years ago.

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But I am able to access Netflix for free because of another service that I pay for.

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Netflix just happens to come with it. So that was how I was able to watch the movie. I don't have to pay for Netflix.

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It's part of this other service that I pay for and therefore got to watch this movie and do a review of it.

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Michelle Leslie, whom we've talked about on the program before, she said, but Gabe, if a movie gets people thinking about Jesus, anything is

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OK. Don't you know that by now? She's being sarcastic, of course. And that's a lot of the pushback that I got to this movie and also the review that I did of The Chosen, the sneak peek of season five, which

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I'll get to that one next. That one's coming up here in just a moment. Thank you, Elizabeth Prada says.

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Me and my friends on Facebook were just talking about this. I posted your review. I appreciate that, Elizabeth. Duane responded and said, nice review.

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Mr. Osteen should be ashamed of himself. He should be ashamed of a lot of things, really. And then

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Duane quoted Second Timothy four, three through four. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine.

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But after their own lusts, they shall heap to themselves teachers having itching ears and they shall turn away their ears from the truth and they shall be turned into or unto rather fables.

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Always true. Always applicable with regards to these kinds of things. Now, this next person who goes by Anonymous said,

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I don't know how Christians enjoy movies like this or shows like The Chosen. It's one thing to love the

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Lord and so rightly be encouraged by his suggestion, I guess. But if you honor his word and you should, then you wouldn't be led to feel entertained by something someone made up about him.

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These shows are lies hideously. And that's a good response to the comment that Michelle made sarcastically a moment ago when people say it's just entertainment.

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You can be entertained by this. The Bible is not just entertainment. And if you're watching something based on Scripture just to be entertained by it, maybe your heart and your motive should be questioned.

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You should search yourself. You watch stuff that's based on the Bible just to be entertained by it.

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It doesn't matter whether it doesn't matter to you whether it's true or not. They take gospel points in The Chosen and twist them.

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One of the points of my video that I did on the John 316 scene between Jesus and Nicodemus.

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One of the points I make is that even though Jesus quotes John 316 in that scene, the whole passage has been so moved around.

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Different pieces of it have been put in different places and added dialogue has been given to Jesus and Nicodemus so that when

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Jesus gets to that line, it does not have the same effect or context as John 316 does in John's gospel.

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And you'll see that throughout The Chosen, even on occasions where a particular scene that they're giving you is something that you could find in the

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Bible. Now, creator and director Dallas Jenkins has said 95 % of what's in that show is not in the

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Bible. And that's probably the most correct thing that he said. But on those occasions when you can find a scene that is in Scripture, again, everything else around it, the stuff leading up to it, the stuff coming out of it, things that they will add in the scene, it completely changes the scene.

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You are not watching what you think you are. You might think, well, they're faithful to these

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Bible parts. And then they add things around it just to kind of make it more interesting or to speculate or dramatize.

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They've changed the message. They actually changed the message of what they're saying so that it does not actually have the gospel impact that God, the

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Holy Spirit means for it to have. These are words that lead to eternal life.

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That's what we have in Scripture. This is not for entertainment. It is not to be left up to somebody's whimsy of interpretation for the purpose of entertaining or making money off of, especially.

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And that's why Netflix makes this movie. That's why The Chosen is making their show. Yeah, you'll watch the behind the scenes stuff.

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And they will say that it's for outreach. And we hope to be changing people's lives and things like that. That is a secondary concern.

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And I know it is a secondary concern because they're changing the message. If it was their primary concern to be faithful to this so that people would hear the gospel and come to know

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Christ, then they would actually be faithful to the message of the gospel. And they're not. And same way with Mary.

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Now, one of the other things that people will say, this isn't a line that I have in front of me, but as I go through these comments,

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I'm probably going to find one. One thing that people will say to me is that it it increases conversation, like, for example, when the

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Noah movie came out, this was a decade more than a decade ago. That film came out. This is the one where Russell Crowe played

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Noah. It was a Gnostic rewrite of the story of Noah. In which

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Noah and God became the bad guys, Darren Aronofsky, who directed and wrote the film, he it was very influenced.

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By Gnosticism and by a lot of Jewish and Talmudic things anyway.

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But but the with that film, when that came out, I remember people saying I did reviews on that movie warning about how heretical it was, how blasphemous it was.

