6 Steps to Observing the Text

we're continuing tonight introduction to hermeneutics and James is not here tonight he answered this question last week so I'll ask and see if anybody else is ready to answer what is hermeneutics how to say the Bible where does the term hermeneutics come from I'm hearing a lot of answers let me go yeah Hermes the the mythological Greek God the messenger of the gods that's right and the goal of hermeneutics is to get the the message from the author to the audience the mess of the the goal of hermeneutics is to get the the message from the author to the audience we are going to be tonight and the third of our eight sessions and we're going to be looking at observation part two our four part outline tonight is we're going to look at six things to look for this is actually really getting into the meat of observation and we're going to practice our observation skills we're actually going to pull up a Bible verse tonight we're going to make some observations from it similar to what we did in the first class but hopefully now that we've been talking about this and you've been reading your book and you've been doing your workbook you'll be a little bit better prepared to do that then we'll have our five ten minute break and then we're going to go over the workbook assignment before we do that let's pray our Father and our God we thank you for this class I thank you for all these folks who have a desire to learn your word and learn it better I pray that you would bless this time that we have together and that you would glorify yourself in it Lord most of all that we would seek and all of this not just to grow intellectually but to grow in our love for you Lord as we know you better we will love you more so help us to do just that in Christ's name Amen all right I have a short introduction to tonight we're going to continue as I said to talk about the subject of observation the first thing I want to give you as a quote now it's long it may be hard for you to see on the board but this is what it says this is from dr.

al moeller he is the president of Southern Seminary the host of the podcast the the briefing thank you the host of the briefing a daily podcast now listen what he says quote researchers George Gallup and Jim Castelli put the problem squarely Americans revere the Bible but by and large they don't read it and because they don't read it that we have become a nation of biblical illiterates how bad is it researchers tell us that it's worse than most could imagine fewer than half of all adults can name the four Gospels many Christians cannot identify more than two or three of the disciples and according to data from Barna research group 60% of Americans can't even name five of the Ten Commandments no wonder people break the Ten Commandments all the time they don't know what they are said George Barna president of the firm the bottom line increasingly America is biblically illiterate now I added this thought I have found personally that through anecdotal evidence that what Barna said in that was absolutely true because we have something called the fishing hole which is going on right now it's 10 days of evangelism most of what we do is hand out tracks but one of the things that I do is I try to engage people in conversation and I engage people in conversation by asking them if they would be willing to take a Bible quiz it's a nice way to begin a conversation with someone and typically people like to engage with trivia questions so I form it in the form of like a game and I have three quiz questions the first question is how many of each animal did Moses take on the ark and if you didn't know that's a trick question it wasn't Moses it was Noah that's usually get some laughing the second question is Moses did go up onto the mountain and received two tablets from God and on those tablets were written a set of commandments how many commandments were there you would be surprised how many people did not know that there were ten commandments given to Moses I'm sure you would think that one would be fairly easy because most of us are familiar with ten commandments but they would I have 113 you know 27 I mean I and that's not a lie I'm not exact this is within the last five days I've been doing this and we started last Thursday I've been there the majority of the nights and have had this conversation every time I was there at least once or twice and then I get to the third question how many can you name of the Ten Commandments how many can you name now this is in rule America this is Callahan Florida this is a city where everybody goes to church not everybody but you know a lot of people do and yet when I asked them how many commandments can you name most of them look like deer in headlights now a few of them got some but very rarely do they know the Ten Commandments so as I said going back to the first thing with with Al Mohler what what