How Do You Actually Read The Bible - Theology for the Rest of Us

Good morning. Oh, man.

Hey, do you guys confused all you look at the band and

everybody shuffled around to the right.

Do you guys notice at all? Different drummer, different

bass guy, new lead guy. Can you guys go for these guys?

Come on then. Fantastic.

I was talking to Joel. I was like, man, you're doing

pretty good on the bass. And he he was like, well, I say

you got no iPad or nothing for the music.

He goes, I I can't read the music anyway, so I just played

by ear. I memorize it and wow,

fantastic. I'm looking over and going this

is this is too good. You make I can't I'm so sick of

these guys talent, you know, shouldn't have that much talent

one person. But anyway, we appreciate these

guys. So can you guys say rejoice

always. Now let's say it like we want to

rejoice, rejoice always. Come on somebody.

You guys have just memorized the verse today.

Come on, somebody first lessons 516.

You got it right there. Rejoice always.

And this verse we talked about lately, but this is one of those

seasons of just full of joy. We get to choose joy, Amen.

And then it goes on to we pray continually.

We could choose prayer. We grateful for all

circumstances for it's God's will for you in Christ Jesus,

Amen. And as Christians, there's

something different about us. Even when the circumstances are

difficult, it's not the way you want to go.

It's a season of uncertainty. Even life or death, we can still

choose joy, choose to pray, and choose to be grateful.

Amen. And people sense that they walk

in and it just, there's something about the person who's

been the presence of God and the demeanor they have because they

actually walk with Jesus. And so today I was going to just

celebrate a few things. It's been just an exciting

season at our church. First of all, Mother's Day last

week, largest middle day we ever had.

Fantastic preaching, by the way. Come on, somebody, everybody's

like, how's it feel to be the second best preacher in the

house? I'm like, I'm probably like the

10th. There's there's so many great

guys, dude, I'm telling you so and ladies, but just fantastic.

We had 421 people out. Largest Mother's Day I've ever

had. Just amazing.

Give it for everybody's new, give it for moms.

Just wow. It's just, it's just insane.

Like we don't know what really to prepare for anymore.

Like how many kids, I don't know, we don't even know

anymore. We had three people.

It's amazing on Mother's Day day.

I don't know all the time you're like man pastor, like I just

want to get more involved. I want to jump on the team.

I'm like sweet. And they all came to set up

today. So we had three new people set

up this morning. Just jumped on in fantastic.

It's just fun. It's just be a part of what

God's doing this whole thing. There's a lady that came out.

It's been coming for a season, but mentioned the the bouquet

bar and was just super excited. Like I cannot believe you guys

go all this extra difference like this extra miles to

celebrate moms and just open up this it just if you come out of

different churches, it's kind of get a little stale, you know,

and stagnant and it just I feel like most people forget this,

but one of the qualifications for a pastor is actually fit for

hospitality. And I think when somebody comes

into a church, this just no automatic like these people love

people. Amen, because God loves us, we

love everyone else. Amen.

And just a little tiny caveats and fun things, but man, how

exciting just to do that kind of stuff and to give back and play

difference. And people notice those small

things like if you love us this much, I mean, what else do you

love? You know?

And it's just amazing to play part of that story.

So I want to say thank you all ladies, put that together.

I will promise you there was zero men behind that.

Just saying I'll stop. I can, I can do that.

This is pretty cool. Last week there, there was a mom

who couldn't make it, but her whole family came out.

And it was one of those families that had kind of been between

churches for a season. Her husband came out and her

family came out, kids came out and spouses and all the things.

And it took about a whole row plus some.

And she talked to us this week and she's I was so excited that

even though I couldn't be there, my entire family went to

Mother's Day at church. Who knows?

That's a good Mother's Day. Amen.

Like my family was in church even without me dragging me to

church, you know, which is often the case, right?

One of the things exciting this season, our belt and SIM 8

project, It's like it's a godsend, Amen.

Like we, we prayed for an opportunity to say yes.

Like Lord, give us the opportunity to say yes to, I'll

be honest with you, this was, was not the first opportunity

that we thought we'd say yes to. Although we're like, Lord, if

you do it, but like, that's just amazing what the Lord's done.

Amen. And so to walk in the season,

just a quick update. We're still in the due diligence

phase. We're still working on some

things we kicked out to end of May.

So they got some things to fix, but they're going to Amen And so

we're so excited for the season and what God's doing and this is

above and beyond. We could ask or imagine, you

know, this, this, this Ephesians 3/20/21 like Lord, you just

doing more than than we even dreamed of.

And I think that's what Lord does Amen.

And so I encourage you guys just be praying and just just we're,

I know you guys are like, we're going to see some drawings and I

almost put like the, the their drawings on the screen and like

we're trying to turn this into a church.

You know, it's, it's crazy. So, but it, it's so much fun and

excited to just to run the season.

This is another crazy fun story. So this week I got a call from

you guys know Patti Gazelle, who knows Patti full life.

Patti. She's she's she can't come as

much her husband's struggle with dementia and just come with the

seasons. And if you know Patti, she's

just full life. She is so bubbly.

If she ever sends you a card, man, my Lord is like, and it's a

3D card. I mean, she makes custom cards

and she's like send cards to to Charlie's 8th birthday.

And I, I said, man, I'm probably just going to disappoint you

with whatever I send. This is not going to be like

this crazy thing. But she called me or text me.

She said, Hey, I've something shipped my house.

I think it's for you. That's our thing is like, man, I

did ship something to her a while back and her address is in

my Amazon. Maybe I sent her some things

that I shouldn't and has a password that's kind of

dangerous, you know, like what did I ship her?

You know, so I go back on Amazon.

I'm like, Nah, OK, we're I saw. I don't think I shoot anything.

She goes, you'll know when you see it.

They're like, OK, surprise. And so I show up and she had

this Amazon box and it was actually full of all these

heaven books. And so she bought a case these

books and she said, I heard you need some of these to pass out

to more people because this book has played just played such a

difference in my life. But she said I was so afraid of

dying. I was so afraid of of of

eternity. I didn't know anything.

I didn't know what was going to be like.