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And I had comments from people saying, well, it increases conversation. I'm thankful that these kinds of things are out there because it sparked a conversation with somebody about Noah.

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Now, really, I don't think that's as true as people will claim that it is.

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Most people are not having conversations over this stuff. They're really not.

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It has not become an icebreaker with unbelievers to talk about what the

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Bible actually says with the vast majority of people, even those people that will say this. Does it create conversations in some places?

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Yes, I'm sure that it does. But these kinds of things, whether it's the Noah movie, the Noah movie is one of those that's just so far off and blatantly heretical and demonic that I would consider that to be even in a different category than Mary and the

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Chosen. But anyway, with with either Noah or Gods and Kings, the one that Ridley Scott did that was a retelling of Moses and Pharaoh.

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Or there was or there's the Chosen or Mary or any of these other films. These are largely a net negative.

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So you understand what I mean by that? The negatives outweigh the positives. Whatever benefits you could get from a movie or a show like that are far, far less than the harm it causes because of the twisting that it does and the misguiding that that a person would receive by watching something like this.

40:51

Becky and I have read comments from people who have emailed us and said, I started watching the

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Chosen and that caused my wife and I to pick up our Bible and start reading it. And once we read the

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Gospels, we stopped watching the Chosen because we realized that show is not what we're reading in the

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Bible. That is awesome. But that is the Holy Spirit working against a program like that.

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Not with a program like that, the Holy Spirit is not is not delighted by this twisting of the word of God.

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It's the same thing with Joel Osteen. Incidentally, I remember talking to a man who said he attended Joel Osteen's church, started reading this

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Bible that everybody holds up, but nobody opens and reads. Have you ever seen that in any one of Joel Osteen sermons?

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So his father used to do this. And then Joel Osteen continued the tradition where at the beginning of his so -called sermon, it's really more of a motivational speech.

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But at the beginning of his sermon, everybody holds up their Bibles and say, this is my Bible. I am what it says

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I am. And all that, you know, whatever mantra it is that they repeat. Well, he noticed this man that I was talking to, he noticed that we don't ever open this

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Bible. So why do we say this thing about I am whatever it says I am when we don't even open it and read it?

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And Joel doesn't even have it open. He's not even preaching from it. So it caused him to go home and start reading it and realize that Joel Osteen was a heretic.

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And again, that's the spirit working against those things. That's all in God's providence that he can do that.

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It doesn't mean it's permission for you to start playing Joel Osteen sermons, believing that it's going to be an icebreaker to help guide a person toward the truth.

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You play a lot of Joel Osteen sermons. What's going to be the result of that? You're mostly going to be leading people astray.

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And that's the same thing with The Chosen and with this movie on Netflix and all these other things.

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You're mostly leading people astray. It is a net negative. It is not a net positive.

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When I was in Christian radio, one of the things that people in radio, programmers in particular, are very concerned with are negatives and positives.

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And so you want to create content that has the least number of negatives. And negative would be anything that causes somebody to change the radio dial.

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You want to create the most number of positives that keep people engaged and listening. And that's why most

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Christian radio, especially K -Love, is programmed with so much fluff.

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And there's really not any gospel there. You certainly don't hear anything about sin and your need to repent and come to Christ, because that would be a negative.

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That's going to make people feel bad. And it's going to make them change the dial to something else.

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And we don't want to do that. We just want to create something positive that is encouraging for people, hence why their slogan is

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Positive Encouraging. I think that slogan's been in their use for 20 years now or something like that.

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They've continued with this positive and encouraging thing. Anyway, so with these movies, it's going to be the same kind of thing.

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And Dallas Jenkins, with The Chosen, is creating something that is ecumenical. He's trying to present an ecumenical

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Jesus that is the most appealing to the most number of faith traditions.

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All you got to do is go to The Chosen channel and see the roundtable discussions that he will have with other faith leaders.

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You'll have a megachurch pastor, a Roman Catholic priest, a

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Jewish rabbi, and Dallas Jenkins all talking about these things. And the Jewish rabbi, incidentally, is probably a

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Messianic Jew or at least claims to be a Messianic Jew, someone who acknowledges that Jesus is the

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Christ, not a Jew who says that we're still waiting for the Christ. But anyway, you'll have these different faiths.

