EP 24: SCC Savor, Month 6, Days 14-19

Allen, Teddy, & Chris: Well welcome back to the SCC Saver Podcast. Savor time. We are savoring God through every bite of scripture. My name is Alan. Yep. I'm Jeremy Rennie. You wish. You wish. I wish. I'm Teddy. And I'm Chris. Great. we're commenting on our Navigator's Bible reading plan, and we're jumping right back in to month six, days 14 through 19. So we're commenting on 2nd Kings 1 through 13. Psalm 119, verses 105 through 152, Luke 438 through 539, and the first two chapters of Philippians. Glad that you're back with us. And we pray that you've been savoring God since your last listen. so we're kind of jumping in. we just finished up first kings and now we're talking about second kings. And thus far in the kings, we've seen the story of two tribes, we've seen the story of Israel, we've seen the story of Judah, these two kingdoms that were split back in First Kings. And then we've seen a kingly rulership over these two nations. And then what we see is that Israel is just steeped in idolatrous worship and bail worship. And then we see the southern tribe of Judah, which was not all that much better, but a little bit better. and then what we see is God's covenants playing out, birth both curses and blessings. And one of these blessings that we actually see is with the story of Elisha, who was Elijah's successor. And what he did was he performed miracles, many miracles, a few different miracles. And what these miracles did, there's a common phrase that we read, which was that that there they may know that there is a God in Israel. And so Elisha's leadership conformed to or showed rather that. God is keeping his covenant with Israel despite their disobedience, and that's a big story of the Old Testament that we've seen. Yep. Favorite miracle? One, two, three, go. she bears. Okay. You mean Resurrection and the She Bears. Resurrection. Of the she speaking of she mine's pro she bears of Elisha's story is probably the greatest in my opinion. Well, comment a little bit about that. In my Bible, I put L O L next to the She Bears one. The she bears. I did too, or something. You know, someone Joe Blackman brought that up to me the other He's So what's up with these she bears? What what teddy, what's up with the she bears? They seem savage, which I'm sure the bears themselves were. But that it's all these like you know, young men like hurling insults at Elisha mocking, mocking him. But it's just like when you mock the prophet of God, you're mocking the word of God, you're mocking God Himself. Mm-hmm. And so the r like the wrath of God can Just comes upon them and it's just mostly hilarious that the Bible refers to them as she bears. Yeah. Also just the mock. You know. Just kind of a go up, you bald head. Looking at another bald head over here. She bears are coming from Teddy. You bald head. Okay, no, but in all seriousness, Chris, why don't you tell us a little bit about what's playing out with the kings that's informed from the law. Well so what we see is we talked about last week how in Deuteronomy seventeen the what the kings are not supposed to do, Solomon started doing, which started to kind of seal their fate. And then we see it again what's happening with the with these kings, especially King King Jehu in the Baal worship. so why don't you comment a little bit about what's what's happening here. Yeah the book of Kings is insane. just the It's so action-packed. It's very fun to read for me. but it's also just surprising the level of of violence that we see. And Jehu's, you know, bloodthirsty guy. He's just he's out for blood. but what we see Jehu do is he's he's a mixed figure because there's some good things that he does, yep, and there's some things that he does that that are still remain sinful. And so we have to pick up on the the context and what the narrator says to interpret these figures in the book of kings, how can we evaluate them? And it all comes back to Deuteronomy, which is why Deuteronomy is one of my favorite books in the Old Testament. It's one of my favorite books in the Bible. Yeah. Because it gives the context for how to interpret all of First and Second Samuel and First and Second Kings, first and second chronicles, all of that, even the prophets, it's all based on the book of Deuteronomy. So three main chapters in Deuteronomy Deuteronomy chapter 12, Deuteronomy chapter 17, Deuteronomy chapter 28. These are important chat interpretive chapters for the rest of the prophets. Specifically chapter 12 for the passages we're reading, it talks about the chosen place of worship. Yeah. So God wants to be worshiped by his people, but he also cares how his people worship him and where his people worship him. If you read chapter 12, you'll read things like this. It says But you shall seek the place that the Lord your God will choose out of all your tribes, to put his name and to make his habitation there. There you