WWUTT 1815 Q&A Polygamy in the Bible, God Wooing Sinners, Applying Allegory

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Why did God allow polygamy in the Old Testament? Does God make himself attractive to unbelievers so he doesn't violate our free will?

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And where do we apply allegory to more poetic books of the Bible? The answers to these questions when we

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Understand the Text. This is

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When We Understand the Text, a daily Bible study that we may grow in faith. For faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the

00:32

Word of Christ. Tell your friends about our ministry at www .utt .com Once again, it's

00:38

Pastor Gabe. Thank you, Becky. You're welcome. Our friend at Grace to You, Fred, says that we need to officially change the name of the show to the

00:46

Gabe and Babe Q &A Super Show. Super Show! Woohoo! Thank you for listening to the

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Friday edition of the broadcast, when we answer your questions, and you can send those questions to whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com.

01:02

We had an election not that long ago, so I wanted to give you some encouragement from Psalm 2.

01:09

Why do the nations rage, and the peoples meditate on a vain thing?

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The kings of the earth take their stand, and the rulers take counsel together against Yahweh and against His anointed, saying,

01:24

Let us tear their fetters apart, and cast away their cords from us. He who sits in the heavens laughs.

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The Lord mocks them. Then He speaks to them in His anger, and terrifies them in His fury, saying,

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But as for me, I have installed my king upon Zion, my holy mountain.

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I will surely tell of the decree of Yahweh. He said to me, You are my son. Today I have begotten you.

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Ask of me, and I will surely give the nations as your inheritance, and the ends of the earth as your possession.

01:57

You shall break them with a rod of iron. You shall shatter them like a potter's vessel.

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So now, O kings, show insight. Take warning, O judges of the earth. Serve Yahweh with fear, and rejoice with trembling.

02:12

Kiss the Son, lest He become angry, and you perish in the way. For His wrath may soon be kindled.

02:19

How blessed are all who take refuge in Him." Amen. Take refuge in Christ, not in the condition of our nation.

02:26

Right. The Respect of Marriage Act, if this truly was a respect for marriage act, then it would define marriage as being between a man and a woman.

02:38

Right. When you said it at the beginning, I was like, oh, man and a woman, yay! And then

02:43

I was like, wait, no, it can't be, because it's today, you know? So, it's kind of crazy out there.

02:49

What the world calls love is not what God calls love. What the world defines as marriage is not what God defines as marriage.

02:55

What the world calls respect is not how the Lord, how

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His word, the Bible, defines respect and honor and any of those virtues.

03:06

Yeah. So, follow what Scripture says, not what the culture is doing. Take refuge in the Son. Yes.

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For it is by faith in Christ we are forgiven our sins and have everlasting life.

03:19

He is King and only through Him will we escape the evils of this world that is coming into judgment and we will live with God forever in glory.

03:28

Amen. So, again, if you would like to send a, did I mention the email address? I don't think so.

03:33

When we understand the text at gmail .com if you have an email, most of these that I have to get to today are emails, but look at this.

03:40

We have a paper. An actual letter. With a stamp on the envelope. Yes, it had a stamp on it and everything.

03:47

That's awesome. This is from Jim. He says, Dear Pastor Gabe, I discovered your podcast and videos last spring.

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I love listening to every podcast and you have helped me grow in the faith. It is encouraging to hear you stand firm on the truth of God's word.

04:03

I wanted to add to your pizza fund or your work on your house fund, whichever.

04:09

That's awesome. Anyway, thanks for all that you and your wife do. You are making an eternal difference.

04:16

Aww. Thank you. I appreciate that, Jim. And he is from Washington, Spokane. We had

04:22

Walla Walla Washington last week. Yeah, cool. And this one from Washington State. In fact,

04:27

Jim, my kids are enjoying your gift as we speak. Yes, they are. They are eating pizza right now.

04:34

Keeping them entertained with Auntie Sonia. That's right. So we can do this. Thank you, Miss Sonia.

04:39

Speaking of which, Sonia gave us some gifts. Some gifts. Wow. You can have those.

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Not only. There you go. His and hers. That's right. She put his and hers stickers on them.

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I like it. Becky got Milano cookies and I got Fig Newtons because I love Fig Newtons. And I love

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Milano cookies. You don't want to share my Fig Newtons? No, gross. I like figs.

05:06

I do not like Fig Newtons. But the real Fig Newtons, I have never tasted an off -brand Fig Newton that I was like, oh yeah, this is great.

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They're all gross. The off -brands are terrible. Little Debbie's aren't bad. But I still prefer the actual

05:21

Fig Newton. You can have them. We don't fight over this. See, what it really comes down to is

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I found a snack no one will steal from me. Oh, not true. Your children love it.

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I guess that is true. They will take my Fig Newtons. They like to sneak in there. But you take everything of mine except my

05:40

Fig Newtons. You take my charger. Well, it works better. If I can find that charger again somewhere,

05:50

I will get you one. Oh, that would be awesome. But every night I come to bed and it's like, where's my charger?

05:55

Oh, hey, by the way. It's over on Becky's side of the bed. That's what I get if you go before me, you just grab my charger.

06:04

Yeah, I do. Anyway, while we're talking about some personal things here, this next question actually gets a little personal.

