Little G Gods (transcript)

com. Good morning, everybody. Grab a seat. Grab a seat, and we’ll get on into it. Happy Sunday, everybody.

Thanks for being here. Glad you guys are all here. Amazing to see all of your guys’ faces and from a little bit of a different perspective, because I’m usually scooped up in the background of tech. For those of you who don’t know me, I am Connor. I run the young adults program here at Tribe, and I also wear a lot of other hats on staff here at Tribe, doing tech, helping with music stuff, and wherever Brian and Lissa point me, I like to go.

And my beautiful wife, Ella. Yep. If you are new or you’ve got a prayer request, we had connect cards on those seats. You can go ahead and fill those out. We would love to join you in prayer, or have a record of your visit if it’s your first time.

And, we wanna remind I wanna remind you guys, as with Brian, the same rules apply that this is an open conversation. So I want to hear your guys’ comments, questions, connections, and we’ve got a mic floating around the room. That is for our live stream fam. I know my mom is probably on there. Hi, mom.

Watching. Yeah. And we’d just love to get feedback from you guys. The past couple weeks we’ve been talking about, Brian and Lissa’s trip to Mount Sinai, the argued real, Mount Sinai in Arabia. We did.

It is controversial. It’s heavily debated, but it’s been cool to look over the past couple weeks at some of the evidence, for why this might be the mountain. So we’re gonna touch on that a little bit today. Last week we got to talk about, annihilating the Amalekites, beating these things in our life, that are just thorns in our side that are continuing to bug us, and we’re gonna kinda continue with that theme of talking about Sinai and making it some practical takeaways as well. So if you’re taking notes today, you write down at the top of your page, the title of today’s message, get the picture?

Question mark? Question mark? And we’re gonna start off today, if you’ve got your bibles with you, flip into Exodus 32 and we’re gonna read the whole thing. So we’re gonna popcorn around. I kept trying to cut it up however I wanted to and was like, nah, it’s just it’s so good we’re gonna do the whole thing.

So once you’re there, you can go ahead and raise your hand up, Kat will give you a mic, and we can get started with reading that. Yes. Gathered around Aaron and said, come make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don’t know what he what has happened to him. Aaron answered them, take off the gold earrings that your wives, your sons, and your daughters are wearing and bring them to me.

So all the people took off their earrings and brought them to Aaron. He took what they handed him and made it into an idol cast in the shape of a calf, fashioning it with a tool. Then they said, these are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt. Aaron saw how excited the people were, so he built an altar in front of the calf. Then he announced tomorrow will be a festival to the Lord.

The people got up early the next morning to sacrifice burnt offerings and peace offerings. After this, they celebrated with feasting and drinking and they indulged in pagan revelry. The Lord told Moses quick go down the mountain. Your people whom you brought from the land of Egypt have corrupted themselves. How quickly they have turned away from the way I commanded them to live.

They have melted down gold and made a calf and they have bowed down and sacrificed to it. They are saying these are your gods oh Israel who brought you out of the land of Egypt. Then the lord said I have seen how stubborn and rebellious these people are. Now leave me alone so my fierce anger can blaze against them, and I will destroy them. Then I will make you Moses into a great nation.

But Moses sought the favor of the Lord his God and said, oh Lord, why does your anger burn against your people whom you have brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand? Why should the Egyptians say for evil he had led them out to kill them in the mountains and to destroy them from the face of the earth? Turn from your burning anger and relent of this evil against your people. Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, to whom you swore by yourself and told them, I will multiply your descendants like the stars of heaven. And all this land that I have spoken about, I will give to your descendants, and they will inherit it forever.

Then the Lord relented over the evil that he had said he would do to his people. Then Moses turned and went down the mountain. He held in his hands the two stone tablets inscribed with the terms of the covenant. They were inscribed on both sides, front and back. These tablets were God’s handiwork.

The words on them were written by God himself. Also quick side note, they think that it was written on marble. Like when it says stone, I think we always picture like gray stone, but marble is really easy to etch into. So just kind of a cool Fine. And there’s marble quarries on the top of all those mountains.

So when I picture that now, I picture the tablets being white as opposed to being gray. Yeah. When Joshua heard the boisterous noise of the people shouting below them, he exclaimed to Moses, it sounds like war in the camp. But Moses replied, no. It’s not a shout of victory.

You can just hear the disappointment in his face. Nor the wailing of defeat. I hear the sound of celebration. When they came near the camp, Moses saw the calf and the dancing and he burned with anger. He threw the stone tablets to the ground, smashing them at the foot of the mountain.

He took the calf they had made and burned it. They believed that it was made of wood and then covered with gold, which is why it could burn. Then he ground it into powder, threw it into the water, and forced the people to drink it. He said to Aaron, what did these people do to you that you led them into such a great sin? Do not be angry, my lord, Aaron answered.