shall go, and there you shall bring your burnt offerings. And that same verse, verse five and in chapter twelve, is repeated in eleven, verse eleven, verse fourteen, verse eighteen, verse twenty-one, verse twenty-six. All of Deuteronomy twelve is about worship the Lord your God in Jerusalem. This is the place he's chosen in the temple. to make his habitation. And all through the book of Kings, we're seeing them not worship God where he's called them to worship and and and specifically setting up altars in more convenient locations, more easier to access locations for the people. That's what we c talked about last week, that the people wanted to w worship on their own terms, not on God's terms. Yeah. So we look we we collectively were talking that about this before we started Second Kings chapter ten. It talks about how Jehu he he wiped out the the prophets of the worshippers of Baal. Yep. And and he does this righteous act of trying to eliminate some of these false prophets. But then down in chapter 10, verse 28, it says, Thus Jehu wiped out Baal from Israel, but Jehu did not turn aside from the sins of the Jeroboam, the son of Nebot, which he made Israel to sin. That is, the golden calves that were in Bethel and in Dan. And the Lord said to Jehu, you know, because you have done well, and he and he gives this pr pronunciation of of the good and the bad that's happened to Jehu. And so we see that Jehu did some good. Yep. He he he took down these false prophets, but he didn't do it to its completion. Yeah, that's just it. He didn't he didn't take down the false places of worship so that all of Israel would go and worship in the temple. So so did he have like like a fifty percent obedience? What do you think, Teddy? Well, yeah, I mean. I think I think it's it was it was a striking picture for me of what it means to obey because I think it was a good picture of full obedience at first. You know, he kills all of Ahab's family, which has brought so much destruction and judgment on Israel. He kills literally all the Baal worshippers and he's and he's super systematic about it. He's like, make sure everyone's there, make sure everyone's there, make sure there are no worshippers of the Lord there, and then boom, kills them all. And so it's like I was like reading that, I'm like, yeah, like that needs to be us in our fighting our sin, in our killing our sin, in our obeying the Lord. We need to be systematic about it. Yeah. But then like Chris said, the next couple verses, but he didn't take down the golden calves. He didn't, he didn't finish the job completely. And so it's just a picture of like what of at first full obedience, but in the end not. And what we need to be focused on. Is 100% like finishing the task in our own hearts, in our own lives. That's good. Not sin management, but sin killing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well and before we move on from Second Kings, I just want to say I one of the the more devotional pieces for me too was it just struck me. chapter nine, thirty through thirty seven, Jezebel's death. yeah. It just I was it says, you know. the Jehu comes to to take her out, but then she comes out and she she's wearing her crown, she paints her eyes, you know, puts her makeup on, and then the result is she gets chucked out a window and trampled by horses. Mm-hmm. And just that one of our seminary professors in Chris and I's class early on said, you know, like doing good works or whatever you do in this life apart from God is putting makeup on a corpse. And that Jezebel, you know, she's this huge high-flying figure. She's coming to her end and she's like, I'm putting my makeup on, I'm putting my crown on. What happens? Corpse. Trampled by horses. And it's like, so is everything else in our life if if we're not like or for the Lord. That's good. It's like putting makeup on a corpse. It's terrifying. Shout out, shout out Dr. Anderson. Wow. Great. Well, That's kind of a overview. Obviously hi we can't talk about everything in Second Kings, unfortunately. We get to sit here. Keep reading Deuteronomy. Keep reading Deuteronomy. Chris wants us to read Deuteronomy. We should read the book of Deuteronomy. Which quick side note, it's actually pretty hard to understand the Bible if you don't understand the Pentateuch. Like Genesis through Deuteronomy. Yeah. Sc scripture interprets scripture, man. Yeah. Exactly. How do you interpret all these narrative passages? You use scripture. Yeah, that's right. maybe it'd be helpful for you if you guys are reading you if you have one of the Bibles where they put a lot of the cross references in the in the binding kind of in the middle or at the bottom. every once in a while just look at those and see what the cross reference is and go back and see why they're trying to why the Bible interpreters they put that there, the people the publishers of the Bible to try to help you interpret scripture interpret