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I am unashamed. What about you? No.
Welcome back to Unashamed. Jay's... Welcome back. It's good to be back. I had the you know you're getting older moment last night, so we had some friends over, and Lisa gets an email right in the middle of dinner, which I don't know why she was checking her email. I don't know, maybe something popped up. I turn my phone off when I have people over, but...
That's a very good quote. Yeah, I just don't like... I figure if you come to my house or if I go to your house, then you get my undivided attention. He says you turn your phone off? Turn it off. Yeah. I didn't know you turned your phone on. I think I've probably... Well, I think you're figuring it out, Zay. You have a lot of people over. I am the worst by design of getting back. But I do if it's important. And what I mean by important...
If it's anything related to Jesus or the Bible. Yeah. Because I have multiple Bible studies going on that never, I don't know when they began. I guess I could scroll on my phone and see when they began. I guess most of them began at their new birth. But, you know, there may be three days before I get back to you. Yeah. That's what I tell folks. I'm like, just be patient with me. You know what I realized yesterday? What?
that my email wasn't working. Ah. How long did it take you to realize that? Six days. So, Maddie? I would probably know after two. That's why I haven't been in the loop.
And what's weird about my email is that it was designed by, you know, a commander or whatever. So these people, I don't, I don't see these people. Yeah. I'm not even sure those people are in this facility. I don't, I don't know. They're probably some other place. There's some group in a small room somewhere making these types of decisions. And I've never been across the ocean to that room. And so, uh,
I finally realized, you know, I was like, boy, some of these people might already give me a heads up. Well, my wife, my lovely wife, greatest woman in the world, she walked me through. I basically had to just kind of reset my password or whatever it was. I don't know. So anyway.
So I missed a lot of breaking news and places I was supposed to be, things I was supposed to do. So I've been putting out those fires for two days. Well, that's exactly what happened to me. Not because of that, but so these folks up at Camp Calvary, Macville, Kentucky, good people. I spoke there, I think, two years ago.
And they had booked us for an event. Their guy, Jordan, who came through here, he actually had dinner at my house. So he said, I want you guys to come to a marriage event. Great. We did it. We did it through our booking people. And then we had the date. I had it written down, but somewhere in the process, and I admit mine is a little bit antiquated.
But we got the wrong dates. But I went back and looked this morning, and every communication I got from these people, we got from the booking people, was all the correct dates. But guess who had the wrong dates? Me. And I think I did it, not Lisa. That's the worst when you realize, oh, I'm the problem. Exactly. I hate that. I'm going to make a spiritual application to this at some point.
But before I do, I mean, because I think the spiritual application will make you feel better. Well, I hope so. I want to make you feel better today. But so I was supposed to.
promote a little event so this weekend i'll be in uh farmington arkansas but don't come because by the time you hear this i would i will have already have been there so we're just gonna rely you're gonna show up at an empty venue and say man you missed a great event jace rogers so i was supposed to promote that a couple days ago but i've already given you the reason why however so to
Now I'm going to give you a heads up. Okay. All right. So on April 18th, now you do have time to put this on your schedule. I'm going to be in Abilene, Texas slash Buffalo Gap. I mean, Al, this is the gap where the buffalo ran through, you know. Oh, really? Yeah, as a historian. It's awesome. Somewhere around that area. And so if you want to join me that evening,
You go to JimNedBPO.org. Kind of sounds like some of my redneck buddies. Is this guy playing poker with y'all? Oh, Jim Ned, but the BPO, I think they're doing some kind of fundraiser for a high school band. So that's band something organization. So anyway, we're...
That's where you'll be. We're going to do it. So my spiritual application is, I got to thinking about this. Remember when we had the debate on John last podcast, or maybe the podcast before, about why this temple story is in the beginning of John's account.
but it's at toward the end in Matthew, Mark, and Luke. We were wondering if it was the same event. Zach thinks it's two different events, whatever, right? Something hit me in the middle of the night. You know how you wake up and you're like, oh, I should have said this. And I should have said this, and it goes in with what you're saying. I think we tend to think, and the verse that we read, because a lot of people say, especially in the world, how do we know this is God's Word?