he said is is something I have experienced anecdotally and I want to challenge you about something that I believe will go a long way toward increasing you as a student of the Bible and that is to commit yourself to some of the basics commit yourself to learning some of the basics without looking at the board how many of you know how many books of the Bible there are how many of you know how many are New Testament okay how many of you oh by the way there's a little handy thing Patsy Hoffman taught me and Bobby years ago she was our Sunday school teacher when we were little and that is that you have 66 books in the Bible the 39 books of the Old Testament 3 times 9 is 27 that's how many are in the New Testament so it's just a nice little handy reminder that 39 books in the Old Testament 3 times 9 is 27 Adam up that's 66 so that just is a good way to remember how many books are in the Bible how many of you without looking can name all of the books of the Bible hey only a few all right now how many of you know without having to research it who wrote those books okay that's a again these are all helpful things that it would be good to put into our memory because all of those things are good in the again in the observation stage knowing who wrote the book knowing where the book is in the and again you can't know where the books are if you don't know what the books are so the learning the books of the Bible and you can learn them I want to throw this up there you can learn them learn where they are by recognizing that they're not put together chronologically but they're put together categorically now when I teach the Old Testament survey which would be the next course and hopefully you guys who haven't taken it will take it when we do the Old Testament survey I will I'll get into this more deeply but the Old Testament books are put in categories not in chronological order but categorical order so we have in the Old Testament the law of Moses followed by the history books of the Old Testament then the poetic books of the Old Testament and then the prophets which are broken down into major and minor and if you knew that then you can at least begin to think about where the books are and you know like if I said everybody turned to Nahum you know would you know where that was these are all just little things that are good for all of us so a good observation question is where am I in the Bible another good observation question is when am I in the Bible the Bible is written over a 1,500 year period and it spans a time much greater than that being able to see where each books each book lands in the timeline of redemptive history is helpful this is one of the things I think is most important about our New Testament survey because when I teach the New Testament survey one of the things that I do in that class is help everyone to understand what order the books came in it's important what do you think is the first book of the New Testament written probably the book of James that's right if not James then it would have been the book of Galatians Galatians was certainly Paul's first letter that he wrote so these are things that are important when we begin to look at their theology and the timing of their theology and we have an idea of when James would have been written somewhere in the late 40s probably 48 or 49 when did Jesus die around 30 yeah I heard you say 33 we know he was 33 years old but it was doubtful that he was born exactly at the beginning of the millennium and as far as timetables go so we probably so we say somewhere around 30 which means the first New Testament book was written at least two decades after the death burial and resurrection of Christ the Gospels were not written until the 50s and John's Gospel probably into the 60s and all of this is just it's not just trivial knowledge it's helpful knowledge most of you have study Bibles somewhere in your house when you open your study Bible up to the book of John or whatever you'll notice it says date and time theme and all those things that's in that study Bible and that there's a reason why they go to the trouble of putting that information in there it's because that's going to help you understand what the book means understanding when it was written who was written by who was written to all of those are important okay so that was a little introduction now let's move to our study for tonight and that is the subject of observation on the subject of observation we are going to look at six things to look for remember what we said last time it's not just it's not just looking but it's knowing what to look for well tonight we're going to try to examine what it is we should be looking for what should we be looking for number one or I'm sorry not number one let me say this first when I first asked you to give me ten observations on Romans 12 1 to 2 some were not quite sure what I was asking for and in the textbook dr.