You know how prone these people are to evil. They said to me, make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don’t know what has happened to him. So I was told so I told them, whoever has any gold jewelry, take it off. And they gave me the gold and I threw it into the fire and it came out this calf.

A miracle. Moses saw that the people were running wild and that Aaron had let them get out of control and so became a laughing stock to their enemies. So he stood at the entrance to the camp and said, whoever is for the Lord come to me. And all the Levites rallied to him. Then he said to them, this is what the Lord, the God of Israel says, each man strap a sword to his side, go back and forth through the camp from one end to the other and killing each killing his brother and friend and neighbor.

Wow. Mhmm. The Levites did as Moses commanded in that day about 3,000 of the people died. Then Moses said, you have been set apart to the Lord today, for you were against your own sons and brothers, and he has blessed you this day. We can actually cut it there.

Yeah. Let’s do it. What sticks out to you from the text? There’s a lot here. A lot of different imagery, a lot of different things happening.

What sticks out to you? Well, something in my translation in that last verse in 29, it says, Moses said, you have been consecrated today for the lord, which I think is like, that’s a binding word. You have been consecrated. Like, once you’ve been consecrated or something’s been consecrated, it’s been changed. It’s been allocated.

It’s been locked in, I guess, as something. Mhmm. K? And God’s saying you have been consecrated, meaning people of Israel. You’re you’re now mine.

Mhmm. That’s good. Adam’s got something. This is more of a question. When it says in Exodus thirty two four, then Aaron took the gold, melted it down, and molded it into the shape of a calf.

And then it says, oh Israel, these are the gods who brought you out of the land of Egypt. When they refer to gods versus god, I guess, what are they? I’m gonna I’m gonna hold you on that one. Okay. Because you got he got a sneak peek at my notes, everybody.

So we’re we’re we’re we’re getting that one. That’s a good one. That will be answered. Yeah. That’s a great question.

And we get to look at the Hebrew for that, which is awesome. Whenever I read this story, I always find it interesting. Like, God’s first reaction is, like, so much anger, and he’s, like, I’m a go wipe out all these people. And then Moses has to, like, intercede for God for the people of Israel. And I just always find it I just always find it, like, so interesting, just that whole passage of, like, God’s first reaction, but then, like, the power of prayer and the power of, like, Moses to be able to say, hey, man.

Like, these are your people. And I just think this is just such a powerful, story of how prayer and intercession, like, actually can change God’s mind. Great time. I still love that also Moses still flips his lid. Like when he gets to see it, it’s still they end up killing a bunch of people.

Like, he’s still like Moses, like, all right, God, you might have had something going there. Like, Mhmm. Yeah. Exactly. That was my best handwriting.

Yep. Gotta do it again. Something that stands out to me is, like, leveling up in obedience. And I’ve seen this in my own life too, but it’s just like, God starts a little bit light, like, with light obedience. Like, I’m speaking to you in a quiet place.

Are you gonna do it or not? That’s real easy low hanging fruit. He’s like, all you gotta do is just wait. That’s it. Don’t build any idols.

Just wait. And they didn’t. And then they the next level was strap on a sword and kill your friends. It’s like, you should have obeyed the first time. You know what I mean?

By that, like, the obedience gets harder and harder. So that shows me, like, just do it right away. Just obey right away. That’s good. Sweet.

We’re gonna jump into the some of the fun evidence stuff, around the physical location of Mount Sinai in Arabia. You can go ahead and throw up that first photo. I find this stuff super fascinating when we get to get, like, real world examples of, the stuff that we’ve read for a really long time. These are petroglyphs pretty close to the Basin Mountain. The thing with petroglyphs is they’re all pretty primitive because it’s really hard to, like, chisel and carve out rock to make that, make this happen.

They basically carve into the black piece, like, this is all black desert varnish, and then they carve these pieces in. Some say that this is just imagery of, like, farmers doing stuff, but I want to show you a couple close ups, that I think relate a lot to this story and could be a depiction of what’s going on here. You can go to the next one. So, this is, an actual picture taken from, Pharaoh Seti’s tomb. This is Egyptian religious iconography, and then this is just a sketch of it to just see it more clearly.

And a couple things I want you to look at here is we’ve got one guy underneath, who looks like he’s kinda like shoulder pressing the cow, and then another one in the back holding the tail. And if you go to the next one, we could see some of the same imagery all over that wall. These are just close ups of those same things. So it’s super interesting that thinking it’s just like farmers in Arabia versus like here is a people group of Israel who just spent four hundred years in slavery in Egypt who have now come to this place and are kind of like turning back to their old ways when they’re doing all of this stuff. Mhmm.