06:14

You ready? Sure. This is from Elizabeth in Jefferson Town. I'm guessing that's

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Kentucky. It would be great if she was Elizabeth from Elizabeth Town, Kentucky. That would be hilarious.

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How far is Jefferson Town from Elizabeth Town? Not a clue. Dear Gabe and Babe, I cracked up laughing at the outtake where Gabe was trying to do a cheer for Becky and he couldn't come up with anything.

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I don't know why I found that so funny, but I couldn't stop laughing. I was sitting in the food court, and I'm sure people were wondering what was up with the girl with AirPods in her ears falling out of her chair laughing so hard.

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Sorry about the embarrassment. Anyway, Gabe said that Becky was a cheerleader.

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Is that true? Are you high school sweethearts? No. Were you popular in school?

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And if so, how did your faith affect your popularity? I was just wondering. And she goes on, she asks a

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Bible question here. Maybe we should do the Bible question first, then we'll come back to it. Sure. So she says, if I'm supposed to ask a

07:18

Bible question, here it is. If marriage is supposed to be between one man and one woman, then why did so many men in the

07:25

Old Testament have many wives, and God didn't rebuke them for it? Thank you for making such a great show.

07:32

Yeah, so I just did a what video on polygamy. I don't know if that inspired her question or not. Yeah. I'll play that video here in just a moment.

07:39

I didn't answer that question, though. I just talked about basically in the video I said that there's nothing in the

07:44

Bible that is approving of having multiple spouses. Right.

07:50

But neither is it really disapproving. True. It's part of the problem. Well, but,

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I mean, however, I see consequences of having multiple wives.

08:01

Absolutely. All over the Bible. Yeah. So, obviously, it's not considered a good thing. It's not ideal.

08:08

Mm -hmm. Polygamy or bigamy, which is having two wives, it's not ideal to have multiple spouses.

08:17

The ideal is what God created in the Garden of Eden. Mm -hmm. Right. One man and one woman, Adam and Eve.

08:23

Right. A man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.

08:28

That is biblical. That's right. That's in Genesis 2. A biblical model or however you word that. Yes. Yeah. What God intended.

08:34

Yeah, there we go. That's in Genesis 2. Paul repeats it again in Ephesians 5. Jesus says it in Matthew chapter 19.

08:41

Mm -hmm. So, this is what God intended for marriage. Right. Now, you have certain people in the

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Old Testament, of course, that have multiple wives. Abraham, Jacob did, David and Solomon did.

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The first time that you see a man with more than one wife is actually in the genealogies in Genesis.

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It pops up there before we get to Abraham. But, of course, in this hyper -patriarchal culture, it was unsafe for a woman to go her whole life without being married.

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Right. Yeah. And if she did not get married, she would probably become a prostitute.

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Mm -hmm. Either you were somebody's wife or you became a prostitute. And so, polygamy was considered acceptable since it was actually providing for those women that would have a really hard life if it were not for the fact that they lived in a household with a man who was providing for them and taking care of them.

09:33

Yeah. And then for a lot of those cultures, too, as they're trying to be fruitful and multiply, but doing it on their own terms and not

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God's, but they would have multiple – a man would have multiple wives and even concubines.

09:47

Mm -hmm. The concubines are there to – I can have even more children with these concubines. Right. And that was the reason for that.

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It was to expand population and also it was considered acceptable because it was providing for women so that they would not end up in prostitution.

10:02

Mm -hmm. And that could be one of the reasons that you don't see an absolute prohibition against it.

10:08

Mm -hmm. Now, in Deuteronomy, when the laws are given for kings, he's not to have too many wives.

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That's what it says. And the interesting thing is it doesn't say a king is only supposed to have one wife. It just says he's not supposed to have too many wives.

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Hmm. Because then his heart will go after his wives and their gods. Yeah. And it will not be after the

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Lord, which of course – And that happens. Yeah, right. That's what we see happen with Solomon. Yeah. That's what ends up happening to him.

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But there's no absolute prohibition in the law of having more than one wife.

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And I think there's somewhat of a grace there. Mm -hmm. This may be hard to swallow, but there's

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God's grace on that, that he didn't absolutely prohibit it so that women would be provided for.

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And they would not come into prostitution, which would be much, much worse. Oh, yeah. We live in a culture that, thankfully, has been influenced by the gospel.

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Of course, we're quickly losing that. Yes. And it's becoming increasingly unsafe for women and children in this culture.

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Mm -hmm. But for a while, while we had the influence of the gospel that has created the

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Judeo -Christian culture that we might consider our American roots having.

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Right. Because of that, it's a safer environment for women. It has become a safer environment for them over the last several decades.

11:26

Oh, yeah. But we're also seeing the downsides of that independence. Yep. Because a lot of the direction that our nation is taking is because of the free love movement back in the 60s and the influence of feminism and things like that.

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That's why we're ending up where we are. Yeah. And even the hyper -sex culture that we're in, women can do everything that men can do.

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Women can become men. Mm -hmm. That you can marry whoever you want and it doesn't matter. All of this stuff. Oh, you don't have to marry at all.

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You don't have to get married at all. All of this stuff has been influenced by this hyper -sexual, feministic intersectionalism.

12:00

Mm -hmm. To clarify, I meant that you can have multiple partners but not get married to any of them.

12:07

Okay, yeah. That's what I meant. That's what you meant by not getting married at all. Yes. But some will even say, like, not getting married being something virtuous.