And so people who don't believe in God, they'll go to the Bible and find what they call contradictions. And of course, we look at it like that's silly because we're so such deep Bible studiers. It's like the more I read and the more I connect dots from what we're going back to.
at least 3,000 to 4,000 years, and you have, what, 41, 40 writers, and there is this synergy that's awesome that we see. But having said that, I don't know what we're trying to portray. These were, God chose to write through human beings. And it wasn't like, the thought that hit me was, they weren't like,
mind-controlled, like woke up zombie state, started writing, and then they're like, oh, let me read what I just wrote. That's not the way it worked. They were carried along by the Holy Spirit, but they inserted their...
their human, you know, what they had been reading, what they saw, what they, and so I think. And John probably does that more than any for sure of the gospel writers. Yeah. Because he'll just give you a little parenthetical right in the middle of a, I mean, none of the others do that.
See what I'm saying? Exactly. He illustrates your point even more than some of the other writers. So I think even like, you know, they tend to highlight different things. Like when he gets revealing about the spirit that is to come, well, in John 14 through 16, there's no mention of any kind of miraculous spirit.
signs of the spirits that's going to happen in the book of Acts. I mean, no mention of it, none. And I think Luke, at the end of his, he kind of refers to, you'll be clothed with power. So he's kind of thinking, oh, this is going to be powerful. When you read John, when he's talking about the Holy Spirit, you get a different vibe. It's more about truth and comforter and counselor and
So I was just going to say that. So you're saying they could miss a date? Well, right. And that's just being a human. Yeah, it's not. It doesn't take away from the overall theme and foundation of what this is all about. It's like you start breaking down God the Father and Jesus the Son and the Holy Spirit and how this plan works.
was woven through history, even like we're revealing through the temple and the kingdom, how are all these people connecting all these dots in their writings coming from different perspectives? And I think that's what makes it so powerful. And so I think you see the same thing today as spirit-indwelled people, despite our flaws. God still...
Trust that to be the plan. We're ambassadors, and we even get some things wrong. And we don't have to have the weight of trying to get every little detail right, because there are a lot of confusing things here, because he chose flawed men to write this. I do like the idea of flowing into the adjustments of how life does. Just to close off my thought, March 21, 2020,
And 22 to the 23rd is the weekend. We'll be in Macville, Kentucky. So I don't know if there's availability, but check with those guys. But that's exactly what you're talking about is you have to adjust because ever since this has happened last night, now we had travel. We had plane tickets bought. We had everything set up for the next weekend because we planned a couple of months out.
So now all of a sudden in a rush, we've got to change schedules. Lisa was supposed to speak here at event. She's called texting the lady. I'm so sorry. We've booked on a weekend. We, you know, this is a mistake. Now we're scrambling to fill that spot. Everything then becomes the cascade, but it's kind of like you described us what we do in real life. I thought about when Jace was talking about it is that, I mean, we, we prepare sermons, you know, a lot of times you'll get a section of something that's so good in your mind that
out of a Bible study we're doing. But then all of a sudden you're working on a sermon in a totally different place. You think, oh man, that piece over there would work so well in this context. And that's kind of what you're describing. I mean, you know, you just take these things and you sort of cobble it together. It's all spirit led because you know that, you know, you know, the spirit's working in the situation.
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and 60% off. Certain terms apply, so be sure to check the site for details. Well, two things I would add. One, you should do what Willie did. You should have pointed them to me, your second string. I might could have filled in for you.
By the way, if you ever need a second string, I will certainly fill in for you if I get your honorarium. So that's a standard. Oh, well, that's, yeah, there's that. That's a weird negotiation tactic. I'm just saying, if you could double buck and you're like, you need to send me. So Zach's volunteering to be the next guy. But on the scripture thing, I think it's an important distinction to make between
dictating the scripture and inspiring the scripture and the Holy Spirit, it doesn't say that he dictated word for word what would be written. In fact, we don't even have access to the original manuscripts of the Bible. We have copies of copies. We have tons of copies.
But we don't have, and then which translation? I mean, if you get into this debate on which translation is inspired and whatnot, it's not the translation that's inspired. It's the word of God that's inspired in the original manuscripts that we don't have access to, but it's the thought. And so the difference, it's not that God used flawed men and that the scriptures are flawed. The scriptures are not. The scriptures are flawless. They are the inerrant word of God. I mean, they do not have any error. Yeah.