Hendricks gives the example of a doctor looking into the throat to see when it was sore why was it sore do you remember that part of the book if you read your textbook he talked about that he said he said you could look in somebody's throat all day long and not know what was making their throat sore but a doctor can look very quickly and say okay it's strep throat or it's this or it's that because he knows exactly what he's looking for and that's part of what observation is not just looking but knowing what we are looking for so with that in mind here are the six things number one we're going to look at we're going to look for things that are emphasized consider the amount of space that's given to something or the stated purpose of something or the order or the movement from lesser to greater or vice versa from greater to lesser give you an example on this where is the Sermon on the Mount Matthew what Matthew chapter 5 when does it end Matthew chapter 7 which means in a book that is 28 chapters long three whole chapters are dedicated to one sermon yeah absolutely absolutely so we know that that is emphatic not only in chapters 5 6 & 7 but it's emphatic in the book Matthew is writing to whom I say what you're saying cuz I can't Matthew is writing primarily to a Jewish audience we know this based upon how much he references the Old Testament and how much he points to the fact that Jesus is the king of the Jews he's writing to a primarily Jewish audience and so when we read Matthew and we get to Matthew chapter 5 we get to this long emphasis on Jesus is great Sermon on the Mount and what is emphasized in the Sermon on the Mount yeah but what is how does he how does he teach the law you have heard it said but I say unto you but he said but I say unto you Jesus is correcting misunderstanding about the law you have heard it said but I say unto you and so this again is a major emphasis in Matthew it's something that is given a lot of space sometimes a stated purpose will be clear sometimes a book will simply or a passage will simply say this is the stated purpose first John these things have been written that you may know that you have eternal life I mean that the word no is in the book of first John all throughout in fact some people call it the no book K&O W no why do they call first John the no book because it's he says multiple times these things are written that you may know that you have eternal life so therein is a is a stated purpose he stated there you don't have to wonder what his intention was again go to the end of John's gospel what does he say same thing that you may believe on the Son of God I've written these things that you may believe on the Son of God that's the purpose of all that he wrote before he says I wrote he says if all the things that Jesus had done had been written there wouldn't be enough books in the world to contain it but these things have been written that you may believe right so John is clear with his stated purpose and there again this is something that's being emphasized by the author if the author emphasizes it then we need to recognize there's a reason for that there's a reason for that emphasis order is important as I said we'll see this in certain times where the order of a particular subject is put out and we see I'm trying to think of a good example I don't have one of my mind right now but just where order of events takes place certain things happen and again the movement from the lesser to the greater we see that a lot we see something it'll begin and it'll say and this thing is better or this thing is greater and again all of those are just emphasizes or emphasis is that's a bad emphases these are all places where emphasis is put yes you've heard of both ways okay good so things that are emphasized key words all of those things are things to immediately look for number two is things that are repeated terms phrases and clauses that are repeated characters whose names are repeated incidents and circumstances that are repeated what's the one event that is in all four Gospels there's only a few events that are in all four Gospels can y'all think of what they are huh crucifixion that's good Julie yeah crucifixion in all four Gospels what else is in all four Gospels goes right along with it the resurrection I was thinking that when you're right Ed that that was the one I was going to mention most people don't realize Jesus death burial and resurrection is in all four Gospels because that is the heart of the gospel that he died first ends he was buried he rose again for our justification that is in all four Gospels but also Ed was right the other event that most people don't realize is in all four Gospels is the feeding of the five thousand and so we see this incident that's repeated all four Gospels yeah but those two occasions are in one book yeah and not all of them record that he did it twice that once he fed 5,000 once he fed 4,000 not all the Gospels record that but they all record the feeding of the five thousand reoccurring patterns there's a pattern in Scripture that is important and it is a it's it's a Hebrew pattern of writing and it is a it's based on the letter X which is in the in the Greek is the letter key I'm sorry excuse me that's not right the letter key which looks like it looks like our X but there's a pattern where you will see like one two three and then two a and then three a and what it is is there's that there's a focal point here and this will match this and this will match this and it's called a key asm and this pattern is actually found throughout the Old Testament I've shown it several times in the book of Genesis alone since I've been preaching through Genesis I've stopped at a few places and I've said see this story this story is built around the structure of the key asm where the most important part of the story is actually right here because this builds up to it and this builds away from it and there's this center point that the whole story is pointing to and this is a way that Hebrew writers would emphasize a specific thing and it was called a key asm and this is just another pattern that we see repeated and it shows emphasis it's emphasizing one thing if I can think about it