12:12

Right. Well, true. So it's better for me to... I mean, like, at Hollywood, they have all their, like, I put my career first.

12:19

Exactly. Well, did you? You know, maybe. Yeah, you did put your career first. You put you first.

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But you're going to regret that in 40 years. Yeah. So that could be the reason why we don't really see an absolute prohibition.

12:30

I'm speaking very theoretically here because the Bible doesn't say explicitly. Right. That's what

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I was going to say. Yeah. It probably doesn't. But we do know that the ideal for marriage is as God intended it from the very beginning, one man and one woman.

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After all, you have the qualifications for pastors and deacons in 1 Timothy 3 says, must be the husband of one wife.

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Right. Maybe that's after Jesus and, you know, things. I don't know. Well, speaking of Jesus, he has one bride.

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Yep, he does. That's true. The church. The church. So we're following Christ's example and we're following His word.

13:04

Mm -hmm. When it comes to these things. So let me go ahead and play that video on polygamy and then we'll get to some other questions here.

13:11

Okay. Does the Bible condone polygamy?

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Let's start with the patriarchs. Abraham was married to Sarah, but then he also married Hagar and later Keturah. His son

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Isaac had one wife, Rebecca, but then their son Jacob had two wives who were sisters, Leah and Rachel, and then he also married

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Bilhah and Zilpah. What about the prophets like Moses? Well, Moses is never mentioned as having more than one wife.

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Zipporah was his first wife in Exodus 2 .21, and then he married a Cushite woman in Numbers 12, a union his siblings

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Aaron and Mariam disapproved of because she was a foreigner. But then there are the kings like David. He had at least eight wives we know of and there were probably others.

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And his son Solomon had 700 wives. So God is apparently cool with polygamy, right?

13:56

No. Narrative is not normative. The Bible never speaks favorably of anyone having more than one wife.

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In Matthew 19, 4 -6, Jesus said, Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said,

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For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother, and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.

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So they are no longer two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate.

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So God's intention for marriage from the beginning was one man and one woman. Furthermore, pastors and deacons who are to be models of Christian maturity are to have only one wife.

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Jesus has one bride, the church, whom he loved and gave himself for. So let us follow his word and his example and keep marriage sacred when we understand the text.

14:45

Okay, yeah, so Becky reminded me that Elizabeth had some other questions here. What were they?

14:52

Were you a cheerleader? So I was a cheerleader. Yes, you were a cheerleader. It was not for very long. I was in middle school and high school.

15:00

It was fun. That's still six years. Not the whole time. Not the whole time in high school.

15:06

I think I was maybe two years of middle school, which two out of the three, so that's almost all of it.

15:12

But in high school I think maybe one, maybe two at the most.

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I never did see a picture of Becky in a cheerleading outfit. Never saw a photo of that. I tried to hide from the cameras.

15:27

I did not like my picture taken. Yeah, but when she and I got married Becky had a whole storage shed full of stuff.

15:33

Oh yeah. We had to shut down. My own storage shed.

15:38

Yes, it was yours, full of stuff. It was mine, yes. So we had to move the stuff to save on money because we were poor when we got married.

15:46

We had to shut down the shed and move all that stuff into our garage. And it took up the whole garage.

15:52

It took up the whole garage. I had to go through all that stuff because I was going to throw a vast majority of it away.

15:58

Which I was fine with. You didn't even know what was in any of that stuff. But I went through a lot of pictures while I was doing that, so I'd find your boxes of pictures and I'm like, okay, let me get acquainted with this gal that I did not know in high school.

16:11

Oh, she was cute. I definitely would have hit on her in high school. Aww. Now, I was not, however.

16:20

Oh, I've seen pictures of you. I would have flirted with you. No, I was way too gawky. I know.

16:25

I like the gawky. It's good. I was thinking, see, you definitely found me more in my prime because high school was not it.

16:35

Yeah. I was homecoming queen, which was a big deal because we didn't have prom king and queen.

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Yeah, we didn't either. It was just homecoming. Yeah. She was a popular one.

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I was. I was not. I was surprised. I was really surprised. I was even nominated. Apparently more people liked me than I thought.

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I was nominated for basketball homecoming, but that was because of my sister. She was the most popular girl in school.

17:04

Yeah, I'd believe that. She went into where everybody was gathered in to do the nominations and she just went in there going, vote for my brother, vote for my brother.

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I just ended up in the court. I was happy with that, but no, I wasn't popular in that sense.

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I was popular in the sense that everybody knew who I was, but that was because it was a small high school. Right. Me too.

17:23

Yeah. But how did that affect my Christianity? I was Catholic growing up.

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How practicing were you as a Catholic? I know we've talked about that. I was more of a priester, but on occasion we would go to the midweek meetings and stuff.

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We call it CCD. I don't know what that stands for. Something, catechism, something or other. I don't know.

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And if you asked me if I was Christian, I would say yes, I believe in Christ. And I thought that it was silly to pray to Mary.

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I thought that all that was kind of weird, because why would you pray to Mary when we pray to God?

17:59

But anyway, I never understood it. So I can't say that I was saved, but I can't say that I fully believed what the

18:08

Catholic taught. Right. It wasn't really because of Catholicism. It was just your general rebellion.