But to read them as dictated from God is to actually misunderstand what it means to have the scriptures. So you have these accounts of the gospel, for example. And I heard it said this way one time that it's like if you have two people, two eyewitnesses watching the same exact event.
And then they record what they saw. They saw a train wreck or a car wreck, and the police comes, and he interviews both witnesses. Those reports may have some differing things that happened, but that's not how you interpret that. You don't read it up. Well, their stories didn't line up word for word. They're giving what they saw in their own perspective, and the Holy Spirit was working through that.
to record these events of the gospel, particularly in the gospels, which is where we would find so-called discrepancies. But when it comes to true, meaningful content in the gospels, there really is no real ultimate variation of discrepancies. There may be some things that you read and hear, well, he says it this way, and then he says it the other way. Or he might have said there was two men there, and then there's one. I can't remember one story, but then...
One of the other gospels says it was just one guy. And so I just remember seeing that one time. And they're like, well, how come he said it was two and then it was one? Right. Well, and that's my point. They're human beings. They're remembering it slightly different in some details. Right. But so just to piggyback on what you said, Zach,
However, I realize this is God's word, and I agree. It's flawless as far as his design. But I've seen people go to the story of Job and his friends. You remember when Job was on the dung heap and he's getting advice from his three friends? Yeah. Bill Dad so far. Well, look at you. Yeah, yeah.
Well, a lot of that advice you find out later, God said, was terrible advice. Yeah, that's awesome. So you could actually go there, and I've heard sermon preachers do it, and they'll quote a verse out of Job, and then I'll go over there and say, they're making this...
They have built a whole doctrine over what God said was terrible advice. Your friends are idiots. The Bible says, and they quote a passage out of Job, that actually the context is, no, that's not the point. They were wrong. They were wrong, and we're quoting in the Scripture. When you said that word flawed, that's what I thought. It was flawed in that it was a terrible advice to give.
And now you're quoting it as, well, that's what the Bible says. Which leads me to the point I was trying to make is we have to put context and history. It is important. And I didn't realize that probably the first 10 years of my walk, which is why I didn't hang out a lot in the Old Testament because I thought, well, that doesn't have anything to do with me. But now here I am.
We were told that. We were told, if you brought up the Old Testament, it doesn't apply. I mean, how many times have I heard that? It doesn't apply. I mean, the whole... I think you're... It's such a good point. And everybody, by the way, says this. That's kind of the caveat here. Everybody says...
from any perspective, well, you need to read the Bible in context. And they all accuse the other side of not reading it in context. So that can be kind of a... It really is. They call it hermeneutics. It really is the study of what it meant then and there before you apply it to here and now. I mean, if you'll do that, you'll get it right more than you'll get it wrong. It reminds me, Jason, when I wrote down, I was... I try to come up with a different verse for every book, and I wrote down the wrong verse.
For about three events in a row in my book, because it was Luke 747 was the verse I meant to say, because the book is about forgiveness. And that's a text about forgiveness, the woman at the feet of Jesus. Well, I put John 747 for three straight events. Which is? Well, look it up. And so I'm writing this down wrong, and I realized one day I had done it. Well, then it hit me.
In a moment, I thought, I've been writing down the wrong verse. And so I had no idea what John 7, 47 said. Well, it actually says, you mean he has deceived you also, the Pharisees? Wow. And that was my verse. Yeah, that's great. That's encouraging, man. Right. And so nobody ever said anything except one guy sent me an email and said, man, congratulations on the new book. I'm so excited for you. I was wondering about that verse that you signed it. What does that mean?
And that's when I realized what I had done. I looked at it and I thought, how do you explain that? So I said, what do you think it means? Thank you.
I put the old reverse on it. Then there's a small group of people that would say it means you are a false teacher. That's right. Exactly. You mean he has to see you do as well? Correctly handled the word of truth. But, you know, it's interesting that you mentioned that. I still stand by my position that this is a different event from Mark 13 and Matthew 20.
