Daniel in Exile Part 1

All right, we will pray and then we will get started Lord Jesus again as we open up your word and we study this out. We pray that you would help us to rightly understand how to call upon you in times of trouble During the time of our exile here on this earth while we are waiting for the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, amen.

All right, you're gonna note something here. We're starting our study of the book of Daniel and I will not be using the theme dare to be a Daniel. Okay, I find it to be a form of narcissistic Eisegesis and we're not going to play that game.

Dare to get exiled right? We are going to note though that when it comes to the book of Daniel that there is Absolutely some comfort for us. During the time of our exile Daniel is one of the exiles of Judah.

Remember less than five 5 ,000 people survived the the attacks of Nebuchadnezzar God acting in judgment and basically cutting out the cancer of their idolatry and their false prophets in order to heal their wound and If you were to compare how the children of Israel were behaving Before their exile and after their exile there is a marked difference.

That doesn't mean that they didn't have problems coming out of exile. They absolutely did in kind of like half-hearted Worship and and really just walking through the motions there was that that was part of the problem, but God had raised up men like Ezra and Nehemiah and.

And they they I mean they really stand out and stark contrast To the the the leaders of Israel or Judah prior to their captivity. But I would note then that this idea that we are exiles now is Is a mindset that the scriptures teach us as Christians.

So we note that the exile of Judah is a historical event. It legitimately happened. Daniel is not mythology. Daniel is history and as a result of it, it's in the types and shadows and when we look at the books like Esther and Daniel as well as Ezekiel these are books written During times of exile and here's what Peter says in hit the opening to his epistle Peter an apostle of Jesus Christ to those who are elect exiles of the dispersion.

Look at that elect what? Exiles, who's that talking about? All y 'all okay of the dispersion of Pontius Galatia Cappadocia Azabethenia. Oslo, Minnesota. According to the the foreknowledge of God the father in the sanctification of the spirit for obedience to Jesus Christ and for the Sprinkling with his blood may grace and peace be multiplied to you.

He continues though blessed be the God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ according to his great mercy. He has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

I could do a whole lesson on this first part. But note that who is the agent of our being born again? It isn't you. It's not it's Jesus. It's not you. It's it's your it's not your free will. He has caused us to be born again to an inheritance.

That is imperishable undefiled Unfading kept in heaven for you who by God's power you are being guarded through faith for a salvation. Ready to be revealed in the last time in this you rejoice though now for a little while if necessary.

You have been grieved by various trials so that the tested genuineness of your faith Which is more precious than gold that perishes though It is tested by fire may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

Though you have not seen him you love him. Though you do not now see him you believe in him and you rejoice with joy. That is inexpressible and filled with glory obtaining the outcome of your faith, which is the salvation of your souls.

Oh wait, the outcome of my faith is the salvation of my soul. It's not the finding of my purpose. No, it's the salvation of your soul, right? So concerning this salvation the prophets who prophesied about the grace that was to be yours.

They searched and they inquired carefully inquiring what person or time the Spirit of Christ in them was indicating when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and The subsequent glories it was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves.

But you in the things that have now been announced to you through those who preach the good news. To you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven things into which even the angels long to look. Therefore preparing your minds for action.

Let me comfort you here today, right? Right, you'll never look at the word comfort again the same right therefore preparing your minds for action being sober Minded not drunk in the spirit sober minded set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

So you'll note here that part of the Christian mindset taught by us in Scripture is to have a forward-looking Faith looking on into the future when Christ returns when we as exiles Finally get to go home to our homeland our promised land.

So you'll note that again this idea of the grace that's to be revealed Anchors us in our present sufferings and makes it so that we can say. Yep. This is terrible right now and Lord's gonna help me through it.

But what's coming is going to be Glorious, right? So as then as obedient children. Yes, that's describing you do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance. But as he who called you he is holy.

You also be holy in your conduct since it is written You shall be holy for I am holy and if you call on him as father who judges Impartially according to each one's deeds. Here we go again conduct yourselves with fear throughout the time of your exile aha, and.

So you're gonna know this is exactly what Daniel is doing as well as Shadrach Meshach Abednego these exiles that are mentioned in the book of Daniel they are conducting themselves with fear throughout the time of their exile and they are going to be spectacularly saved from some horrible things and you're gonna know even if God doesn't Spectacularly save you from horrible things in your life and you perish as a result of what is happening to you.

God is none nonetheless saving you because he is saving you and bringing you home to the promised land that he's promised. So we are all exiles. So conduct yourself with fear throughout the time of your exile.