scripture, just like what Chris did. so try to do that every once in a while and see why they might be pointing you. Okay. back to commenting on our passages. We're gonna move now to the Psalms Psalm 119, as we've been just delighting in the word of God, letting scripture interpret scripture, our understanding of the Bible comes from the Bible. And the psalm is just like it's almost like it's just he's worshiping it. It's sweeter than the drippings of the honeycomb. One thing that stood out to me as I was reading and praying through Psalm 119 was the dichotomy of the evildoers and those who keep the law. It's like the the psalmist is constantly saying, Keep me from evil, keep me from the evildoers. Well, who are these evildoers? These evildoers are those who forsake God's laws, forsake God's commandments. and he he just is actually like entrenched with evildoers around him. He's like, Lord, direct me back to your word. And I'm like, man, I'm just thinking about my own personal life. It's like you get frustrated about sins going on in the world, what seems to be unfair, that Christians suffer, good people suffer, you know, those who love the Lord, it's like, man, God's word. It just might remind me to check my own heart. Like, man, where is there evil inside of me? Keep me, Lord, direct me back to your words. Search my heart because hey, that's what's gonna keep me from evil and that's what's gonna keep me on the blessed path. So yeah, that was just kind of what what what stood out to me in the psalm. What about you, Teddy? For me, it was verses one five through one twelve. It just kind of struck me the the personal vibes that that this section gave of just that that From the psalmist to God and how much of a personal relationship he has with God, and the the place that the word of God has in that relationship. Mm-hmm. That the word of God is a lamp to his feet. That the word of God is his life. That the word of God, the test his testimonies are our heritage forever, the joy of my heart. And in and it's just that. That our our relationship with God is in direct correlation with our knowledge and our understanding of his word. Yeah, it's great. The amazing thing about the Psalms is they're just constantly giving us language for what we need to be praying. And and so, you know, Psalm one nineteen, it's language that we long for our soul and heart to feel. but sometimes we don't feel like that. Sometimes we don't feel like the word of God is what we want more than Riches and gold more than, you know, sweet food, whatever the case may be. Yeah. How would you encourage someone then that's struggling that way? And then I was just about to read these verses. You know, it says, Psalm in verse one thirty-one, it says, I open my mouth and pant because I long for your commandments. Turn to me and be gracious to me, as is your way with those who love your name. Keep steady my steps according to your promise, and let no iniquity get dominion over me. So so even as you're you're you're on the roller coaster in Psalm one nineteen, on in in some phases you're like, Your word's the best. I love your word. And then in other moments you're like, Lord, help me treasure your word as the best. And so it it's a constant prayer and aspirational sort of desire to keep putting the word in its right, rightful place as as what we surrender our lives unto, submit unto God's word. Yeah, that's great. Well, something that's really encouraging as I was walking up the stairs. Chris and I just saw you reading word. I was just really encouraged be that how much you love the word and it just encouraged me to love the word even more. So praise God. Yeah. Yeah. Just I look up to you in that way for how much you love the word. And I think that's one of the cool parts of being a part of the local church is like you see people like when you are struggling to love the word, but then like you see Chris, Pastor Chris, talking about the word of God and delighting in the word of God and it encourages you to like just want to love the word. So just be around Christians who love the word and it rubs off. Amen. so we're gonna comment about Luke now. and as we talked about a little bit, this that we see Jesus arrive, and then his kind of ministry really starting now. And we see the temptation. We looked at the temptation, we looked at him beginning his ministry, him speaking it from Isaiah sixty one, saying, Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. So Jesus is saying, I am the Messiah. Everything that's been prophesied in the old testament, about who's this coming Messiah, it is him. He's here, he's on the scene. and and now what we get is he starts to heal. So he starts performing his miracles, and he's healing, he heals a man with an unclean demon. And then we get, and then he he healed many others, those with the fever, and then we kind of get Jesus' programmatic statement for why he's here. And