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None of them are Orthodox. I don't mean Greek Orthodox, but you know, right teaching, sound doctrine, none of them are that way.

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And in fact, the Roman Catholic priest is probably some very popular priest that you've seen around.

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Same with whoever is going to end up being his evangelical expert. It's either going to be a professor from one of the major seminaries or it's going to be this megachurch pastor.

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But why does Dallas rely on all these different voices to speak this way about Jesus? And they're all agreeing on it.

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Incidentally, you watch those roundtable discussions. They're all agreeing on what they say about Jesus because they're not trying to be accurate to the text.

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They're trying to come up with a consensus Christ that the most number of people are going to agree upon.

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The most positives, the least number of negatives. But in trying to present the most positive

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Jesus, they actually do the most harm. It's a it's a net negative. Like I said, let's see if I can come up with a few more comments here about Mary, and then

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I'll go on to that clip from the chosen. So this was from Joe Johnson.

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All I needed to hear was the name Joel Osteen. Then Netflix was the clincher. This is a definite nope for this guy.

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Good job. Oh, I like this comment. So this is from Jack. Now let's see Netflix give this treatment to Mohammed.

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I'm sure that would go over really well. Yeah, kind of funny, isn't it? They won't take the

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Koran and twist those stories, but they'll take the Bible and twist those stories.

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Why won't they twist the stories in the Koran? Oh, I think you know why this one is from Ken.

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He says another girl boss history rewrite. It seems big pass. Yeah, the

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Mary in Mary is not as much of a girl boss as the Mary in Journey to Bethlehem.

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That Mary was the worst depiction of Mary that I've ever seen. Definitely feminist girl boss intersectionality intersectional

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Mary. That's what we got in the Journey to Bethlehem musical that came out last year. But you're right.

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She was a girl boss in this film as well. This next comment comes from somebody who didn't give their name, but they're apparently a

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Donald Trump fan. They said the Bible is so full of rich stories that would make for excellent

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TV and movies. I shiver at the thought of the early life of King David recreated in film, live action or animation and would love to make that a reality someday.

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But in the meantime, we all we get is the same Second Commandment violation garbage made and remade by people who hate

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Jesus Christ and long for damnation. I'm impressed by the level headed nature of your review, because this is a topic that I get very passionate about.

47:22

Yeah, I can tell. And that's a great comment to the drama that is in the Bible is great.

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If you're looking for drama, why do we need to change these stories? Why did you know when we got the version of Mary that we got in this film, that story is not better than what we have in the

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Bible. And we see that over and over again, even with the chosen, though, they're dramatizing it and adding all these things out there on the fringes from what you find in the

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Bible. Yet even any of the drama that they create and those stories from the

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Bible that they try to depict accurately, I don't really think they try to do it accurately. But anyway, those ones that they try to depict, they change it so much.

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It was like, well, what was wrong with what was there? That was fine. That is very compelling and captivating drama.

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But that's not what they stick with. They like their words better than God's words. My idea is much better than God's idea is really what they end up saying with the way they rewrite things.

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All right. I did not get as much pushback to Mary as I did to the chosen. So let's go ahead and shift over there.

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Let's look at this clip from the chosen season five. This is the video that I did, and then

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I'll respond to some comments to this one. Leading up to season five of The Chosen, creator and director

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Dallas Jenkins hosted a live stream online. There were behind the scenes looks. He sold a bunch of merchandise, and he gave a sneak peek of a scene between Jesus and Judas, who would betray him.

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Judas believed the time was right for Jesus to claim the throne of David. Jesus disagreed. So Judas said,

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Why won't you take my advice? Am I not here to help you? I've never asked you for your advice.

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Then what am I here for? Then Jesus said to him, You have a choice to make, Judas. I'm listening.

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Who you belong to. Who has your heart? I want it.

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And I've had it before. That's not what the Bible says. John 6, 64 says

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Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe and who it was who would betray him.

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In verse 70, he called Judas a devil. And in John 17, 12, he called Judas the son of perdition or the son of destruction.

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The heart of Judas was never after Jesus. And Jesus knew this. Judas's destiny was always to betray him in fulfillment of prophecies made about him.

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Let's continue. You followed me willingly. There's nothing more than I want than that.