I think I got that right. Well, you sent me about a, you know. Not Mark 13. I mean Mark. 10 page letter about that after we had this discussion earlier. Yeah. And I was like, well, next time I have two hours to research this. So weird. Go ahead. I'm sorry. Yeah. It's different than Mark's account and is what I meant to say. I was confused.
confusing with all that discourse. But I do think that the point is, though, for me too, Jace, it was seeing how this overlays with the, it's like this narrative, a grand narrative of Scripture, which we didn't mention in the last podcast, but when there's a reason why
He quotes the Old Testament so often, even in the part where he's turning over the tables. He says his disciples remember that it was written, zeal for your house will consume me, which is a prophetic word out of one of the Psalms. And so that's why you can't read this in isolation. You have to read this in more of like a meta context.
narrative from a metanarrative perspective that he's continuing to go back. The New Testament continues to point back to the Old Testament. You can't understand what is actually happening here if you pull it out of its Old Testament context of a story that has all of these different authors, which is kind of honestly for me, that's an evidence for the scripture.
that this scripture was not dictated by somebody going into a cave and receiving a dictation from God. If that's what it was, how would you ever prove that wrong?
You can't. If I told you guys that I went into a room and the Lord spoke to me and I come out with something, this is what he said. There's no way that you could ever possibly prove that to be wrong. You can't prove it to be right either. That's the problem. But with the Holy Scriptures, it's multiple authors writing over the course of hundreds of years.
And not only that, that these authors are taking the events they're talking about and they're connecting them in space and in time.
That's a dangerous thing to do because if any of these events don't happen, for example, if that temple doesn't come down in AD 70, it kind of destroys Jesus' whole argument. I mean, the whole thing falls with history or stands with history. And so the reason why the Word of God has prevailed throughout all of time is that it's true. You can't take it down. It's true. ♪
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Unashamed at checkout. That's an additional 15% off at fastgrowingtrees.com. Use the code unashamed at checkout. Fastgrowingtrees.com. Code unashamed. Now's the perfect time to plant. Use unashamed to save the day. Offer is valid for a limited time. Terms and conditions may apply. I agree. And it's about a person who is true. Right. Which is probably the perfect segue back into... Well, I said all that to say this. Two days ago...
I was ready to reveal this. Oh, boy. Well, but now I can't remember exactly where we were going with it. You led us up to this pathway, James. I felt like we were on the edge of a precipice of looking into, because you were like, I don't even know if y'all are going to agree with my assessment. You had me salivating, waiting on the point. And now you're saying you don't even remember your point.
I remember the point. I just don't remember all the legs of the point as I did because I had really studied that the night before. You're making me feel better about missing the event date, I'll tell you that. And in the last two days, I've had a lot of chaos in my life. So I'm going to rely on the Holy Spirit. Oh, boy. And I do just want to say before I begin this, okay?
You've got to remember, I think, just to put a little exclamation point on what we just discussed, and you can read that from 2 Peter 2 when it says that you must understand, this is verse 12, that no... 2 Peter 1, isn't it? Oh, 2 Peter 1. Why did I say 2? 2 Peter 1 when he says you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture...
came about by its own interpretation. Men were carried along by the Holy Spirit. I just quoted that. I didn't read it. I couldn't find the verse. I had to get my glasses on. And he says we didn't, verse 16, we didn't follow cleverly invented stories. However, combine that with what we did do on the last podcast was Ephesians 1 being a mystery. The whole plan of God's a mystery. I listened to this guy, because look, John 3 says,
And what we said, there's a huge controversy about, I say controversy, that seems. There's a lot of ideas. A lot of opinion. Opinions on what it means to be born of water and the Spirit in this context, in this moment. So I did some research, and I thought, okay, let me look into this. Maybe I've missed something, because I do think you've got to bring an open mind here. And...
So I heard one guy, this Dr. Heiser, give the context. Now, I want to say right off the bat, what I'm fixed to present, I mean, I got this from him, and I think it's right as far as the context of in the moment. However, I disagree with his final analysis. I really did. Because I think kind of what happens here is,
Just like the temple that we just read, John is going back and saying, okay, the temple was this, the idea of the temple to the Jewish world, which is what? A physical structure where God and priests met on behalf of the people. Is that a good assertion? Or where heaven and earth were overlapping. Yeah. You agree? Because of 151. But then John took it forward.
