Ep 1245 | Uncle Si’s PG-13 Joke Finally Lands After 20 Years & Why Wisdom Must Be Earned

At EDF, we don't just encourage you to use less electricity, we actually reward you for it. That's why when you use less during peak times on weekdays, we give you free electricity on Sundays. How you use it is up to you. EDF. Change is in our power. I am unashamed. What about you? Welcome back to Unashamed. If you're watching, you see the Zach, you've got your camo on today. You've been hunting or you've been killing some of those geese in the park or? Nope. I just, it's just part of my arsenal of clothing. We call these hunter wannabes. Now look, I had no idea you were going to open the podcast that way. We haven't been communicating, but I actually played the role of Zach yesterday because it's duck season and I usually go every day of the duck season and I am not going duck hunting. That's why I've been traveling. So yesterday I went treasure hunting in South Arkansas and I didn't realize. Instead of duck hunting. I didn't realize what was going to happen. I mean, I'm out there in a field and these speckle belly geese and snow, they're all in the field. I'm in and I got the wrong weapon in my hand. They were not scared of me. I don't know if they thought I was a tree or what. In gun range. It sounds like they know the difference between a metal detector and a shotgun. There's a famous story on where I said that it's PG 13, Maddie, but for the kids, I'm not verifying that. But so Si, you know, this is not coarse joking, but it's close. So Si is in a boat with Jay Stone and other hunters. I forget who all were in the boat. And Si had to believe himself because that's what happens, especially when you're old and you're confined and you're hungry. And you're two gallons of tea a day. That's probably, I buried the lead out. Good job. And you're drinking all this tea. And so they hadn't shot a dog all morning. None. The water was way up the exact tops of problem we have than now. And so here comes like a huge bunch of gadwalls, 10 or 12. And they just come right in the decoys and it's bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb. They rip them. And the whole time Si's hollering, I got the wrong weapon in my hands, boys. I got the wrong weapon in my hands. So when you said it a minute ago, I thought about that story, but I wasn't bold enough to tell it. Thank you, Jay. Well, that's just life, you know, life happened. And it's circumstances happen. Look, we go to the bathroom. These are things that happen. I'm out in a field yesterday. Guess what? I had to go at some point. I'll leave the details out, but I was in the middle of nowhere. But what was ironic is these hunters were hunting right on the other side of the levee of where we were at. And we would see the ducks come in and they bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb. And I thought, this is so weird that I'm a duck hunter. I'm in a, obviously a duck hunting paradise because there's gunfire and there's geese that I would like to eat just right here at me, but I'm not duck hunting. So it did feel weird out. It's been crazy. This lack of water. Did you find any treasure? Oh, we found some treasure. Look, we hunted me and the Murray and Randy, which are three of the guys. You know, we did a show together about treasure hunting and they, they get in these group texts, which I normally am not a fan of, but I have a treasure hunting group text. And they were so excited. Look, this place we went, this just shows you about life. You want your life lesson of the day from a biblical standpoint. The place we were hunting used to be a town, an entire town, a bank, a hotel, roads, now nothing. There's no sign of life for as far as you can see in one direction. It's just fields, fields, fields. And it's just crazy how at one time you think, man, I got, I'm the mayor of this town. One day there's just no town. And so, yeah, we found a lot of civil war bullets. We found a hot, what we call a hotspot. We were mainly doing a reconnaissance, you know, we got accessed all these fields and we had hunted some parts of the town before, but we found a hotspot about two o'clock and all of a sudden, you know, we were dancing out in the field and somebody would have driven by a randy found a silver coin and just, he has a little dance. It's kind of a moon cross between a moonwalk and some kind of redneck folk dance. But it was just good times. I mean, the Bible is very clear about comparing the joy of that. And so we found all kinds of stuff. Murray found some kind of cannon shot from the silver ward. Looked like an egg. I don't remember the exact, because he said that's a, he has all this stuff by name. And boy, you would have thought, and I was like, what's that thing worth? Because he was going so crazy, you know, and he's like, $3 probably, you know, $3. He said, it's a find of a lifetime. Then I found a bullet and I was like, you know, what is it? And he said, I said, it's a three ringer. I didn't analyze it, you know, and he's like, we've never found a three ringer out here. That can't be a three ringer. And I was, well, I got to look and, you know, got my glasses on. I was like, well, it's got two rings. He's like, that's a rare bullet. He come running. I mean, he's 80 years old. He came running across the tops of the, of the, where they had plowed this field. Which was pretty impressive. I mean, it was almost like walking on water for an 80 year old man. He's like, that's a sharp, that's a rare bullet. We found three or four of them out here. And I said, well, if it's rare, you found three or four of them out here. And he's like, it's a find of a lifetime. I said, what, look, I said, what's