18:15

Yeah. I really was. I was a horrible person. I mean,

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I'm fun to be around, but I was a terrible person. Yeah. So, yeah,

18:27

I don't know. I wasn't saved until later. I'd say even after college.

18:34

I was a Christian when I was in high school. In fact, I was baptized when I was in high school.

18:39

But I compromised on it a lot. Yeah. So I was not a good Christian, even though a lot of people saw me that way.

18:45

They probably thought that I was. There were others that knew better. But, yeah, in order to be liked by others, in order to be popular, even though I wasn't popular,

18:55

I would compromise on different things. I got older and realized how stupid that was. I didn't care.

19:02

You either liked me or you didn't. And that was that. So that was my attitude towards everything.

19:08

I've softened on that a little bit. I'm not as abrupt with people.

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I'm a little kinder with my words now. But I still hold the same thing of, you know, either you're going to love me or you're not.

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And that's OK. It's OK to not like me. Yeah, there's a verse

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I constantly come back to when it comes to describing the way that I lived in late high school and then in college.

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Psalm 119, 109. Though I take my life in my hands continually, I will not forget your law.

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Yes. So there are many things that I tried to do on my own and still think that I can keep my faith.

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I can dabble in this and I can still call myself a Christian. And even though I was that dumb, the Lord didn't let me stray too far.

19:52

Oh, that's awesome. And so I'm very grateful for that. That was the grace of God in my life. And I'm thankful for like I had just enough of a name because of my work in Christian radio.

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There were just enough people out there that recognized me and knew who I was that they wouldn't let me get away with too much.

20:08

Yeah. And so I'm grateful for that, too. The fame actually had some upsides.

20:13

Yeah. I mean, I abused it. I definitely did not handle it in the right way. But at the same time, being well -known probably kept me from doing dumber stuff than I could have ended up in.

20:23

True. But yeah, thank you for the walk down memory lane, Elizabeth. Yeah, I was just going to add that I was a strong -willed child, so I had to learn the hard way.

20:33

Yeah, you had to learn through your own errors. Oh, it was bad. But anyhow. Question from Grady or actually,

20:40

I guess it's just a hello. Oh, he sent us a gift. Yeah, so we got a gift via PayPal.

20:49

PayPal. PayPal. Well, thank you. He says, Hi, Gabe and Babe. I sent you a donation to go towards your recording studio and for pizza for the family.

21:00

I have a suggestion. You need to get T -shirts printed with the Gabe and Babe answer show.

21:06

Ah, so not super show, but answer show. Yeah, right. All right. And sell the shirts to raise funds to go toward your studio.

21:15

I'll take two in XXL. I love it. Love you guys, and thanks so much for the ministry our

21:21

Heavenly Father has blessed you with. It was our pleasure. This next one also comes via email.

21:28

This is from Jeff, and he says, Huge fan of the videos. Thank you for them. I send them to everyone

21:35

I can. I would recommend doing a video on the response from Red Pen Logic on his newest video.

21:42

Here is the link. Specifically address his statement that we as Christians pray that God will make himself more attractive to unbelievers.

21:52

I like the Red Pen Logic guy, but he is way off on his answer to why we pray for unbelievers.

21:59

Thank you. Okay, so I watched this video, and this is, I did not know of who this guy was until just now when

22:07

Jeff sent me this. Red Pen Logic. But he's responding to a video that I saw several months back, something that had gone viral from a woman on TikTok.

22:16

Okay. She's an atheist, and she thinks that she's owning Christians with this argument. Like, ha ha,

22:21

I got you guys. Okay. I got you in a catch -22. There's no way you can avoid the answer to this question, or you know, without painting yourself into a corner.

22:29

Sure. And so the Red Pen Logic guy responds to that video. Okay. So let me go ahead and play the whole thing here, and then we'll respond to it.

22:37

Am I gonna like this? The woman is very much gonna irritate you. Awesome. Thanks.

22:44

We're responding in love, though, babe. Uh -huh. Yeah? Uh -huh. 1 Peter 3 .15. Yep. Give an answer for the hope that lies within you.

22:49

I got it. Do this with gentleness and respect. Okay. Focus on the Lord.

22:55

Here we go. Ooh, thank you for bringing this up, because I've been wanting to talk about this for a while now.

23:01

Christians. Question for the Christians, number three. Here we go. If your

23:07

God, all -knowing, all -powerful, omnipotent God, made all of us by His own hand,

23:15

He created us exactly the way that we are, that's what you believe, right? If your God made me into the atheist that I am, and He gave me the free will to believe or to disbelieve, when you pray for me, asking

23:34

God to save me, how is that not a contradiction of your own

23:39

God's will to have created me exactly the way that I am? How would

23:45

He answer your prayer for me without directly voiding my free will, which is to remain religion -free?

23:55

How would He do that? How is your prayer not a complete waste of your and His time?

24:01

Because He can't answer your prayer. He can't void my free will that He's given me. How is

24:09

He going to save me? And why are you so arrogant to believe that you know better than your own

24:18

God? I want to draw your attention to three serious issues with this video.

24:24

First, this video starts with a straw man. A straw man fallacy is when you misrepresent a view in order to refute it.

24:30

It's easier to knock over a straw man than a real man. Well, what's the straw man here? She says

24:35

He created us exactly the way we are. That's what you believe, right? Wrong.