during the break I'll try to find one and pull out and actually show you how it looks but that's that's just an example of another pattern that we see think of this isn't a key asm but thinking of patterns when you hear in the in the book of Genesis chapter 1 what is it what's the repeating thing in chapter 1 and it was good and it was good and it was good and it was good it was good right it was over and over there's this repetition right why would there be an emphasis on the concept of goodness in chapter 1 because God is good because there's going to be a major distinction between that which is not good and that's the sin of chapter 3 so we see the goodness of God's creation everything he did was good and it follows that repetitious pattern of his goodness versus our un goodness or sinfulness badness we also see the New Testament use of Old Testament passages like Psalm 110 1 and Leviticus 1918 are among the most quoted Old Testament passages in the New Testament you may know what Leviticus 1918 is it's a surprise somebody open your Bible and turn tip I say it's a surprise I don't mean like it's interesting that this is the most one of the most quoted verses of the Old Testament that last part you shall love your neighbor as yourself when Jesus was asked what are the two great commandments in the law the first when he quotes is from is yeah he says love the Lord your God with all your heart soul mind and strength but then he says and love your neighbor as yourself and that phrase is only found once in the Old Testament it's in Leviticus 19 verse 18 an obscure passage in Leviticus Jesus says is the most important love your neighbor as yourself and it's the one of the most repeated in the New Testament all right so we've we've seen things that are emphasized things that are repeated by the way if you want to dive deeper into any one of these your book does that the book gives great examples of these that all I'm doing is reminding you of what's in the book allowing you to ask questions so if you if you're reading the book then you're you should be ahead of the class you should be right where you right where we can have these conversations number three things that are related movement from the general to the specific questions and answers and cause and effect one of my favorite things in the Bible is cause and effect and we all remember cause and effect from school at least I hope and it based on the concept of if then and we understand that the cause is the if and the effect is the then if you are driving fast and you pass a police officer then you may get you may get stopped or you may get a ticket or you you know you may at least have a moment where you reassess your speed and I think most of us have done that but we were driving a little faster than we should have and we see the lights on top of the car and we slow down a little bit more quickly what's that I still have no idea okay well it's just you know it's funny the Bible says the law brings the knowledge of sin and I always think about that when I'm driving and I see the cop car behind me and it makes me feel like I need to slow down even if I'm not driving fast you know it's like is it's like the law brings the knowledge of sin the law in the rear view mirror breathe say well I need to check oh my brake lights working good you know is my you know my tag in order you know so all these things kind of come to your mind because the law is there you know and and huh yeah yeah amen yeah so these are all you know we look for things that are related in the passages things you know moving from the general to the specific moving from you know when if the text asks a question and then answer it that's a that's related and look for those things look for the cause and effect number four look for things that are alike and you guys remember similes and metaphors similes use like and as you know if I say to my wife you are like a rose you know or you smell like a rose all right that is a simile I'm using like but a metaphor is a comparison that doesn't use like or as so if I tell my wife you are a rock you know you're my rock you know you're the you know that that might be a different way of describing her and it is a different way of describing her but it's also a different way of communicating what I'm trying to say the Bible uses both Jesus was very famous for using similes we often refer to them as parables the kingdom of heaven is like this or that right and he would make a parable or a reference he'll reference something that the kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed or the kingdom of heaven is like this or like that that's something that's being emphasized it's something that needs to be recognized people get upset with the concept of metaphor because sometimes people say we should never use metaphor the Bible is always literal well the Bible isn't always literal and when we get to the interpretation stage I'm going to try to explain what I mean by that some people get offended when I say well people ask me do you do you interpret the Bible literally I say no I interpret the Bible literarily means I interpret it according to the literature form that's being used and if you try to interpret Psalms literally or the Song of Solomon literally you're going to come up with some very strange looking folks I mean think about how he describes the the Shulamite woman you know in her body in her face and and you know it's it's very to him it was saying she was beautiful but to us you know if you say you know all the things that he said about her it's very awkward but they were meta yeah exactly yeah yeah the metaphors of the day you know if Ron came to you and says you have a neck like a giraffe you probably wouldn't be overly excited about that that that that compliment but in that day it had a positive way it was a positive message and metaphor in scripture is is used I think one of the most important ones is and this might offend some of you but I'm gonna throw it out there you can do with it what you want when Jesus said unless you eat my body and drink my blood many people have taken that literally and created an entire theology of real presence sacrament sacramental real presence in