Jase felt uncomfortable because he prefers being closer during Bible study, and the new setup was farther apart than he expected.
The main issue Jase faced was finding ducks, which was embarrassing for someone from a family known for duck hunting.
Phil Robertson's health showed improvement for the first time in months, which Jase attributed to prayers and new doctors.
Si criticized the dressing for being too runny, not having enough sage, and the ducks being too tough.
Jase reduced the sugar by a whole cup, making the pie less sweet and more balanced, which was praised by Phil Robertson.
The gathering had over 100 people, including family members, friends, and even some people from the Dominican Republic orphanage.
Four second cousins, including Chad's son Holt, were baptized during the gathering, which was seen as a meaningful addition to the family's spiritual journey.
The sermon focused on the importance of forgiveness within families, emphasizing that forgiveness is a test of family unity and a reflection of Christ's forgiveness.
Jase learned that sexual identity and activity should reflect God's design and the relationship with Jesus, balancing the extremes of cultural permissiveness and religious condemnation.
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What about you? Welcome back to Unashamed. We kind of have been splitting time a little more time here in the duck car room. Does this feel like...
A temporary home yet, Jase? No, because... I don't like being this far away in our Bible study. I kind of like being a little closer. I got chastised for saying it was six feet. They said that, I don't know what I'm talking about. It's more like 10 to 12 feet, so I don't know. I don't know what you're talking about here, Zach. We got into logistics. Six feet, 10 feet.
What is six feet? It's down at the distance from where you are. Yeah, I said it looks like you're six feet apart, and then some of the audience said that I was an idiot, that it's more like 10 feet. I'm like, well, they're right. Zach, you're the lightning rod. Six feet. But to be fair, six feet is like 10 feet. It's not like I'm talking about six feet versus 60 feet. We're having a first time on the podcast, so if I stand up,
I'm six foot tall. If I lay down right now, I'm halfway to out. It's about 10 to 12 feet. The audience is right again. Zach is an idiot. Hold on. Let's pause for the apology.
No, we didn't get it. No, I feel weird. I stand corrected. I stand corrected. It's 12 feet. So I feel weird here because Al for 10 years, I sat to your right. Yeah. It was my place. The only thing they left of mine was my little sign over there that says, do not say it says, do not touch anything on this table.
Three exclamation points. What was the one you had? You had something about hemorrhoids on the original show. What was that one? I don't recall. Stealing gives you hemorrhoids? You had another sign that was. No, we had a refrigerator behind me. Yeah. And Jay Stone had a note on that that said, thou shall not steal. I don't remember the hemorrhoids comment, but I'm sure.
So, yeah, it does bring back memories. I'm glad I'm not building duck calls anymore. A lot of duck calls were built here. A lot of film was done in this room for a show, for a little duck show. It was. I'm now a consultant, Al, when things go wrong in the duck call world. So that's kind of my role at Duck Commander. And, you know, they don't call very often. So I guess they got it figured out.
So, Cy's kind of taken over this room because this is where he does the Duck Call Room podcast. Yep. And so... A lot of noisemakers, bongos, gongs. They actually have the best thing that I've seen Cy come up with. I don't know if I brought this up on the podcast before. So, Cy, because of our show, the treasure hunting show, Duck Family Treasure, we're
We actually had another raging debate whether there's panthers roaming to and fro, which Si literally gets mad at because I'm not a believer. And we've had two or three sightings in the past, what, two months? Yeah. Where none of these were black panthers, but Si believes they are. But so they come out with a shirt. I think they actually did it for the Treasure Hunt show, and it says, I believe, and has a...
It was like a black cat. Yeah. And so somebody in the fan world came up with a T-shirt that has an actual Black Panther wearing a T-shirt with Psy's face on it saying, I believe. Best T-shirt idea. That's pretty good. So it's a reversal of... Yeah, it's hard for the animal kingdom to believe that a human such as Psy
Well, so I threw side of the bus yesterday because I made for Thanksgiving and we'll talk about our big Thanksgiving gathering. So we realized that by the time you hear this, Thanksgiving is probably a little bit in the rear view mirror. But for us recording, it just happened. As in two weeks ago. Lisa and I decided since dad was down this year that we were going to make his duck and dressing. Now it was our first time, so I didn't expect it to be perfect and it wasn't.
but it was pretty good. And so we made the duck and dressing. The most embarrassing thing, Jace, for you is that the hardest thing I had to find were ducks.