24:41

This is not the Christian view. Christians believe God made the first parents, but then something happened.

24:47

We call it the fall. The world isn't the way God originally made it. Adam and Eve broke the world, and it's been broken ever since.

24:55

That includes our beliefs and our behavior. That's the Christian view. So no, God didn't make you into an atheist you are today.

25:03

On the contrary, God says His existence is clearly seen being understood through what has been made.

25:09

But there are some that suppress the truth. So her atheism is on her, not God. Second, there's the issue that praying for unbelievers necessarily violates their free will.

25:19

At this point, we need to ask, what exactly are we praying for? Here's my answer. We're asking

25:24

God to act in such a way to make a difference. Now, this no more violates free will for God to draw unbelievers than it violates free will for me to woo my wife into a relationship.

25:35

I didn't force her to marry me against her will. So then why'd she marry me? Well, I wooed her. I made myself appealing.

25:42

Now, I had hair back then. So that she would like me and eventually fall in love with me. Call it wooing or drawing or attracting or persuading or whatever.

25:50

But I acted in such a way to help create a relationship without violating her free will. And if I can do it, then

25:56

God can do it. When I pray, I'm asking God to do that. Third, she claims it's arrogant to ask

26:02

God to save unbelievers because it goes against God's will. Ironically, it's God's will for us to pray for the salvation of the lost.

26:10

The apostle Paul tells us to imitate him. And he says, I think

26:18

Paul would be surprised to learn that his prayer goes against God's will. This video is mistaken. God has invited us to pray for unbelievers.

26:25

And when we pray for those unbelievers, it's not arrogance. It's kindness. When he's done talking, he drops his pen into the cup.

26:34

So, sort of like drop the mic. Whenever he starts talking, he takes this pen up and he starts talking with a pen in his hand.

26:42

I can kind of relate because I used to do that in debate when I was in college. I always had the pen in my hand.

26:50

At camp, there's this thing called the stick or whatever. I don't know. Some people use it.

26:56

Whoever has the stick can talk. I know what you're talking about. Now it's my turn. Here's my pen.

27:04

I don't mean to poke fun. I just think it's awesome. So, what do you think? What do you think of her comments and then his response to that?

27:13

Well, honestly, before I was saved, I thought the same thing. Before I was saved, yes,

27:20

I said I was a Christian. I would claim it. I really wasn't because I didn't know.

27:27

And you don't know what you don't know, right? So, what I thought I knew, I claimed it.

27:33

But at the same time, I thought that you could choose whatever you want to choose. So, if you chose to believe in the male and female gods, then you could.

27:42

Or you could choose to believe that there's only one. Or you could choose that there's,

27:48

I mean, whatever you choose to believe in is what you choose. So, yeah, I kind of explored different things and that was one of them.

27:57

Why does this make sense? And it didn't make sense to me because I wasn't saved.

28:02

Right. And that's this woman's problem. Right. But then his comments where he was talking about how, just like I wooed my wife.

28:12

I could tolerate her. Really? Yes. It was his answer you had a problem with.

28:20

Yeah, this is kind of the result of when we'll tend to humanize God. So, the way that we do things, we'll attribute those things to God as if He does those things.

28:29

Yeah. But there's not this wooing the way that you try to attract a girlfriend or something like that.

28:36

I mean, if you take that part out of it, I mean, I guess I understand because, you know, with a friend, but still no, no, that's a bad example.

28:45

Yeah. It's still a bad example. I don't know. I don't. If God wants to change your heart,

28:51

He will kick the door in. Thank you. He dropped my face in the mud. He drug me through it before I changed my mind.

28:58

You want to tell me that the way that he appeared to the Apostle Paul on the road to Damascus was not violating his free will?

29:06

Hey, God, back up here. You're kind of infringing on my free will a little bit.

29:11

Oh, my goodness. In fact, Paul said about that, about his own testimony in Galatians 1 .15,

29:20

when God who had set me apart from my mother's womb and called me through His grace was pleased to reveal

29:27

His Son in me so that I might proclaim Him as good news among the Gentiles.

29:32

Right. Yeah. It was not my choice to believe

29:37

God and to follow Him. It was totally a God thing that the

29:43

Spirit changed my world. Exactly. Oh, yeah. I have no doubt in my mind that I'm a believer because God changed my nature from a person who was rebelling against God to a person that now desires

29:54

God and wants to follow and obey Him. Amen. Yeah, me too. It is because He has changed my heart.

30:00

My nature, who I am, the kind of person that I am, is not drawn to God in any way. And that's the same case with this atheist woman.

30:08

I mean, she is not drawn to God by her nature. Now, I do agree with the red pen guy.

30:16

That is not the way that God made us. So He didn't make us to be in rebellion against God. Right.

30:22

He made us to be in fellowship with God. Right. Because all things were good. That's right. But then

30:27

Adam and Eve rebelled against God and then death entered the picture and all things came under the curse.

30:34

And part of that curse is that everyone in the line of Adam would have the same sin nature that Adam is cursed with after the fall in the garden.

30:43

As it says in Psalm 51 .5, we are conceived in sin. From the moment of our conception we have a sin nature.

30:51

Right. So this is not the way that God made her in that sense. But she is certainly rebellious against God because that's her nature to be that way.

31:01

Right. In order to come to God, you cannot come exactly as you are. Or you can come as you are, but you can't stay as you are.