the in the bread and the cup certainly Rome has surely gone further than is proper by creating an entire perpetuatory sacrifice out of that communion table but but it's when Jesus held holds up the bread and said this is my body he didn't say this is like my body he said this is my body and Luther was one who believed that the body and blood are present in the bread and the cup and when he met with Yorick Zwingli at the Marburg colloquy they had 15 points of doctrine that they disagree that they discussed and only one did they disagree on and it was the presence of Christ in the Eucharist or the bread in the cup and it is said that Luther became enraged by Zwingli because Zwingli said when Jesus said this is my body he was speaking metaphorically is there is metaphor like if I say my wife is my rock you know or if I take a picture of my family out and I say this is my family and you say wow you gave birth to a piece of cardboard with ink no this represents my family and so the word is in they would mean represents when Jesus holds up the bread he said this is my body if he's speaking metaphorically he means this represents my body but Luther beat on the table and he said Hulk asked corpus ma'am which was Latin for this is my body and he would not accept anything other than the literal interpretation of that phrase and therefore he and Zwingli divided and never were united again over that one point of doctrine and it was a question of whether or not is that passage speaking literally or metaphorically so went a little further on that than I wanted to but you understand the importance of it now right why that's emphasized that's something that's so rather something that's alike that you need to decide how are we going to interpret this all right number five we said things that are alike that was number four things that are unlike number five I love the word but and when I say that I mean the word adversative but because it changes things but when we say it in the Bible it always changes things something be going along and they'll say but and then you know it's saying you all know this because of how you interact if somebody come to you if you know you you guys out there if you met a young lady and she says you know I really like you and I enjoy spending time with you and I enjoy our date but you don't want to hear anything after that you are you are no longer interested you want her to stop right there because whatever is coming is going to be different than what just came now many of you guys have shirts I've seen you wear them that have on the back but God and that's taken from Ephesians chapter 2 that says we were dead and trespasses and sins in which we once walked right but God being rich in mercy has saved us by grace the word but that's why I say the word but it's one of the most beautiful words because it changes things and that's that if you are ever studying a passage of Scripture and you come across that word circle it highlight it draw a line to let yourself know something just changed metaphors often show contrast like for instance the unrighteous judge in Luke 18 what's Luke 18 about yes remember somebody open your Bible let's look at it real quick that's about Jesus thank you Ross for that stirring commentary it's about the widow and what does she do that's right she comes to the judge every day seek she she's seeking justice from her adversaries right when she comes seeking justice from her adversary the king doesn't care but eventually she comes so much we call it the parable the persistent widow because she's persistent and finally the king says I'm going to give her justice not because I care but because she's been so persistent and what does it say about God in that passage no the next part the next one because it compares this parable is compared to God what does it say yeah okay right there so here's the story you got an unrighteous judge who's willing to give justice to a woman who's persistent and Jesus says and will not the Lord give justice to his elect who cry out to him day and night what's he doing he's using a contrasting metaphor if an unrighteous judge is willing to give justice because of a persistent request how much more would the righteous God of heaven be willing to grant justice to those who call out to him you see the comparison there but it's an unlike comparison God isn't like the unrighteous judge but the point is if an unrighteous judge will do it how much more and again the lesser to the greater how much more would the God who is just give justice to his elect so it's just again that's that looking for that contrast irony irony is sometimes hard to define there was a whole song about it never got it once rain on your wedding day not ironic unfortunate not ironic do y'all even know what I'm talking about there was a song in the 90s came out it was called ironic you know rain on your wedding day all this stuff none of it was ironic that's not irony okay go ahead Bobby I know you want to say that's right that's right the song itself is ironic because there's no irony in it and yet it's about irony that's great yeah yeah don't you think okay so having said that there are some ironic statements in the Bible there are times when the Bible uses irony and I and I would add to that I think there's a time when the Bible uses sarcasm some people might not think of God willing to use sarcasm but certainly the prophets were when the prophets of Baal were crying out to their false God and Elijah says maybe your God is relieving himself maybe he's asleep maybe if you yell louder or cut yourselves deeper he will respond that's that's great that's dripping with sarcasm yes that's right that's a good example of what you do you want to follow him and then they get all enraged yeah absolutely I mentioned here Luke 845 under irony when Jesus says who touched me now you might not think of that as an ironic statement I've always thought it was something semi-ironic simply because Jesus knows everything but why is he saying that hold on here what Frank Frank's trying to talk what were you saying I can't hear it was what she was doing it was like it was like she was trying not to not to be noticed that that was what she was doing