WWUTT 1570 Q&A Original Blessing, Dungeons and Dragons, Misc. Matters of Conscience

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Responding to questions from listeners about what original blessing is, if Christians can play Dungeons and Dragons, and addressing some other miscellaneous matters of conscience. Visit wwutt.com for all our videos!

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You've heard about the doctrine of original sin. Well, what about the doctrine of original blessing?
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Is it okay for Christians to play Dungeons and Dragons? And what are some other liberty of conscience issues to think about?
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The answer is when we understand the text. Many of the
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Bible stories and verses we think we know, we don't. When We Understand the Text is an online ministry dedicated to teaching the
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Word of God in context, promoting sound doctrine while exposing the faulty. Here's your teacher,
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Pastor Gabe. Thank you, Becky, and greetings, everybody. I'm flying solo this week, and that's partly because I was sick earlier in the week, and that's thrown everything off.
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There was a couple of days in there you didn't have any episodes of the podcast. I think Thursday's episode finally got uploaded on Friday night.
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Now, here we are on Saturday, and this is the Friday Q &A. It's on Friday that we like to respond to questions from the listeners, and you can submit questions, too, when we understand the text at gmail .com.
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All this year, Becky being with me on the broadcast has been hit or miss because we don't have a studio at home anymore, and we are very touched to read emails from you that have said, we love hearing
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Becky on the program, and we hate that you don't have a studio at home anymore because it means that she can't be on as regularly.
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Sometimes we get to Thursday. It's time to record the Friday Q &A, and she's beat.
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She's done. She doesn't want to drive anywhere. We have to bring all the kids with us. It sure would be nice if we could go back to the system that we had before where the kids go to bed, and then we can just go downstairs to my study and record the next day's broadcast, but, of course, we can't do that because I don't have a studio at home.
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So we've appreciated the encouragement that you've given to us, saying whatever we need to do, is there something that we can do to help you have a studio at home?
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We think we have the money. We think that everything that we need to build what we want to build and do it right, like up until this point, you've heard me say things like, hey,
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I'm going to build this in the garage, or we're going to throw it in the shed in the back or something like that, and then it just turns out that just doesn't work.
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It's not practical. So what other ways can we go here, and what can we do that's quick so we can get this done sooner rather than later?
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It's now been a full year since I've had a studio at home, 13 months, actually, to be exact, and it's hard.
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It's harder on me than it is on you guys. I'll tell you that straightforward. It's really tough.
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So we think we've got the money. It's just being able to find the person that can do the build and continue to pray for us.
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We'd really like to have a studio at home. We'd really like to be able to do that again. If I had a little more foresight on how hard this was going to be,
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I might have been a little pickier about the house that we chose. But now here we are.
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We think we've got the money to be able to do the build that we want to do, be able to have a studio at home again.
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We'll see how it goes. Pray for us. Thank you for everybody who's given us donations, though we're not able to take those tax free anymore like we were able to do in Kansas.
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It's pretty much on an honor system. If you give money to us, you just have to take our word that we're going to apply it to doing something that's going to be ministry related.
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It's not it might buy us pizza. I'll just I'll say straight. We might buy a pizza with it, but it still contributes to the ministry because we feed our kids pizza while we sit in here to to do the podcast together.
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Anyway, if you would like to donate, if you're interested in giving to the ministry, pretty much PayPal is the way that we're accepting those contributions.
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And you can go to WWUTT .com. I know that there are some people that have been hesitant to use
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PayPal because PayPal has changed some things around. I think they're even aren't they reporting how much money people make now or something like that.
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I can't remember what it was. It wasn't important enough for me to look into it, apparently. But if you're all right with that, if you can use
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PayPal Venmo. That was something else. Somebody told me to look into Venmo. I haven't done that yet either.
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But anyway, yeah, website is where you can go click on the give tab and it'll give you information on how you can contribute to when we understand the text.
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Some of you have just sent an email and said, hey, I'd like to talk to you about giving money and and I've had a good chat with some of you about how you can contribute to the ministry.
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I'd be willing to talk with you about that as well. So you can always send an email. How can I give to the ministry and and what is what's a way that we can go here?
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Speaking of emails, let's get to it. This first one comes from Kevin. He says, Pastor Gabe, I heard a local pastor in his sermon series blessing state that we should not think of original sin, but think more about original blessing.