here's what he says. now when the sun was setting, all those who had any who were sick with various diseases brought them to him, and he laid his hands on every one of them and were healed. And the demons also came out of many crying, You are the Son of God. Interestingly, the demons called Jesus the Son of God, but he rebuked them and would not allow them to speak because they knew that he was the Christ. And then later on he says he departed and went to a desolate place and the people sought him it to be healed again. But he's like, Hey, here's what he what I've come to do. I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns as well, for I was sent for this purpose. Why was Jesus sent? To preach the gospel, the good news of the kingdom of God. Right. Totally. Amen. Amen. Yes. Podcast over my God. No, I mean I mean it's it's that like the the healings, the demons being cast out, like those are great things. They're momentous things. They're they're almost like otherworldly superpower things, but they're not the thing. Yeah. And I heard someone describe it, you know, like for those of you Who have read Chronicles of Narnia. So in the line of the witch in the wardrobe, Aslan's coming, but before he comes, or before people see him, the snow starts melting. The spring starts coming. And then some and then people say Aslan's on the moon. It's the sign of the times. It's the sign of the times. And so Jesus starts healing, casting out demons. And it's just like this is prefiguring the kingdom that he's there to preach about. Right. Yeah, it's great. But it but it's interesting to to that point. It's just like it's like order of priority in Jesus' mind. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. The the order of priority is preaching. Right. And then below that is miracles, healing, feeding, because he understands that it's his preaching of the good news that's going to ultimately save souls. Right. And we see that same kind of thing in John six, where he's like feeding all the people, feeding the five thousand. He's like, but but Physical bread won't won't heal you. You need the bread of life. Right. Yeah. It's it's the affirmation of his kingly sh his kingship, of his of his of of his godliness, of the fact that he is coming and these things affirm and witness to that he is the Messiah. He is the son of God. Yep. Yeah. So and it and it's just like Chris, what you were saying, like the prioritization, and it's that so should it be in the church. Right. The church throughout history has been a source of of education, of health care, of doing good deeds, but none of those things should ever su usurp the preaching of the gospel. Because there's other people out there that will provide education, will do good deeds, which the church should do, but no one else out there besides the church is gonna preach the good news of the kingdom of God. Yeah, that's great. Mm-hmm. Amen. What so it it it begs the question. It's like what is the mission of the church? Right. It's like Have we drifted from the mi what is the mission? The mission is to preach the good news and make disciples of Jesus. And so what we have is Jesus saves people through his people. And this is exactly what we see next when Jesus calls the first disciples, because he's gonna save people through his people. yeah. Yeah, the par the healing of the paralytic is just an all time story. And it kind of goes with our current seek the lost. Yeah. Yeah. Because you know, you see the guys They they're lowering their buddy through the roof. And Jesus' first thing isn't you're healed physically. He cares more about a soul. He says your sins are forgiven. Yeah. Amen. Amen. And so Jesus cares about our bodies, but he's he addresses the the more important, right? The priority of our soul being right with God, our sins being forgiven. And that whole situation ends with amazement seizing them all, glorifying God. They're filled with all saying, We have seen extraordinary things today. Exactly right. And and I I that's my prayer for our church that our heart posture would be I we want to see amazing things happen. And those things are the dead being given new life. Yes, man. I want to see the miraculous works of dead men in their sins coming back to life. Yeah, in knowing Christ. And you know, that's the whole thing. It's kind of this Jesus v. Sar Pharisee thing. It's like who can for s forgive sins but God alone? Or like this man is blaspheming because he's proclaiming to be God because only God can forgive sins. That's exactly right. Only Jesus and who he is, his person, his work can forgive sins. And that's what he calls his people to. That's what he's calling. He says, Hey, you're gonna preach about me because I can raise the dead. I can forgive sins. I liked and and there there's kind of like just in our picture and understanding of salvation and how God saves like This the paralytic, he was brought to Jesus. He