And so I was just definitely afraid of holding everything.

I was so sad and scared. And now I get a chance like to

share with other people. And she told me she was I'm so

excited for heaven. Isn't it amazing and so on.

Her heart is like, I just want heaven to get in some other

people. Amen And so if you walk through

a season where maybe there's some of your family that's

struggling with just kind of life and death, or you're you're

in the middle of it and you're you're walking the season bad

prognosis. I get to send this book to a

lady that was put on Hospice last week, 51 years old and was

given a month to a year to live. And I was like, you got to get

your mind and heart around heaven right now because you

man, I'm telling you, it is so exciting.

I know you're just scared to death, but man, just scared to

life. Amen.

And so I'll encourage you. I've got an extra copy up here

if somebody wants to just come find me after.

I don't want to throw it hurt anybody like it did last time.

So it was a bad thing. So anyway, we're going to dive

into this series. So how do you actually read the

Bible? We're going to theology, but how

do you read the Bible? This is the best book you've

ever read, by the way, Amen. I mean, we we love Randy Alcorn,

but dude, he got nothing on this all came from that, Amen.

And so I would encourage you guys like, how do we actually

read the Scripture? Because for most people, as a

pastor I meet, they're not really against reading the

Bible. They just feel really

overwhelmed by it, but like they don't know where to start.

If they have started, they didn't finish, right?

Like they're going to read the Bible in the year and didn't do

that. Like you tried, like Lord, you

made a commitment. You start checking the boxes in

about 5 days in. You're like, man, I'm so

confused, right? Have you read the Bible and

didn't get anything out of it? I'll be real honest on the path,

I've read the Bible and sometimes I read like what in

the world just happened, right? And it could be confusing and

then we kind of get discouraged. I think Satan has a strategy to

keep us away from the Bible. I think it's way more spirits

than we ever think or imagine. But for most people, it's very

overwhelming. And then we get distracted and

busy. And so I want to encourage you

guys. How do we dive in the Bible?

So today I'm just going to use some simple things, some

practical things, but I'm also going to give you some really

deep encouragement of why we should dive in.

So I think that's going to maybe shift the needle for you to

really, really spend some time with the Lord.

And so I'll just start with this.

It is actually very dangerous not to read the Bible.

It is very dangerous not to put your head to Scripture.

Even if it's confusing, you don't know to start, I would

encourage you that we got to make time to get ourselves in

the Bible. It says this in Proverbs 1412.

It says this. There is a way that appears to

be right, but in the end it leads to death.

There's a way it appears right to a man, but in the end it

bleeds to death. And it's really scary because

most people were doing were confident in doing like the path

looks good, the direction makes sense.

It feels good relationally, it makes sense financially, and

we're going through our life. But the danger of the whole

thing is we're not doing it with the Lord, Amen.

And it seems like it's like, why is the path for destruction?

It it seems good like this is it like my life is built on these

things? And it's like the American dream

or the pursuit of this American dream, but has nothing to do

about Jesus. Like we're not following his

will. We're not hearing his voice.

We don't know the direction wants to go.

Like it looks this is the right way, but it's not from the Lord.

And Satan is really good. He didn't he didn't really come

out to the front door right? Like he, he distracts you and he

keeps you busy and he puts all these obstacles in your life and

he just gets your heart and mind focused on something else

besides him. Now this goes all the way back

to the original sin in Genesis chapter 3.

Genesis 3 · chapter mention

And you guys remember what happened when Ave. they ate the

apple? What was the first thing that

happened? You guys remember their eyes

were open. That's right.

Good job over here. That's really good.

Their eyes were opened and they recognized good and evil and

they recognized they were naked and they were ashamed.

And what they do from God, they hear from God, they reign from

God. And you know, we often think

about the the curse and we think, oh, well, this is what it

is now. And there's there's toil and

there's pain and all these things and there's death.

And that is true. But what happens is we forget

the very essence of what broke was our relationship with God.

That was the very first time that God, I'm going to say, got

up in the morning, OK, right. And he walks in the cool the

morning and he looks for his son Adam and his daughter Eve.

Where are you? And they don't answer for a

second. And he cries like, where are you

let go over here. It is the first act of grace, by

the way, Amen, That God still pursued us even when we're

broken and messed up and covered the sin and shame and

selfishness. Our God still loves us, Amen.

And you can't forget that. That's just so foundational to

walk with God because I think Satan has just kept us broken

and in shame and in combination. But we forget the very essence

is that there was a time where we got every morning and we

grabbed the hand of our Father and said, we're going to play

today. What we're going to do today,

what we're going to build today. What kind of animals are going

to name today? What, what, what things are we

going to discover today? We're going to teach today.

And we never knew it was like not to actually walk with God,

that his voice was preeminent, His love and grace were over us.

We were covered completely. And then we walked away.

And I think what happens is sometimes we equate our broken

relationship with God, that we don't pursue him because we

don't think God loves us. And that's not part of the

curse, Amen. God, do not curses and say, get

out of my presence. I don't love you anymore, you

are worthless. Get away from me.

I think Satan likes to teach us that, though, Amen.

And So what happens is when we don't get in the Bible, we're

actually going back to the original plan of Satan.

We're going back to the original way that Satan was where our

where our voice and God's voice are no longer connected.

And it's very dangerous. Matter of fact, I would say it's

even deconstructive. Like you will take your life and

drive it to its furthest extent, as far away from God as

possible. Even the point we don't believe

in God anymore. This is what Satan's strategy

has been the entire time. It's kind of interesting too,

because, you know, people like really love the Bible.

Sometimes you get like a bad Rep, you know, like, you see,

these guys were kind of the top. Sometimes we call them Bible

thumpers. I don't know, a group kind of

church like that. It was just like Hellfire.

You got saved every Sunday. Come on, somebody, right?

Maybe it was just me, right? That was a fundamental Baptist.

We say it wasn't fun. It was definitely mental.

Come on, somebody. If you come from that circle,

you'll laugh harder than anybody else.

But if you're not laughing, then I might not see you next week.

But it's all good. I'll quote the great theologian.

We, we come to being dangerous. We're going to quote Alice

Cooper. Come on, somebody.