because y'all hadn't look i'm having a conversation with a woman at brookshire's and i said you know i had all my stuff out there and she said looks like you're making dress and i said yeah i said you know the hardest thing to find right now and this is embarrassing coming from a family known for ducks i'm having a hard time finding ducks we're not killing many ducks out there on the river well this was a weird season uh because it was the first time you know in 45 years that
My dad has not been a part of duck season. He came opening day, which I shared, but he wasn't himself. And he didn't really participate because he just didn't feel good. He was miserable in his own words. And so after the hunt, he was like, don't call me. I'll call you. So now having said all that, and we kind of shared Phil's problems and y'all prayed. And I'll have to admit in the past year,
three or four days, there's actually been the first improvement that I've seen in months. Yeah. He was better two days ago than he's been in the city. Yeah. So that was very encouraging. Uh, cause I'm being brutally honest here, uh, at the bottom of that before the improvement, I was just thinking, I'm not sure how long Phil's going to be with us. I mean, he has really digressed, uh, mentally and physically, but like I said, thanks to your prayers and, uh,
I mean, that's the only thing I can attribute it to. He is seeing some new doctors and different things, but it's right. It's a spiritual thing at this point just to maybe stop the slide. But anyway, so I was making the duck and dressing. John Gimber, our cousin, came through with eight green wing teal. Teal are the best for the duck and dressing. So Gimber came through, and so he brought me eight dressed teal, which I figured I would dress them myself, but that was nice.
And so I did the duck and dressing well. So I presented it. I did it like dad does it. You know, he like takes the top off and the ducks are on top and it looked great. It was not quite set as much as it needed to be. And I think it's because I didn't use a big enough, you know, pot. But so Si eats some. And so I said, which, you know, I've learned a long time ago, if you're a Robertson and you ask the question, you have to be able to stand the answer. Yeah. So I said, Si, what do you think? Nope. Nope.
So he said, nope. So he knew that you were referring to him. He knew immediately. And he said, Dresden's too runny, not enough sage, ducks are too tough. Well, do you want to hear my experience? Sure. I looked at it and said, nope. You said no before. Well, I just thought I knew Phil –
Didn't make it. And I'm not a big dressing fan anyway. I was going to say, you've never been crazy about it. No, but I do eat a little bit of it every year, but I didn't this year because I was scared of the unknown. Not that I don't... Because if somebody was said...
You nailed it. Well, here's sort of two things. And, of course, Lisa was like offended. But I said, babe, you know, he's just speaking the truth. And he was right about it wasn't firm enough. I think I got it fixed. I'm going to try it again next year. It needs to be a bigger pot. Dad's roaster is twice the size of my roaster. So part of it was it was too thick in the roaster.
And then the ducks need to be boiled longer. He was right about, so he's right about two out of three. Uh, he's off on the sage. He's lost his mind. I said, so tell me this cause I'm seriously asking the question. How much sage do you think needs to go into this pot of dressing? Cause dad is like, don't get wild. Don't get wild with the sage. And cause we put about a tablespoon of sage in. He said four bottles.
Oh, boy. I said, whole bottles of sage? I said, Sal, why don't we just go out and eat grass behind Willie's house if we're going to be putting that much sage on dresses? So he's way off on the sage, but he's right on the edge. Way off. Well, Al, I think you've got to start with who you picked of all the family. Well, he just happened to be the first guy that ate it. You said he lost his mind, but –
That's been gone years ago. So I think some of what he said was true. It didn't look right to me. It was a little off. But I will say this, you know, we're kind of. Look, we ate it all, Jase, except for, I mean, it was all eaten, which, you know. Well, let me warn you, just because somebody can critique something does not mean that they can tell you how to make it better.
That's true. But you do need the critique. I mean, look, I'm asking in honesty, but the four bottles of sage is just, well, that's insane, sir. That's insane. I mean, that would ruin it. Well, we're, we're back into black Panthers running around. But what I will say is, uh, this, you know, this struggle that we've had with my parents not doing so well from a health standpoint, uh,
has caused all the daughter-in-laws to do a lot of cooking and the sons. Yep. I noticed Willie's kind of
taking the point on that he's going out at least once a week sometimes more oh i'd say more than that but i noticed when cory comes down because i've been down visiting several times she brings up oh she stops by you know kentucky fried chicken because that's funny so missy was like you know this is kind of a gulp moment when we're now
Basically every day. Somebody's taking food out, yeah. Because Phil doesn't have much of an appetite, and so we've kind of figured out
We just need to really make spectacular food. Yeah, we're trying to beef him up. Yeah, and I've noticed. But he's not crazy about eating other people's food. Exactly. I cooked him, grilled some filet steaks with the furnishings. And I'll tell you, I sat there and he attacked it. So it was real gratifying. And he's like, you hit it on this. So I was good. But Missy, she made, you know, K sweet potato pies, which is kind of the Holy Grail thing.