she just being able to do that being healed yeah yeah you know and it was like it was almost like it was in it it was like it was just like it was a side issue you know what I mean what it wasn't like right in front of me like most of the time people would come in and get healed and they would you know they would they would come to know and bow down before but in this case yeah what were you saying you let me catch off I just won't be able to hear both no I was just I was just thinking that you know I think it was Jesus way of showing the people around him that he even knew when somebody needed healing just knowing that she reached out for him you're right she didn't come to this place yeah I like your faith that she knew all I that would have been like really like that wasn't cool yeah it wasn't cool yeah well like I said the the the irony of just Jesus asking that question who touched me as if one as if he didn't know and two if you read the story it says they were all pressing in upon him everybody's touching you that's the irony everybody's touching you what are you talking about I know somebody touched me that somebody received healing and he knew who it was but you go ahead yeah well that well I don't have I don't I don't want to spend too much time on it there in that particular situation there's two events going on Jairus has a daughter Jairus comes to Jesus come and heal my daughter right how is his daughter 12 year old daughter woman comes with an issue of blood we don't know her name so we'll just say the woman how long has she had the issue of blood 12 years before this event God sovereignly brought about the birth of a child and an issue of blood with a woman that we don't even know her name so that in this moment the power of God could be shown twice in one day one in healing the woman's of her issue of blood and one with raising a child from the dead we see God working post or rather pre this moment he's working in the past to bring about this event right now and both of them are 12 year old issues that's right shows us the sovereignty of God even before healing and love and mercy and all that God is the one who's bringing us about to glorify his son demonstrate his power before the people so that's a part a lot of people miss because you don't even think about the connection between the two so all right things that are unlike let's go now number six things that are true to life the whole Bible is true to life but what I mean what the book means is what is this passage tell us about reality like for instance with Noah and the flood Noah and the deluge what is it that we learn about the world in that huh well there's some truth to that that we see a world filled with sinful people and the world is still filled with sinful people who are doing simple things also tells us something about why the world looks the way it does think about the Grand Canyon and all those different things that are probably the results of the Great Deluge why do people do not huh John Pitts yeah but why do people deny that the earth is young because they say well look at all these rock formations they couldn't have been formed in a very short amount of time unless of course there was a giant deluge that happened six to ten thousand years ago but they don't believe that what aspects of the text resonate with your experience I've been preaching Genesis 22 and it's hard to not read Genesis 22 as a father a father who is commanded take your son your only son Isaac whom you love and sacrifice him on the mountain that becomes something that resonates with our experience one of the other ones it's not on here but one of the ones that really resonates with me is the death of Nadab and Abihu I mentioned that passage a lot because it strikes my heart so much these two men were priests before God they were the sons of Aaron they offered up a strange fire before the Lord we have no idea what that fire was like or what it was that they did that was so offensive to God other than that they offered up something that he did not command and in offering up something that God did not command the fire came out from the temple or the tabernacle and consumed them in front of their father and it says and Aaron held his peace didn't tell him not to weep he said for those nope didn't say that either he says for those who draw near to me I must be considered holy and Aaron held his peace God was demonstrating that if you are going to draw near to me if you're going to come and offer sacrifices in my temple you better take it seriously yeah but I think in regard to the holiness when God says those who draw near to me must consider me holy I think it's regarding because they came to him in a way that was flippant they came I think that's I think that's the context of that statement but certainly what you said is also true I just think for that particular one isn't where is regarding that what life principles is it relying upon or proposing think of the incident with David and Bathsheba what are some of the life principles that we learned from David and Bathsheba don't watch women take baths that might not be the the right one but that's certainly there yeah huh don't cheat don't peep Tom what's it called peeping Tom I said what so you know all these things don't be a voyeur whatever that's the more that's the more appropriate term huh go to work all the other kings are out of battle and you're staying home yeah oh yeah so many principles lying have y'all seen that meme of the guy standing next to the basketball game and he's just standing like this and he's got this really like like really disappointed look on his face it's just a meme and it's out there and there's a lot of people have done things with it and he's just got this kind of like he look I don't know what game he was at he was out of he was at a basketball game he's standing on the bleachers by himself and he's got his hands on his hips and he's just looking really upset and and the funniest one I've ever seen it's like Uriah when he sees David get the heaven I mean cuz you know Uriah is the victim here and he was so he loved David so much I won't even go to my house David's like go it's I shouldn't laugh but it's funny dr.