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Then I will pray for you. Jesus never said this to Judas. Would Jesus have prayed that Judas would make a different choice and not betray

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Jesus? Then God's word would be wrong and you and I would not be saved. Psalm 22, 41, 69 and 109 and Zechariah 11 all contain prophecies about a wicked man who would betray the

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Lord's anointment, even for 30 pieces of silver. That was Judas, whom Jesus called to fulfill this purpose.

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In John 13, Jesus washed his disciples feet and said, Do just as I have done to you.

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I am not speaking of all of you. I know whom I have chosen, but the scripture will be fulfilled.

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He who ate my bread has lifted his heel against me. Beware those teachers who twist the scriptures, especially for the fields, for entertainment and for profit.

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When we understand the text. So this fellow Randall said, wouldn't that fit the scripture?

50:57

Second Peter 3, 9. The Lord is not slack concerning his promises. Some men count slackness, but as long suffering to us word, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.

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Judas in his own free will departed. Why dog anything that tries to put the gospel out?

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Philippians 1, 18. What then, notwithstanding every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is preached and I therein do rejoice.

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Yay. And I will rejoice. Well, first of all, with regard to the reference to 2nd Peter 3, 9, that's written to the church.

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And it would not have been written to Judas because Judas was not the church. So in talking to the church.

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Where Peter says the Lord is not slack concerning his promises. Some men count slackness or slowness.

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If you're reading the ESV, but as long suffering toward us, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.

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That's speaking to the church. He is long suffering toward us. Who's us?

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He's not talking about all of mankind. He's talking about the elect, by the way. That's the very first verse in 2nd

52:07

Peter. He is addressing the elect. Judas was not elect.

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And Jesus even said in his prayers and in his comments about Judas that he was an elect.

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So then Randall says, why dog anything that tries to put the gospel out and makes that reference to Philippians 1, 18, where Paul says, whether in pretense or in truth.

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Hey, at least the gospel is preached. Now, see, that argument would make sense if my concern was that Dallas Jenkins was only creating the chosen to make money.

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Let's say it was totally accurate, but he's only making it to make money. I could make that accusation of Dallas, but he's being faithful to the word and it's getting out there and people are hearing it and they're coming to Christ because of it.

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Well, whether in pretense or in truth, meaning whether the intentions are good or their intentions are not good, at least

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Christ is preached. And for that, I rejoice. It's going to be before God, whether Dallas stands or falls.

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But that's not the issue here. The issue here is that the message is being twisted. It is a different Jesus that they're presenting in the chosen.

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And therefore, it's a different gospel. You can't follow the Jesus in the chosen and be saved.

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You must follow the Jesus of Scripture, of the Bible, of the one that the

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Holy Spirit reveals to us in his word. That's the only Christ that saves us. In 2

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Corinthians 11, for the Apostle Paul said to the church in Corinth, if someone comes and proclaims another

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Jesus than the one we proclaimed, or you receive a different spirit from the one you received, or you accept a different gospel from the one you accepted.

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You put up with it readily enough. In other words, Paul is basically saying to them, why are you not offended by this?

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If you were truly following Christ and truly in the gospel, then it should offend you. When somebody comes to you with an imitation, you're going to say, back off me with that stuff.

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I am not interested. That's not going to save me. That's not going to sanctify me. Only this word that has been given to us through the spirit, speaking to prophets and apostles who wrote these things down for us that became compiled in the pages of Scripture that we call the

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Bible. Only these are the words to eternal life. Only these are the words that will sanctify us and grow us in holiness, drawing us closer to Christ and making us more like him.

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The chosen will not do that for anybody. This fellow named

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Phil says, Judas didn't depart from the faith. He never had saving faith. 2

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Peter 3 .9 is about waiting patiently for all his elect to be saved. Who is God patient toward in this verse to us?

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Who is the us? It is Christians that the letter is addressed to. I appreciate that, Phil.

54:59

And incidentally, he was responding to Randall. That wasn't a comment to me going on.

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I appreciate that the J .C. Ryle X account shared this quote from J .C.

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Ryle in connection with that video. What is the best safeguard against false teaching?

55:17

Beyond all doubt, the regular study of the word of God with prayer for the teaching of the

55:22

Holy Spirit. Amen, J .C. Ryle. I appreciate that. Somebody asked me if this was one from one of the newer episodes.