of Robertson food, especially during Thanksgiving. And she made four of them. Have you tried it? Yeah, it was good. Oh, she has it down. Yeah, I tried it. And so she said, I'm not sure what Phil's going to think. Because she's never tasted it.
which is crazy. She doesn't eat sweet potato pie, nor will she even try. She makes it, but she doesn't taste it. I mean, look at her. She might weigh 100 pounds. You know what I mean? She doesn't. She's not eating sweet potato pie for whatever reason. But she just doesn't have any interest in it. But she follows the recipe. Well, she uses me as a critique because I made a couple subtle changes to Kay's recipe, and we haven't told them. And I said –
Because once Missy took over and I was shocked how she quickly, I mean, she got it down. I was like, this is exactly. Because I've always told Cass, like, don't put so much of the filling in, even though the recipe calls for it. Because you want to be able to cut the sweet potato pie, grab it with your hand and walk around and eat it.
When it gets too cakey, it loses something. And I said, the other thing is I've always thought it was a hair too sweet. And so I was looking at that recipe. I was like, how many cups of sugar you put in this thing? So for a batch of like four that would make four pies, which really is eight if you use half the filling, it was four cups of sugar. I said, that's too much. So I said, I told Missy, I was like,
Take a cup. You just randomly think that's too much. You don't know. Well, because I thought it was a hair too sweet. Okay. So I said, take a cup out of it. Let's start there. She's like, a whole cup? I can't do it. So she took like half a cup. We did it. I was like, nope. So she wound up taking a whole cup out, and I said, it's perfect.
I said, I want you to present this to Phil and Kay because now it's perfect. That's the old Elon Musk technique. You just go in there and start slashing stuff. Yeah, I did. That's what I did. Jace is the sweet potato doge. So we didn't tell Phil and Kay this whatsoever. We bring the pie. Of course, the pie looks perfect. It has the look. They take a piece.
And somebody else in the family, I'm not going to mention, made the sweet potato pie. I looked at it and said, nope, didn't try it. Just like you did my dressing. But they had brought that pie down there. And I noticed there was one piece from one side gone and one piece, and I thought they didn't go back. And I know why. It doesn't have the right look. So I was like, Phil, here we go. Missy sweet potato pie.
He took a bite of that and he just, his eyes literally lit up and he said, now you got this down. That is it. And I was like, cue the sirens. I hear them in the background. It sounds like Zach's ride has shown up. It has been done. So look, I come back the next day visiting. All of that pie is gone.
The other pie...
Still there. Still intact with the two pieces missing. So that's all you need to know. I was pretty proud of you. I will say just to tie off of my story as well is that dad ate my dressing and said, mine and Lisa's, and said I couldn't have made it better myself. Really? That's what dad said. So I'll take that as well. That's a vote of confidence there. It's a vote of confidence. I mean, look, it's legacy. I mean, that's what you got to remember in all this is that the legacy is being passed down. The legacy
the pumpkin or the sweet potato pies are getting better. The dressing is a work in progress, but it, I mean, but you're trying, you know what I mean? On that, on that front. And you guys, well, you have to be unafraid to fail. I mean, like otherwise you'll never do it. It's like, well, I can never be as good as, you know, dads or moms or what you got to try. You got to like jump in there or else you can't carry it out.
So it's important to get good cell phone coverage and sometimes that's not always possible. Jason, some of your travels and treasure hunts, I mean, it's not always easy to get those good cell phone
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So there was a couple other things I wanted to mention about the gathering, because it's the holidays, it's duck season. How many people do you think were there? 80? 100? Oh, it was over 100. Was it over 100? There were some people at our Thanksgiving family dinner that I did not know. I always meet new people at our family gathering. So...
Because usually we're like a gathering place. Like there's one of our producers is from Canada, and so she doesn't have family here, and so she comes every year. So we've got a lot of folks like that that come, which is just they're part of the family.
kind of a, I heard my crew. Some of my crew came down. Yeah. Uh, your sister and your sister, one of my favorite people on the planet. Yeah. And we, and I got to have a great visit with them, which was awesome. I did not. We, uh, we brought a family. Look, a lot of our families within our family help other families that have had a tough road or, you know, pre Jesus or whatever, fallen through the cracks of society. And, uh,
Like Al said, there's some families that don't have a family. And so that was a lot of the people that I didn't know were those kind of situations. One of the guys, and I don't know if you met him, he works here, Jase. He was one of the kids from the orphanage.
that we worked with for years in Dominican Republic. Missy did, Corey, all of us. And he now works for us. He's married. Saw him. I thought it was fantastic. Yeah, so it was really a cool thing. Yeah, it morphed into something that I think is good. But we preoccupied most of the night with the family that we brought. And I had a spectacular time. Yeah.