Oh, man. And if you know anything about

Alice Cooper's music, I mean, it's dark, right?

I mean, there's got guillotines, you got snakes, you got all this

whore, all these things. And his story is crazy.

And I don't know all the bits of the story, but he became

obviously drugs, alcohol, all the all the 9 yards.

What's crazy is his wife, Cheryl, She's actually a

pastor's daughter. And I started thinking like,

man, Can you imagine that conversation?

Like you're going to marry who? Like you're doing what?

Like, I just like, man, you know?

You know, there was like all sorts of this drama dysfunction

that happened. But it's crazy.

She actually came to Christ later in her life.

And through that, Alice saw the difference that was made in her

life. And he was struggling with

alcohol. And he said, I cannot, I know I

cannot defeat this on my own because it's so destructive.

And so he turned to Jesus, our relationship with Christ.

And it's been sober for decades. And he had this quote and I saw

it the other day and it's so amazing.

He said drinking beer is easy, trashy hotel room is easy.

But being a Christian, that's a tough call.

He said that's real rebellion. That's pretty good.

Amen. That's our thing about real

rebellion. Like when you pick up the Bible

every time you read it, this is the most rebellious act you

could ever do. You're, you're rebellion against

original sin, you're you're rebelling against Satan, you're

rebelling against sin nature, like you are turning back to God

and fighting your world a real war.

And it's pretty amazing. There's a reason why the Bible

calls this a sword, because you actually have to be in rebellion

to actually use it. And so I think Satan just wants

to keep us away from getting the Bible.

And for most people, sadly, they don't read the Bible.

Most people, it's just, it's like literate but illiterate.

They choose not to read and I want to encourage you guys.

If you could do one act as a Christian, it'd begin your face

before God and open his scripture and just let God speak

you through his word is a foundational piece of your walk

with God. You know, I think about this

sword called the Bible and I I love my my boy Peter.

He he's just so fiery in the Bible.

Some of you guys remind me of Peter by the way, you just like

you just go for it. You don't care about the

consequence. You just going and Peter was

that guy right? And he he was so upset when

Jesus was getting arrested. What did he do?

He pulled out his sword and what?

Yeah, cough, Malchus's ear, right?

And in Jesus, he picks up the ear and he heals them.

He tells Peter, whoever lives by a sword what dies by a sword.

And it's the last time you see Peter ever pick up a physical

sword. Every time.

The last time you see him be a brawler.

And some of you guys come out of the world like if you ain't

fighting, you're not getting anything communicated.

Like there's a line. I'm just going to just going to

punch your lights out, right. And that that was Peter.

But when Jesus told me if you live by the sword, died by the

sword, it's really interesting because we always think we

aren't supposed to fight. But what what Peter learned that

he was restored. And anyway, what did Jesus tell

him? If you love me, what?

Feed my sheep. If you love me, feed my lambs.

If you love me, feed my sheep. And for the rest of Piers life,

what do you do? Yeah, he picked up the sword.

Amen. He he, he exchanged a physical

weapon for the most spiritual weapon you can have and he

preached the Bible, Amen to the point of death.

Matter of fact, he was so passionate about the word of

God, he proclaimed it evenly when he was in Rome and in

preaching to these people that were highly persecuted.

And this is the way he says about the word of God itself.

And second Peter, this very last thing he's writing, second Peter

chapter one, verse 3. This is what you're reading by

the way, when you pick the Bible up, it says his divine power.

Talk about God himself has given us what everything, not just

some things, but every single thing we need for what a godly

life. So God's power gives us

everything we need for a godly life.

And you know, sometimes you want to like live somebody else's

life, like, oh man, it'd be great and this and that.

No, no, you just want to live the life that God has for you,

Amen. Be content with where God has

put you. Live a God life through how our

knowledge of him like so we know about God, God's divine power,

because we know about our knowledge of God.

How do we get knowledge of God through the Scripture, Amen.

And so because we know about his power through the Scripture, it

says who has called us, I love this by his own glory and his

own goodness. You sing about that a little bit

ago. Like I want to come into your

goodness. I want to come into your glory

on the talk of what you're doing.

It's not our glory and our goodness, it's his, Amen,

through his power and says there's first force that through

these he has given us his very great and precious promises.

So, so when God's power, which is comes through God's word and

knowing him, and we experience God's goodness and God's grace

and God's plan, he gives us this amazing promises and great

promises you find in Scripture. I live my life by those, by the

way, Amen. They're like the voices of

people just kind of keep fading farther away as the voice of God

is lifted up. It says so through them You may

what participate in his divine nature like so so we get a part

of our lives. This resurrected Mike's over

here laughing to make me finish what I started earlier.

Mike and then sat up out a lot. I gave him the list and he's

like he was dying and it's great whatever, but we get to

participate in his divine nature.

That means when we came to Christ as a part of us that was

resurrected because the power of Jesus and we could participate

in the resurrection power of Christ, our soul spirit is

already resurrected just like Christ.

There's a part of us that looks just like heaven.

This is the grace of God, Amen. And having escaped the

corruption. So by being resurrected, we've

escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.

Does that sound like a war to you?

Sounds just like a war. And Peter is so excited to tell

those people you no longer have to live by the things of man, by

the evil that's done because we know Jesus, because of his power

through knowledge of Christ, through the Scripture.

He boldly proclaimed through Scripture.

That's what his whole life was built on and ultimately appeared

into this. That's through the Scripture

that you are saved. You're saved because you know

who God is because of Scripture. It's not because you grew up in

a Christian home or you are a good person.

It's because you know who Jesus is, because we have the Bible,

Amen. And Peter knew, if there's one

thing I'm going to die for, I'm going to die making sure that

you know the Scripture, Amen. And there's people in this world

that are being arrested and killed because they preach the

Bible every single day and not just because they're on the

pulpit, OK? They're living it out every

single day. You think about this knowledge

of Jesus that were saved and resurrected like Christ.

Here's the thing you get about the Bible.

And and this would be people disagree, hopefully not in this

room, but maybe. But the Bible is absolute truth,

like every part of the Bible. And what what Peter is actually

saying, this is your first and final authority.