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It seemed a little off base scripturally. I found a book called Original Blessing, and it seems he took most of his message from that book.
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Have you heard of this teaching and could you direct me to a resource to help me understand it or the dangers of it?
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Thank you so much. Well, there's actually a few books called. Original Blessing.
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There's one by Danielle Shroyer that has I have seen it pop up here and there.
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I've never read it. There's another one that's called it's by Nadia Parson.
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It's called Back to Eden Living Under the Original Blessing. Those are the two big ones that come up on Amazon.
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Anyway, the most popular under this title was a book by Matthew Fox that came out in the 80s, and it was called
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Original Blessing. Now, Matthew Fox is an Episcopal priest. I don't know if he's still doing stuff.
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I remember reading something about him years ago. But anyway, he's an Episcopal preach.
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His bio on Amazon says this. He's an internationally acclaimed spiritual theologian,
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Episcopal priest and activist. He holds a doctorate summa cum laude in the history and theology of spirituality from the
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Institute Catholique de Paris and has devoted 45 years to developing and teaching the tradition of creation spirituality.
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And I guess that means he's still around, which is rooted in ancient Judeo Christian teaching, inclusive of today's science and world spiritual traditions, welcoming of the arts and artists, wisdom centered, prophetic and committed to echo justice, social justice and gender justice, unquote.
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All right. So to to summarize it for you, Matthew Fox is a flaming liberal. That's all you need to know about this guy.
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And, you know, whatever theology is in the book, Original Blessing is going to be wonky. I never did read
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Original Blessing. I just know that the guy at the time that I heard of him was very new age.
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Original Blessing is not a doctrine or it's not like a like a historic doctrine.
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We could put it that way. This is definitely more on the new age side of things. Original sin is a historic doctrine.
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In fact, we would call it an essential doctrine. The doctrine of original sin, that term itself you won't find in the
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Bible. It's a term we use to describe a teaching or a doctrine that is in the Bible. And it's simply the very first sin that was committed.
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We call that the original sin. When Adam disobeyed God and ate from the tree that God told him not to eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
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And as a result of Adam and Eve sin, the effects that's had upon the rest of the human race ever since, all of that is wrapped up in the doctrine of original sin.
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So we understand, as Romans 3, 23 says, that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God because we're all descended from Adam.
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We all have a sin nature. As it also says in Romans 3, there is no one who does good, not even one.
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No one does righteous. No one seeks for God. And that is because all of us are born with a fallen nature.
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We're conceived in sin, as it says in Psalm 51, because we're descended in the line of Adam.
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The only person who was conceived without sin was Jesus Christ, because he was not conceived of the seed of Adam.
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He was conceived of the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary. So he was sinless from conception, lived a perfect life because he was the only one who could do it, and died the death that we were supposed to die, taking the wrath of God upon himself when he died on the cross as an atoning sacrifice for sins.
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God received that sacrifice, raised him from the dead, conquering death itself, so that all who believe in Jesus will be born again.
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We're no longer under the headship of Adam, but we're born again under the headship of Christ.
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And then we are justified, washed clean of our sins, and given new life in Christ, the promise of eternal life with him, having been redeemed.
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Our sin debt paid for by the death that Christ died on the cross for us.
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I'm adding a little bit to this. It's not necessarily all of that in the doctrine of original sin.
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It's simply understanding that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. And really, the doctrine of original sin is not spelled out in Romans 3 .23,
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but in Romans 5 .12. Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, so death spread to all men, because all sinned.
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So we understand that everyone is a sinner, and no one is born innocent.
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And that is an essential doctrine to the Christian faith, because we have to understand everyone needs a
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Savior. There is no one who is born without sin, and therefore doesn't need
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Christ. Everyone needs Jesus. And you cannot know what you need saved from unless—you cannot know that you need saved, rather, when you put it that way, unless you know that you have sinned.
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So this is why the doctrine of original sin is such an essential doctrine of the Christian faith. Now, that doesn't mean for a person to be saved that you have to be able to give a definition of original sin.
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And until you've heard that term, and you can spell it out, then you really don't know what it means to be a
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Christian. There are people that come to faith in Jesus Christ who have no idea what original sin is, but they know that they have sinned, and they need a
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Savior. And that is, of course, wrapped up in the doctrine of original sin.