this worth? He said, $4. He said, maybe seven. I didn't realize Murray had fallen on such hard times that he could see and he would never sell it, but he just, you attach value to it, you know, but it doesn't matter to him. It's like, this is, so it was, it was good times and surreal. And then so I came back home late last night. I hadn't eaten much all day. So I ate a pot of, pot of chili. My wife cooked for me. And I come to Doug commander today and it's like, I can't find a parking place. And I thought, what is going on here? Do you notice this, Matty? And so I asked somebody, I said, what, what, what is going on here with all the people? And they said, I think everybody showed up for work. That was the one. Everybody showed up for work. I don't know. Is that, is that not common or what? Yeah, I thought, you know, and then, then I've been on this poetry side of, you know, the Bible and wisdom literature. I've been studying it. And so I was like trying to think of a poem because it's like the new year and everyone is, you know, they've been filled with his renewed vision and inspiration and all the things that they couldn't get done. And now they just showed up and well, I can't even get through a hall without having five conversations and somebody said, my hat was dirty. And I was like, why would you point that out? You know, they're like, well, I know you were fixed to podcast. So you might want to, so I don't know. I'm wearing a dirty hat, I guess. We've taken, I've never noticed. So we never know. There's no judgment here. I spent time in the outdoors, you know, it might get some debris and dirt on it. I take that as a pride of life, you know, that's part of it. So we were raised by a man who never had a clean shirt. So never, never. So I said all that story to say that I'm not duck hunting right now because I have guests coming in in two days and we have a report that we have now ducks on our property, even though we have very little water. Now it's only about 20, but we have 20. And so I have your saving, you're saving those for your guests. I'm saving them for the guests. So I'm excited. Uh, I've got back to back guests coming in this weekend. So we're saving the whole. We're protecting those 20 ducks. I love it. Well, you're already getting into first job. I'm ready. Jason's trying to detour out. Apparently he wants to go to a little, little post on proverbs eight. Well, I do. And I think I set this up on the last podcast. And the reason I was late today for the podcast, we're starting much later than we should is because, uh, we had the cleaning ladies come in at our, at our place and because we've hosted parties and I missy needed some help. And look, I clean up too. There's, I pitch in. But they asked me what we were fixed to talk about today in my podcast. So that made you tell them you have no idea. Oh no, I said, well, if anybody asked me that, I would say, I don't know. We're going to find out what rabbit. Oh, Jason's going down and we're just going to follow him in. So Al, when's the first time that you got a term life insurance positive? You know, it actually was when I was in a seminary and, uh, and I didn't have any money because I was a preaching student, but a wise man explained to me the importance of life insurance when I was just a young man and had no money and thought, well, you know, I don't know how, how this is going to work. Yeah. I was in my early twenties. So it was right after we had Layla, uh, our first born daughter. And the reason why I was like, man, what happens if I die and something happens to me, who's going to take care of my family meeting their daily needs? I mean, that would be very shocking and disruptive to a family. So I was very adamant about getting term life insurance policy very early in my life. And so now I want to encourage you to do the same. There's no better time to check out fabric fabric by Gerber life. It's a term life insurance policy. You can get done today. 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Speaking of rabbit holes, they we started a Instagram page called rabbit holes, which has got Jace's rabbit holes on the channel. And and apparently the powers that be at Metta have taken the channel down. We don't know why. So not sure what happened there, but they have come in and we've been censored. We've been censored. Not sure if it was intentional or we're doing a deep dive. But if you if you used to go to the rabbit hole Instagram channel to see the little clips of of what we do here on the podcast, you're just going to have to come to the podcast now to get your rabbit hole until we figure out what happened with Instagram. I can actually answer that dilemma for you. What is it? We have not discussed this. I have a history of censorship of all social media outlets. You censor them or they censor you. They censor me. And I found two principles that led to said censorship. And I didn't try the Phil Robertson approach, which he, you know, he made a speech. He challenged some of the owners of these social media companies to for a sparring session, which I don't think they took up and took him up on. He changed the name from Zuckerberg to Zuckerberg. So so I noticed the two things that they don't like is hunting or, you know, shooting any kind of animal that you're going to eat. Even though they're what I gathered for eating the consumption of said animals, they just don't want to see the process. Yeah. And any kind of Bible discussion. That those were the two things that I was censored over, over and over again, which is the two things you talk about. So yeah, you're, you've got a dilemma. You, well, you, you know, you could talk about treasure hunting. Maybe