Well, how long will that be until Jesus returns or you die? Whichever comes first right knowing that you were ransomed from the feudal ways inherited from your forefathers. Not with perishable things such as silver or gold.

But with the precious blood of Christ like that of a lamb without blemish or spot. He was foreknown before the foundation of the world, but he was made manifest in the last times for the sake of you. Through him you are believers in God who raised him from the dead.

Gave him glory so that your faith and hope are in God. So good mentality for Christians to embrace you ain't gonna be here very long. You are in exile. You are behind enemy lines. You are in pagan territory.

Alas, do not despair a time is coming when you will be called home like the exiles were and Back to the real promised land new heavens new earth. That being said we can then begin the story of Daniel in The third year of the reign of Jehoiakim the king of Judah.

Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came to Jerusalem and he besieged it. You're gonna know Daniel does not begin with a long time ago in a galaxy far far away. There's a reason he's not writing myth. He's writing history.

Well, there's miraculous events in here. How can this be history? Do you really think that history doesn't have miraculous events in it? Who told you that it doesn't? The person who who challenges the Bible and says the Bible can't be real history because it contains miracles in it.

Really have you been everywhere? Do you know exactly what's possible? Are you 100 positive? Can you definitively prove that God doesn't exist and that he can't react? He can't actually act in his creation.

So yeah, when you start talking like that, you tell me more about yourself than the actual state of the world and the universe. Yes Bruce oh, no, I saw the restraint that you tried to. Bruce Bruce Burns is here.

What's interesting about Daniel and Nebuchadnezzar? The secularists who say well, there's no evidence of any any miracles in Babylonian history. So Daniel has to be a fraud. They ignore the fact that even though Nebuchadnezzar ruled for something like 30 years.

The records fall mysteriously silent for the last 17 years of Nebuchadnezzar's reign.

Yeah, they do when most of Daniel happened. I would note this that the person who says that there are no records is Absolutely lying because we have an epistle written by Nebuchadnezzar in the book of Daniel.

We also have an epistle written by Darius in the book of Daniel and what I find fascinating about these. We'll get there when we get to the story of Nebuchadnezzar's dream. Well, actually his he has a dream and then he's punished by God at the end.

He writes us a letter, but I would note here I always like to point out to people that you always got to pay attention to epistles to see who it's written to and in Nebuchadnezzar's epistle I'm gonna make this very clear.

Nebuchadnezzar is an actual author of Scripture his his writing inspired by God the Holy Spirit is embedded in the book of Daniel and Daniel was absolutely in a position to receive a an epistle from Nebuchadnezzar and from Darius because he was one of the highest officials in the Babylonian government at the time.

And then also with the Medes and the Persians the media Persian Empire. So, you know, you'll note here that the person who says that there are no records is cooking the books because Daniel actually has given us a historical document written by the hand of Nebuchadnezzar and By the way, it's addressed to you and I do mean that it's actually addressed to you.

Well, we'll take a look at that. So, you know the book begins Historically in the third reign of Jehoiakim the king of Judah Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came to Jerusalem. He besieged it and The Lord and here were words.

This is gonna be Adonai gave Jehoiakim into the king of Judah into his hand with some of the vessels of the house of God and he brought them to the land of Shinar to the house of his God. You got his God right and placed the vessels in the treasury of his God.

Then the king commanded Ashkenaz and boy, I gotta tell you I struggle with these Babylonian names. They do not roll off the tongue. Well at all his chief pre his chief eunuch to bring some of the people of Israel both of the royal family and of the nobility youths without blemish of good appearance and Skillful in all wisdom endowed with knowledge understanding learning and Competent to stand in the king's palace and to teach them the literature and the language of the Chaldeans.

Now if you if you've done any study of the Babylonian Empire in the media Persian Empire that follows historians talk about the brilliance of this particular move of theirs when they conquered people they Assimilated them into their culture.

They didn't treat them merely as slaves or whatever they actually wanted to be part of this grand Empire that they had put together and so Nebuchadnezzar wanted to absolutely give Places at the table if you would the table of power to people who were exiles because he thought that they brought something of value to the table and so the the Babylonian Empire was kind of a not a melting pot but more like a patchwork quilt and Intentionally, they didn't subjugate people they tried as best as they could to Incorporate them and assimilate them into their their whole culture in their way of life.