That's what he says, is it? He says everything to the

knowledge of Christ. You have everything to live a

godly life. So what that means is our life

is best put under Scripture. Amen.

Now the world's going to tell you a lot different, like, oh,

there's no absolute truth, which which is an absolute truth, by

the way, just throw it out there.

I guess you're wondering, but the Scripture is everything we

need. And imagine if God gave us a

playbook that told everything about the enemy schemes.

Like what? What?

What if we had like a way to break the code and understand

the strategy and know the plan and the ways that our enemy

thought? It's pretty crazy to think about

it, isn't it? You go back to World War 2, it's

pretty amazing. You guys ever heard a, a band

named Alan Turney? You know that is he, he, he, he,

he was the one that decoded the enigma.

You guys remember the Enigma, OK and all that they changed every

day and it was this dial had different dials on it and nobody

could figure it out. And he made the first computer

that was like a manual computer, but it he got electronic all

these solenoids. And every day they figured out

they'd say how Hitler at the end.

And so he put new the last letters of every message and he

used it to decode every day. And so the last part of the war,

they knew every single message from the Germans, but nobody

knew that we knew what they were saying till decades later was

classified. But what's really cool that most

people understand is that when they broke the enemy's code,

they believe it saved. At minimum, this is a low number

saved two years of World War 2 fighting, which would actually

be interpreted into if you took like actual people, they believe

it saved 14,000,000 lives by decoding the enemy's code.

And I started thinking about that, and I started thinking,

man, how many lives have we saved if people can start coding

the enemy's real code? Like how many people know Jesus

if they get to see the way that God made it, if they just

understood, like there's a scheme that you're playing into

and we're too busy fighting other people to recognize that

we're all enemy. You cannot be seen.

And he has a scheme and a plan to distract you from the love of

God, that that God has a plan for you, that he's pursued us

from day one. Our sin.

God has chased us down this stuff that people say, well, God

doesn't exist and he spun atop and walked away and God doesn't

love us. That is so far from Scripture it

is unreal because God is pursuing us.

When I share the Gospel, the first thing I want to start with

is the the first thing that man opens eyes to was the face of

God because God has always chosen to love us.

It's a great place to start. By the way, if you like one of

those Romans 323 guys, I love you.

Just go back one step. Amen.

If you don't know I'm talking about, it's OK, He'll get there.

But how do you read the Bible? So let's just walk through some

like real practical pieces. The the first thing you want to

look for when you open the Bible and by the way, the Bible, the

Bible means what you guys remember.

The Bible means books. That's right.

It doesn't mean just a book. It means books, a library, a

collection. And so when you open the Bible,

what you want to do is you want to figure out the writer of the

book you're reading because there's 66 books.

You want to figure out the author's intention.

Somebody say all thorough intent.

It's kind of weird. Like you don't usually have to

think about that because you're so used to.

You'll read whatever you're writing, reading.

It'll make perfect sense. Like, I went back to like 1997,

maybe 98. I'm not quite sure the whole

love story here. But if I were to pick up a note

from Barry to Christie, Come on, somebody, where's Barry at?

By the way, I believe you skipped that step, Right, Barry?

Oh, man, I'm sure he's been all sappy and lovey and gooey.

I mean, we we all know Barry didn't write anything.

I know you're right, Barry. I was going to ask Christy,

like, what? What do you do to woo you?

What did you do? Barry?

There's so much I want to say, but I won't just to protect him.

But. But if you read the note, if you

had a note and you read it, you'd be like, Oh yeah, this is

a love note, you know, And that that would be the context, like

the intention of this and that he's wooing her heart as hard as

that, as I believe. But then you you know that,

right? And if you pick up the Bible and

you read it like, what is this is, is this like a history book?

Is this trying to describe the facts that happened?

Is this stuff that's written for like a command from God?

Is this poetry? And there's like imagery?

Like what's the imagery? What's happening?

Like, is it, is this a letter of somebody?

Like what's The Who, who wrote the letter?

What's the point of the letter? Like, who's the letter written

to? Like, was he trying to correct?

Nobody writes something for no reason.

Like what? What's the, the big theme like

what's he trying to accomplish and what direction is it going?

Prophecy, What's what's the warning?

There's always a warning in prophecy, by the way.

And it was very, it was never like you guys doing great.

Keep up the good work. I don't think God sent many

prophets as clear that message to anybody.

It was like, get back on track. You're going to be have some

judgment, right? And it's just you.

What's the intention? What's the author intent?

And I was going to say the Bible does not mean whatever you want

it to mean. I see this so often, like people

take scripture and they just take a verse and whatever they

come up with and it has to fit their preference, which is a lot

of Christians do this by the way, they put personal

preferences into Scripture, which is very interesting.

And then they die on the hill, a personal preference.

I'm like that that that's crazy, right.

And you got the world. They'll put their own

preferences and like deny that Scripture isn't real.

And so it's always coming with their own way of reading it.

And I've seen Bibles that take masculine of the Bible.

I've seen Bible. It's just weird.

There's certain things where people are like, Oh, God's not a

man. He's he's this, I'm like, where,

where, where did you? Where are you getting that from?

There was a man that came for to our church for a short time and

at one point it wasn't at the time it was it was like trying

to justify polygamy from Scripture.

I was like, that's interesting. I've never seen somebody with so

much balls to go there to scripture and Lily say that's OK

to have multiple spouses from Scripture.

Is that crazy? It's crazy to me.

I was like, are you reading the same Bible I'm reading?

And I look at this, I think, is this prescriptive or descriptive

when you read this? I mean, just because people did

in the Bible doesn't mean we should do it.

People ate an apple and disobeyed God or a fruit and

walk. It doesn't mean you should do

it. Just because it's written there

that it wasn't prescriptive for us.

It wasn't a command from God just because people were like,

yes, they were selfish and did what they wanted to do, but I

don't know. That's just that was just me.

And yes, I said balls from the stage.

You can quote it. So it's a salty church.

It's a salty guy. I mean, you're trying to justify

sin from the Bible. It's just like, man, Oh, that's

great, man. And you see this on so many

levels, man sexuality or any other pieces like it's OK to be

drunk or all these, I don't live my party life.