that's your way. If you really want to get viral, you're going to have to talk about treasure hunting, but they're not going to let the other stuff out apparently. I did try to segue that angle on the show into treasures come in different forms. And some of them are the beautiful gifts that God put in our hands to be consumed. Genesis chapter nine. This is not like I came up with it. They're basically censoring the Bible. Read Genesis nine, ax 10, Leviticus 18. These, these are why that we get to partake in tasty animals. It was his idea. It's not ours. So, uh, you know, that's, that's neither here nor there. Well, I'll report back when I find out what the, um, what the issue is. I don't want to say they're censoring you yet, but it could be that you are yet. Once again, a victim of censorship will find out they shut the channel down. They also shut down another channel we had to it. And we don't know why. Yeah. So we're going to, we're looking into it. You know what I feel? Oh, it's just a terrible mistake. We're so sorry. And then, you know, then they do it again, again. I equate that censorship, uh, with the same as being persecuted and, uh, having bad things happen for doing something right. And it just kind of comes, comes with that, which is a perfect lead into where I want to go with proverbs. I just had this, you know, we're reading, we're in first young and, and I've already said this is tricky is not a good word, but it's a tricky book. And I told you what the theologian said about finding the Lord in the book of John, and then he read first John and thought, I'm not sure I'm going to make it. And I don't know if we really solved that riddle, but there are things that, that are stated here in first John that I feel like it's hard to wrap your head around. And I think part of it, I'll tell you this, I've, I've in, in just one chapter of study, I mean, I've obviously been reading it and looking at the whole book, but I've only done the deep dive in the first, you know, chapter and then the couple of verses in chapter two. And I have done more Greek word searches and studies than I've done in anything we've done so far. I think that's, that's really good. Uh, the reason I brought up the cleaning ladies is cause they asked me what, what I was going to talk about. And so I started into it. And, uh, which led to a question by one of the girls that said, why do you, what do you think the key to study of the Bible is? And I, I keep getting that question. And I said, this time, instead of just answering, I was like, well, what, what do you mean by that? What's your motive behind that question? And she's like, well, I just have a hard time putting it all together from start to finish. And she meant Genesis to revelation, which is why I'm bringing this up because here, let's just say this is the same John who wrote John. And we talked about that in the previous podcast. I mean, it's anonymous, but it just seems like it's the same guy because he started John with, in the beginning was the word, words with God, word was God. Word became flesh, verse 14. And then here it's like that, which was from the beginning in first John. But the key connection here is he's going back to the beginning and showing the word of life, as he points out in first John one here, as being revealed, appearing, showing himself. And so in my answer to the girls, I said, look, one of the keys is understanding that Jesus is weaved from Genesis to revelation. And this is the reason for me saying that, that what I just quoted in John one and first John one, he's going back to the beginning and he's talking about this word of life. And you throw in the other verses that we frequently mentioned about this is how God is speaking to humanity by becoming a human. Think Hebrews one, one through four. In the past, he spoke in various ways and through prophets, but now he speaks to us through his son. So he embodies the logos, the logic of God, which is what that word means. So the reason proverbs came up, it's because Al like you. And the other reason that I gave to the women about the key to understanding the Bible, which is one is look through in Christ. What that means, the Bible written with Jesus as the centerpiece from Genesis to revelation in how to understand God. But the other thing is this language barrier. And you take like wisdom in English, which is what would you say? That's what proverbs is about wisdom. And in Proverbs eight, there is a and we're going to read it. There's this. I don't even know how to describe it. There's this speech personification. Yeah, there's a but it's a speech. So like take Hebrews one through nine, it's a series of speeches about wisdom, but wisdom is kind of viewed as a person. Right. And, you know, I believe it's a metaphor. And I think most scholars who kind of think the way I do, it is a metaphor. Like in creation, wisdom was like this. Spoken in the first person as a creating agent, which becomes, and here's the key line that I want to put out there, a blueprint for how humans should operate. But it's not. OK, one, two, three, four. This was my mistake in Hebrews. I read Hebrews for the first 20 years of my faith thinking, OK, I need to get these things in my life, but a lot of the sayings are like riddles after the speeches in Hebrews, I mean, in Proverbs one through nine, well, then 10 through 30 are just these little sayings, riddles, just kind of facts. Like it's not necessarily saying, do this and this will happen. It's just like, this is what happens. This is the fabric of society. And it's things like integrity and justice. And there's kind of a moral component that is behind all of it. But it's also about hard work and