came to Jesus with a great need. He's like, Jesus, I believe in you. And and he was healed because of his faith. You know, and his sins were forgiven because of his faith. But then when Jesus calls his disciples, it's kind of like a little bit of a flip of the s the story because Jesus just goes up to them and he's like, Hey, Levi, follow me. And then he leaves everything and follows him. And it's just that like that that in salvation, like God saving us is a summons. Yeah. He's like, You're mine now. You follow me. Yeah. Yeah. Following after Jesus is everything. And that's why Jesus at in in thirty two actually says, I've not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. And this is just maybe a quick evangelistic note. I'm just thinking about seeking the lost and how our church is called as individuals and as a corporate body to witness to our friends and neighbors. I'm sure maybe you guys have witnessed and they've recognized I heard this argument the other day. I'm preaching the gospel, preaching the good news to someone, and they go, Well, I don't need religion to be a good person. I'm like, Yeah, that's if that's what you think the Bible's about, if that's what you think following Jesus is about, you're right. But it's not. It's about repentance, about being saved. It's about faith in God and worshiping Him, and only He can do that. Right. So Jesus comes. So just yeah, when you're evangelizing, keep the gospel front and facing. Like people are gonna hit you all those types of questions, like, look. Jesus Christ came to save. He came to call sinners, you gotta recognize that you're that. But it does cost, it costs everything to follow him. Any last comments on the the gospel of Luke? Anything? Great. Well let's move on to our last book here. And we'll bring it. speaking of gospel centrality, gospel focus, this book in Philippians is actually one of my favorite epistles, and we were arguing about this before. They're like Philippians, your favorite epistle. Chris was yelling at me. Well, whatever. You choose your own favorite book of the Bible. Philippians. Philippians is definitely not top five. Yeah, whatever. Anyway, the book of Philippians, partnership in the gospel. we actually Chopo, when he was here, it was cool. He preached from that. Philippians two, one through ten. Or is it Philippians one? I can't remember what you did. But partnership in the gospel. And so this is a very affectionate pastoral letter. Teddy, tell us a little bit about kind of The scene of this this letter, Paul's writing, kind of yeah, what's kind of his thrust in this? Yeah. Well, I guess I there's a lot to be said about the background. but but I guess most importantly, you know, Paul's writing from prison that comes through in his writing. Hopeful, hopefully you can see that. But I think just the nature of the letter is much more personal, much more fraternal. Than most of his other letters. A lot of his letters are very official, very let me load you up on theology and then teach you why that's important. But this is just like the personal, the theological, the practical are all kind of interwoven throughout the whole letter. And and it's just the and and it's just the the letter's great. Probably one of the reasons you love it so much, Alan, is because like it's it's talking about the the joy that Christian believers have together. as they follow a humble God, as they follow Christ, the greatest example of humility. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Chris, why don't you comment on that a little bit? The greatest example of humility. Paul Paul puts that forward in in Philippians two, Christ's example of humility, often been called by scholars, theolog theologians the Christ Hymn. it's kind of a poetic form in nature in the middle of this this letter about who Christ is and what he's done, especially his humiliation and his exaltation. So why don't you comment a little bit about Christ, you know, that Christ him and his humiliation humiliation, exaltation. Yeah. And I before I do, one of the things that I love about Philippians that I think that you also probably love about Philippians, we're we're now imposing we're now imposing what we think Alan likes about Philippians. So let me tell you let me tell you, we l we know that you look here's a guy. Who loves Philippians because it's all about the gospel. no, you're just you're zealous for the gospel and evangelization. And and I think that's like the opening of Philippians. He's like he's pre Paul's preaching the gospel in prison. He's like, I I don't wanna do anything else but preach the gospel. Yeah. And he's like, I don't even care even what Well, people's motivations for preaching the gospel are. As long as they're preaching Christ crucified, I'm good with that. Like I can ride with anybody in in a sense, right? He's like, I just want people to to hear the good news of Jesus Christ and Him