31:10

You can't stay there. Yeah. God will change you. He changes your heart to come to Him.

31:16

Your heart was changed before you came to Him because you would not have come to Him under that nature that you were in.

31:21

Right. It has nothing to do with free will. God has no plan to uphold human free will.

31:28

Right. That's true. I'm going to accomplish my purpose to bring the salvation of my elect without violating free will.

31:36

That's not God's plan at all. Yeah. I don't know of a kind way to respond to that.

31:42

So why do we pray then if God is sovereign and He is going to save whom

31:51

He means to save, then why should we even pray for them at all? Well, it's, I mean, you're praying for, you're petitioning

31:58

Him. We're called to petition to Him. Yep, you got it right there. Why do we pray?

32:04

Because we're called. Because we're told to. Yeah. Because we're commanded to pray. We are commanded. That's number one.

32:10

Yeah. We pray because God told us to. Yes. And Jesus said, when you pray, pray then like this.

32:17

In Matthew chapter six, we have the Lord's Prayer. What we refer to as the Lord's Prayer, which is kind of a blueprint for prayer.

32:23

Right. People will recite it as kind of like this is the ideal prayer, but it's just laying out for us what prayer should look like.

32:31

Right. We begin by acknowledging that God is holy. Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

32:43

Of course, God's will is going to be done. Right. On earth as it is in heaven. Right. But we pray for that. There's no question about that.

32:49

Right. We pray for that because it brings our thinking in line with His. We don't change

32:54

God's mind. He changes ours. Right. And so our thinking comes into submission with His will when we pray for His will to be done, not ours.

33:04

So we are sanctified. Yeah. And then we're sanctified. Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

33:10

Give us this day our daily bread. Mm -hmm. Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. Mm -hmm.

33:15

And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. You can see in that pattern of that prayer how the prayer is coming into submission into the will of God.

33:25

Mm -hmm. Now God does mean for our prayers to affect change.

33:31

Yeah. And He's going to use our prayers to bring it about. Mm -hmm. But that is still, that's us being included in this plan that He has already decreed from before the foundation of the world.

33:41

Right. Praise God He includes us in that. Yes. Yes, He knows whom He is going to save, but He has designated that the church is the instrument that's going to take the gospel to the world.

33:52

Mm -hmm. So that those whom He has elected will hear the gospel and repent and be saved.

33:58

Mm -hmm. Hence why Paul started his letter to Titus, for the sake of the faith of God's elect.

34:04

Mm -hmm. And he started his letter to the Corinthians in 1 Corinthians 1, 1, Paul called as an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God.

34:14

It was not by his free will. Right. It was by God's will that he was included in that.

34:19

And Paul said it was by the grace of God and he praised God for that. Yes. It is not God wooing, it's

34:25

God kicking the door in. Yeah. Wooing. I appreciate your question though,

34:31

Jeff. Yes, thank you. This next one, oh yeah, I was supposed to respond to this last week. I think I can get this pretty quick.

34:36

But remember Jeremy asked a question about theonomy and I answered that. Mm -hmm. But he also asked about Psalms.

34:42

Oh yeah, okay. Or sorry, about Hebrews. He said, I have a question about Hebrews. You said, and I assume

34:47

Pastor Buck as well, that Hebrews is an expositional sermon on Psalm 95.

34:54

Can you go into more detail on why you think it would be Psalm 95 and not Psalm 110? Oh right.

34:59

Thank you for your ministry. I've been listening since 2018. Aw. Great to have a listener that long.

35:04

I appreciate it, Jeremy. Yes, it is an exposition of Psalm 95 and also

35:09

Psalm 110. The way that sermons were done back then, and I asked Pastor Tom about this, because I saw it in Hebrews and I had to ask him, am

35:19

I seeing this right? Mm -hmm. Would you say that this is how Hebrews is laid out? So I made the point in the introduction to the book of Hebrews that Hebrews is in three parts and that's how you can know that Paul and Luke were

35:32

Baptists, because it's a three -point sermon. And so in one of those points, you have an exposition of 95.

35:39

In another point, you have an exposition of Psalm 110. And then there's another point after that.

35:45

This is the way that they would teach in a synagogue. Pastor Tom gave me more background into this. Okay. But this is the way they would teach in a synagogue.

35:52

It's like they would have this triad of points and they would kind of dance through all of the three points as they went through the sermon and it's laid out that same way in Hebrews.

36:01

Mm -hmm. And so it's kind of like the kind of teaching that you would get in the synagogue is the kind of teaching, that same pattern of teaching that you see in the book of Hebrews, because of course that's what the

36:10

Hebrews would have been familiar with. Yeah. So a couple of those points rest on an exposition of Psalm 95 and an exposition of Psalm 110.

36:18

So yes. Yes. The answer to your question is yes. It's both. Awesome. Let's see how much time

36:24

I got. This is another one of those weeks where I'm teaching a class here in 15 minutes. Yeah, and I came late.

36:30

Sorry, guys. So we're finishing this up and then I gotta go teach. But this one is from Kellen in Lincoln.