justice and these types of things and overcoming adversity. And so I said all that to say it's it's not so much what to think, but how to think and how to view life. And you see all this as evidence that there is a God creating a universe in wisdom, creating the heaven and the earth and then having a blueprint that you actually see in the creation process that's factual, that it makes Proverbs incredible. So it's a new year and we won't be able to do things that matter and to be intentional. One of those things is to invest time to shape the character of your kids. And that's one of the reasons why we love brave books. Jayce, you especially because your wife is an author for brave books. She's an author and she's a reader. I mean, one of the greatest memories of when we had small children and even, I guess, now with grandkids and other kids, she reads books to those kids. And I listen just like I'm one of the kids, but finding great content is a challenge and these are awesome. Missy wrote a book about unconditional love. Jayce has it there if you're watching because you're my family. Jeff and Jessica wrote Dear Valor, which is a great story about adoption and what it means to be chosen. So brave books is around to help parents raise strong families. It teaches biblical values through stories that kids love. Their books teach lessons like courage, forgiveness, fruit of the spirit. And each one even has a conversation starter and games in the back to bring the whole family together. When you subscribe, you're going to get a new book every month plus Missy's book and Jeff and Jessica's book for free. That's two free books. So let this be the year that you start fun and purposeful new family routines. Just go to bravebooks.com slash Unashamed. Use the code Unashamed to get 20% off your first order. That's bravebooks.com slash Unashamed code Unashamed for 20% off. And then you get to Proverbs 31 and there's this analogy, another speech about a wife of noble character and it eerily images, not only a wife that's just fantastic, but perhaps, you know, even the bride of Christ and all this, and it's not just morality in there. It's just the way they work and the way they think and the way they handle what life brings them. So having said all that, I went to Proverbs because to me, the difficult transition, the hard part to wrap your head around in first John one, in this first section, this first paragraph, prologue or however you want to define it is when he says, we proclaim to you in verse three, what we have seen and heard. And they were in the presence of this man called Jesus who was with God and was God in the beginning. And it's more that he just had a human life. He is the life of life becoming a human life. Which is hard to wrap your head around. They heard him, they saw him, they touched him, they looked at him, they contemplated, they, they saw this blueprint of wisdom and what he said, where he went. And they basically, Jason, misunderstood him the whole time. I mean, you know what I'm saying? They were like bewildered the whole time they were with. Exactly. And the connection to wisdom, you remember even Jesus's childhood, what are the only verses that discuss his childhood? And it brings up this idea of wisdom. Says he grew in wisdom. Well, I'm viewing wisdom based on what we're going to read in Proverbs 8 as a blueprint to creation itself. And even another way to look at it, it's kind of like the grain to use a woodworking illustration, you know, the grain of wood, because I was a woodworker with duck calls and you try to go against the grain and guess what happens? Problems. And so I think you see that in the book of Proverbs and wisdom. And then you see Jesus who shows the ultimate heart, character, wisdom of God. So think about all the verses that we can read later about in speaking of a treasure hunting illustration. What's the one that says is that Colossians in Christ are all the hidden treasures of wisdom. I'll look that up somewhere. I have it written down and I was also thinking knowledge. I was also thinking of James one and James three. You know, James brings up in the first his first chapter, this concept of godly wisdom. And then he gets to chapter three and he makes the comparison of earthly wisdom versus godly wisdom. So to your point, he made the exact same argument that Paul made in Colossians. Well, here's some verses. First Corinthians, no, first Christmas, one whole thing's about wisdom. But first Corinthians one thirty, it is because of him that you're in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God. First Corinthians one twenty four, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. Colossians two three in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. Even in Matthew 11, 19, when, which is a very good passage to read, but he concludes this when he said, remember John the Baptist, y'all view him, you know, a certain way based on the way he looks and acts. And then you accuse me, Jesus of being a glutton and a drunkard because I hang out with tax collectors and sinners. But then he makes a statement, wisdom is proved right by her actions. That verse is what where I want to go, that little statement, because after John says this in first John one through three, he then says so that you also may have fellowship with us. And then this phrase and our fellowship is with the father and with his son, Jesus Christ. So we're we're being invited into a fellowship with the eternal God and his complexity in being father, son and holy spirit. And as you said on the previous podcast, that that word, Cornelia, it's more than just, you know, we're sitting around eating cake and having coffee. This is a