But I think that's good to be thankful because really we're thankful in Jesus. I mean, we're in the book of Colossians and how many times has he said, and be thankful and be thankful. Yeah. It just keeps coming up. I'm not sure I told the story, but we, uh, my cousin Kim, uh, who's Tommy's daughter, dad's the brother two years older than him. Uh, that's crossed over. Um, she called me and said that two of her daughters, uh,
And her daughter's boyfriend, their college age, wanted to get baptized. And I was like, yeah, that'd be awesome. And so before we had our gathering, they got there that afternoon on Wednesday, the day before Thanksgiving. And we all went down to WFR, to where our building is. And then by the time they got here, Holt, who is Chad's son, Chad and Jace are the same age, they're a day apart.
His son wanted to be baptized as well, so we baptized four of the second cousins. Yeah, I thought that was kind of cool. That was just a cool thing, a little serendipity for the thing. They were introduced before. But when we get to this new self in Colossians 3, 15, let the peace of Christ rule in your heart, since as members of one body you were called to peace.
and be thankful. Yeah. And so, uh, I think that trumps the forever family. I mean, it's awesome. If you can have your family being a part of God's forever family where Jesus is ruling. Yeah. And, uh, so, um, you know, I think our gatherings have morphed into that and that's cool. The other thing I was going to say is I did have the ducks for you. We shot four wood ducks,
uh, one day and a Mallard Drake. And then the next day we got four wood ducks and Jersey Joe, who has married through his son into your family. That's correct. I handed him them ducks. Yeah. He, he, he texted me. He had them. I'm just saying somewhere. I think Jersey, uh,
You need to find some ducks. And he made his own dressing with the family within the family. That's right. So I did produce. He actually texted me in defense of Joe.
And said, I have some wood ducks here because that's what I had figured I was going to have to cook with. And I said, well, I got a better offer, Joe. I got offered some teal. So he did have one. Well, duck season, so today is the split here in Louisiana. And we didn't have the greatest of duck seasons. But you got to remember, it was the first time I was going to say this a while ago in 45 years for me that –
I wasn't alongside my dad the whole time. So what resulted is we only hunted half of the first split. Right. Because my dad would go every day. But I thought, you know, they're just not here. Yeah. And there was a couple of days where I think it was 85 degrees. And I was like, no.
No, I'm sleeping in. So that was one reason we didn't, uh, you know, we didn't grind away, but the first day was spectacular. And the last day was as well. So, uh, we had a couple of really good days in there, but, but the ducks are just now moving down there. Right. So Zach, tell us what did you do for Thanksgiving? Cause you didn't come here. Obviously we missed you here. What were you doing? Yeah, we did a, we did a little gathering with Jill's family, um,
smoked the turkey did the whole we did the whole thing our dressing was not overly runny it was not overly dry it was perfect we didn't put ducks in it though so but no but the turkey was i'm having a hard time with this learning how to smoke stuff on this traeger grill um and so i need to
Well, there's a guy in our family who is actually an expert. Yeah, we have an expert. I actually cooked steaks one night for Missy's side of the family. And I'm like, I'm just not a great griller. I can take any kind of wild game and get me over a stove.
And it's spectacular. But I'm not the best of grillers. And I'm just confessing that. I've tried. My son is my oldest son is way better than I am. But I called Stone, got his opinion because I thought I keep they keep asking me to grill. And there's not a whole lot of buzz about it. Yeah. They eat the steaks. There's no buzz. So I said, let's kick it up a notch this year.
And so I got Jay's opinion and I got my son's opinion. But you know what I noticed in both of their just off-the-cuff remarks is they both said the same phrase that I thought was profound since we're talking about food and Thanksgiving gatherings. They both said, you know, there's just a feel for it. You know, they talked about the little thermometer. They both, I was like, I don't have a thermometer. They're like, well, really? Yeah.
On your grill, they both grilled on my grill. They're like a lot of hot spots. It's hard to uniform everything. But they basically went for the two minutes on each side
in the middle of the hottest place, then put it just off. And they were saying four or five minutes, you know, on each side. Right. Because that's more my problem is getting everything. But they both said you just got to look at it and there's a feel for it when it's right. And you got to let it rest. I mean, that's the thing. You got to let it rest. But I had all the – they had a few little surprises on the seasoning. They introduced garlic powder.
And I put that in there. And I'll have to admit, when it's all said and done, way better, way more buzz. Of course, they don't know that I called somebody and said, which it's very humbling to do that. Yeah, you got to reach out. But I'm like, you know what? What you want is SPG, salt, pepper, garlic. Well, I had all three. And I threw in a little Cajun seasoning because we're from Louisiana and I love it.