36:38

And he says, Dear Pastor Gabe, thank you so much for this study in the Song of Songs. Right now you are going through two books that I have never heard anyone preach on,

36:48

Hebrews and Song of Songs. Not that I think no one has ever gone through them, of course, but in my 30 plus years of moving around and attending several churches,

36:57

I've not yet heard a pastor preach through them. With Song of Songs, I appreciate your commitment to what this would have meant to a

37:05

Hebrew at the time in which it was written, without jumping into overly spiritual application, or even skipping the husband -wife application in favor of a more

37:15

Christological application. Not that there isn't a Christ application, but you're putting things in the right order.

37:22

Here's my question. How did you know to do that? When you read Song of Songs, what made you think this is about a husband and a wife, and not this is about Christ in the church?

37:34

Because as I've been following your study, I've simultaneously checked several commentaries online, and all that I've looked at, without a single exception, jump right into making the man

37:46

Christ and the woman the church. So again, my question is, with so many commentaries doing it wrong, where did you learn how to do it right?

37:57

Well, I remember when you started it, you were saying the same thing, that all the commentaries were saying

38:02

Christ. Yeah, that's right. If you just go on BibleHub, in fact, go to BibleHub .com,

38:09

just enter one of the verses or the chapters from Song of Songs. I think on BibleHub you have to put Song of Solomon.

38:15

I don't think anything will come up unless you enter it that way. Anyway, so enter a chapter and a verse in Song of Solomon into BibleHub, and then click on Comment, because that will give you the commentaries, and just look through it.

38:28

You'll see right there from the historic commentaries that the vast majority of them, if not every single one of them on BibleHub, jump right into the

38:35

Christ connection. And it really was hard for me to find good commentaries when I was preparing for this study that didn't do that right away.

38:43

And so what I ended up having to do is taking a lot of those commentaries that I've enjoyed over the years. A lot of them are classical.

38:49

I don't read a lot of modern commentaries. Most of the commentaries I read are classical commentaries. But finding those commentaries and just drawing from them where they would make the

39:00

Hebrew connection. Like, this is what that meant to a Hebrew. They would make the Christ connection first.

39:05

This means Christ is doing this, and His bride is doing this. The church is responding in this way. But then

39:10

I would have to find the stuff in between where it's like, okay, that reference to pomegranates meant this to a

39:15

Hebrew. That reference to fragrance meant this. I'd just have to figure that out. So how did you know to do that in the first place?

39:21

My dad. Yeah? Yeah. So my dad, from the very beginning when he was teaching me the Bible, he told me, you have to understand this first according to what it meant to the audience that this was written to.

39:34

Who is the author? Who is the original audience? And you have to understand it that way before you can make the modern application.

39:44

Because otherwise you're just going to read the Bible allegorically. You're going to read everything allegorically.

39:49

Everything is just an allegory or an example or some sort of story or illustration that we can take and apply to whatever situation we want to apply it to.

39:57

But you have to understand what the original meaning was from the author to that audience before you make that application.

40:04

And it was that discipline that prepared me even for more poetic books like Psalms or Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs.

40:15

It was going through that discipline of knowing I have to know who the author is first, who it's being written to, and why.

40:22

And what they would have understood this to mean before I jump into what

40:29

I want it to mean. Right. So we're trying to make application as we go through that, as we go through Song of Songs.

40:36

But I think the proper application is going to be, what does this mean for your marriage?

40:43

Before you're jumping into now, what is the picture that we get from this with relation to Christ and the church?

40:48

Yeah. Because marriage is a picture of the way that Christ loves this church. Exactly. Paul says that in Ephesians 5.

40:54

Pastor Tom is preaching on that just this coming Sunday. He did wives submit to your husbands just this past Sunday.

41:02

And this coming Sunday, he's in husband, love your wife as Christ loves the church.

41:07

Right. So the picture of marriage is an illustration. God gave us this to be an illustration of how

41:13

Christ loves his church. So there's definitely a connection there. Oh yeah. And you can make those allegorical connections in Song of Songs.

41:20

But you first have to understand who these characters are in this story, why it's written this way, what these metaphors are, what it would mean to a

41:29

Hebrew before you can start making that application to today and then drawing that application into Christ.

41:36

Because of course, this was a thousand years before Christ came. Right. Yeah. The Hebrews would not have been reading that going oh, this is the way

41:43

Jesus loves the church. Right. That's so true. Now they may have been drawing the connection, this is the way

41:49

God loves Israel. There may have been that connection there. Okay. But it wouldn't have been understood as Christ laying his life down for the church.

41:57

Yeah. Because even up to the day of, they still didn't know. Yeah, right. The disciples still didn't get it.

42:03

Even after, it had to be revealed to them. Yes. But anyway. So I'm very thankful that God, it pleased

42:14

God to put me in the family that I was born into, this was by his will, that I would learn the scriptures in this way from a father who loved the

42:25

Bible and he wanted to see his son grow up understanding the Bible. And so my dad taught me that.

42:31

And then putting you in ways of exercising that more and more. Because you were in forensics and debate and on the radio and you just have to, and even in the pulpit at times and Yeah, I was preaching, my first sermon was when

42:44

I was 17. So you had plenty of practice. Yeah. Putting, or putting that into practice and making it.

42:52

Yeah, what has that been now? 25 years that I've been preaching? So, and then my dad, that was my dad that did that.

42:59

He was the one that gave me the opportunities. I worked in Christian radio and a church would call up and say, hey, we're looking for somebody to fill the pulpit this

43:06

Sunday. And dad would go, my son can do it. Yeah. Yeah. As soon as I could drive and I could get there, he would tell me, okay, you're preaching here on Sunday.