Hendricks mentions using sanctified imagination now I would caution you to not use sanctified I so Jesus which is reading things that aren't there but it is important to have imagination now did I mention last week about the Abraham and Isaac video that my wife and I watched you know I'm preaching I think I mentioned it in my sermon maybe that's where you heard it but Abraham and Isaac go to the mountain for the sacrifice that you can really imagine but there's a movie where the where where Sarah's running and screaming don't kill him don't kill him and it's like that's not in the Bible that's not even like there's nothing in the Bible to indicate that she even knew so it just it's that's I said Jesus that's reading into the text something that's not there hey she was a spry hundred okay she was you know but the point is what I put here feeling emotions and experience these are things that we can do when we read the text I think about some of those times where the disciples were with Jesus and they thought they were gonna die and they're on the boat on the Sea of Galilee which was a place that was known for storms coming upon sailors or fishermen with no warning and the storms would come with sheer intensity at the drop of a hat and they see this coming and they see what's about to happen and they think they're gonna die and Jesus is asleep and what do they say Lord we're perishing and we laugh because we're like the one who invented the storm is in the boat with you but if we can for a moment put ourselves there you know have we not been just as afraid in a moment I remember one time I was coming down to 95 and I was getting on to 95 so it's right over here and there's a spot where it curves back really hard and this is before they started the construction this had to been 20 years ago and I was in my old Dodge pickup so it's a long bed Dodge pickup and as I hit the curve my back tires broke loose and the car began to spin by God's grace it caught back again and I was able to correct it and it didn't continue to because it could have spun into a roll and could have easily have killed me but I remember in that moment being more frightened than I'd ever been just having the car essentially go out of my control and even though it was only for a few seconds it was a very clarifying few seconds as I was scared to death so when I think about these guys on the Sea of Galilee with the water beginning to overtake the boat and the rain and the wind coming in it's easy to use a little sanctified imagination and to hear the guttural sound of their Lord we are perishing it's real it was real and that is a that's something that's helpful when you're reading the text okay a few extra things on this we've looked at the six things but I want you I'm going to give you a few things that aren't necessarily in the book but these are just additional thoughts grammatical construction is very important and I've already talked about this once but we're going to do this in a little while when we actually look at the text oh we're almost out of time so we have much time grammatical construction identifying nouns verbs etc discuss sentence you guys you guys know how to diagram sentences some people know what it is some people don't even know what it is it was something that was done in schools for a long time it wasn't done in my era and so most of you who are around my age didn't do it but sentence diagramming is very helpful I watched my wife teach my son Cody and I would like stand over her shoulder like because I was learning while she was teaching him yeah I mean I was watching her do it I was amazed it was very neat and this again is the reason why we need a solid Bible translation because if you're diagramming sentences out of the message you might have some trouble and one of the things that dr.