By saying, quoting Jesus, where it says, destroy this temple and I'll raise it again in three days. So I think the same thing happens here. So I realize when I say I'm disagreeing with a Hebrew scholar in his final analysis, that is quite a statement. And so...
understandably, I could be wrong. But I do agree with the context, which I had never noticed before. And so here's basically what he... And just to remind you, because you said this in the last podcast, when Jesus said you are Israel's teacher...
And do you not understand these things? You said that triggered you to. That triggered because that was his main point. Right. He's like. You should know this. He was going back for Nicodemus, who was a member of the Jewish ruling council.
And a Pharisee. Yeah. He was a leading religious mind in these things. And there were only a handful. So why in the world would Jesus say, you are Israel's teacher and you don't understand these things? Something, what he said, had to be connected to something that happened in Israel's past. He just thought, you should have known this. So he also brought up the idea of him using Moses as an illustration of
When he says that in verse 14, just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert. So here's what he said. If you go back, and I want to read this. I want to do something we don't normally do, but I just think it's important. The numbers account? No, we're going to go to Exodus 14. Of all places, we're going to go to the crossing point.
of the Red Sea by the Israelites. Okay. Because Heizer's point was water and the Spirit. He's like, now look, he had a lot of reasons for this. One, it happened at night, and now this Pharisee's coming to him at night. Remember when you made the point at night? You didn't make this point, which I didn't think was that big a point. Okay, so the crossing at the Red Sea happened at night. Yeah.
You know, maybe just the Nicodemus came to Jesus at night. Have we ever thought about that? I tend to be just simplistic in mind. Maybe that had nothing to do with anything. Right. But what did happen, what happened at the Red Sea? Now, we're going to read it, but what's your first impression of that? You're not thinking water and the Spirit there. However, when you read the story, well, water...
parts. And the reason it parted is because God sent a giant wind. Well, what happens right after he told him to be born of water and a spirit, you know, and then he goes about the wind. Yeah. Then he goes to flesh, gives birth to flesh. Now look, if his point was John's point was that you think Nicodemus, that just because you're born in the right nation, that you're going to be saved. Well,
And you piggyback that with John 1 when he said, I've given everyone the right to become children of God, not based on who your dad was or what country you came from or a husband's decision. Right. You see? Yep. But born of God. Heiser's point is, his point is he's trying to get Nicodemus to see based on John 3, 16.
For God sent his son to the world. He's trying to use this illustration to take him back because this event, they're still celebrating this today in Israel. This is like the event of Israel's liberation from Egyptian bondage. And it was a miraculous spirit led. If you take wind as a definition of what's the Hebrew word for spirit?
uh ruah yes same same spirit now before we read it and you go back to the creation itself what happened the spirits hovering over the waters and god divided the waters you have the same we have three moments that we could go that spans at least a couple thousand years here three thousand years
where something spectacular happened when the waters were divided and the Spirit entered the arena. Right. And now it seems like Jesus is referring to that because his point was his mind, when you start talking about water and Spirit, his mind, being Israel's teacher, would go back to this Red Sea encounter, right? However, now, once you read it,
Once I read this, and I agree with Heiser that I do think that this is involved in the context of what Jesus is talking about, it did make me disagree with his final analysis. And here's why. That's why I want to read this. So Exodus 14, verse 1, Then the Lord said to Moses, Uh...
Tell the Israelites to turn back. And I'm just going to hurriedly go through the story. Verse 2, they are to encamp by the sea. Verse 3, Pharaoh will think. Let me get my glasses. What chapter are you in? Exodus 14. Pharaoh will think the Israelites are wandering around the land in confusion, hemmed in by the desert. I will harden Pharaoh's heart and he will pursue them.
But I will gain glory for myself through Pharaoh and all his army, and the Egyptians will know that I am the Lord. So the Israelites did this. And Al, you can set the stage on what led to this encounter, but this is basically God freeing the Israelites from Egyptian bondage. Yeah, they had been through all the plagues. I mean, they had been pushed out, and now here they were. ♪
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changed their minds about them and said, what have we done? We have let the Israelites go and have lost their services, which I thought was a fantastic verse. Yeah. Because when you're in bondage, you're basically serving, because I'm going to make a spiritual application to this later.