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I said, yes, I believe Jenkins said that this was from season five, episode four.

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The first two episodes of season five are coming out in March, and they will air only in theaters.

55:43

This is the way that The Chosen is going now. Theaters do not get

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The Chosen in front of more people. The way The Chosen gets in front of more people is through their app or through releasing on streaming the way that they've been doing.

55:59

Theaters doesn't get it in front of more people. But this is the way that The Chosen is doing things now. They've been doing this in season three because they get more money this way.

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So they will withhold the first few episodes, even from their crowdfunding supporters.

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They withhold those episodes. They show only in theaters. So you have to pay money to go watch it in theaters.

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And then after a certain amount of time, then they release the show on streaming. Again, money making thing.

56:29

That's the reason why they're doing it. And even though they've signed this big deal with Lionsgate and they're making all this money from their contract with Lionsgate, with the movie sales, yet they're still doing crowdfunding.

56:42

So they're taking money from people who are supporting the show when they don't even need it anymore because Lionsgate is funding it.

56:51

Now, this person, James, he said, Jenkins, Jenkins, Jesus is straight up blasphemous at times.

56:57

That's right. Yeah. He says things that Jesus absolutely would not say. So it's not just a matter of interpreting this

57:05

Jesus as potentially or perhaps saying something like this.

57:10

It's not just speculation. It is putting words in Jesus mouth.

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He never would have said. And that was really the point of that video in which I reviewed that particular scene.

57:24

Jenkins has Jesus saying things Jesus never would have said. He would never have told

57:29

Judas. I used to have your heart because he never had Judas's heart. Judas's heart was never toward Christ.

57:35

Jesus knew that he knew that Judas's heart was never for him. And the reason why he was called to follow

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Jesus was for that purpose of betraying him into the hands of his enemies so that he might be crucified so that we could be saved.

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This is all by the working of God. Now, Jesus loved Judas. He surely did.

57:59

Because Judas was his enemy. And Jesus taught us to love our enemies. Jesus washed

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Judas's feet. We have that in John 13 from what we can understand from the different gospel accounts of the of the

58:12

Last Supper. Judas was even present there at the Last Supper. So Jesus loved him, showed affection for him so that as it's recorded in Matthew, when

58:22

Judas came and betrayed Jesus, Jesus said to him, friend, do what you can.

58:28

Whatever you came to do, because Jesus treated him like a friend, even though Judas in his heart did not really have affection for the

58:38

Lord. This person whose name is Kelly says, yeah, we know. Have you ever preached a message in which you expounded on a on a biblical topic?

58:47

Was every single word you spoke quoted directly from the Bible? There was a movie called The Gospel of John, which did that.

58:53

I really liked it. But the fact remains, all Jesus did was not recorded.

58:58

Of course, I absolutely acknowledge that. And I've made certain speculations.

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Maybe the apostle Paul felt this. Maybe Jesus and the disciples did this. I've done that whenever I've been preaching through certain books or narratives or things like that.

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But there's a difference between clarifying. I'm just speculating here. I don't know that this is actually what what it is.

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There's a difference between that. And putting words in Jesus mouth, he never actually would have said.

59:29

Whenever I make those speculations, I'm speculating based on the evidence that we have presented in front of us.

59:35

Now, Jenkins says that's what he's doing. If you've ever seen interviews with him, he says that one of the tests, one of the litmus tests that they will give to a script or a scene or whatever, they will say, is this plausible?

59:48

Is it plausible that this, you know, would have happened in this way? But it's still at Jenkins discretion.

59:55

It's still subjective according to what he thinks would happen. Whereas as an expository preacher in which my role as a preacher is to draw the meaning out of the text according to what

01:00:07

God means for it to say, not what I want it to say. My role as an expositor is to remain consistent with what we have in the text.

01:00:16

Dallas has said he's not consistent with what is in the text. When people will ask him questions like his own fans, you watch it on,

01:00:26

I don't have any examples in front of me, but you watch it on either YouTube or Facebook, usually on Facebook.

01:00:31

It's the comment section on the Chosen's Facebook page. You'll see his own fans will ask him questions about, are you going to do this?

01:00:40

Why didn't you have Jesus say this? Because that's what the Bible says. There will be questions like that in the threads.