partnership. This is a full partnership. This is I mean, this is like a marriage. Fellowship, it's way deeper than our word for fellowship. And and wisdom is involved because it's linked to the beginning just like Jesus. And so I do think it's a metaphor, but I'll read the text. This is Proverbs eight and the key verses. I'm going to find my glasses. The key verses I want to read and maybe I'll read those first is Proverbs eight, twenty two. The Lord brought me forth as the first of his works. And there's two other alternate interpretations here or the way the Lord possessed me at the beginning of his work. Or the Lord brought me forth at the beginning of his work. So the concepts I'm trying to highlight here are wisdom is being viewed as being brought forth from the beginning. It's part of the beginning. It's part of his work. Before his deeds of old, I was formed long, long ages ago at the very beginning when the world came to be. And I want to skip down to 30 and 31. I was constantly at his side. I was filled with delight. Day after day, rejoicing always in his presence, rejoicing in the whole world and delighting in mankind or the human race. And that's why I came up and I didn't come up with this on my own just from researching and studying with this. I kept hearing this blueprint for humanity and wisdom. So if you go back to the beginning of of Proverbs. Chapter eight and verse one, it starts, does not wisdom call out, does not understanding, raise her voice at the highest point along the way where the past meet, she takes her stand beside the gate into the city at the entrance. She cries out, I raise my voice to all mankind. You see, you see where I'm going with this? And so what I concluded is, is that, yes, you know, it's a metaphor. But then when you start looking at all the different Proverbs and how it works in these speeches and these just life lessons and knowledge and how to think about life. And I think that's why the diversity is there, because you don't know what life's going to throw at you. So it kind of helps you in how to think from a place of integrity that was God designed for us to function as his image bears to. And now we're back on that. And so basically what I concluded is, you know, when this thing began, you have two aspects of work and two aspects of rest. But each has a work involved. And I mentioned that on the last podcast. When when he rested at him in the garden, it was to work and reflect in this wisdom that was the blueprint of creation itself. Now, obviously the reason I brought up all the verses about Jesus is because I believe like everything else that happened, Jesus became the fulfillment of that wisdom in a bodily form. So the reason this is controversial, because some people link this to Jesus right off the bat here in Proverbs 8 and they're like, oh, well, Jesus was created and there's different religious groups that that try to make that point here. And I think they missed the point there. I did. I have five kids and it cost a fortune to get health insurance these days for all seven of us. I know that if you have looked at the price of health insurance premiums in the last couple of months, they have skyrocketed. It's absolutely insane. So when Christian health care ministries came along, I was like, sign me up because for our family, switch it to CHM. It wasn't just about saving money, but it did come in and have to cost, which is awesome. But it also aligns with what we believe. And it feels more like a community rather than a bureaucracy. So what we do is every month we submit our medical bills if we have any and then believers from all over the country pitch in and then they also lift up your family in prayer. Yeah. And you know, Zach, our problem was not a bunch of kids like you. What was so expensive to us? We were self employed and it's so hard to get affordable insurance. And so cost sharing really helped us get through the whole cancer thing. I mean, just in and again, like you said, just having people that you know are praying for you. And it gave us an opportunity to pray for a lot of other people as well. Yeah, this is a real thing. In fact, I mean, if you think was this really something people are doing, listen to this, CHM members have already shared more than $12 billion of medical bills together. So you know, this is solid. This is a real thing and a real alternative to your traditional health insurance. And also you're going to get a lot more flexibility because I can go to any doctor I want that I trust without having to go through a middleman. Honestly, I should have done this years ago and stop feeding money into a broken system. So you too can ditch your traditional health insurance and join CHM today. All you got to do is visit chministries.org slash unashamed. That's chministries.org slash unashamed. chministries.org slash unashamed. You were joking with me before the podcast started. I was the theology police. I think you were joking. Maybe you weren't. I was joking, but not really. Go ahead. But I mean, we need the we need that police for. Yeah, we, well, that and that was a that was an ancient heresy that really emerged early in kind of the church history that certain folks thought you read it. You read a passage that Jesus is the firstborn of creation. And so that, yeah, you think male was Jesus created. And if you, and I think that it's hard to really understand those concepts about the nature of Christ, if you don't have the full picture of the, of the story, the Bible in mind, particularly the story that we are part of a new creation. And so when, when the Bible talks about Jesus being, you know, the firstborn of creation, it's that's that is not that the being