This is absolutely consistent with what we would we know about how the Babylonian Empire behaved. Right. Yeah, so you don't have people who are who are nursing a grudge while they're in exile. They feel like they have a voice they have ability to participate and have make some kind of a difference in Steering this the ship of state if you would and that's important.

And so this is absolutely consistent with how the Babylonians conducted themselves and then later the media Persians. All right. So let's see here skillful Endowed with knowledge understanding competent.

We're basically looking for good-looking smart guys. So the nerds that who are good-looking They are the ones Who who are rising it there? They are the ones chosen to potentially have this place. So here's what we learn here.

They were endowed with knowledge learning competent to stand in the king's past to teach them the literature the language of the Chaldeans. So there's a training period you need to you need to at least understand our backstory our historical narrative How we operate and so the king then assigned them a daily portion of the food that the king ate and of the wine that He drank they were to be educated for three years.

And at the end of that time they were to stand before the king among them were Daniel Hananiah Mishael and Azariah of the tribe of Judah and the chief of the eunuchs gave them names. Daniel he called belches are Hananiah he called Shadrach Mishael.

He called mesh Meshach and Azariah. He called a Bendigo. All right, so they get they get Babylonian names which belches are actually kind of invokes a false god of The Babylonians which is kind of a mess, but all of that being said, you know, that's not that's not an uncommon practice.

You think back in our history people coming from Europe that going through Ellis Island if they come into Europe with a really? Hard Slavic name or whatever. They're given they're given a much easier name to pronounce, right?

So I do think about the fact that the Mayevsky clan. They had their names modified, you know. So on my father's side of the family the Mayevsky's from Poland, which sketchy group I'm just saying they had their names changed to Majewski and.

Which is just ridiculous, okay, you just you know, how is Majewski better than Mayevsky? I don't know but yeah, you know you get the idea. All right. So these guys are given new names and Here's where we're going to do a little bit of pre-work along these lines.

If you've spent any time in evangelicalism or big megachurches if you ask the average Megachurch goer, especially if they have any connection at all with Saddleback. Even loosely you ask them what Daniel chapter 1 is about and they'll say it's about dieting.

That is an adventure in missing the point. Let me let me give you a little bit of history behind that it was probably about a decade ago Rick Warren decided that he was going to write a book and He also I think he had dr Oz as part of his team and some other things like this and the name of the book was called the Daniel plan and It was all it was all based up.

Supposedly based upon this chapter and what I always found fascinating and when I did the podcast I covered this this topic twice because there were two big pushes that Rick Warren gave regarding the Daniel plan.

The first year then it came out and then several years later during January the month when everybody decides that they need to lose all the weight they gained during Thanksgiving and Christmas. And and what I found fascinating and this is this is absolutely true.

I've met with Rick Warren and Rick Warren easily when I met with him and this was in 08 I think. When I met with him, he easily weighed more than 120 pounds than I did. So he's a big he's a big man. And so he was talking about the importance of this Daniel plan and of losing weight and all this kind of stuff.

But he never really lost weight in fact. He's probably packed on another hundred pounds since I met him and but every time he would come around to do the Daniel plan. He was engaging in Optical illusions is the best way I can put it.

He would teach the Daniel plan while wearing a very large dark black t-shirt. Okay to kind of hide the contours and things like this, but he wasn't actually applying himself to this at all and. And so I would note that despite being the author of the so-called Daniel plan and apparently this is all about being healthy.

Which is not really the point. He you know, that's so if you if you know anybody who thinks the Daniel plans like a thing. Just tell him it's a complete twisting of Scripture and even the author didn't practice what he preached.

Okay, he made a lot of money with that program, but he did not actually. It's annoying. It's the best way I can put it. So here's the actual account. Daniel resolved that he would not defile himself with the King's food or with the wine that he drank.

Therefore he asked the chief of the eunuchs to allow him not to defile himself. What's Daniel concerned about? The Torah right Mosaic Covenant, are there foods in the Mosaic Covenant that Daniel is not allowed to eat.

Yes. Sadly number one bacon. Okay, bacon off the menu bummer for Daniel, right? And so you'll note Nebuchadnezzar has no No rules or regulations over him. He's not part of the Mosaic Covenant. He can eat bacon.

He can eat lobster. He can eat crawfish. All the wonderful things that God has created that are just so savory and delicious. He can enjoy that stuff. Daniel can't and you're gonna know going into exile then Daniel is a fellow who who obviously surrendered himself To Nebuchadnezzar as Jeremiah had told him to so he fears the Word of the Lord.