01:00:45

And Jenkins response will be, that's not the story we're telling. So he says that he's not trying to be faithful to the text.

01:00:56

He's trying to tell a particular story. And his only metric for whether that story is accurate is his own subjective ideas of whether or not that would be plausible based on the

01:01:08

Jesus that he has in his head, not the Jesus that is in the Bible.

01:01:13

Oh, he might have a version of Jesus in his head that's based off of the Bible. But so do the

01:01:19

Mormons. So do Muslims. They have a version of Jesus that's it's based on the

01:01:25

Bible, but it isn't actually the biblical Jesus. And I say that term based on the

01:01:31

Bible loosely, because if you're going to say based on something, then you're going to say that's the base point.

01:01:36

And everything goes out from there. But it's not really the way that we use that term anymore. Um, this this person said,

01:01:43

I don't watch that chosen stuff. No movie is better than the word of God. Absolutely. This fellow,

01:01:50

Micah, says you can say that emphatically. You know, everything Jesus said and prayed about,

01:01:56

John says later at the end of his telling, Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down,

01:02:04

I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for all the books that would be written. That's John 21, 25. I know with absolute certainty that Jesus did not say to Judas.

01:02:16

I used to have your heart. I know that 100%. And there is no doubt in my mind.

01:02:23

Can I say that emphatically? I'm doing it right now. And Micah said again, you know, everything

01:02:29

Jesus said and prayed about. No, and I never claimed that I did. I never said that in the video. I can say that this statement, this claim that Dallas Jenkins makes through the chosen is a fabrication.

01:02:43

It is wrong. It is a different Christ than the Christ of the Bible. This is an exchange that would not have happened between Jesus and Judas.

01:02:51

I can say that 100%. And I don't have to know every single thing that Jesus said during his earthly ministry in order to make that claim.

01:02:59

I've got the scripture which comes from God, from the Holy Spirit, and I can weigh any other claim that anybody else makes against that.

01:03:09

And this one doesn't hold up. This fellow quotes Matthew 26, 39.

01:03:15

And going a little farther, he fell on his face and prayed, saying, my father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me.

01:03:22

Nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will. He did pray for a different series of events, though.

01:03:29

You're right. I was kind of wondering if somebody was going to throw that verse at me and try to say, couldn't

01:03:35

Jesus have prayed this about Judas? I never saw a comment like that, but I thought somebody might say it.

01:03:41

Couldn't Jesus have prayed something about Judas that was like what we have in Matthew 26, 39?

01:03:47

So like saying of Judas, if there is any other way, then let

01:03:52

Judas make a different decision, not as I will, but as you will. And my answer to that would be no,

01:03:58

Jesus never prayed that because of what we have said to us in John six, that Jesus knew from the beginning who it was who would believe in him and who it was who would betray him.

01:04:13

He knew from the beginning when Judas shows up, he knows that Judas is the betrayer.

01:04:20

He knows that Judas's heart is not really for Jesus because it said at the end of John two, at the end of the second chapter, that Jesus knew what was in the heart of man.

01:04:31

And he knew what was in Judas's heart. He knows the moment he lays eyes on Judas, the betrayer.

01:04:38

This is it. I mean, take, for example, what we have in John one, when

01:04:44

Jesus first meets Nathaniel, Jesus said to Nathaniel, behold, an

01:04:51

Israelite, indeed, in whom there is no deceit. He's never met Nathaniel before. And yet when

01:04:57

Nathaniel approaches him, Jesus knows that this is an honest man. And Nathaniel said to him, how do you know me?

01:05:03

And Jesus answered him before Philip called you when you were under the fig tree, I saw you.

01:05:09

And Nathaniel answered him, Rabbi, you are the son of God. You are the king of Israel. So Jesus answered him, because I said to you,

01:05:17

I saw you under the fig tree. Do you believe you will see greater things than these?

01:05:23

And he said to him, truly, truly, I say to you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending on the son of man.

01:05:32

Jesus knew the heart of Nathaniel. He even knew what Nathaniel was doing before Philip knew what

01:05:39

Nathaniel was doing. And so as Jesus knew Nathaniel's heart, so he would have known

01:05:45

Judas's the very moment that he laid eyes on him. You know, there are occasions in scripture where God, this includes

01:05:52

Jesus, tells somebody not to pray for someone else. In Jeremiah 7, 16, do not pray for this people or lift up a cry or prayer for them and do not intercede with me, for I will not hear you.