And go to the next one, we get to see some imagery that they’re thinking, that a lot of scholars believe is, people dancing, because if they’re not dancing we see the hands down or to the side a lot, and then you see some of these exact same images pierced through with what looks like swords, right? And to depict the 3,000 dead. Yep, exactly. Yep. Some of that well, and that’s that’s interesting too.

There’s certain, go back to the big one. There’s certain things here that may be a little crude to point out, but if you can see some of them, like, have these appendages sticking out from the middle of them too. Like, to your translation had a great thing of it, of, like, they drank, they ate, and they raise up to engage in pagan revelry, like some sort of orgy or something like that going on that, like, it they took extra effort to carve those things out in particular. So super interesting, and I think it’s really compelling evidence, to what we’ve still been looking at, the past couple weeks that this may be the actual mountain, which is super cool. Yeah, gets me super fired up.

Let’s take it back to the text. Before we go further, I feel like every time I’ve heard the golden calf talked about, it ends up being a, just a modern application of, the idols in our lives. And that makes a great sermon. Just to be like, what are the things that you put above God and that we’re not supposed to do that? And it’s amazing.

And I think if that’s resonating with any of you, that’s something you can pray on and mess with, but I feel like we’ve talked about that enough here in this space when especially when, like, the snow is coming and these kind of things. Like, it’s pretty easy. Yeah. The ski swap. Yeah.

And so that that be a calling to pull away the idols that we build up in our own lives, things like our work, our appearance, money. Again, like I said skiing, adventuring in the mountains, and if that’s a challenge for you, like, pray on that. But we’re going to go a little bit deeper today, because we’ve got a good crop of mature people on the roof. Heck, yeah. We’re going to look, back at Exodus four and five or, Exodus sorry, Exodus 32 verses four and five.

And when we look back at this to Adam’s question, we see Aaron say, these are your gods, oh Israel, who led you out of Egypt. And I think it’s really interesting as we start to dive into the Hebrew, I love getting into, like, the original text, the original translations. The word for that little g God that they use here is Elohim, which if you look through the whole Old Testament, it’s pretty much just a catch all word for God in general. It’s the same word that if you look at, like, a number counter of how many times that word is used in a certain context, there’s over 2,000 times that’s used for capital g god, and then there’s a small handful of times where it’s used for little g gods, because we know that it is just a catchall term. Scholars have just used context clues essentially to determine whether it’s a little g or capital g, and it’s pretty unanimous across the board that, which ones are little g and which ones are big g.

What I want to look at then is in verse five, we see that Aaron specifically calls out and in the Hebrew Yahweh, this will be a festival to the Lord. And I think it’s super interesting because we get this if it was all catch all, like all Elohim, it’d be like kind of nonspecific. It’d be pretty easy to point to just idols. But what I want us to look at is the fact that Aaron still said this is a festival for the Lord. And so that there may be a chance that what I want us to think about is that it’s not just that they made an idol to worship other gods.

They could have named it they knew tons of other gods from Egypt. Egypt had a whole pantheon, and they didn’t name any of those. Instead, Aaron says we’re gonna make a festival to Yahweh, to the one true God. And so it’s not just that they made an idol to worship other gods, but that they worshiped an incorrect image of the true God. That even to look at it and call it God was to miss the mark.

And it’s they’re they’re kind of mixing these things together. They’re mixing the the religion of what’s up? What’s up? Go for it. You know, in reading this, comparing them to us, they didn’t know God.

They just knew what he had done for them. We have Jesus. We know what he has done for us. So they didn’t have a relationship with God to they’re worshiping things. You know, I mean, I can’t imagine praying to something sitting on my dresser at home, you know?

When I can get on my knees and have that relationship with Jesus. So these people only could see what he had brought them from, but didn’t have that personal relationship with him. And were so easily influenced to do whatever, let’s do this or that. So if you’re grounded, for us, if we’re grounded in knowing what God did for us, we don’t have to look for idols, because we know who he is. That’s good.

And just a distinction in in that verse. It says, when the people saw it, they explained, oh, Israel, these are the gods. So the people are saying this. Mhmm. And then Aaron says, alright.

Then we’ll build an altar, and we’ll make it a feast to the actual lord. Mhmm. So the people are saying, let’s let’s do all this for a false god. They’re gods. And Aaron’s kinda trying to, you know, play the big guy and go, alright.

Let’s just bring it back around. Maybe we can make this about the Lord. Mhmm. Yeah. And I think too, we always have to think about us as Israel in these stories because they’re given to us because it’s human nature.

And so when I think about that, I think about how many times we go and do something and then say, like, oh, lord, will you come and bless this thing I’m doing? Like, that’s exactly what they’re doing. Like, we got bored. We need we need something tangible to put our affections towards. And then, oh, yeah.