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No one is innocent. No one gets out of this by their own merit. You cannot work your way to everlasting life.
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It is only through Christ that we have the forgiveness of sins, and fellowship with God, and are made fellow heirs of his eternal kingdom.
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So anyway, all that to say, this is the biblical doctrine of original sin. Whatever original blessing is, is not in the
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Bible, and in fact, is most likely a false doctrine. Coming from Matthew Fox—if that's indeed who you're referencing,
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Kevin, if that's who you heard about, Matthew Fox is indeed a false teacher—what he taught regarding original blessing is that there's positivity, negativity, creativity, and transformativity.
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I don't know if he went Ividies on all of those. But anyway, the positive is something that we get.
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The negative is something that we lose. The creative is celebrating the things that are, that God has actually made us to be, or given us the gifts to enjoy, that sort of a thing.
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And then transformativity is becoming who we're destined to be.
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So you can hear in all of that that it's very—well, it's
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New Age, and it has that whole motivational speaker vibe to it, right?
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That's kind of like everything Joyce Meyer says and Joel Osteen says.
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See, the reason why things are so bad for you is because you think so negative. If you wouldn't think such negative thoughts, things would be better for you.
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God gave you a power of creativity. So if you just think positive thoughts, things will be positive around you.
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And that's Matthew Fox, taught exactly the same thing. The whole thing with negativity, something that we lose, that's something we need to let go of.
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If you're holding on to the negative, we need to let go of the negative so that you can dwell upon the positive, and things will go better for your life.
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All of this is wrapped up in original blessing. And he wants to get people away from thinking that they are sinners.
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Really, what he wants to get them away from is thinking about the Bible at all. But it is necessary for us to know we have sinned, because if you don't know that you are a sinner, then you don't know you need a savior.
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If you don't know that the judgment of God is coming against all the ungodliness and unrighteousness of man, then you're not going to look to Christ to save you from that judgment that is to come.
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Look at the way that the gospel is presented throughout the book of Acts. The apostles go into places, and they talk about the judgment of God.
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Peter at Pentecost in Acts 2, Paul at the Areopagus in Acts 17.
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In that sermon, the way that we have it in Acts 17, Paul doesn't even drop
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Christ's name. But he does tell them the judgment of God is coming upon them, and God has shown whom he will judge them by, by raising that man from the dead.
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So though Paul doesn't even mention to them the name of Jesus Christ, he does point them to Christ.
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And he talks about the judgment of God that is coming. How much preaching, how much evangelism do you hear that's being done like that today?
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This is the way the apostles evangelized. We need to have more judgment in our preaching so that people will know that Christ has been given to rescue us from the judgment of God.
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And it's only because Christ has paid the price for sins by his death on the cross that we can be saved and no longer an enemy of God by faith in Christ.
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We are friends of God. Sons and daughters of God. Fellow heirs with Christ of his eternal kingdom.
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It's only when you hear the bad news that the good news becomes so good.
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So stay away from the Matthew Foxes that want to rob you of the joy of the gospel and look instead to Jesus Christ.
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All right, next next question we have here. This comes from Cameron. Hello, Pastor Gabe.
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I grew up in the Assemblies of God Church in the 80s and was taught falsely that everything was of the devil.
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Movies, video games, rock music, dancing, cartoons like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and He -Man,
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Dungeons and Dragons, etc. Later, I realized that they were making law where there is no law.
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I now go to a church that teaches the word of God rightly. With that, what are your views on Dungeons and Dragons?
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Is it a conscience issue or something to be avoided? I know that you don't have to play with magic in the game and just play it like an adventure.
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Yeah, and that's that's what I would say. Like if you're playing Dungeons and Dragons like that, I don't know that you're doing anything that's wicked.
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Now, my parents kept me from Dungeons and Dragons when I was a kid. They told me that it was something satanic.
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But in defense of those parents who may have raised their kids like that in the 80s, Cameron, I was a child of the 80s like yourself.
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Parents probably just didn't know. And so they were hearing it from somebody else that this was full of witchcraft.
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And that's what Dungeons and Dragons was. And so if that's if that's what Dungeons and Dragons exposed our kids to, if they became participants in witchcraft when they played with it, then parents were going to keep their kids from it.
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And I don't think parents were doing anything wrong with the information that was available to them. That's the right move, right?
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Parents want to protect their kids from things that are demonic and full of witchcraft. I totally understand that.