01:06:07

Jesus, who is the son of God, part of the Godhead was every bit as much a part of that comment that was made to Jeremiah the prophet.

01:06:14

He says it again in Jeremiah 11, 14, do not pray for this people or lift up a cry of prayer on their behalf, for I will not listen when they call to me in the time of their trouble.

01:06:24

It is God's intention to bring judgment upon them, and even their cry of distress is not going to stop the punishment that is coming.

01:06:32

Jeremiah 14, 11, the Lord said to me, do not pray for the for the welfare of this people.

01:06:38

Jesus would not have prayed for Judas. It was always God's intention that Judas was going to betray the

01:06:47

Christ. As we read about in Acts chapter four, this is in a prayer that the apostles lift up to the

01:06:55

Lord. David, your servant said by the Holy Spirit, why did the

01:07:00

Gentiles rage and the people's plot in vain? The kings of the earth set themselves and the rulers were gathered together against the

01:07:09

Lord and against your anointed. For truly in this city, there were gathered together against your

01:07:14

Holy servant, Jesus, whom you anointed both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the

01:07:19

Gentiles and the peoples of Israel to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place.

01:07:27

And now, Lord, look upon their threats and grant to your servants to continue to speak your word with all boldness while you stretch out your hand to heal and signs and wonders are performed through the name of your

01:07:40

Holy servant, Jesus. That's a prayer the apostles prayed in Acts four, verses 25 through 30 is what

01:07:49

I read there. And so we can continue in confidence, knowing that God is sovereign, he is in control.

01:07:57

And he is going to bring about his purposes as he means to bring them about no matter how bad things get, no matter what may happen to you, no matter how distressed you may feel seeing the condition of the world or different things going on in the news or in society, maybe in your own family, in your own town or otherwise, continue to hold fast to this truth that God is in control.

01:08:19

And from the very beginning, he has been doing what has been in his heart to do and he will accomplish all of his purposes.

01:08:28

He has promised for you that in Christ Jesus, your sins are forgiven and you will have everlasting life.

01:08:33

There is no reason for you to doubt that. And even in the worst of circumstances, God is doing all things, working all things together for our good, for those who love

01:08:45

God and are called according to his purpose. Romans 8, 28, we have nothing to fear, knowing that our

01:08:52

God is sovereign, he is in control and Christ reigns. And in him, we have been reconciled to our creator, not just in relationship with him now, but we'll live with him forever in glory.

01:09:06

Amen. Heavenly Father, we thank you for what we've talked about today, the questions that we've answered, the videos we've watched, scriptures that we've read and things that we've thought through.

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And may these things sanctify us and draw us nearer to Christ and help us to trust you more day by day.

01:09:25

Let us not be led astray by those things that try to appeal to our senses.

01:09:32

The feels want to be entertaining to us. We're not just watching these shows because we want clean entertainment.

01:09:39

It should not be our objective for watching these kinds of things. We desire the truth. Our hunger is for the truth.

01:09:46

And we love the truth so much that we hate it when somebody comes along and tries to their own gain, their own advantage, their own platform or whatever else.

01:09:56

Keep us faithful to these things and may they work out in our lives a desire for Christ and holiness that we should walk upright before you in holiness and uprightness all our days until the day of the

01:10:10

Lord. Come quickly, Lord Jesus. We pray in his great name. Amen. And that's

01:10:24

Jesus saying in Matthew chapter five, let your light shine before men so that they may see your good works and glorify your father who is in heaven.

01:10:32

Yeah. And even kids are known by their works. That's one of the verses too. Yeah. Speaking of kids.

01:10:38

Yeah. One just came in the door. How about that? And a dog. Oh, is it the dog that came in?

01:10:44

It was the dog. It's not even a kid. I saw the door open, but I could not see a head from where I'm at.

01:10:52

That's the dog. It's the dog. You dopey dog. Well, can you go shut that door?

01:10:59

All right. Oh, boy.

01:11:10

Yeah. He needs to stay in here because if we let him out there, he's going to scratch at the door the whole time. Oh, no.

01:11:20

Yeah. Have her take him to bed. Yeah.