Let’s add God’s name to it. Mhmm. It’s, like, just what we do all the time. And I mean, we get to point fingers at them and be, like, oh, well, they forgot. How easy is it to just, like, just wait?

But, like, how often do we forget? Right? Like, it feels like us as believers have, like, amnesia sometimes. I think that’s the best way to put it where it’s not like we just forget, like, who we are, who God called us to be, the things he’s asked us to do, and that we can still forget that. It’s easy especially looking at the Israelites because we get to see their cycle of obedience and happy with God and then totally falling away, like, over and over.

That it gets pretty easy to point fingers at them. How long was Moses up on the mountain? Yeah. Yeah. And how long was Moses up on the mountain?

He was up on there for a long time. Yeah. Clay, you had something. See, I I’m thinking a comparison with God praying and asking the disciples to pray and them falling short, same way with Moses going up on the mountain and the people not being able to wait for his return, kind of Going somewhere? Yeah.

Yeah. That’s good. It’s a great connection. I love it. Adam’s got something in the back?

This might be a silly question, but is it possible that there was more than one golden calf built? Or just one, you think? We don’t really see that in the text, like, portrayed. Phil’s got something with that. Because in because in Kings, like, there was the two, first Kings Mhmm.

The two that were built. Yeah. I don’t know. When I see gods, it makes me question that. Yeah.

Exactly. It’s a lot of earrings. Yeah. And we did and, like, there’s a there’s an argument that it could have been, because, like, there’s, like, they had a ton of gold on them. They just basically pillaged Egypt.

Like, they were told to, like, not actively pillage Egypt. Egypt gave them everything when they left. They were just, like, take all of our good stuff. Take all the gold and jewelry and go. So It’s muted.

No? There you go. Not on. There we go. Okay.

I was remembering what happened with, the 10 plagues with Israel, and how, like, God is literally, like, spitting in the face of each of these Egyptian gods, and how, like, he basically causes all the cattle to die. And there were, like, multiple gods in Egypt, like like, Hisat or Hathor and all these different cattle gods, which were in charge of livestock and everything and their health. And so God is like, alright. Your God is dead. That’s not a thing where I’m more powerful than that cattle God.

And so I’m thinking of that as well as also, like, the possible reality that, like, they’re literally riding cattle out of Egypt. So it’s like these are literally the gods that brought you out of the land of Egypt. That kind of deal. But, yeah, how quickly they forget that, like, it wasn’t those things that brought them out of Egypt. It was our Lord Elohim, the God.

I also had another thought there. Oh, yeah. Like, so often we’re we’re wanting to pull in other things on top of our salvation. Like, Jesus plus Come on. My works, plus whatever my own ambition, plus everything, is what’s gonna make me right and what’s gonna worship the Lord.

And he’s like, no. It’s just Jesus. Like, he is the one and only thing that lifts you up out of slavery, out of darkness, out of sin, and not the Lord plus everything else. Let’s go. Sweet.

The challenge I want to give us today, coming out of that idea that, like, there’s that we see that mixture of little g Elohim gods and Yahweh the Lord is that having a mixed image of who God is is still idolatry. And that all of us can be guilty of this, that this is not just a thing that they did, but this is a problem that we see in the church at large. One of my favorite Timothy Keller quotes, is if your God never disagrees with you, you might just be worshiping an idealized version of yourself. Let that sink in. I’ll say it again for the people in the back, yep.

If your God never disagrees with you, you might just be worshiping an idealized version of yourself. Timothy Keller talks about it a ton. He talks about all of that kind of stuff. And I feel like it’s especially important for us as Brian has talked about so much, that as the days get more complicated, that it’s especially important for us to have the right image of God and a complete image of God in our hearts. A couple examples that might dangle your toes over the fire for a minute of things that came up as far as, like, wrong pictures of God is, like, a picture of God that lets you engage in sin, that lets you sleep with your boyfriend or girlfriend, that lets you get drunk every once in a while.

How about a picture of God that, lets you judge others with this religious pride or show partiality. God speaks directly against those things. What about a picture of God that is all love? That it’s just like, we’ll just love everybody. It’s all good.

Like, or a picture of God that says there are multiple ways to heaven. How about a picture of God that neglects his promises to Israel? It’s a big thing we talk about in here a lot. Ladies and gentlemen, please silence your cell phone. You’re good.

You’re good. You’re good. You’re totally fine. Happens all the time. But especially especially as the days get more complicated, like, that last one hit me hard of just like there are a lot of us that, like, we’ve talked about a lot in here that, like, supporting Israel, siding with God’s chosen people is not just like carte blanche condoning everything that they do, but that we need to be understanding that that is a huge picture of who God is and the character of God.