And so, because God liberates us through the new creation from being under the services of the evil one, which is very powerful. So, verse 6. So he had his chariot made ready and took his army with him. He took 600 of the best chariots along with all the...
Chariots of Egypt, this would make a great movie. With officers all over them, the Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh, king of Egypt, so that he pursued the Israelites who were marching out boldly. The Egyptians, all Pharaoh's horses and chariots, horsemen and troops, pursued the Israelites and overtook them. Verse 10, as Pharaoh approached, the Israelites looked up and there were the Egyptians marching after them. They were terrified and cried out to the Lord.
They said to Moses, was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you brought us to the desert to die? So now they're- It's just kind of been their theme. We did all this, and now we're going to be killed. Because now they're trapped. You've got to remember, they've literally gone to the edge of the sea. They were encamped there. Nowhere to go. Well, there's nowhere to go. Why? What are you going to jump in the sea? What happens when you jump in the sea? You drown. You also die. So that's why. It wasn't just because they're-
They're being chased that they're going, they're trapped. So where am I at? What have you done to us? Yeah, what have you done to us by bringing us out of Egypt? Didn't we say to you in Egypt, leave us alone, let us serve the Egyptians? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert. Now they're grumpy because they're fixed to die. There's nowhere to go. You can either be killed by the army or you can jump in the sea and drown.
Moses said, don't be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance will bring you today. The Egyptians you see today
You will never see again. The Lord will fight for you. You need only to be still. Now, I'm going to stop. You could almost preach a sermon over that. Oh, Al, there are hundreds of sermons about this, and I want to show you another way how people misinterpret Scripture. And I've heard this. People say, I mean, Exodus 14, the Lord will fight for you. You just only need to be still. There's been songs written about it. You know what's crazy?
Is that sound so good? And then the next verse, you know what God says about that? The Lord said to Moses, why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to move. I thought I literally laughed out loud when I read that. People say, Moses had this great speech and he's like, just be still. The Lord's going to fight for us. Then God says, hey,
You idiot. Tell him to move. And he didn't say idiot. But I just want to make the point that God had something else in mind here. And it was in their minds approaching something that would guarantee death. We can't move. There's nowhere to move. That's why this is so profound.
He's like, move. Where are we going to move? We got a sea on one side and we got an army on the other. So watch what happens. And then I'll make the application. Verse 16, raise your staff and stretch out your hand over the sea to divide the water so that the Israelites can go through the sea on dry ground. I will harden you.
The hearts of the Egyptians so that they will go in after them. And I will gain glory through Pharaoh and all his army through his chariots and his horsemen. The Egyptians will know that I am the Lord when I gain glory through Pharaoh, his chariots and his horsemen. Then the angel of God who had been traveling in front of Israel's army withdrew and went behind them. The pillar of cloud also moved forward.
from in front and stood behind them, coming between the armies of Egypt and Israel. Throughout the night, there's the night, the cloud brought darkness to the one side and light to the other side. So neither went near the other all night long. Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea and all that night, the Lord drove the sea back with a strong east wind."
So then you know the end of the story.
the Egyptian army, and threw it into confusion. He made the wheels of their chariots come off so that they had difficulty driving. And the Egyptians said, let's get away from the Israelites. The Lord is fighting for them against Egypt. Then the Lord said to Moses, stretch out your hand over the sea that the waters may flow back over the Egyptians and their chariots and horsemen. He did that. The Egyptians were fleeing toward it.
and the Lord swept them into the sea. The water flowed back and covered the chariots and horsemen, the entire army that Pharaoh had followed the Israelites into the sea. Not one of them survived. So I do think that is applicable to the story, and maybe that is the context that he wanted Nicodemus to go back to. Yeah.
So the end result is, if that is the context based on the, you're an Israelite, you should know, if he was talking about the Red Sea. And I do want to mention, there is a little credibility. 1 Corinthians 10. I wanted to read it. To that, be an analogy. So if you read 1 Corinthians 10, now that we're going forward, he says, for I do not want you to be ignorant of the fact, brothers, that our forefathers were all under the cloud of
and that they all passed through the sea. They were all baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea. They all ate the same spiritual food and ate the same spiritual drink, for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, which was Christ. Nevertheless, God wasn't pleased with them because once they got out, you would think that they would all follow him faithfully, but then they didn't.