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My parents kept me from it when I was a kid. It wasn't until I got older that I saw, well, you could play it like a game.
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It could be like a board game. It doesn't have to be that you're actually investing yourself in doing witchcraft and magic and getting carried away in role play or holding seances or casting spells.
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Like if you're doing that kind of a thing, then you probably are venturing into some godless territory. But if you're just playing it like a game,
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I don't see what the harm is in that. I've personally never played, but I have seen it played. And what
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I what I saw looked harmless to me. This next question comes from Philip in L .A.
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Doesn't say whether that's Louisiana or Los Angeles. Hey, Pastor Gabe, I appreciate the comments that you made about gambling in the previous episode.
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I have an uncle who was addicted to online gambling. It turned out that he ended up losing over $50 ,000 before anyone noticed his addiction without mentioning people or other details.
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The family was devastated. The good news is that he appreciated that the family confronted him and he repented.
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He's made a full recovery. And though the family still has a long way to go to pay off those debts, my aunt and cousins remain by his side.
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That's wonderful to hear. I hope when you mentioned repentance there, you mean that like he repented before God, he's been forgiven his sins and his family has forgiven him as well.
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That's great to hear a recovery story like that. As Becky and I had talked about last week, that's not generally the the outcome.
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Usually a person that gets committed to gambling or gets addicted to gambling and all manner of wickedness follows with that and families are left in ruins and devastated.
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So this is great to hear about an issue of somebody repenting of that and and is working on paying off those debts.
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I know that's really hard and it's kind of like every day you're paying off a debt. You're being reminded of the sin that you committed, but you have to accept the consequences of your sin and you have to accept also the forgiveness that comes by faith in Jesus Christ.
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No amount of paying off your debts will forgive you of the sins that you previously committed.
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You have to receive forgiveness from Christ and then make amends where you're able to make amends.
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All right. So anyway, I interrupted there, but going on with Philip's email, a few more Christian liberty issues came to mind.
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If you don't mind me giving you a small list, what does the Bible have to say about number one, playing poker?
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You mentioned gambling, but what if somebody has a poker game in their home? Number two, playing video games.
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Number three, reading comic books for multi -level marketing. Five Dungeons and Dragons.
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I answered that one already. Six running for public office, seven listening to popular music, eight reading
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Stephen King novels, nine eating at expensive restaurants and 10 becoming a soldier or police officer.
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Those are some really good ones there, Philip. I appreciate that. Okay, so let's go back to number one. Yeah, last week we talked about gambling and I didn't mention playing poker at home.
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To tell you the truth, I don't have Becky with me here to verify this is true, but what
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I'm about to share with you is indeed true. We had recorded that segment twice and the first time that we recorded it,
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I did talk about playing poker at home and saying that that can be completely harmless, but then
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I deleted it. And the reason why we took that section out was because I was afraid that I might actually be giving somebody permission to gamble and then causing them to stumble.
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But I think that I can frame this in such a way that you understand where I'm coming from. So if a bunch of guys want to get together and you want to play poker, and even if you want to have like a $20 buy in or something like that, and whoever wins the poker night wins the pot, it was basically you paid $20 for fun together with the guys that night and you were all able to keep one another accountable.
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You weren't in a sleazy joint like a casino is. I see that as being innocent fun.
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It's like game night, like playing board games, but you're throwing money into it to increase the risk, right?
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Now, somebody else can hear me say that and go, Nope, I think it's completely wrong. Christians should have nothing to do with it.
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And that's why these are liberty of conscience issues. If you think that you would be sinning by partaking in that, then don't do it.
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And don't try to convince anybody else to do it, because then you would even be convinced in your conscience that they're sinning.
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But if you see it as being something that's completely fine, I'm not sinning when I do this.
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Just don't flaunt it, because you know, this could be one of those things that could be really controversial.
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So don't be out there flaunting it going, Hey, look at me and my Christian liberty. I can do this, and I'm not sinning.
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Because remember, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians chapter eight, if food causes my brother to stumble,
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I will never eat meat again ever so that I will not cause my brother to stumble.
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So if partaking in this is going to cause a brother or sister in Christ to sin, then don't do it.
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Don't even do it at all. Not just don't flaunt it. Don't do it. And you're going to have to wrestle with those things.