You see all the time. It's like, are you going to

scripture, putting yourself under authority of scripture or

you going to scripture because you want to make it say what you

want to make it say? And it's like you just can't

twist it. And like, I just think you just

got to put that to a stop, man. And why, why didn't do that

anyway? I, I was, if I can go to

scripture and make it say whatever I want to say, I'm

going to resign as a pastor. I'm going to go to my lake house

and I'm never coming back. And what's the point?

I mean, if, if, if, if the authority, if, if the God I

serve is so manipulated by my way of thinking that he's no God

at all, just going to say it. And so if you can just make it

what you want to say, like, I don't know if you really love

God as much. You just love yourself because

there's no honor in that. Anyway, that was a, the proof of

thought. Put that out there so we don't

bring meaning into Scripture. We discover meaning from

Scripture. We go to Scripture and we say,

what is the authority? God, What are you saying through

this writer to these people? And we pull out the meaning from

the texts. Acts 1711.

There's a church that was really good doing this.

It says now the Berean Jews were of more noble character than

those in Thessalonica. Man be bummed to be in

Thesalonica right there. Right.

Like all alternatives. Yeah, they were more spiritual.

Yeah, they had better character. And why?

Why? It says for they received the

message, some of the Scripture and of Jesus with great

eagerness. They were excited for the things

of God and they what, examine the Scriptures, how often?

Help me out every day, every Sunday, every life group, every

Bible study, every day, they examine the Scripture.

That's good. By the way, Amen.

This is a noble character to see it not not just because it was

like, man, I'm just curious to see the Bible says they're

actually questioning if what Paul is saying is actually true.

Isn't that amazing to think like who would question Paul?

The Berean church, Amen. And if you're like, go to church

like, well, Pastor Sean said, so I hope you know better than

that, Amen. I hope, I hope you don't quote

me when you're sharing the gospel with somebody.

You know, My pastor told me the Bible says Amen.

And the best way to know truth in any regard of truth, I don't

care if it's science, it's reason, it's history, whatever

is the best way to know truth is to filter it through Scripture.

You take what you hear through any area and you put it through

Scripture. If you know the truth about

marriage, take it through Scripture and you know the truth

of all the things that culture is doing, just go back to

scripture and that fact. The best way to know Scripture

is actually to filter through more Scripture.

Amen. You can't take one idea from one

area that's not even a command of God and then say it applies

to everything in the world. If you the Bible is, by the way,

does not contradict itself, it completes itself.

Amen. If you think it's a

contradiction, you have to do some more studying or change

your heart because you can find what you're looking for, I

guess. But with the best filter of

scripture is scripture itself. The the Bible, The God of the

Bible is consistent and pure and never changing.

And the Bible is written by God. He is the author of the Bible.

And it's not even a dead book, it's the living book, Amen.

And so you can go to it and it will show you the things in your

life that it be shifted. It's not going to give you 2

different answers for the same thing.

So you can test your preachers, Amen.

You can test your leaders. You can test what everybody's

saying in the world. Is this really what the Bible

says? Now?

It's kind of crazy because there's a lot of loving, well

meaning people that will give you half or three quarter of the

truth. They don't want to offend you

and so they tell you the easy answer or half the answer.

It looks like a lot of great ways, like a person struggling

financially and a good hearted Christian will say that's OK,

you don't need to give to God right now.

Save your money and take care of yourself and then give back to

God when you can. That makes no sense to me as a

Christian. Like, I don't say you have to

give it to church, but returning to God was given to you is

actually command of God. It's in the heart of God.

So I, I know you feel for this, this widowed young lady or

whatever the situation is, but that's not scripture, Amen.

That's just like your way of like placating the scripture.

And there's a lot of people that will down the hill, personal

preference, which may be like 90% truth or 50% truth, or they

down the hill, they'll, they'll, they'll use the name of, of

personal preference or they'll use the name of tolerance.

In the name of tolerance, I'll preach the message that's pal of

people's ear that people will come and hear this message.

There's a lot of churches like that.

And I don't, I don't, I just don't understand it.

I, I really don't like, I, I, I don't serve like a made-up God,

like I sort of living act of God that's in Scripture.

And so the under the call of any person is to tickle people's

ear. Yes, I do think you should be

cognizant and you should care, and you have something hard to

say. You should say it with grace and

mercy and love, truth and love, Amen.

But I don't think you you forego truth because you really love

people more than Jesus, because you don't love them more than

Jesus, Amen. But the ultimate we preach the

name of Jesus. And by the way, the name of

Jesus does offend. It is offensive.

The first time I had a chance to preach the gospel to A to a

crowd of people, it was just soccer ministry that put

together when I was in college and had a kids camp and you

know, all those things. There's a group of parents,

there's probably 40-50 people. And I remember preparing for

this and I was like, I don't know who's going to be there,

but it's kind of weird. It's a bunch of people in the

community. I was like, man, I don't want to

share the gospel. I don't want offend anybody.

Is that the dumbest thing ever? But like my insecurity, my name

of tolerance was like so great. I don't want to offend anybody.

And this man told me he's like a fourth generation church

planner. He said, Sean, look me in the

eyes, the gospel is going to offend.

Get over it. I was like, oh, OK, guess I'm

preaching the gospel, you know, but but it's like, where is your

faith hung on? You know, like we can't let our

insecurity and our personal preferences and our our worries,

like supersede the name of Jesus.

And I think a lot of people do it in this culture because it's

it's if you notice, politics become more spiritual.

I think the church become less spiritual.

And so politics is coming into the church.

And so I think it's time the church just has to do.

We always done just stand up and just speak and share the truth

in love. Amen, I'm watching social media.

I know truth and hate Anyway, so how do the Bible?

I think you guys start out and you got to ask yourself what's

the authors intention? And I think dive deep into the

context that your second thing, look at the context and so

context, everything. Context is what's around the

text. Like who wrote it?

That's like if you didn't know that was Berry right in that

note, that'd be a little kind of weird, right?

If you read the scripture, it's like, is this Paul?