of Jesus or the son, rather that the son himself was created. What, what that's indicative of is that Christ and Bill Smith are one of our former mentors who went on to be with the Lord. He's he doubted a few years back. But one thing that he would always say that I thought was so helpful when you start talking about Jesus, you got to remember Jesus is the incarnation of the Son. So there's no Jesus in the Old Testament. Now there's the Son in the Old Testament. Jesus was born in a manger. Jesus was the, the, the one who is fully man, fully God. Jesus was the incarnation of the Son. And so that's important to remember. Cause when you think about it in that way, when we talk about Jesus and the, or the Son of the Old Testament, we're talking about the second member of the Trinity, when we talk about Jesus in the New Testament, we're talking about how that second member incarnates and becomes a man. He puts on human flesh. He becomes the creation itself. And the reason why he does that is that he has to fulfill what Adam failed to do in the garden. So you mentioned that Adam was put in the garden to rest, but that word rest is, is it more indicative of to work it, to cultivate it? Yeah, it's a different kind of work in imaging. That, you know, that's why I brought this up. And look, Zach, we were, we're tracking on this because I wanted to bring up that Colossians one, because when it says he is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. And then later he also says he's the firstborn from among the dead. Well, he wasn't the first guy that came back from the dead, but he was the first born from among the dead with this new body representing that new creation that we all will experience with our new bodies. But also I think this wisdom was made known with him being the first human to get it all right. As far as the character and wisdom of God, because he says that and then eerily those two verses that I referenced before we started with this, that's in Colossians one, 15, talking about why he's supreme. But then when he gets to chapter at the end of chapter one and verse 28 of Colossians, he launches into this wisdom. He said, we proclaim, which was the mystery being revealed that Christ is in you, which is first John's going to tap into. We proclaim him. This is Colossians one, 28 and monashen and teaching every everyone with what? With all wisdom, which is that lady wisdom, that metaphor that Proverbs eight is is viewing the fabric that this in the beginning, our creation was formed in. He then brings that up. And then that leads to Colossians two with in verse three, when he says in Christ, all the are hidden, all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. I tell you this so that no one may deceive you by fine sounding arguments, which is why in first John, I pointed out that one of the reasons he said he was writing this is in chapter two and verse 26. I'm writing these things to you about those who are trying to lead you astray. And so that's why I wanted to make the connection. And I also wanted to try to destroy this idea that on one side, the bad work is when humans say, oh, I want to take possession of God's creation and do what I will, which is what happened with the fruit instead of allowing what you're supposed to be doing and work in the garden and then trusting God on the idea of good and evil or wisdom. And you trying to work for yourself to be validated and glorified, which is we all agree is wrong. And so that's why you have passages like Ephesians two that says we're saved by the grace of God. And we realize it was a gift from God. So and not by work so that no one can boast. But then it says, but we're created to do good works from when created in my and God's mind before the creation of the world. So it's like you have it. It's two different works. It's God's plan for humans, what they're supposed to model and reflect. And you have man's idea of what that's supposed to look like. That's all I'm trying to say. This fellowship with him is having him at the control center, but it's what we're called to be. It's, it's how we are to think, not necessarily like, oh, I got this little compartment. I checked all the boxes that I'm in and now I just sit around and wait and become lazy, which proverb says it's not very wise. And I love the way Jay says that you, one thing that intrigued me about when you were mentioning Proverbs eight and I took a hard look at it is that you look at the guys that wrote it. I read Psalm 19 as well in the last podcast, David's words, which were about creation and the wisdom of God, similar to what Solomon, who's his son does here in Proverbs, but one of the things I love about him, and we're heading there in the text in first John is that these were flawed men, but I love the point you're making that the wisdom of God was still there and their hearts were still there. I mean, David, of course, had terrible flaws. And I mean, his wrecked his whole family over bad decisions and making terrible mistakes. But in the end, he confessed that he was a center and he was weak and he made terrible mistakes and he still loved God. And it worked out for David, even though he had a lot of consequences. And Solomon was the same way. I mean, you read Proverbs and you think, man, what a wise guy. And you read Ecclesiastes and you're like, what happened to that guy? Well, I was going to bring that up now because that'll be another rabbit hole coming when we get to Ecclesiastes because once again, it's lost in translation. Because our word for whatever that Hebrew word is, I forgot it off the top of my head. But we translate it meaningless, you know, life, everything's meaningless. Everything. That