And we see that through the whole Old Testament, and we see, we actually have a couple copies of the book, Joel Richardson’s new book, The Gospel of the Skull Crusher. I’m about halfway through it, and it does a beautiful job of weaving together the Old Testament and God’s heart for Israel pointing to Jesus and why it matters. So great read if you want. And the reason I feel like it’s important is to that note, seeing all this beautiful this beautiful golden thread that goes through the whole old testament prophesying and waiting eagerly for this Messiah to come. We see in the New Testament Israel had the wrong picture of God.

They they were too focused on the warrior king peace that will come later and not enough focused on the defeater of sin. And if they can mess it up and get it wrong when they knew this text so well, then, like, it’d be naive to think we couldn’t get it wrong either. And so it’s important to make sure we have the right picture of God. Does that make sense? Are you guys tracking with that?

Thank you. Come on. So then the question becomes, how do we make sure our picture of God is correct? I got three points. We’ll kind of dig into each, individually.

The first is digging into what the word actually says. It means reading things in context, like, not just pulling verses out that we like to hang our hats on, but reading things in full context. I love pulling different translations. It’s really fun. Like, the Bible app is great for that because you can just click and hit compare and just show you a whole list, which is awesome.

My personal favorite is getting into the Hebrew and the Greek. It’s an awesome resource, if you haven’t heard of it, called Blue Letter Bible. And it basically can do a side by side of here’s the, like, English translation that we have, and then here’s and it’s all in, like, broken grammar because their grammar is different than ours. Like, here’s the one to one translations, and then you get to click on certain words and get digging into that’s where those, like, number lists come from of, like, thousands of uses of that word Elohim for big g God. And then look in big picture and small picture.

We don’t want to get too focused on, like, oh, well, I read just Exodus thirty seventeen, which is four five words. The Lord said to Moses and, like, parse the heck out of that. It’s, like, it’s amazing to do that, to dig in deep, like, especially in the New Testament. There’s so much that we can get from that, but also looking at it big picture. I had a mentor that challenged us to read, any of the any of Paul’s letters in one sitting because that’s how it would have been done, is they would have gotten a letter from Paul and they’re like, guys guys the new letter from Paul just dropped, like we gotta we gotta get this we gotta read this, and one person would stand in the church and read it to everybody there.

They didn’t have multiple copies they could pass around, and so it’s cool to do both big picture and small picture. And my last favorite resource is commentaries. If you just Google whatever verse you’re reading and commentary, like, there’s a few that pop up. My favorite, is called enduring word by a guy named David Guzik. The reason he’s my favorite is he pulls in a lot of people that have talked a lot about certain passages, and he also does a really great job at saying, well, some people believe this, and some people believe this, and here’s why, Versus just being like, this is the right way, which is really cool.

Do you guys have anything as far as that’s coming up when we’re talking about digging into the word and what it actually says? Don’t just dig into it. Agree with it. Like, even when you find things that make you feel like, sit there and wrestle with that. Yeah.

And agree with God in the end of it. Big time. And I think I think part of that agreeing with God, for me, becomes, like, it gets easy for a lot for a lot of us to just kinda, like, gloss over stuff, but, like, to really be like, what are the implications of that verse? And let it kinda maybe piss you off a little bit. There’s a reason we’re not God.

Right? And so you’re totally right, where it’s just like, okay. I I submit myself to this that this is truth. This is what God says, and my flesh is, like, heck no. Like, that is so hard to butt heads with and rock with that.

I love it. I would say leave room for the holy spirit to speak to you through the word. Yes. What? Leave room for the holy spirit.

Oh, yes. I think a lot of times we wanna just gain knowledge and more knowledge, and we want to know everything about the bible. And then we we start going straight to the commentaries. We start going straight to other people’s opinions about that verse, and then we form our own view about the verse based off of everybody else’s view. Instead of let the holy spirit speak to you through that verse.

Leave room for that before you start. Commentaries are a great resource. Looking in different translations are a great resource. But also leave room for the holy spirit to talk to you personally about that verse. Come on.

That you’re not gonna get from the commentaries. Big time. Because he may be telling you to do something specifically through that verse, but you just missed it because you’re looking for the knowledge about the verse instead of listening to God through the verse. Let’s go. And that goes it’s a great segue.

I usually don’t like segues. I fell off one once. To our second one. Thank you. Thank you.

I I had to make a couple bad jokes for Brian’s sake, because he’s not here. He is on the live stream now. Is surrounding ourselves with godly counsel to that same point of listening to the holy spirit and how it speaks through the word, is also hearing how the holy spirit has spoken about those passages with the people around you. Is maybe you were, like, felt a certain way about a verse, and you were, like, oh, that feels great, and totally chill. And then the next time you’re in a Bible study, like, multiple people bring up, like, a deeper meaning or something that it’s actually saying.