Like what's what's Paul's story is, is is this Joshua?

What's Joshua's story? Moses, you just got to who

wrote, what's the context, this big context?

Who wrote this? Who are they writing to?

Why is this happening? Like what's this past about?

I'll give you an illustration of this.

How many guys memorize the verse lately?

Show of hands by lately. OK, yeah.

Good, awesome. A lot of you guys, right.

If you memorize the verse, I will encourage you to always

memorize the context of the verse.

Can I encourage you that it would be like owning a shovel

and don't know what a shovel's for?

If you memorize a verse without context, you like, I have this

awesome shovel. I don't know what it does

because I don't know what it's made to do.

And I would encourage you when you memorize a scripture, know

the context of Scripture. I'll give you an illustration.

There's this awesome thing out front.

You guys see the kids store out there by the way, you guys see

the you know what that is? These are our biggest rewards.

You know, we're incentivizing, just encouraging all these kids

like, hey, memorize the scripture, like show up with

your Bible, Amen. Bring a friend, like be nice in

the groups and they give them kids cash and they can buy stuff

from the store. Amen, Hallelujah, praise God.

And one of the ways that they can get some kids cash is by

memorizing a scripture. And so this last week's

scripture, I believe it was elementary was Ruth and they

know this one. They may teach those kids yet.

All right, just me. All right, some of you guys.

Good job, Diane Ruth 116 And so I see the verse.

I'm like, all right, kids, let's go for it.

You know, and it says where where you go, I'll go.

And they they skipped the part which I was like, put it in

there where you stand, I'll stand your people will be my

people. Was they stay man, I messed it

up already. Will you stay on stay your

people become my people and your God, my God.

And so I taught this to my older two kids and I was like, OK,

let's we've kept working it and they were just all the place and

I kept working it. I was like, OK, I'm like, what

does this even mean? So I'm like as a passion, I'm

like, I better make sure. So I have to read chapter 1,

right? I'm like, who is saying this?

I know there's like other characters besides Ruth.

Well, it turns out who wrote this?

Ruth wrote this. I was like, OK, she's talking.

OK, what's going on? If you know the story?

So who's who's Ruth talking to you?

She's talking to owe me. OK, who's Naomi?

I know me. She came from some Bethlehem and

it was a famine. So she went to the Moabites and

she married this Moabite man and she had kids.

She had two sons, and each of those sons got married.

And then for whatever crazy reason, her husband passed away

and her twin sons passed away. And she's left with Ruth, her

daughter-in-law. And then she has another

daughter-in-law. And she's telling them right

before that she says, hey, Ruth and other daughter Law can't

remember her name. She says, you guys just stay

here, go back to your family with the Moabites.

Just go be a mom's house and just stay and this is like

Ruth's declaration that I'm not going to stay here with these

other gods. I'm actually going to go with

you. So over you go, I go and

wherever you stay, I'll stay and your people, my people and your

God because my God Amen. Now you got to know all that for

that, that verse that makes sense, Amen.

We do this all the time in different ways.

How do you know like Philippians 413.

How many all know that, right? I could do all things through

Christ, who and a lot of guys, it's like I can accomplish great

things for a Lord. And you see this all the time.

Like you get the tattoo, which is cool, right?

We love the tattoo. It's amazing.

Hope you put it in context, otherwise you're going to be

real bummed out today when you find out what this really means.

Anybody have a tattoo of this, by the way?

They're so ashamed they won't raise their hand right now and

you get the tattoo right? And you're like, this is what it

means. What does it really mean?

You gotta look at the context. I mean, it's a great verse out

of context, you know, I mean, because it stands alone.

So you can just kind of use it, But it's it's not talking about

accomplishment. It's not talking about like, I

can accomplish great things. Go forth college student and do

great things, go win the game. Like that's not what it's

saying. It's not the the absolute

meaning. Like that's not what he's trying

to accomplish. So let's just read the context.

Philippians 410, look at that. So I rejoice greatly in the Lord

that you at last renewed your concern for me.

Who's who, who who's you talking to?

I resource greatly, Lord, that that you, who's you Church of

Philippi. Thank you that you renewed.

I want to make sure you're right.

You're concerned for me. But what are you saying?

OK. They they, they have been giving

gifts to him. They're they're a church plant.

They don't have a lot and they haven't been doing anything in

the moment, but something happened and they gave a gift to

Paul and he's writing us back to him.

I'm so glad at last you were new to concern me.

Indeed, you were concerned. I'm not saying you weren't

concerned, but you had no opportunity to show it.

You'd have the money, the resources, the people to show

your concern. How will we praise God?

I've been in that spot a lot. Amen.

Like I want to help a missionary out and I'm like, brother, like

I'll pray for you, which is still great, but I don't have a

lot to give you. You guys follow me.

Like you want to help, but you can't because you're not on the

spot to help him. And verse 11 says I'm not saying

this because I'm in need where I have learned to be what help me

out content, whatever the circumstance.

I'm not. I'm not saying thank you because

I was broken. I couldn't do my own without

God. I'm just telling you I've been

content to whatever the circumstances, you can go on to

talk. I know what is to be in need.

I know what it is to to lack. I know what it is to have

plenty. I've learned the secret of being

what content in any and every situation.

So there's a secret whether he's well fed or he's starving to

death. He says when I'm fed or hungry,

we're living in plenty or want, whether I'm on a castle, when

I'm in a mansion or I'm in a pit and I'm being beaten and I'm

just left for dead, which these things happen to Paul because I

learned the secret. Come on.

So what's the secret? I can do all things through

Christ who strengthens me. So this isn't about achievement.

It, it, it, it's actually about resilience.

It's it's about being content. It it, it it's being OK to

suffer. So when you say I do all things

in Christ to me, that means you're OK, whatever the

circumstances are that this is God's will for your life right

there. That's what that means, Amen.

But if you take the verse, you're like, I'll just, you can

do all things like if that's what it's saying.

How many guys knew that this was a missionary passage?

By the way, how many guys knew that this there's a missionary

passage that was written to a church that then gave to Paul

and Paul's like, man, thank you for the gift.

But I want you to know with or without it, that was content

because God had me right where I should be.