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You have to consider those matters, doing it with a heart of charity, with a heart of love, not out of self -righteousness, not out of arrogance, but out of consideration and compassion for one another.
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Because first and foremost, as Christians, what is our responsibility? It is to love
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God and to love one another on these two commands. Hinge all the law and the prophets, right?
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As it says in Ecclesiastes 12, 13, fear God and keep his commandments because this is the end of the matter for all mankind.
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This is the whole duty of man. All right, continuing on with some of these that Philip has on his list here.
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Number two, playing video games. I play video games. My kids play games.
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I play video games with my kids. But like with anything else, it's to be enjoyed in moderation.
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You can get addicted even to playing video games. And what sort of redeeming value is there in that?
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Like, what have you gained? What what has been contributed to your eternity because you beat this boss for the umpteenth time or something like that?
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It's like with anything else. Just be wise with your time. Don't let it be so consuming of you that you have now basically become lazy because you do nothing but sit around and play video games.
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You know, video games and board games are arbitrarily the same thing. It's just that one is more interactive on a table and the other is on a video screen.
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But yeah, be wise in the way that you use your time, not filling your time up just with entertainment things.
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But you're still a diligent worker and and especially growing your family in an understanding of God's word, raising your children in the discipline and the instruction of the
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Lord, teaching them how to be wise with their time and and the gifts that God has given to them as well.
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Number three, reading comic books. I've enjoyed reading comic books. In fact, I've collected comic books.
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I thought at one time my investment in comic books was going to pay off one day.
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It really didn't. I think I would have gained more putting that money in a savings account and and letting that accumulate interest.
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I thought that's what I would get from collecting comic books. But no, it really didn't. So yeah, again, another one of those things to be done in moderation, like reading any book or novel,
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I suppose. Now, there are, of course, some comic books that are completely inappropriate.
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I had some books when my son started getting old enough and he wanted to pull out some of dad's old comic books and read them.
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And I looked at him first and I was like, man, no, I really don't. It's just the way women tend to get drawn in those books sometimes.
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So I got rid of those books anyway. Being careful with what you subject yourself to, because even though you're talking about an illustration on a page, there's a way that those artists tend to objectify women and the form of the female body.
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I don't know if when you mentioned these things, Philip, if you wanted me to go into that kind of detail.
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That's just what comes to mind. What we as Christians need to think about, what we need to consider before we invest ourselves, our time and our money into things like this.
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Number four, multi -level marketing. That's a really good one there. So you're talking things like Amway, Herbalife, Avon, Mary Kay, Advocare.
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I had somebody at my church years ago that did Advocare, and he was really annoying about it.
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I also served at a church where they forbid anyone from serving in ministry if they were into multi -level marketing.
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I think it was like hired on staff, so you could still volunteer in the nursery, in other words, but you couldn't be hired on staff.
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You couldn't be part of the church staff and also be in multi -level marketing, which was probably a wise move.
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But anyway, stuff like Scentsy and even Pampered Chef, all of that goes into multi -level marketing.
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And if that's what you want to do, like you want to try to earn a little personal money, you want to make it like a personal job,
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I don't see that there's anything wrong with that. I know that sometimes the multi -level marketing stuff can get into pyramid schemes, where you kind of have the promise of goods, but no goods are delivered.
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And then that, of course, would be wicked. You're just kind of conning people out of your money. But multi -level marketing itself, it just depends on the kind of time and money that you want to give to that and handling those things wisely.
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So you're not investing yourself in something you're losing on. You never gain anything back from it.
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So you need to be smart with the way that you invest yourself in some of that. In and of itself, though,
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I don't see that multi -level marketing is sinful. We might call a lot of it annoying, but maybe not sinful for you to partake in that and be selling those goods to others.
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Number five, Dungeons and Dragons. Again, I mentioned that one already. Number six, running for public office.
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Yes, you can be a Christian and run for public office and get into politics, but you have to be careful there, as with any secular job.
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I'm sure it's a little bit harder in politics than it would be working at a car dealership or having a house cleaning service or something like that.
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But making sure that in anything and all that you do, it is unto
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God's glory. And you think about your actions and your words that are honoring of the
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Lord and encouraging of other people as well. Number seven, listening to popular music.
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I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with listening to music that, for example, is secular.
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It's not immediately Christian music. There's some Christian music I don't think you should be listening to.