And so I think it was pretty spectacular. So I guess that's... Well, just so you know, Zach, to show you how big our gathering was, we had eight fried turkeys and four hams. They all got eaten? As the main meat. And most of it got eaten. All the turkeys got eaten. I was impressed. That's impressive. We had... That's a lot of meat. Multiple nations represented there also. We did. We did. So, you know, it was...
I thought it was a really, really good night. We may, we may try to make the journey down there next year. Well, you know, Zach's experiencing the fear of missing out. Now we made such a big deal about it. Well, I heard it was like a family reunion. Melissa said it was like all the, all the cousins came the whole deal, you know? So it'd be nice to see everybody. Yeah. Well, I think everybody's heart's kind of heavy. Uh,
you know, with our parents, but my mom has made a remarkable recovery and she was there and, uh, and was, I think the best she's been in months. So mom's been great. And then my, our aunt Nancy, uh, it was her grandkids that I baptized and she was there. And there's something about that. There's something about a matriarch because now our, you know, our family's in so many wings. And so to be able to pull those together was a cool thing.
So if you enjoy our podcast, and we know that you do because we hear from you all the time, we'd like for you to head over to blazetv.com slash Robertson and subscribe. You're going to get In the Woods Archive, which is Dad's show that we kind of first started us with Blaze. All our old overtime segments are there, as well as Cooking with the Robertsons.
And so we've been cooking at our houses, showing some of our favorite meals. Jace, have you filmed the latest one yet? I have not, but it's on the docket. It's on the docket. We got one coming up. Jace likes to do the catch and cook method. Or kill and cook. Yeah, well, catch, kill, and cook. There you go.
But we got a lot of cool stuff. Mom and dad are on there. We've had Sal on before as well. So we got a lot of cool stuff. We want you to check them out. You can sign up at blazetv.com slash Robertson. And you'll get $20 off. Sign up for Blaze TV Plus today.
I'm most excited, Jace, about you employing the Department of Efficiency on the baked pies. You came in and you just said, we're going to gut this thing. We're going to gut this bureaucracy of sugar, and we're just going to see what happens. Everybody was like, well, you can't do that. But you were bold. You went in there and said, no, we're going to cut it.
And then they took a bite and they said, you know what? It's better. Yeah. There's a lesson there. It's the Elon Musk RFK effect. Jace is under the spell. He's under the spell. Y'all got politics on the brain today. I actually laughed so hard this morning at my wife, which is good after 34 years of marriage. I'm talking about just uncontrollably laughing.
laugh because i was in there preparing for uh the podcast which i i got a big shock for you what we're fixing to discuss is not what either one of you thought we were this may be r-rated in a jesus way but uh
And you think, what does that mean? Yeah. Well, we'll be intrigued. But, you know, so I have the TV on, but I don't have the, you know, I've got to where now I watch TV without the volume. Yep. Just trying to keep up with what's going on, you know, in society. I actually had the news on. And she walked in and there was a banner up there. And it's like, it said something, Biden pardons Trump.
which to show you how well I am in the news, I didn't even know what it was talking about. - You didn't even know Biden had a son. - No, I didn't know he had a son and he was in jail and he was like, he's fixed to get out. So I thought, oh, that's interesting. And so my wife just, she looked at it and went, "To thee, but not me."
I was like, to thee, but not me. What are you talking about? So she all laughed. That's pretty funny. Because then she told me the story. She was like, he said he wasn't going to. Oh, he's been saying for a year he's not going to do it. Yeah, and so she came up with that. And I got so tickled about that. And I thought, babe, you woke up this morning with.
passion and you were calling out hypocrisy this morning in the political world but uh it actually kind of went along with where what we were studying and so uh you know we had a we had a funny moment there that's pretty funny that's my political he pardoned him not just for the firearm deal he pardoned him yeah everything for 10 years yes the whole i'm like man
Someone had posted on X today I thought was pretty telling. It said, the 75-year-old grandmother who was arrested for praying outside an abortion clinic is reporting to prison this week. Two-year sentence for praying outside an abortion clinic. No pardon for her, but we got one from good old Hunter that James didn't know existed. No, I apologize. What's his name? Hunter? Hunter?
But I'm going to use that the next time I see a situation, to thee but not me. To thee but not me. So I'm not sure where. It sounded like a Bible verse, but it just wasn't. It sounds like Shakespeare. She pulled out a little King James on you is what she did. It was really funny. So Al, you preached yesterday. Are you going to start with your sermonette? I can, unless you want to just jump into your thing.
Well, look, since this has been a wild card, I'm looking at our producer, and she has a grin of like, what is happening today? I can't even see her behind all the monitors. So look, this whole thing, this letter to the group in Colossae, which is, just think, this little group of people in homes oppressed by Rome.