43:13

And he taught me how to preach and I did sermons. They weren't terribly expository.

43:19

I was still trying to figure out like this is what I want to talk about. Now, how can I get it to fit this passage?

43:25

Yeah. I still wanted the passage to be the star, but I'm imposing my own ideas onto it.

43:31

There was, in putting that into work, it took, oh, I don't know, probably 10 more years.

43:36

Yeah. Before I finally got out of that. Yeah. Yeah. There were some of those early sermons I preached.

43:42

I can think back to stuff I said when I was like 24, 25 and I'm like, man, I wish I could go back to that church and change that.

43:48

And be like, no. I don't know if any of y 'all in here remember me being here 15 years ago, but I just want to apologize for that sermon.

43:59

Here's my ministry. Yeah. Go to when we understand the text.

44:04

I'm now doing videos that refute me from 20 years ago. Right. Refuting myself.

44:10

Anyway, that's, I've got about five minutes here and I got to get to class. Well, I was thinking, oh yeah.

44:16

Oh, get to class, like be there. I got to teach. All right. Let's wrap it up. We've got seven minutes.

44:21

No, what were you going to say? Oh, I was just going to say Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday is New Testament.

44:27

You cover a New Testament book. We're in Hebrews. And Thursday is Old Testament. We're in Song of Songs.

44:33

And Friday is obviously the Q &A. The Gabe and Babe Show. And Song of Songs ends this coming

44:42

Thursday. So that's November 24th. That's Thanksgiving Day. But that's my last lesson in Song of Songs.

44:48

And then on December 1st, I'm starting in the book of Isaiah. If you missed anything else in Song of Songs, go back and catch all of that.

44:58

I've enjoyed these last two books that I've done, Ecclesiastes and Song of Songs, have probably been my favorite studies, my favorite

45:05

Old Testament studies on the podcast so far. I've enjoyed that immensely. And I hope that you have too.

45:11

But now we're going into Isaiah. So we've prepared ourselves with some of these poetic things in the wisdom books on how to interpret those things as a

45:20

Hebrew would understand them. Now we've got to apply those same disciplines to Isaiah as we jump into the prophets, the major prophets.

45:28

Yes. And Isaiah is definitely a major prophet. Right. All right, let's pray.

45:34

Yes, let's. Heavenly Father, we thank you for the goodness that you show to us in Christ our Savior.

45:39

And may we desire to live lives of holiness and godliness according to the pattern that has been set forth for us in Christ.

45:49

As we've been reading about in Hebrews earlier this week, by putting on flesh and dwelling among us, he becomes our older brother.

45:56

And by faith in Jesus Christ, we have the forgiveness of sins, but we also have adoption as sons and daughters of God.

46:04

Jesus was raised from the dead and became the firstborn of many brothers. Romans 8 29.

46:10

And that means that we who are in Christ, we will likewise be raised with him. He was the first.

46:15

There are many others that will come along. And so we thank you for this message of the gospel that you have given to us that Christ died for our sins.

46:24

He rose from the dead so that by faith in him we also have everlasting life.

46:30

And as we've seen the holiness in the life of Christ teach us to live just like that.

46:35

As it says in 1 John 2 6 that we must walk as Jesus walked. So teach us to walk in his ways and share his gospel for it is only by faith in this word that others can come to salvation and be saved and live forever.

46:50

It's in Jesus name that we pray. Amen. Amen. Okay. Now my mic is being finicky.

47:07

Again, we're having that problem. Man, I'm dry. Dry today. We worked hard and stirred up so much dust.

47:14

This has not been open. Thank you. There you go. I already chugged a whole one. I can't get the lid off.

47:21

That's why it's not been open. There you go. It doesn't want to be opened. There you go. Thank you.

47:28

What, what, what? Oh, yeah. Kind of need the lid. The lid's kind of important. There you go. I'd rather not get that on my equipment.

47:38

Or all your paperwork. Oh, I get my tea all over my paperwork. Do you really?

47:43

See the brown spots on this stuff over here. Now it doesn't want to close. That's weird. It just keeps...

47:50

Don't use my extra strength. Check. There you go.

47:59

Can't do it. That's the official throat clear. I couldn't find anything.

48:06

We were scrambling for books and things like that. I was like, nope, you might not have it tonight.

48:12

We got to go. Okay, well, it's 520. We got to get started. We're not going to get 40 minutes in here.

48:20

This is when we understand the text. A daily Bible study that we may grow in faith for faith comes from hearing and hearing through the word of Christ.

48:28

So we may grow in faith. In faith. For faith comes from hearing. Right. I caught that after I read through that.

48:34

But thank you. Yes. Okay. Because sometimes I need to hear it. Still the same.

48:41

Check. This is when we understand the text. A daily Bible study that we may grow in faith for faith comes from hearing and hearing through the word of Christ.

48:51

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

48:56

Thank you, Becky. You're welcome. Fred Butler has said we need... I'm going to have to do this again. Man, I was so froggy.

49:03

See, now I'm froggy. Froggy. Ribbit. Okay.

49:12

This is when we understand the text. A daily Bible study that we may grow in faith for faith comes from hearing and hearing through the word of Christ.

49:21

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