He takes God's Word seriously and his faith is anchored in the scriptures and he knows that he would he's still bound by the Mosaic Covenant and Now he's got a job that could potentially put him in danger of having to defile himself.

And I would note in exile here today on planet Earth. You are going to face challenges like this in your job as well. There is an application here and I would note. Probably one of the bigger things that we have to worry about in our lifetime is the requirement of woke corporations.

Requiring you to affirm somebody's chosen pronouns. Can I do that? No, I can't. I cannot affirm somebody's Chosen pronouns, right? There's a reason for it because the scriptures say and Christ affirms that God created them male and female and.

So when you affirm somebody in their so-called self chosen pronouns, you are denying Explicitly that God has made them male and female and so I always recommend to people who say they have challenges like this at work.

You go to your HR department and you kind of ask I don't want to defile myself and here's in the United States. Here's how it plays out in the United States. It is against the law To discriminate against somebody based upon their religion.

It is absolutely forbidden. You can't do it. If you were to say no Muslims are allowed to work in my corporation. You are facing a lawsuit and you're gonna lose it hard in the same way though. You basically sit down with HR and you say here's the thing.

It is against the law to discriminate against people based upon their religious beliefs. I am a Christian. I affirm the God of scriptures and Jesus Christ and the scriptures say that God has created the male and female.

If You are going to require me to affirm somebody in their Preferred pronouns you are telling me you are asking me to deny my Savior and what he's taught. I Cannot do that if I have to choose between Jesus or somebody's preferred pronouns.

Jesus always wins and so if you're gonna push this agenda and make me have to affirm somebody in their pronouns. Then we're gonna have a lawsuit. Because you were discriminating discriminating against me and putting me in a situation that would cause me to compromise my faith.

Yeah. That's the current day iteration of bake the cake, right? Yeah. So that you'll note that currently in the Supreme Court has backed up the right Of people to not act contrary to their conscience.

Right, so I would note that Daniel like right out of the chute. They are now as part of their job and training. They are in danger of defiling themselves and legitimately having to break part of the Mosaic Covenant.

But note then the wisdom and the humility by which they are acting. So God gave Daniel favor and compassion in the sight of the chief of the eunuchs and the chief of the eunuchs said to Daniel I Fear my lord the king who assigned your food and your drink for why should you why should he see that you were in worse?

Condition than the youths who are of your own age. So you would endanger my head with the king. So at this point the chief of the eunuchs has got a problem here. And that is is that if he gives in to this request He potentially could lose his own head because you'll note that Nebuchadnezzar is not exactly known for being rational.

He's not exactly known for being cool calm and collected. Okay, he's rather volcanic in in his in his emotional outbursts. And so here this guy's look he's now in trouble because he's he knows that the officials.

Yeah, this is gonna be a problem if you guys end up looking sickly. I'm toast, right? I'm supposed to care for you guys. So Daniel said to the stewards whom the chief of the eunuchs had assigned over Daniel.

Hannah and I am Ishael and Azariah. Test your servants for ten days. Let us be given vegetables to eat and water to drink then let your our appearance and the appearance of our of our of the youths who eat the king's food be observed by you and Deal with your servants according to what you see now.

Here's the funniest part about this and remember Rick Warren wrote a book about the Daniel plan. It's all about losing weight. Okay. So he listened to them on this matter tested them for ten days and at the end of ten days It was seen that they were better in appearance and fatter in the flesh.

Than all the youths who ate the king's food. In other words, if you follow the Daniel plan, you're going to put on weight. Maybe I amend my statement. Rick Warren did follow the Daniel plan, right? So they were fatter now back in the day fatter is a sign of wealth it's a sign of health.

Skinny is a sign of poor. Okay, so keep that in mind in our day overweight is a sign of inactivity. Okay, it's a different thing altogether. People don't look at me and go man Roseboro's got to be the wealthiest pastor on planet Earth.

No, they're saying this guy needs to get out more and exercise, right? So Notice cultural differences now. So the end of ten days it was seen they were fatter in flesh and all the youths who ate the king's food.

So the steward took away their food and the wine they were to drink and gave them vegetables. Bummer for them man, as long as kale wasn't part of it. I think they'll be over bill. All right. Right now as for these four youths God gave them who gave them.

God gave them learning and skill and all literature and wisdom. Daniel had understanding in all visions and dreams. God gave them now. This is important part of this. We all are given gifts by God we also have Aptitudes that we have been given that have something to do with genetics and have something to do with our upbringing and stuff like this.