And you’re, like, oh, okay. Like, that challenges what I thought about it. The challenge being, like, to not read God’s word in a vacuum. Right? Like, it’s this beautiful thing that we get to do one on one with God and hear from him as well, but because it’s also text, we get to explore it with each other.

And that’s, like, through bible studies, even just through, like, getting to chat with people about stuff. Like, I love I I look forward to winter so much because I get to we get to go ski touring with a bunch of our young adult crew, and I get to just have conversations about these things all day long. And then we get to ski a little bit too. And then I’d encourage you too to be vulnerable and open about the things that you believe and why. Like, what do you actually think about this passage and why?

Because I think that can be a hindrance, is, like, oh, well, these all of these people are saying this one thing about what this passage says, and I don’t know if I’m in the same alignment with that, and so I’m just gonna sit back. And so I’d encourage you to be vulnerable and open with those things, especially in safe environments, like Bible studies, like places like this. Yeah, shoot. Yes, take it, take it. And he’s saying that about being vulnerable.

So many of us don’t speak up or ask questions because we always think we’re wrong or we don’t have enough knowledge of the bible. None of us are ever gonna be where we think we know it all. Okay? So I just encourage people not to be afraid to ask a question, because there’s really no bad question or wrong answer. That’s why you’re with a group, a safe place, that you can talk about it, just like here.

So don’t be afraid to speak up and ask a question because it’s not a bad question. Big time. Yeah. That’s so good. I heard this the other day, and I I just wanna make sure that everybody understands.

AI can make things appear correct when they’ve they’ve basically just changed very small words in the definition of things. So make sure that you kind of compare this with with other believers and with with other with the word. Yeah. And I mean going going above AI, like, a good charismatic teacher can also do that. Yes.

Right? Like, a good charismatic teacher can, like, pull one verse and have the, like, alliteration and four great points that, like and, like, it’s good. It’s, like, great for your life, but, like, do we get to test those things and challenge those things? Does it line up? Yeah, exactly.

And that’s why I like that challenge, the first thing of, like, look at big picture and look at small. Like, we get to look at whole passages, whole sections, whole books to get context and then go to the small things as well. The last one we’ll hit on is intentionally pursuing different perspectives or intentionally pursuing things that challenge you. So whether that’s engaging with people who maybe, like, aren’t in the same dom denomination as you, especially, like, there’s bible studies all around the valley. You could jump in on just about anyone that you wanted to and get some good wrestle out of it.

Whether that’s, like, you’ve got enough relational equity to, like, kinda butt heads personally or it’s just gonna be wrestling in your own heart. Definitely listen to the spirit on that one. You don’t wanna be going to every other bible study and trying to rip people apart. And then research, like, what and why people believe certain things. One of the most amazing things you can do to love somebody that you disagree with is understand why they agree or, like, why they think that way.

And it’s also one of the best ways that you can argue what the truth is. Is because if you have no idea what their context is, what their argument is, and why they believe those things, then you’re kinda just gonna be stuck. You’re not actually gonna be able to meet them where they’re at. And so that’s something that we can do to equip us that way. And then to Tyler’s point is, like, seeking out passages that kinda, like, rub you the wrong way.

We’ve talked about a lot. I feel like we do a series every year on turn your cat around. We’re like, you’re petting the cat the wrong way. Like, God always moves his hand the same way, And sometimes we have to turn the cat around. That there are verses that if you dig in, it it might, like, challenge you and let it challenge you.

Like, to to Tyler’s point is don’t just read it and be, like, yeah. Okay. Cool. Great. Awesome.

Like, dig in with the implications of what that means and how that sits in your flesh, and then submit that to God. I’ll be super honest. Like, the passages of, like, we get to just go freely into heaven and the, like, implications of that of, like, somebody on their deathbed who lived a whole life away from Jesus, who’s like, I accept the Lord ninety eight years in, whatever, gets to go to heaven. Like, my flesh, as a person who likes working really hard for things, has a really hard time sitting with that. And so I I seek those passages out and submit my flesh to them, because I know, like, that’s how God works.

Like, his his word says that’s how he works. So I get to trust that even if my flesh sometimes has a hard time sitting with it. Exactly. Yep. Yeah.

And I love the story of the prodigal son because we get two perspectives. Right? We get the one who goes away, squanders everything, comes back, and there’s a big celebration. But we also get the older son and the father is just like, you had me the whole time. You had relationship with me, deep relationship with me.

Isn’t that enough? Like, isn’t that better than just one big party, right? And we get that as believers who get to stay in it and so that’s a that’s a peaceful part for me. What else is coming up anything coming up for you guys with that? Tyler go.

No. You need it. Oh, I do need it. Yes. I don’t like mics.