Began to have other problems. But the point of our discussion here is, so then, so what does this mean? So I was going to give you the three things that people disagree on, on what John 3 is talking about. And I'm saying I'm offering a fourth example.
So here's the three things. People say, what does water mean when it says, unless he is born of water and the Spirit? Or he can't enter the kingdom. And he also said, unless you're born again, you can't see the kingdom. So we're talking about entrance into the reign of Christ, the king of kings. Correct. Which we have multiple times said, we believe that happens now, forever.
and later. Now, in that, as you surrender to Jesus, and I would argue, are baptized into Christ and receive his spirit, you enter the kingdom. But,
You enter it later in that when he comes back, you then get a new imperishable body to dwell with God. Which he modeled for us by his own glorified resurrection. Well, one's entering and the other is a full consummation of what's already been begun. That's a good way to put it. Good caveat, Zach. So here's your three options. You can believe that the water means...
uh being born as a human yeah because the next verse says verse six flesh gives birth to flesh but the spirit gives birth to spirit i would argue that i don't think that is what he's talking about just because i think the context is that he was born within the israel
So that's what that reference is. Go back to John 1, 12. And I would also argue, and this is kind of graphic, but I don't know any other illustration or how to put it, is if it was that, then you would also be saying that an unborn baby is somehow, what are we going to do about that? If water is being born as a human, right?
Well, what about when you're in the womb? Yeah. You see what I mean? Sure. What happens when the water never breaks? Are they not a human? I don't think any person on the planet who follows Jesus would say that. Like he said, in order to see the kingdom, you have to be born. Well, what if you're not born?
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Well, exactly. I believe heaven or heaven, the new heaven and earth will be filled with unborn babies. I believe they will be a part of the afterlife. Well, when we looked at John the Baptist back in Luke two, Luke one and Luke two, he had the spirit of God in the womb. Yeah. He wasn't born yet. What were you going to say is that, what was your point? I, yeah, and I also, I've always found that explanation, uh,
to be lacking in that Nicodemus' whole framework when he hears the phrase born again, he says, how can I... He immediately went there. How do I enter my mother's womb and be born a second time, which is kind of a weird imagination that he paints there. But he's thinking physical birth, and he's thinking, I don't want to get too graphic here, but he's thinking the physicality, the physical impossibility of a full-grown man
re-entering his mother's womb and coming out again. That's what he's asking. He's like, that's not possible. Because he only viewed it as being born as an Israelite. So it makes sense for them to say, yeah, you got to be born of the mom. It doesn't make sense. But it's an option. And look, lots of people believe that. I've read it before. Then you option two. And look, there's more options. I think these are the most critical options.
These are the most credible. Option two is that water is that Red Sea moment, which is what Heiser thought, that it's just being born into Israel. And...
But it's mainly a response to option three, which people in the camp I came from say that this is talking about being baptized. Right. So to receive God's Spirit. Now, he made the point, the reason he didn't think it was that is because, well, why would he be bringing up something that hasn't happened? He's like, this is a Christian's baptism. That wouldn't make any sense.
That's why the reason I disagree with him is, well, so is the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Yeah, because that hasn't happened. So that's not a good argument. That's the argument he gave. And Dr. Heiser is no longer on the planet. I hate to disagree with someone that's gone on to be with the Lord. Because I don't think this is some kind of deal breaker argument. This is a very difficult passage to understand. What was he talking about? So I'm in option four.
which is, I believe, it's option two and three. I do think the context is this Red Sea occurrence with the waters dividing and the Holy Spirit and that being later fulfilled into the new exodus that Jesus was talking about, being freedom from the control of the evil one, being freedom from your sin. And I have a lot of reasons for that.
But I do believe he was looking forward to baptism when someone surrenders. Now look, the reason that I think he doesn't believe that is because maybe we need to have a conversation on what exactly is that baptism. But I think it lines up because of verses like this. I want to read Galatians 3. So when you read Galatians 3.26, it seems to fit what I'm proposing here.