I mean, you can imagine the persecution that's going on. And so you have this beautiful letter that here we are dissecting 2,000 years later with what is just as powerful in today's culture and world about Jesus as king and why that's true. I mean, Colossians 1, you went through that. You kind of hit on that in your first sermon about is Jesus big enough to
for for us to believe in yeah to believe in yeah and i thought that was a very good line in your in your sermon and uh of course your sermon yesterday was kind of revolved around uh can we forgive is he big enough for us to be able to forgive others like he forgave us and embrace his forgiveness right yeah which you know you you picked out this verse in uh colossians 3 13 which we get uh
Because we're not really going verse by verse because I think when you do it, you miss the big picture of who Jesus is, which is why I really like your points. Right. But I will read that because it's awesome in 13 and 14 where he says, bear with each other. Now he's talking about the new self now. Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.
And over all these virtues, put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. So that was the thrust of it, which, look, you read those verses, and it's like, oh, isn't that great? You try to put that in your life? Yeah. Oh. That's right. I mean, and I just, we were sitting there, we spent 20 minutes talking about this gathering thing.
You know, it's hard to get along with one person. I mean, just think of your marriage. And really, you talked about this moment in year 15 of your marriage where you had this transitional moment to your marriage. How long ago was that? 25 years. Yeah, 25 years ago. And part of that for you, which I thought was real vulnerable for you, is you offering forgiveness to your wife. Right.
And so I just thought all these hundred people trying to get along as a family. And when you start looking at our culture and just, it just seems to be a breakdown of the family. In a family setting, some paths hurt, some cross words, but,
some difficult situations. And it may not even be you. It may have been your parents or your grandparents. I mean, it's things that happen over the course of time. You're right. I said it was the great, in my sermon, it's the greatest family is the greatest test for forgiveness that could ever be made. Yeah. Because you have so many opportunities to offend. Yeah.
Tell Congress to guard your card.
Because Americans lose when politicians choose. Learn more at GuardYourCard.com. So with that set up in mind, here's what happened to me this morning. I was thinking, you know, here's this, they're having all this pressure in these churches. Because when you get to chapter three, all of a sudden it gets real practical. He starts bringing up family relationships. And he starts talking about the old self, putting that off, kill it.
I mean, put to death, therefore. And we had Mac on, and he talked about that verse in 3.5. But you also have this other side of the cultures within these religious groups, and in this case particular, Judaism and this kind of rule-oriented approach to get people to live right and to get along, which doesn't work. You have all these rules and don't do this and don't do that. And at the end of the day, you have...
oppressed people who get tired. Because if you try to do it yourself, what happens? You can't do it. So you get frustrated and you get exhausted. And so then what do you do? You quit. And that's why it won't work. Because we can't
pull this off with our willpower and determination. Which is why I used the rich young ruler from Mark 10 in my sermon yesterday as the example of that. Great illustration. So I had listened to Al's sermon last night, and so I just read the text. I got to chapter three, and I read...
Since then, you have been raised with Christ, which we've covered this ad nauseum in a good way, that there was this, you participated in this death process.
that Jesus offered on a cross. And you very meticulously went through that in your sermon about what the cross actually accomplished. How big the sacrifice is. Yeah, forgiveness and sacrifice, but it triumphed this worldly culture that seems to be driving everything. So then you have this, you've participated, now you've been raised, so now what? And it's a beautiful yet very...
thought-provoking group of verses because it says, set your hearts on things above where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. So you always have this two things at work. Once you respond to Jesus and surrender to Jesus and you die, you now have Jesus pictured at the right hand of God representing us in heaven. He's there on our behalf and he sends his spirit to
to indwell people that are on the earth to represent him. This is kind of the thing he's tapping into, and it's hard for him to even describe it. So in verse 2, he says, set your mind on things above, not on earthly things. Very difficult to do. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ and God. So he's like giving you this picture that I'm actually hidden with
in Christ because he's at the right hand of God. So if somebody said, just show me Jesus and I'll believe. And you're like, well, he's actually hidden from your sight. But if you watch me, you'll see his spirit living in me on the earth. But he's actually physically at the right hand of God on my behalf. So I think that's a real cool thought. So then it says when you're, when Christ, who is your life, which I think is a reference to the spirit of
That's in you. So even though he's at the right hand of God, he is your life now because you died and you were buried and now you were raised and God has entered your life. When he appears, when Christ who is your life appears, well, then you also will appear with him in glory. So if you want to see the actual Jesus, it's going to happen.
As spirit-filled people, we're going to appear together. We'll get the new bodies like he has, an imperishable body. So based on all that, then all of a sudden he gets real practical and he says, put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature. And so I just read this, as I have probably a hundred times, sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires, and greed,
which is idolatry. And something hit me in that moment. I thought, you know what? The first four of these things seem like that we're talking about sex, sexual immorality. So sex that's not moral, which would be sex that's not right. And you say, well, oh, is there a sex that's right biblically?