It’s just speaking to what you’re saying at the end there of wrestling with the 98 year old. I mean, but that just shows God’s forgiveness Mhmm. And God’s love in that Yeah. Of, like I was actually reading through something about that the other day. It was about, no amount of work you do.

It’s like it’s like we get this picture in our head of oh I need to have a bible study every day and pray every day. God’s gonna love me better and see me better. But that’s not how it works. It’s you’re forgiven and the blood of Christ is washed over you. So God sees you as like he sees his son, and he loves you like he loves his son.

Do you get what I’m kind of saying here? Yeah. Gotcha. Big time. And there’s a reason that, like Yeah.

He’s God and I am not. Right? And we are not. Because, like, there’s certain ways that we would wanna do it that he is he has a better system to it. And the other yeah.

Go. Exactly. Yes. Lissa said she also likes it when her son calls her every day. Yeah.

I know. I’m just I’m adding on to what you were saying. But, like, but it it draws us close to the father Big time. When we do those things, not because it’s based on our salvation. Yeah.

Exactly. And as we’ve talked about the past I think it was last month or the month before, we were talking about reward in heaven too. Right? Like, salvation is secured, but, like, that the person who, like, believes right at the end doesn’t have the chance to, like, build up the good works, the works of the spirit that, like, are talked about when we’ve when Brian talked about full reward in heaven. And so we get that too as an added piece, but that still it’s like, God just washes it clean.

Just awesome. What else? Sweet. We’re gonna take a little time to pray. And as we do this, I want you to ask God where you might have the wrong picture of him in your life, of Jesus, of God, and what that means.

Like, how that’s actually showing up in your life. Again, whether it’s the living in sin or if it’s the judging others because you’re better than them. Like, to Tyler’s point, like, we don’t get to say that we’re better than them because we’re saved through grace and grace alone. And we also, like, are called to not, like, judge those that are non believers. Right?

Like, that there is a different standard for those who have received Jesus and those who haven’t. And maybe it’s the wrestling with the Israel peace and God’s heart for them. Whatever that might be, I want you to ask God to reveal it and then submit it to him. So bow your heads with me. We’re just gonna sit in stillness for a moment, do some work with him in your heart right now, and then I’ll pray over us as a group.

Father God, may we may we look to you with the right complete total image of you, God. Bring up in our hearts these areas where maybe it is just an idealized version of ourselves. And whether that’s the whole picture, God, or even just little bits, we wanna have a a total complete picture of you so that we can worship you for who you are, god, so that we can pursue you, and so that we can look to your coming, god, and be so ready for the day that you get to come back. And that we may not miss it, God, that we may not miss it as things get more complicated in this world as the day draws near. God, forgive us for the areas where we’ve chosen that version of ourselves over you, God.

Forgive us of that idolatry, and show us, God. Show us your truth. God, through your word, through your spirit, through the people around us, God, teach us your way. Teach us your way. Help us.

Help us. For that. And now I am chosen. Free and forgiven. I have a future.

And And it’s worth the living. Sing this together. I wasn’t made. I just love the character and the nature of the Lord. And just like that song says, we were made for more.

Why would we keep doing this if we’re made for more? But I love the continual invitation of Jesus to partner with him and what he’s doing. He’s the creator of the universe. He can do anything he wants anytime, but he invites us to have a part and to play a part in life. Right?

And so why would we do those things? Well, the answers are flesh. Right? But he’s just a continual invitation from the Lord. Yes.

I’m creator. Yes. I can do anything anytime, but I want you to be involved. I didn’t make robots. I made humans with free will, and I want you I want you to want to do the dishes.

You know that term? He wants us to want him and spend time with him. And one of the ways we do that, and every week when we come to Tribe, every church does this local church. This is our local church, but everyone does it. Where you bring a portion of your hard earned finances, That’s a way that we just partner with the Lord.

Will the gospel not be spread if we don’t give our dollars? He can do anything he wants. But it is our heart posture, and it’s a way that we say, God, we just love you and trust you in all things, and this is easy for me or I think, more often than not, at least for me, it feels hard. It feels hard to give sometimes for me. I don’t speak for myself.

But in the flesh, but man, you know that God is going to put his super on our natural act. And so every week when we’re here at tribe, when we get together, we bring a portion of our finances, we call it the tithe. And then above and beyond that or something extra, we call the offering. And we just say, God, this is an act of obedience to you, and I love and I trust you, and it’s all yours anyway. So it keeps our heart calibrated with his.

So let’s pray, and then people put up that slide, Hux. Ways that before we pray, ways we give here at Tribe, if you have a smartphone, there’s gonna be directions on the screen. You can always give on our website, or there’s physical boxes if you have cash or check. One right here when you leave, and then a black lock box right outside the front door. But if you send just like you’re texting a friend, a new number to (833) 369-7847, the word give, the dollar sign, and then the amount.