connotates something different. And I've done a rabbit hole in what that means. And I mean, there's different words you could use. But I think from the scholars that I respect, it's more like smoke. It's a word for smoke. And you think smoke's real. You see it. Yeah. But when you try to grab it, it, you, what happened? It just, where did it go? And that's more of the idea because yes, you have Proverbs. It's like, well, that'll do it. Follow all these things and you got it. Not, not realizing it's more about how to think when these things come. But then you get to Ecclesiastes and it's like, well, what happens if you do all these things in Proverbs, the wise decisions and it still goes bad, which is a possibility? Well, then you have Ecclesiastes. I kind of lose a little bit of it because I think the Gospel centered movement that has been prominent at least in the last 25 years has pushed rightly so against legalism, which we all came out of a legalism too. So that's this like, I mean, I do think probably the church was in a historical place of maybe very legalistic understanding. So the Gospel center movement pushes back against legalism, which is to say you earn your way. And so then we moved into grace movement, which is no, it's, it God's the one that accomplishes it. It's not about works, we're saying, but by faith, you know, through grace and, and, but the problem is when we say that we sometimes, I think what's happened is we've, we've taken it and we just so you, works don't matter at all. But clearly you were put into the garden to work. So it's not really a full picture of it. And I think what happened is what we ended up making all the emphasis of our discussions in the church, and this is cross to domination. I mean, this is Southern Baptist Church of Christ. Oh, you're right. Yeah. This is the argument. It's America. The Western church is focused on only justification when it comes to when we're talking about salvation, when that's not really the full picture of, of what's going on here. So when Christ becomes the first born of creation, what, what that ultimately means, I started to say this earlier is that it is him, we would say Christ fulfilled it, fulfilled what? He fulfilled what the first priest was supposed to do. Who was the first priest? Adam. What was Adam supposed to do? Cult, be fruitful, multiply and cultivate the earth and have dominion ever. He was to take the first temple, which was the garden, and to expand the first temple across the entire cosmos. That was his job. That's what he failed in. What did Israel fail in? They failed to take the temple and to expand it. This is over and over and over again in the Old Testament scriptures. This was the point of humanity to take and to make the entire cosmos the dwelling place of God. And, and we failed at that. Adam failed, Israel failed. Jesus shows up on the scene and what Jesus actually accomplishes is he is the one that is going to do that. That is the, that is what the apostle Paul is talking about in Ephesians, when he says that Christ is the cornerstone foundation of the temple and we are, are living stones growing into the holy temple, right? That's the language that that temple is expanding across the entire globe to the point when you get to the end of the Bible, Revelation 21, and John the Revelator is looking around. He's like, I didn't see a new temple in the new city because the Lamb himself is the temple. The son, the son of God is the temple. And so, that's the picture I think we, when you get into the controversy around, was Jesus created? No, he wasn't created. Right. Or the son, the son was not created. And, but when the Bible talks about him being the first born of creation, he is the one who is inaugurating the new heavens and the new earth. He's, he's the one that's doing that. And then we're coming along under him as his vice regents to make that happen, to expand that under his role and under his reign. Right. Well said. And, and what's embarrassing and sad is that we had to waste 10 minutes talking about that because really my whole point is, since we're so focused on that, you, you, you, you characterize that accurately. We're missing all the good news of what first John is talking about and what we get to participate in and what we get to do and work in in our own life and how really smart we become. And I think the illustration that made that light switch come on to me was that Colossians two, three, because, you know, even to use that illustration about Murray, Murray loves to find, you know, bullets. That's what he, what, what he's all about. And every time I go with him, we're going to go somewhere where we might find some bullets because he's just, that's what he's into, but he's missing. You know, I like finding a big silver coin here. And I'm like, if I keep running with Murray, let him make the decision every time, well, that's all we're going to find his bullets. I'm like, okay, it's great. You know, wonderful. And I think we do the same thing if you're just focused on that justification. That's why he said in Christ are all these hidden treasures of wisdom and knowledge. And so my whole point is you say, well, why are we going through all this? Because when you read a verse like to get back to that illustration about, I found Jesus in the book of John, I read it first John, and I thought, oh, I don't know if I'm going to make it. So I'm going to, I'm going to bring up one of these passages to show you how this, you shouldn't be fearful of it. And this is first John two and verse six. It's a simple sentence. Sounds great. It says, whoever claims to live in him must walk as Jesus did. Oh, that's going to be difficult. You see