I always like to say that Dwayne Clevin who is the Church Council president? God has given him the spiritual gift of spreadsheets and Man, I have never seen anybody with a stronger gift of spreadsheets than him.

But all of that being said I I can work in spreadsheets. But it's about as fun as like eating sand and it's just not something I enjoy doing and so this is part of the reason why I say math is evil because I don't have an aptitude towards math and Then as a pastor, I can legitimately say that God has given me a teaching gift.

But here's the thing when God gives you Mental abilities when he gives you skills when he gives you gifts like these they are not for your self and if you have this attitude, well, I am smarter than everybody else you are Abusing a gift that God has given you when God gives you a gift.

You are not smart or skilled for your own sake. You are smart and skilled for the sake of serving and loving your neighbor with those skills. Yes. Right, there's nothing wrong with profiting your vocation because you'll know that God wills that those who preach the gospel make their living by the gospel in the same way God wills that those whom he's given skills to and gifts to that they make their living through those Skills and those aptitudes and so God wills for us under the current curse because we have to pay for our food.

We're all coming by the way food is without price in the world to come. No, there is no money that needs to change hand when it comes to the food. We are we are given our daily bread Freely in the world to come under the curse.

We've got a toil. So the idea then is is that you you charge a good market rate don't gouge and if you're if your products and services are Superior you can charge a superior. Right, and here's the thing.

There's nothing wrong with being wealthy. That is not a sin. What is wrong is worshiping and looking to money to meet your needs rather than God and those who are given much much is required so understand this if you if you God has given you a skill and you have great aptitude and as a result of it your Market value is higher as far as what you can earn in the marketplace.

You also have a greater responsibility to share the good gifts that God has given you with those who are not Capable of meeting their own needs or are struggling. So the idea here is is that I like to think of an economy like an ecosystem.

I mean you guys remember Sesame Street. There are so many good lessons in Sesame Street, right in in Sesame Street there was this really kind of Impressionist kind of cartoon that they once had and it was it was a scene of an ocean and there was Seaweed and there were big fish and there were little fish and everything was thriving there.

And then it what happened is some guy comes along and he removes the seaweed which gets rid of the small fish. And then by getting rid of the small fish they got that got rid of the big fish and the whole ecosystem Collapses, right?

You'll note that in the day that we live in and this is has nothing to do with Daniel. This is kind of just answering the question in the day that we live in that there's constantly Rhetoric where people will somehow say that everybody who is rich is rich on the backs of other people that somehow they have Scammed and schemed and done evil and they're not giving back to society.

Belonging on okay in an economy. You need big fish and you need little fish and Everybody symbiotically gets together and you obviously have laws so that people don't take advantage of each other or become rich through Through that scheming or through, you know oppressing other people.

But a lot of people who are very wealthy and who are business owners are high up in the in the corporate world. They haven't they haven't cheated their way to the top. They've legitimately gotten the skills put them into practice and shown their market value and they earn more than I do and that's Perfectly great because more of their taxes goes to pay for my military.

Okay, then then my money and here's the thing people like that. They also have this this incurable disease called Entrepreneurialism and they end up taking large amounts of money and risking everything by investing and creating Businesses themselves where people come to work for them.

So the idea here is is that we are all given differing gifts. But God has created the body of Christ as a body and we all kind of interact in inner. We we all need each other same if you were to kind of take that and extrapolate it out into the economy.

We need millionaires and billionaires. We need people who pick up the garbage. We need people who are craftsmen and tradesmen and then people who are just in the mushy middle like pastors like myself.

We we all need each other and the gifts that we've been given are for the purpose of serving each other. They're not for you. Although you do need to benefit from because you still have to put food on the table.

Yeah. Yeah, that's a terrible thing by the way, yeah if somebody says oh you're just a taxi driver shame on you. Absolutely shame on you. All right.

We know somebody's never been stuck on the side of the road after some suicidal deer.

Right. Yeah, we need we need uber drivers. We need Lyft drivers. We need taxi drivers. We need people to pick up the trash. You don't believe me. Have you seen what New York City looks like after a trash strike?

It's a mess, right? So you never as Christians we never get to look down at somebody and say you're just up. Because in Scripture slaves who don't even own themselves the lowest of the lowest in the Roman culture was the slave and Scripture says all of their work is being done to for Christ and Christ himself will reward them Slaves for their work, right?

So we as Christians and we refuse To basically demean those who by society's standards Have a job that we consider to be low. It's not low because their work is done for you and it's done for Christ. It is not low and those who by the world standards are have high positions.