That's pretty good, Amen, and we can learn a lot from that verse

that I can endure all things is a better maybe the best

translation. I can do all things through

Christ. And so if you don't know the

context and there's a lot to say about context, but if you know

the context, I would encourage you first of all, to get a style

of study Bible, Amen. Like, yes, how many guys have a

study Bible show of hands. All right, read the study Bible

at the beginning of every book and study Bible is going to be a

synopsis of the book. I know you're going to talk

about the author and then history and when it was written

and who was written to and the the theological themes and all

these little pieces. You have to read that, Amen.

Like, don't you? You'll be of course, you're

confused. You pick the Bible up and you

don't know who it's written to and why it's written.

You'd be like, huh, you have to study, Amen.

Study. All right, sorry, I'll stop but

and study by was also notes at the bottom of the different

pieces and I usually highlight things that be about different

pins on or things are really important.

I would encourage you to do that.

Amen. You can study the words there's

in in America. There's an endless amount of

study tools. There.

There is there you go. There is more journaling.

Oh, he's tried them out there you go.

There's a lot of them, right? And in in America, there's more

content created for Christian writing than any other society

in the history of the world. And it doesn't look like it

affected our culture very much. Isn't it interesting because you

actually have to do something with it.

Amen. And so don't let the Bible sit

on the shelf. Just read it.

I would encourage you, if you don't know where to start, you

don't study Bible. You can Google some things.

It's dangerous a little bit. I'll say that you can use

ChatGPT. You can just get who wrote this.

You can find something out. But again, you have to weigh

things and get a scripture, Amen.

Like just don't take its word for it.

I don't care who it is. You have to study and learn.

And if you want to learn, it's amazing.

You can often find you will find the answers.

Amen. There's a good website

calledgotquestions.org. If you're just looking for like

just like where to go and you ask any question, it would kind

of pop out like an amazing answer.

I will say ChatGPT still seems to be like, you know,

evangelical like it's still like we believe the Bible, which is

probably will change at some point in the future.

But at the moment you got some answers there.

You can ask, you can phone a friend.

Come on somebody. Hey, Rick Lilly, what's going on

with this scripture 10 hours later.

Thank you, Rick. Come on, somebody, right.

But you got to have friends like that, Amen.

You don't. You got to follow a rabbi.

You know what I'm saying? Rabbi Rick, Come on, somebody

you know. Oh, I just love it.

But there's godly men and women in the church you could ask and

they would love to give an answer.

Amen. Like, you know, ignorance is

sometimes a choice. And so we can ask, right?

Ultimately, this is what it looks like.

So there's a man I met with last week, which kind of like

recovery group, like a men's Bible study Monday night over

elite Total fitness plug. Bucky.

Bucky, there you go. Bucky's right here in the back.

Give it up for a buck. He don't know it.

You know the why you're clapping.

We give it Bucky and Bucky man, he's fired for Jesus.

Amen. And he's telling them about

Christ and it we just the whole conversation is amazing and just

all built on scripture, which I applaud and I thank you because

so many people just Foo Foo stuff and it's like built on

human wisdom and human ideals. That's not built on God.

And that's what lasts when we get done.

There's a man who's really curious and he has some

questions and there's about marriage and all that stuff.

And you can tell he's like discontent.

And Bucky just says, hey, dude, I got a verse for you.

He pulls up Second Corinthians 4, I believe, and he talks about

this present temporary affliction, momentary

affliction. And he quotes the verse like

opens it up and says, hey, guy, I got this verse.

I was going to say, Bucky memorized that verse.

You internalize the verse. You knew the context of the

verse. And when he needed to use the

verse, he brought it up because he had it in his heart already.

Amen. That's going to encourage you.

You cannot share something or apply something if you don't

know what it means. You have to know the context.

You have to know why it's written and who it's written to.

And then you can take a word. The Bible says in Proverbs that

a word fitly spoken is like an apple gold and frame silver,

that you can take a moment, you can bring it right to Jesus

because you have a word from the word.

You actually have a word from God because you actually walk

with God. I keep saying if you want to be

spiritual, you actually have to be spiritual, but that means the

point of the Bible, by the way, is not to check off the point.

You read the Bible. The point of the Bible, you

don't get extra credit because you read left to right and you

didn't apply anything or obey. It actually may be worse for

you, but you have to read the Bible.

You read it to be transformed, Amen.

And we let God transform you and not just transform you because

you're trying to be obedient, earn God's love.

You just be transformed because you in the presence of God and

when you read the Bible, it's like you're reaching your hand

out to God and saying, Dad, just show me the way.

It's like, it's like breaking original curse by original

purpose. You're open the Bible and you're

walking with God. And so I encourage you just if

you don't know what it means, like slow down, ask questions

like fight for it. Like I have to do as a pastor, I

have to wrestle things. The the ladies actually asked me

this question, like, what's the interesting of soul and the

spirit? Hebrews 412.

I'm like, that's complicated. Like let me give you that

dichotomy trichotomy man's speech with the context of

Hebrews 412 and keep on a text message for you guys.

You know what I'm saying? Like, thank you for asking, you

know, and she's in the front row right here.

And she replied back, that's really good stuff.

Thank you. I was like, that took me an

hour. You know, there's so many lines

and now it's quotable. You can just like share it.

Like Pastor said, Pastor Sean said, like, well, there's a lot

there, right, But I would tell you about the Bible.

Confusion is not failure. When you read the Bible and

you're confused, that's not failure.

That's an opportunity to go deeper.

And that's that's how I know so much about Scripture.

It's not because I just downloaded it.

It's just when I have a question, I try to find an

answer like I'm confused. I'm like, I want to out educate

myself from this problem and I recognize there's some questions

I ask. They're not going to find an

answer to like why God? That's you get some things

around it, right. But when you ask questions about

Scripture, it's amazing how many often that God show you can find

it and it's searching and studying.

But the goal of reading the Bible is to find God's voice

again, to find significance from the Scripture.