Because in verse 26, it says, you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For all of you who are baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. And look what the first thing says on the next verse. There's neither Jew nor Greek. Well, I think that's the context of John 3. He's saying God sent Jesus for the whole world. There's a new exodus that I'm bringing forth, and it's for everyone.
And so, yes, I'll give you a story that you're familiar with, with the Red Sea and all that and the water and the wind. But I do believe that's how he was luring him in. But he was also looking forward to when people are baptized, which is not, of course, then you come up with the argument, well, what are you saying? There's something you can do. And no, I'm like, it's just like the Red Sea moment. They were viewing getting in that water as death.
You see what I mean? Sure death, but God did the working in that situation. So I think when you're baptized, I think to go off on Romans 6,
He's asking you to die, to surrender, and I'll work it out. Literally jump in the Red Sea, and I'm going to part the waters. So the spiritual application of that, I think, is very powerful. Yes, say something. Yeah, I think if you think about this motif in Scripture that moves from Genesis all the way to our moment that we're in now, there's other water stories. You mentioned the creation account where the Lord split the waters.
There's also next, I think the next one would be the floodwaters. Then there's the waters of Joshua, where the Jordan actually parted as well. In Joshua 4, verse 23, I want to read this. For the Lord God dried up the Jordan River.
Because they did the same thing. They got to the Jordan River. Where do we go? It's very similar to the Red Sea. Where do we go? We go through the Jordan. Well, they cross over. The Lord dried it up before you and you had crossed over. The Lord your God did to the Jordan what he had done to the Red Sea when he dried it up before us until we had crossed over.
Here's verse 24, and this connects to what you just read in Galatians. He did this so that all the peoples of the earth, Jew and Gentile, might know that the hand of the Lord is powerful so that you might always fear God.
Now, this is he's talking in an immediate context. I want everybody or all the nations around to be fearful of Israel. But I think there's also the bigger context of God. This is this is also echoed. It's when when Jesus crossed into the Jordan and got baptized, it's connected to this to this moment to the Jordan River. And so here's where the other part plays in with Noah.
Like, the reason why I do think you're right, and I'm not saying that we might have to disagree on what baptism is, but I think it's what the waters represent here. I think Peter gives a good language for this because Noah was saved also through water. If you think about it, God killed, just like he killed all the Egyptians and washed their problems away. Hey, Zach, look, Al, where am I at? Where was I going next? Yeah, same thing. I was going to 1 Peter 3. However...
Due to time, we're not going to be able to get into that. So I just think this is a part... Are we out of time? We are out of time. Wow. But I think this becomes an important part one because we did have to go down the rabbit trail because it's such a hard thing to wrap your head around. And I do think we need to have that discussion on what exactly is baptism because I think the reason...
that people say, well, it can't be baptism here, you know, talking about the water. Well, maybe we need to understand what exactly baptism is. Because look, I think all three of us are agreeing. Jesus is what, what,
is saving us it's what saved us and it what is saving us which is why he told the other story which i'll get into next time about moses and the snakes and the bronze snake yeah that that ties it together to exactly what you're saying but we don't have time to get there today so i just wanted to propose because it this is a very difficult passage right but i think in effort to be fair
In that moment, I do think he was talking to Nicodemus in an Israelite context. And I really believe the red partying of the Red Sea because it was the most monumental event in their history. They immediately, you start talking about water, sea, and wind, and that's where they're going, liberation. But if you're hung up on the water part, just, I know we're out of time, but just, here's what Peter says. It's not the removal of dirt from the flesh.
So don't get caught up on the water. You're missing it because you get caught up. Well, exactly. Water doesn't save anybody. You're missing what baptism is. Well, I agree. And that's where I want to go into part two. And then we can get, what do you call it, the meta-narrative of the bigger picture, which is what I believe is God sent his son to save the world. Yeah.
And look, you can be born again. You can be into the kingdom. You can start over. You can have a new exodus. I mean, all these things are the greater point. So Unashamed Nation, just pray that Jace, between today, Wednesday, and next Monday when we record again, that he will remember where he left off so we can pick this discussion up next time.
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