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Anyway, but you know what I mean? It's it doesn't have anything that is exalting of God.
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It's not praising God for anything. Is that music OK for us to listen to? I don't think there's anything inherently sinful about that, although there is stuff out there and in the vast majority of popular music, like the stuff that's on the the top 40 list, for example, that Christians should not be listening to paying for letting in their ears, meditating on and especially singing along with.
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But again, that's a case by case basis sort of a thing. So just in general, listening to popular music is not sinful.
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But what kind of music are we talking about? Eight reading Stephen King novels now that gets a lot more specific.
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You know, Stephen King, you might just think of as being a horror novelist. Doesn't the guy just write scary stories?
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I used to read Stephen King novels, especially when I was in high school, and he writes some very smutty stuff.
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I mean, stuff that you would you would say would be like on the level of what's called mommy porn, the whole fantasy novel sort of a thing.
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King writes scenarios like that into his books. Should a Christian be involved in reading things like that?
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And that's just even setting aside that a lot of his books deal with the occult and things like that.
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So, yeah, I mean, you're probably not good entertainment for a Christian, right?
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Consider once again something Becky and I mentioned last week, the Philippians four eight principle. Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is dignified, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable.
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If there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, consider these things.
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And again, it's not about, well, I enjoy this, so therefore it must be lovely. Therefore, it must be pure.
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No, it's what God says is true. What God has said is dignified, right, pure, lovely, commendable, excellent.
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What God says is worthy of praise. So we understand what scripture says.
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We apply it to even those things that we might enjoy as entertainment.
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Is God being glorified in this? How am I able to be sanctified through this?
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You know, it's another way to consider it. Am I being made more holy because I'm partaking in this and can glorify
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God in this? There are some things that we're going to find when we evaluate. We take a step back and we look at those things we've enjoyed for so long, but we've just never put it to this kind of test before.
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When we examine it, we might come to recognize, I don't see how this is glorifying of God in any way.
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And if that's what we see about the thing that we've enjoyed for so long, we have to cut it out. God is not being glorified in this.
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I'm not being sanctified in this in any way. And so what good is it for me in my life?
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I only want to commit myself to those things that I know God is receiving glory for, that my brothers and sisters in the
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Lord, we can build each other up in this, and that I myself am being sanctified through this.
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So just, you know, things to think about. Again, a lot of this could be left up to a difference of opinion, but it's good for us as Christians to weigh and measure these things according to what
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God has said is right and good. And if in wisdom, we see what's a matter of opinion versus what scripture strictly prohibits, right?
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God allows this. He says no to this. Those things that are left up to matters of opinion, we know not to quarrel over those opinions.
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As Romans 14 one says, number nine, eating at expensive restaurants that way.
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Now we're getting into a little bit more subjective territory. So what's an expensive restaurant? Paying more than a hundred dollars for a meal?
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Let me just share my own personal opinion on this. I can be perfectly satisfied with a pizza that's 15 bucks or less.
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I've eaten cheaper pizza than that, and it's really, really good. My whole family is fed.
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I'm good. I, you could not have given me a hundred dollar meal that would have satisfied me as much as that $15 pizza
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I just ate. So I'm, I'm a cheap date and I'm good with cheap food.
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I don't have to eat at expensive restaurants, so I don't see the value in going out and paying a whole bunch of money for food when
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I can, I can eat a lot more cheaply. And so that gives me more money to invest in other things that my family and I can enjoy something else or to be able to, uh, to give to my church or invest in some sort of ministry related thing or build a studio that I can have in my house.
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And I don't always have to come down to the church to record, you know, something like that. That's just kind of my personal take on eating at expensive restaurants.
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I just don't see why, like, why do we, why do we need to eat expensive food?
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And now having said that I've been treated to some really nice restaurants. And, uh, if you are so inclined to take me to a nice place, don't think that I would refuse because, because of this answer that I just gave just on a personal level,
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I'm not looking for the most expensive place to eat, nor do I feel in my spirit, like I'm missing out on something because I don't make a lot of money to go eat at really nice places.
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Finally, number 10, becoming a soldier or a police officer. I'm asked about this fairly often, but there's nothing inherently sinful about becoming a soldier or a police officer.