What does this look like for me today, Paul, you are so grateful

that no matter how hard it got, you can do all things through

Christ. And so when life doesn't go my

way or it's uncertain on between jobs or my kids are acting like

lunatics because that just happens at times, all these

things happen. Lord, I'm just going to trust

you, Amen. Like I'm finding the significant

from that scripture and applying to myself immediately.

This one says to James about the Bible, James 123 Anyone who

listens to the word but does not do what it says, like someone

who looks at a face in the mirror, his own face in the

mirror, and after looking himself goes away and it

immediately forgets what it looks like.

I I, I, I love these type of Christians, man.

They think their poop don't stink.

You know, they're like perfect, everything's great.

I'm like, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Like you look in the mirror, you, you find the flaws.

Amen. You, you see the goodness,

right? But you also see like there's

some room to grow and you change.

But says whoever looks intently into the what help me out that

is on the screen. Yet there it is.

There it is, there it is. Who looks in to help me out.

The perfect law that gives freedom.

Who knows? That's an oxymoron.

A law that produces freedom. That's pretty good.

That's pretty good and continues in it, not forgetting what they

have heard, but doing it. They'll be blessed in what they

do. And the people want the blessed

life, but they don't want the obedient life like they want the

life that a Christian has. They want the joy and and the

contentment like that Paul had, but they don't put themselves

under the scripture. And we say is when you open the

Bible, it's like you're like, Oh, OK, I man, that's going

great. Oh, and you make a choice to

change. Amen.

And this law, it's amazing, you, you obey the law of God and you

have ultimate freedom. It's amazing.

The most freedom is actually found under the authority of

scripture. And if you're like, well, I

don't want my, I want my marriage to be successful.

I want my kids to be godly. I don't know how to apply to all

these things that you're going through.

I feel overwhelmed and defeated, like you have to put yourself

under Scripture. Amen.

And if you're not willing to chase that down, ain't nobody

going to chase it down for you. Nobody's going to be like, did

you read your Bible today and God spoke to you?

It's not very often you have the life you have to do that, Amen.

We call it a culture of self feeders.

Before I planted this church, there's a man that was training

me and he's he told me, he said babies cry when they're hungry.

Grown men get up and make a sandwich.

It's pretty good, Amen. Like I don't get anything from

the Bible just because you're probably not reading hard enough

like you. I promise you, when, when I read

scripture, I, I, I want to read scripture where I don't leave

until I hear something from God. I don't leave scripture until I,

I, I've got some, some nugget of truth that no, God is there.

And I sense that I need to be obedient to something.

Like I want to do a direction. I want some wisdom.

I want, I want something for my life when it opened the Bible.

Amen. I don't want to do this like,

well, I, I signed for a Bible from the year plan.

There's a ones going on right now.

People are loving it, which is awesome, right, But I just want

to go through the motions like, well, look how far I've made and

not be transformed. I, I would say it's quality over

quantity every single time. And at the end of the day, I

would say it this way, it's not how much you read the Bible,

it's how much let the Bible read you.

If you don't leave transformed because of Scripture, it's not

because God's not willing. Amen.

And then we just, you just live that out.

And I tell you, this sounds so basic, but this is like the

turning point for some of you guys's lives, like just to read

the Bible and let the Bible read you fighting against and

rebellion against all the Wiles of schemes, the devil, the fiery

arrows. We talk about Ephesians chapter

Ephesians 6 · chapter mention

6 about the original design that we have and that we walk wisely

in this world because we know exactly who we are, exactly

where we came from, exactly what God's called us to do, because

we can know God's will, because we actually know God himself.

Amen. So Father, come before you God.

I pray God, we just elevate the Bible in our lives today.

I pray for those that are Jesus followers today that would just

say today I need to get in my Bible.

I need to have not just a habit, but I need a deep desire to get

in the race, to get in the rebellion, to step out against

all the things that are attacking me that I've given so

much ground to and get my nose into scripture and know who you

are. How many guys would say today's

the day you just need to turn back to Scripture?

How many guys show your hands today?

That's you? Like it's been a long time since

that has been the prominent feature, the priority of your

life. I'm going to follow you, God,

not because I have to, because I'm going to know you be

equipped and all things got to serve you.

And so God, you see the hands. God, I pray for repentance on

our church. Pray repentance in their hearts

or those who may be just gone through the motions and forgot

that this is a real war, that this isn't a peacetime movement.

And so God help us to step into your presence and to feel your

love. And then we simply just dine

with you, even the presence of our enemies.

God, you set a table before us and that you were enough, just

like Paul talked about, that we can do all things because you

are with us. I'll pray for one group of

people specifically today as those you'd say today.

I needed the Bible to read me like baby day.

You recognize that there's a God who loves you.

We talked about that in Genesis. And the Bible says in John that

the Word of God himself is Jesus and that he became flesh and

dwelt among us, that we beheld the glory, the glory, the only

Godfather full of grace and truth.

And Jesus, the actual word of God is trying to come into your

life today. The Bible says if it calls on

Jesus be saved, forgiven and made new that Jesus went to the

cross and died for you and exchanged all your sins for all

his rights, his righteousness, because he loves you.

It's never stopped pursuing you in the store of redemption.

And so today if you need Jesus to come into your life and save

your sin for the very first time, that ain't be looking

around. Not going to call it.

Make it weird be a humble yourself before God today and

say yes to Jesus and have to do life in Jesus be forgiven today.

If that's you just raise your own highest place.

I need Jesus today and to walk out here with a relationship

with Christ forgiven and made new for the very first time when

we do prayer. If that's you, the prayer does

not save you, but set your heart towards him and say father God

thanks so much for loving me enough that you'd give me a word

named Jesus to die on the cross for me.

There's a sinless Son of God because you care enough about

me. Even though I was still strained

in my sin, I was yet helpless. You died for me and God, Your

eyes were on me. There's a joy be set before you

adored the cross. Thank you so much for loving me,

God. I humble myself.

God be coming alive today. These are idle words.

This isn't dead ink. So thank you Jesus for this

living word that you've given me, that you have life today.

Just like Peter talked about the knowledge of you that I've been

partaking in the aspect of the divine nature of God.

So thank you Jesus, I pray this in Jesus name.

The church said Amen. Come on, give some glory to God

today. Amen.