my point? Just stand alone first. I mean, think if you think about the whole first on the whole book is centered on the incarnation of Christ. And I mean, it's repeatedly talked about his incarnation that Christ comes in the body. And I think where the rub gets on this whole deal, we all struggle with it. And I fall in and out of this in my walk with him. But the lie that that I've been told is that that eternal life is something that's beyond the grave. Eternal life is more that quantity of existence. I get to live forever and ever and ever. What you're talking about is, no, it's an integrated life with Christ. It's an immersion in Christ. And so when you ask questions like that, you remember the question that if you've ever been in youth ministry, they all ask it, how far is too far? Like when you're talking about like, how far can I go with my girlfriend? Or how far can I go with my boyfriend? Can I, you know, can we make out, you know, obviously, you know, certain things are sexually simple. But what about this kissing? What about holding hands? What, you know, and how far is too far? How many beers can I have before it's too many? Like, can you get a buzz? Can you get dry? Where's the line? And that's the problem. If you approach this with justification as your starting point and your ending point, then you're going to ask those kind of questions. How far is too far? Because what you're actually saying is, how much can I keep for myself? That's what you're asking. Well, now we're back into that wisdom that came from the beginning that was shown in the garden. And so I want to show another verse, which I would say is the answer to that first John 2, this is first John 3, 5. Now, we'll get into this in detail. I'm just trying to get you to get the concept. So here it says, but you know that he appeared, which is a link verse two, verse John one and verse two, that life appeared. He appeared so that he might take away our sins. Now, now look at this next little sentence and in him, which is going back to first John 2, 6, whoever claims to live in him, in him is no sin. Now, I get it. We have trouble in our lack of wisdom in understanding that concept and just saying, okay, so if you're in him, there's no sin. It's been done away with, it's gone. But we as humans, we just, we have trouble with wrapping our heads around that. And then we're disqualified from saying, well, I can't walk as Jesus did, because I got all these sins. It's like, what you're in him and there is no sin. You're like, well, I know there, I know that's what it says, but, but I have sin. Well, maybe there's something wrong with the way you're trying to wrap your head and how you're thinking about this. It's gone. He took it away. He remembers it no more. So you see where I'm getting at this on how you think, rather than what to think, how you think is important. And you say, well, I'm just never going to be able to do that. Well, then he gets to, and this will be the last one on this little rabbit hole, first John 3, 24, those who obey his commands. Now, now listen to this, live in him. We're back to this, which what I told those cleaning ladies this morning is the whole key to understanding the Bible from cover to cover, cover to cover in Christ. What does that mean? How you think about that? And this is how we know that he lives in us. We know it by the spirit he gave us. Well, now we have the other part of the Godhead that up until this point, we haven't even mentioned the Holy Spirit dwelling in us to give us the power to know how to think about these difficult things. But the bottom line is, once you kind of start meditating on this, it's amazing how you're so thrilled about what God has done where you literally get up every day, not just Sunday, and start trying to be Jesus in this world, just because that's just what it says. This is who I am. And the wisdom that comes along with that will help you to do it. And God is empowering you through his spirit, who is now in you. I think it's a good rabbit hole to wrap your head around. And we'll even get there in that paracletus, Jase, you remember from when we did John 14, 15, 16, the advocate, the helper, Jesus telling us the disciples about the Holy Spirit is the same word that John used in 1 John 2, talking about Jesus being our defense attorney. Which is the same word that he used for the Holy Spirit that we have, which is heart once again, is going to require some wisdom. Because think wisdom is not just understanding its skill, its talent, it's all these things that are blueprint for success that God designed the whole earth and for humans to aspire and that you can't run from. Because look, even people who don't believe there is a God, if you read these Proverbs, and I had a bunch of them I wanted to read, but we ran out of time, they'll agree with it. It's not like, because it's not like do this, it's just like if you do this, this is going to happen. And if you don't do this, this is not going to happen. I mean, it's just facts of life that we take for granted that are woven into societies and on earth in human relationships. And I do like that, that concept that it's always been there. And that's the beauty of it. And it's always been there for people to either believe in or not believe in. And so that's the choice. And that's the razor wire here that John is walking on. You make the choice to believe or not. So we'll continue to pursue next time on Unashamed. Thanks for listening to the Unashamed podcast. Help us out by leaving a rating and review on Apple Podcast. And don't miss an episode by subscribing on YouTube and be sure to click the little bell and choose all notifications to watch every episode.