Well, absolutely. I don't know of any scholar, no matter if the secular world has leaked over into religion, which it has in a lot of churches, but I don't know of any scholar who is overall respected that does not say that the Bible teaches religion.
that sex that is right in the Bible is between a man and a woman, a husband and wife for life. That's it. Exclusively. Right. So without going through all the verses, I mean, but just think where Genesis started. Genesis started with a man and a woman being created for each other. The two will become one flesh. There was no shame. They were naked, had no shame. And it was a God created,
orchestrated, architected relationship that produced kids.
And then Jesus confirmed the very thing you just said in Matthew 19 in a discussion about marriage and divorce by some legalists, confirmed exactly what you just said. He quoted those verses. Exactly. Which basically affirms this is the way it is. Over and over. That's why I said all scholars, they're agreeing, okay, for this reason, there's a phrase that always goes back to Genesis that is used often.
Matthew 19, other places in the Bible. For this reason, a man will leave his father and mother, which is another issue in our culture. Yeah.
you know, they won't leave or the parents won't leave, leave them alone. They leave and cleave and be united with his wife. And the two will become one for this reason. What was the reason? And when the, when he says that, think about when he says that in the image of God, he see, this is the problem that we get into with, with talks about sexuality is what we try to divorce the concept of sexuality from intention and design. And,
And I love that you would go back to the Genesis creation story to anchor the whole discussion in that, because what he says is, let us make man in our image and the image of God. He created them both male and female. And so part of our our image bearing properties is the fact that we are diverse people.
sexes, male and female, coming together in the union of the sexual union. Oh, by the way, you know what happens at the climax of the sexual union? It produces more life. So you even see the triune nature of God. You see it in this relationship. And the reason why Paul says that
this is idolatry. Because think about, what is idolatry? When I think of idolatry, I think of the idols. I don't know why I think of little statues up on a mantel somewhere, but it's like, I think about, you get a knife out and a piece of wood, and you literally, with your own hands, you carve out an image, a statue of something, you put it up on a shelf, and then you worship the article that you carved, which seems like
like crazy. Why, why would I worship something that I made? Well, cause truthfully what you're doing when you do that is you're worshiping yourself. And that's the, that's the reason why idols are so powerful. You look back to the old Testament and you read these stories of people worshiping idols and you're like, how stupid could you be? Why would you worship a statue? Well, that's what you're not worshiping the statue. They're worshiping themselves. We do the same thing. And so with this, with this idea of sexuality, you,
or sexual immorality rather, impurity, passion, evil passion really, evil desire, and covetousness. What all that is ultimately, it is an elevation of the self, and it is a worship of the self. It's a worship of the creature rather than the creator that created the creature, Romans 1, which is why he says in the very next verse that,
On account of these, the wrath of God is coming. That's the same wrath of God that's mentioned in the first two chapters of Romans, which was God leaving them to themselves because they chose to worship and serve the created things rather than the creator. I think that that's why in sexuality, by the way,
It seems to be the most visceral expression of that. So I think that's why it says that, Jace. I think that's why you see that sensuality vein running through this entire text, this idea of not being able to stop the indulgence of the flesh because it's so visceral and so powerful. But ultimately, at its core, it is a worship of self.
over the worship of God. And it shows you how rampant it was in any culture, even 2,000 years ago. Oh, no, we're tracking that 100%, because when I read the sexual immorality, impurity, and which is, remember when we were in Ephesians chapter 5, and that verse that said, because Ephesians, similarly to Colossians, says,
Paul lays out the plan. God had this plan all along, you know, before the creation of the world, he was looking at you in Christ and this contagious love from the Godhead, which he is love, you know, the first John four, it's just what he does. And it love reproduces itself in,
as God, and it does so through relationships. So now we're really seeing the big picture of how this is, and he lays that out, and same spirit, you know, I pray that you may be strengthened with spirit in your inner being, remember, so you can know how high, wide, deep, and long is the love of Christ. But he gets to Ephesians 5, and he's like, but among you there must not even be a hint of sexual immorality or of any kind of impurity. Remember, we read that
Greek word, which is like the demonic, unclean spirit that happens, which is not when we as humans give in to things that are not bearing the image of God. And so it's like, well, there's two. Then it's like, well, lust, that's another sexual angle of that. And evil desires, which encompasses a lot of sexual activity, you know, that's why the
porn industry is what it is because it's tapping into those desires. So I was like, well, let me say one thing about that porn thing. It's interesting when you read Romans one and it says they basically worshiped images and you think, man, how dumb can you be? Like how stupid who would, who would ever worship an image?
says the culture who literally worships sexual images. It's not, you're, you're looking at pixels on a screen and I'm not like, I'm not like trying to shame anybody. I mean, this is like an epidemic that, right. But we have worshiped pixels on a screen. Pornography is literally pixels on a screen. It's not real. It's not a real person in your, in your life. Yeah.