crucified for our sins, so that people can be saved. And so, yeah, I think I think that's comes out in the beginning of the book too. Totally. but I think about Philippians two, specifically those first eleven verses, Yeah, just incredibly devotional. it's something that that a lot of Christians keep in front of them consistently as like, why do I live the way I live as a Christian? Like, why how should I live as a Christian? Yep. And it's all grounded in the in all all the ethics, all the things that we should or shouldn't do as a Christian are all grounded in, well, what did my savior do? And how did he live? And and it he left the father's side in heaven. So that he could come and take on the the humble, lowly form of of a human being and and that in a poorest state, right? And and so I think just watching Jesus's willingness, his obedience to suffer, to suffer the the lowest state of humanity, but then also to suffer punishment, becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Mm-hmm. So, you know, we talk about active and passive obedience of Christ for us. Tell us a about a little bit about what is active obedience and passive obedience. You tell us a little bit about active and passive obedience. Yeah. Active God kept all of the law. Yeah. Passive meaning he submitted to death and death on a cross, meaning to God's wrath, his satisfactory wrath on the cross, where he would suffer at the hands of God's wrath. Mm-hmm. Yeah. So yeah, I think I think it's just A passage that shows the humility of Jesus and it shows us if our savior was willing to live like this, then then we ought to be too. Yeah. Teddy, do you think? No, I just I was reading over it as you're talking and verses four and five. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also the interests of others. It's like, all right, great statement. We should definitely do that. Verse five, have this mind among yourselves. Which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count a quality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men, and being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on the cross. You know, and it goes on, and it's but it's just that that like Chris said, all th the Christian life is an imitation game. Mm-hmm. It's Walk in Christ's footsteps and when you're not, you just you look back down at Christ's footsteps and try and get back on that path. That's great. He Paul says something that's really interesting. You're like, what does this mean? he says to work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you both to will and to work for his good pleasure. Is Paul saying that we need to work out work for our salvation? Paul's here, the the the nature of God's sovereignty in all of life and in human salvation, and the simultaneous truth of our responsibility for the our actions and the things we do are both very much true realities that us in our human brains have an extremely hard time reconciling. Sure. But Just because our human brains can't do it doesn't mean it's not so. Yeah. And so the Christian life is one where you work hard, where you you work out your salvation. You you pursue the Lord. You seek to follow those footsteps, but all the while knowing that it's the Lord in you who's good is to will and to do. Yeah. I think it's kind of an interesting point. Like salvation took work. Just not your work. Right. Like it's just like we were saved not because of our work, but because of the work of Christ. Yeah. The same way, like sanctification, it takes work. And that work is only able to happen because the Spirit of God dwells within us. Amen. That's why we say We need the Holy Spirit to enable us to work. Yeah, true. So it's like it in our own willpower, if we just try to white knuckle it, if we're just trying to be like, I'm gonna be the most disciplined Bible reader of all time. Yeah. And we try to do that in our own strength, like we're gonna fail. Yeah, you're tapping out by quarter two, dude. You're not finishing the race getting afford quarter four if you're just gonna try to white knuckle grip it. So it's like we work hard in dependence upon the spirit. And we continue to ask the spirit to allow us to work hard to hit to his glory. Amen. Straight truth. Well, there's a lot of rejoicing to be had. What are we rejoicing in? I mean in the book of Philippians, just rejoicing. That's another thing. You're you're you're a man of joy. Philippians is kind of your book. Rejoice. Rejoice. Is that the Christmas song? Yeah. Yeah, there we go. Rejoice. Tad Teddy likes to sing. Yeah. Well, I am Jeremy Rennie coming to you from downtown Periwinkle. This has been another episode of SCC Saver. Savor that goodness. Good night, friends. Make sure you check us out on Apple, YouTube, Spotify. This has been another episode of SCC Saver.

Psalms 119:105–152 Deuteronomy 12 · chapter mention Deuteronomy 17 · chapter mention Deuteronomy 28 · chapter mention