You'll note the greatest warnings in Scripture are to the rich. The greatest warnings in Scripture are to them. We'll note then that the rich need a lot of prayer because they have a lot of Temptations as a result of being in contact with such resources, right?

But we never we never then say that what well they are higher and somebody else is lower. Baloney okay, and Kong's finger we have engineers and spreadsheet people and and Mathematicians and we have farmers and tradesmen and all kinds of folks here and you know what?

Every single one of them when they come to the Lord's table, they're on their knees on the same level. It's an it's an ecosystem, right? So I just bring this up because you're gonna know God is the one who gives you learning and skill.

Does that mean that they didn't have to do their homework? No, they were in a three-year training program and they had to do their homework and God then gave them skill in all literature and wisdom and Daniel had understanding in all visions and dreams and at the end of the time the three years when the king had commanded that they should be brought in the chief of the eunuchs brought them in before Nebuchadnezzar and the king spoke with them and Among all of them none was found like Daniel Hananiah Mishael or Azariah.

Which by the way is great for them, but it's also endangering to them. Because you're gonna note when God gives you skill, you know, it's always gonna be somebody at work. They're gonna have the evil eye.

They're going to be jealous of you and believe me when I know I can say this definitively where two or more are gathered. There is politics. Right exactly, yes, that's right. That's right. You had to be there.

All right. All right so therefore these guys stood before the king and Every matter of wisdom and understanding about which the king inquired of them. He found them ten times better than all the magicians and the enchanters that were in his kingdom.

You're gonna note this these guys didn't have to put themselves forward. Ooh, ooh, look at me I know the answer. Oh pick me boss. Pick me, right? When the boss called on them and they gave their answer the boss went wow, that was pretty amazing.

So you're gonna note here if you have a gift, you don't have to let anybody know about it. It'll it'll it'll shine all on its own. All right, you don't have to draw attention to it. All right and Daniel was there until the first year of King Cyrus.

Which means and Cyrus is the guy who gives the decree for the Jews to be able to go home. Which means Daniel was there a long time. Okay, really really really really long. You know, we don't. I don't think Daniel ever made it back though.

Did he make it back? I don't think. I don't. That's the full 70 years. Yes. He's he's in his 80s, right.

When the order goes out, mm-hmm.

So Daniel's there the whole time. Okay. Now now we're gonna get to one of my favorite chapters chapter 2. Nobody can ever accuse Nebuchadnezzar of being reasonable. Okay. Well before I get there, let me check let me check Questions real quick here.

All right. All right, so Love the story of Esther. Okay. I got it. Okay. Let's see here. Just put a small piece of kale on a burger. Oh Stephen Elliot, may God have mercy on your soul. Okay I'll pray for you my brother.

Okay, I'm gonna bring kale salad to the Christmas party. Thank you Rachel for not doing that. Okay. Okay, Jason asked how do we know what skills or gifts we are given? So here's the thing the Evangelical Church does this thing there where they do they do they do get gift assessments, right?

I think that these are not exactly kosher, I Think that those might be able to get get you into the ballpark in some cases but the reality is this is that oftentimes you will find that the gift that you have been given or the skill set that you have is is Discovered by by kind of trial and error.

It just and it naturally comes. It's like it because we're constantly interacting with other human beings. You're gonna find that. Something will come up and oftentimes think God is the one who's causing these things to happen.

Where all of a sudden you are your gift all of a sudden manifest. It shows itself and people go. Whoa, you're really good at that right and That that oftentimes is the indicator because it's like it's it's like when gears, you know when they're not connected.

They just kind of spin, you know all on their own but when you're when your gift gets engaged in the right sprocket like things start to move and things start to happen and. Then if you actually have a legitimate teaching gift, may I give you this gift of advice?

If you are a man and you have a legitimate teaching gift from God. There's a good chance that you're going to be called to the pastoral ministry. Don't. Try to run away from it. God will ankle tackle you and drag you into the pastoral office.

That's what happened to me. So keep that in mind. That's just some advice. But in reality these things are discovered kind of organically and you'll know that the church survived for thousands of years.

Almost two without people having gift. Evaluations and people still their gifts would rise to the top. It becomes really obvious and so. You know other people are going to say, you know, you're really good at that you go.

I am. They'll say yeah, you are and you go. Okay, and it oftentimes it at first it kind of shocks you but then you get you settle in and things work itself out. All right. Chapter two. Before we get there, let's do a little bit more work in First Peter and there's there's a very specific reason why I want to do that, by the way.