No, you don't even know him. Yeah. It's an image. So what I did was I thought, you know, anytime the Bible brings up something that profound, I mean, it's like it has to mean something. It's like, look who you are. Look at what you're participating. Look how big Jesus is. He's the king of kings. And then so like the first transition he does is,
You really should read Colossians from chapter 1, 1 to 3, 4. And it's like, that's what you have. That's your identity in Christ as a group. This is what's happened. And it's like that verse 5 is like, so first off the top, what does this mean practically? Because you're still, you can know all that.
And what happens if you, you know, you get online or, you know, you have a woman walk right out in front of you dressed in modestly. Well, it's hard to put all that chapter one, one, three, four in the moment. So he it's like he makes this transition put to death. Therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature. So we're going to get really practical. So I was like the fact that he started off with four sexually involved women.
categories makes me realize there is a connection to the marriage that was introduced by God in Genesis between humans and the marriage like Ephesians 5 did when he talked about a role, same kind of model. I remember when he gets to the end in chapter 5, he's like, this is a profound mystery, but I'm talking about you and Jesus, the church and Jesus. And it made me think that
The Bible starts with a marriage in humanity, Adam and Eve, and it actually ends with a marriage. And you get to Revelation 21 and you see the bride of Christ coming out of heaven. And you have this idea of being married forever to Jesus. Well, that's just can't be a coincidence. So I thought, I need to hear a sermon. Surely someone has had the courage to,
to give a sermon on this in Colossians 3, 5. That's where I was thinking. So wouldn't you know it, the problem with the internet and doing research there is because it knows your tendencies and who you've listened to before. So I just typed in marriage and sex online.
you know i think i put sex and marriage in jesus because i didn't want to just put sex out there without you're going to win it with those pixels yeah i was very uh careful i'm not sure what exactly i put but i said i don't want to put anything and so number one was a guy that i i've listened to before and and really the you know because i have a few guys that i listen to or or read
uh, outside of the Bible. And it was John Tyson, uh, from New York. And the reason I listened to him is because here's a guy from Australia comes to Christ. Uh, I think he'd come out of the like assembly of God background and, and he's, he kind of grew into whatever is that would have a better, uh, uh, illustration of what camp that is, but kind of a non-denominational Jesus focused, uh,
type movement. But I thought, but he's in New York City, which, you know, from me being from a rural place, I just can't imagine trying to take Jesus into one of these big cities where this secular divide, especially when it comes to sex, is just rapid. So that's the reason, a lot of reason I listened to him because I was like, if you want to ever get a pulse on the culture, listen to some of his sermons.
And so up popped this topic. It said sexual formation. And that was the name of his sermon.
clicked on that one hour and five minutes i listened to that and look here's the way i'm going to describe it because i know we're out of time i just wanted to introduce this so when we come to the next podcast we can get into the weeds of this oh yeah because i got a lot more to say i thought it was fantastic the first thing i did when i listened to it was i clicked it and rewound it and listened to it again so it was two hours and 10 minutes this morning and uh
And it reminded me of my dad in his heyday. Cause I was like, boy, we've come a long way since my dad used to have these graphic sermons about sex, because I thought, I can't believe this only has 500 and something views. Cause I'm going to tell you something. It was blunt.
And maybe it won't have that. Maybe it'll have a lot more views after our endorsement. Well, the reason I had to listen to it twice, Zach, you'll appreciate this because he uses a lot of vocabulary that you do. So I wasn't sure if I agree with it or not because some of the words I never even heard before.
But overall, it was exactly what you said in your speech about how your sexual identity and activity is a reflection of how God made us. And that should be the case. And he went both ends of the spectrum, and we'll talk about that. And the two spectrums were on one side, you have the culture saying whatever it is,
Do it. Whatever you desire, do it. And then you have on the other side some religious groups that say desire is bad. Like Colossians. You can't even have the desire. They don't have it. And in the middle, what you're supposed to be is that God...
not only created it, he sanctions it, and it should be a reflection of the greatest relationship in your life, which is the Lord Jesus. All right, so we've got a lot, obviously, more to say about this. Zach's chomping at the bits, too. We'll do that in the next podcast. I do like John Tyson, though. He's good. That is a good place to go. We'll talk about this more next time on Unashamed. Thanks for listening to the Unashamed podcast. Help us out by rating us on iTunes.
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