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In fact, uh, one of the, the examples that I often go to is in the beginning of the gospel of Luke, when
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John the Baptist has some soldiers that come to him and they say Luke three, 14, some soldiers were questioning
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John the Baptist saying, what should we do? And John said to them, do not take money from anyone by force or extort anyone and be content with your wages.
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Did John say to those soldiers? Well, first you need to stop being a soldier. No, he said, don't use the authority that you have to act crookedly, to take advantage of others, be content with your wages, appreciate that as a soldier or a police officer, you're making a paycheck and be content with that so that you don't extort other people for more money.
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You know, even, um, in Matthew chapter eight, where Jesus is, uh, is talking to the centurion or the centurion comes to Jesus and asks
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Jesus to heal his servant. Jesus doesn't tell the centurion, Hey, first stop being a centurion.
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You're living in sin. And then I'll heal your servant. No, he heals the servant and even says of the centurion's faith.
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Nowhere else in Israel have I seen faith of this kind. He marvels at the faith that the, that the centurion has, that Jesus can just speak a word and his servant will be healed by his authority.
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So, uh, there's a couple of examples anyway, that I've used before regarding whether or not a
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Christian can be a soldier or a police officer. There's nothing inherently sinful about those careers, about those occupations.
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All right, let me do one last one here. Uh, skip to the end. I have a couple of other emails.
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Maybe I'll save that for another time when Becky's with me. This comes from John and Shelly. Hello, Pastor Gabe and Becky.
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My wife and I really enjoyed listening to the Friday 1126 podcast. So that was last week's episode.
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We both really got intrigued and tickled listening to you tell the story about labor pains when
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Becky was pregnant. My, uh, my sympathy pains is what it was. I would like to share with you our own little ordeal.
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I married my beautiful Shelly on October 1st, 1988. Our initial plan was to wait a year or two before having children.
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But we know how God's sovereignty overrides our plans. LOL. In 1989, during my second tour in the
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Navy, I started having sharp pains in my lower abdomen. These got so intense that my wife and I went to the
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Navy hospital's emergency room. They ran several different tests on me and even gave me an
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IV, a Vicodin for the pain. But I would literally wake up out of a dead sleep when the pain would hit me.
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At one point, the night doctor on duty, a Navy commander, equivalent to an Army Lieutenant Colonel, was ready to have me admitted in order to run further tests.
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I mentioned to them that my wife was sitting out in the waiting room and was probably very uncomfortable in those chairs.
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So they sent an orderly to go bring her back to the treatment room. When my beautiful eight -month pregnant
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Shelly walked into the room, the doctor took one look at her, turned to me and said,
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Petty Officer, you are having sympathy labor pains. And then told the night staff to prescribe me something for nausea and sent us home.
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That was our first child, now 32 -year -old son. We also have a 29 -year -old daughter and a 27 -year -old son.
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I never experienced sympathy pains again. But to this day, I remember that episode.
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God bless you and your family. I pray you had a great Thanksgiving and we wish you all a Merry Christmas and a
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Happy New Year. Keep up the great work. We love it. Thank you so much for sending that email,
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John. And God bless you and Shelly. If you have other emails you would like to send, maybe sympathy pain stories you would like to share, you can send them to whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com.
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We give you our best from the Hughes family to you. God bless you this holiday season, and God willing, we'll be back on the broadcast with you next week.
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Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, we continue our study through 1 Corinthians, still in Chapter 11, Proverbs 22 on Thursday next week.
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And hopefully, I'll have Becky with me for the next Q &A. Heavenly Father, thank you for this time together.
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Thank you for the gift of joy, of laughter, sharing stories with one another. Most especially, we thank you for the story of Jesus Christ.
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Having been told in the Scriptures of the Son of God that was sent to the world to save sinners.
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Romans 5, 8, God demonstrates his love for us, and that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
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As we remember that story again around Christmas time, the Son of God who put on flesh and dwelt with us, who lived a perfect life, who died on the cross for us, who rose again from the grave, has ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of God.
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May this be a story that we share with others, that they may turn from their sin to put faith in the
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Lord Jesus Christ, the way, the truth, and the life, and so be saved. It is in the name of Jesus that we pray,
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Amen. This is When We Understand the Text with Pastor Gabe Hughes. There are lots of great
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Bible teaching programs on the web, and we thank you for selecting ours. But this is no replacement for regular fellowship with a church family.
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Find a good, gospel -teaching, Christ -centered church to worship with this weekend, and join us again