Anytime. So let’s pray together as a family. Yes. I don’t think it’s it is in there. If you when you text this oh, that’s a great question.

Thank you, Colin. It will go up to the church center app, like it says click on this, and that’ll that’s a church center app, and then you can decide where your money goes. Yeah. If you click on the tab of what you’re giving, it’ll say, tithe, building fund, when’s your evidence? Tribes next to them.

And then it’s labeled as tribes next to them. Yeah. Thank you for clarifying. Alright. Heavenly father, we just love you so very much.

Whether our feelings say that or not, we know it’s true, and we say that our feelings have a a back seat. They’re not first. We put you first, God, you and you alone. And we know our feelings follow, but we just say, Lord, you are worthy of all praise. There are so many ways to love you and to worship you.

And one of those ways that we bring our tithe and our offering offering as a sacrifice to you saying, God, we love and trust you. This is yours. And so, father, I pray for every giver today, whether we’re giving now or another time with our paycheck rhythm, whatever it is, Lord. Thank you that you see our heart. And if there’s anything that needs to be recalibrated in that area, Lord, I pray just Holy Spirit, just speak to each one of us the way that we need, either a little bit of correction or an attaboy, whatever it is, father.

We just trust you in how you move in that way. And, Lord, I just pray for all the time, the money that is brought into this local church called Tribe, Lord, that it will be stewarded well. And, Holy Spirit, you guide where the money goes. And we just know, Father, that we have the privilege of being your hands and feet of a local church and even I mean, just all the time as a believer, we have the privilege of being your hands and your feet and your mouthpiece to draw people to you. And in the natural funds that help that happen.

But thank you that you just calibrate our hearts to yours, father. Let us always be seeking how we can be a light for you. We love you so much. We trust that this money will go to do exactly what you want it to. We pray these things in Jesus’ name.

Amen. The only announcement today, if you will just take a look at our refrigerator on the way out, we need some kids’ art. A sheet on there. There’s, some fresh sign up pages, and we’re gonna be doing some, this sheet is on there, but just to give you a snapshot, serving a meal of the Good Samaritan Mission, that is always a hit, and it’s always it’s pretty fun actually, and we get to love on the people of our community. There’s gonna be, serving for the worship and ministry night at the mission too.

Yep. Yeah. Same night. Yeah. Same night.

So if you don’t wanna make food If you don’t wanna make food, just wanna worship And you wanna worship and pray for people Listen. There are endless opportunities. Cleaning bathrooms, organizing clothes Yes, please. See Clay. See Clay after service.

Yeah. What Clay just said for yourself for yourself. Was there’s a men’s all community bible study that he’s a part of. And if you would like to get plugged in to a men’s study, you talk to Clay. Ladies, if you wanna go to that men’s study, you just talk to Clay right after.

And Nancy and I are talking and Nancy and I are going to be leading a ladies bible study and we’ll have details for you for that. Awesome. That’s a great question. We love you, Clay. We just want him to be all inclusive.

I’m trying to be good. And then just a snapshot because we know now that Halloween is done, the holidays are coming on a freight train. And so, Thanksgiving is coming up, but Christmas, of course. And so we’ll have Christmas on Town Square, like tribes tradition, and it’ll be an hour earlier this year. It’ll be be at five.

So just mark your calendars for Christmas Eve on Town Square, and then, of course, that Angel Tree that we do every year, they’ll they’ll have more details to come, and it’s on the fridge. If you wanna sign up for Tuesday night meals or bringing Sunday goodies, that’s all on the fridge too, so stop by the fridge. But Christmas is, like, seven weeks away. That’s why I put that on there. It’s because people are like, oh, man.

Like, I would have planned to come to Christmas Eve, but I whatever. So now I’m giving you seven weeks morning. 5PM, and it’s only thirty minutes usually, our Christmas Eve service. So bring all your friends. It’s super fun.

That’s great. Why don’t you guys stand? I’ll pray for you. We’ll get out of here. Great job, Connor.

Can we give it up for Connor bringing the word today? Thanks for being such good contributors. Bow your heads with me. Father God, thank you so much for another day, God. For, the opportunity to come worship you in so many different ways, God.

And to grow closer to you in all that we do, God. I pray that you fill us with your spirit and that the truth spoken today would not just stay here in this building, God, but that you would use it as we go out from here. God, fill us with your spirit in our workplaces, in our friend groups, in the places that we recreate so that we may change lives for your kingdom here in this town, the surrounding area, into the uttermost bounds of the earth. We thank you that you are faithful to show up when we ask. We pray this all in Jesus name.

And everybody said, amen. Thanks for being here. Happy Sunday, everybody. And since Brian’s not here, remember, you got this.