Ep 957 | Jase Delivers an Urgent Call for Strong Fathers in the Wake of the Georgia School Shooting
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Ryan Reynolds here for, I guess, my 100th Mint commercial. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I mean, honestly, when I started this, I thought I'd only have to do like four of these. I mean, it's unlimited premium wireless for $15 a month. How are there still people paying two or three times that much? I'm sorry, I shouldn't be victim blaming here. Give it a try at mintmobile.com slash save whenever you're ready. For

$45 upfront payment equivalent to $15 per month. New customers on first three-month plan only. Taxes and fees extra. Speeds lower above 40 gigabytes. See details. I am unashamed. What about you? I probably got a few parasites, but... You got a few. We all do. When we were young, Jace, we used to get wormed.

Because we'd get worms. And from being barefoot, I guess. I mean, I don't know what causes that. Like you'd worm a dog? Yeah, they would worm us. They rub your throat and they put the big pill in there and rub your throat like that. It would be these pills that you took. Zach, let me give you a cricket word since you're into those words. It was called human worming.

Human worming. I've never heard of that. Yeah. I don't think we were ever. When you live by the riverbank and you spend a lot of time in trash piles and mud. So how often did you get worms? I think it was once a year. Once a year.

Like when you say they, who is that? Dad and mom. They were warming us when we were five years old. Well, and then my famous story, Dad, about you was that someone threw their worm pill behind the space heater, and it was Dad who did it, and he didn't own up to it, so everybody got a whip.

And everybody got the peels, too. And everybody had to retake the peels. Retake the peels. That's where that came from. You know, line everybody up. Phil did that a couple of times in our childhood. Oh, yeah. We couldn't figure out who the guilty party was. Somebody was not coming. He just said, you know what? All of you get up. That's right.

Well, it was like the time we got drunk, Dad. It was the last whipping I ever got from you. I think I was 15. And we all got drunk. 15? Oh, you were older than that. No, 15.

With W and all that. Yeah, 50. That wasn't the last time you got drunk. That was the last time you got a whip. Well, right. It was the last time I got a whip. Some guy was there visiting, and I said, son, I don't know who you are. Wrong place at the wrong time. Bid over at the truck. Because that was a... I probably felled on his butt. He'd give you some commentary, Jay. I think what Phil said, I remember that. Yeah, I guess I was...

You would have been about... I thought I was 10 or 12. Well, you were. You'd been 11. And because you stuck that belt in my face after I watched you whip four grown men with a belt. Here's how it went, because I remember that. He basically said, first, we can either...

if y'all want to try to whip me, we can go that route or I'll whip you if you want to hang around my son. And Red and Bigfoot

Bill's mom and dad, his stepdad, were standing there. They were watching all this because he said... They said, please discipline him. Yeah, because dad was like, I mean, do I want to whip him or do you want me to? And they were like, no, you get him, Phil. We have sanctions behind you all the way. It started with, do y'all want to just fight? Or if you want to hang around my son, you must endure...

Yeah, and he gave them the option to leave. They could leave. He said, you could leave because I don't think— You don't have to take this. You can leave. He didn't want a lawsuit coming on. Because this one kid had never been down there before. And never been back. And never been back. 30 years later, the guy, the one that was leaning over the truck when I said, I don't know who you are, wrong place at the wrong time. His name was Terry. And 30 years later, he called me. He said—

Thank you for straightening us out. He actually came to church, Dad, and told you that. I was going to say that. He spent a career in the Air Force after that. I was going to give you the sing song. So when Phil got him up and he synchronized the belt –

To the behind, he said, I don't know who you are, but you tell your daddy why you got this. That was the... Every time he said a word... It's a syllabic. It's a syllabic beating. Yeah, it's a syncopation there. I never heard from his parents, so I always accepted it as they were all in. And that was risky to do that. Well, it was a different era for sure.

But we deserved it. But I did realize, Jase, the reason he opened with that, you know, hey, if you don't want to fight me like a man, because we were old enough now to know better. And Dad was, like, realizing that, you know, he wasn't going to be – even though I appreciate him trying in that moment and it didn't work because I still had about three more years of wandering. By the way, it all came out well for each individual. Oh, I say all the time, I call it tough love because –

When you're telling somebody this is the wrong way to go and doing everything you can to try to get them on the straight and narrow, I look back on that, and I respect every bit of that. There's no resentment on my part. Well, I mean, I don't know when this podcast will air, so I'll give some disclaimers here. But, I mean, even yesterday, everybody's back to school. It's early September. And then there was a school shooting in Georgia. Yeah. And it's a fluid investigation, and I mean, I've only watched five minutes of it.

But, I mean, it was a 14-year-old boy who they said had threatened to do this online last year when he was 13. Wow. And, of course, what did you do? They had gone to the dad and said, hey, your son, of course, he denied doing that. And so that's why I said it's a fluid investigation. I read that and saw that. And then, lo and behold, he does it. So he was already marked as...

a danger. And here you have this situation, but it reminded me of that movie. Remember that movie years ago? I'm sure you saw it. It was named Red. It's rated R, so if you go watch it, I can't remember exactly what you'll see, but it was rated R. But I really like the movie. It's a very quirky movie. It's not the one...

There was another movie came out that I never watched with Morgan Freeman. Yeah, that's what I was. No. This movie, if you hadn't watched it, because it's at least, can you find that, Maddie? Well, let's get a year on that. Red, I can't remember the main actor's name. But, and if I tell you the movie, you'll probably remember. So this guy, old man's out fishing and three young ewes come up, 15 to 17, I guess.

And the guy's fishing. He got his dog there. Well, they tried to rob him. Let's see. We're looking at the... 2008? I think that's it. 2008. Who's the main actor? That's Brian Cox. Brian Cox. That's it. So he's a...

Oh, look at that. So it's 7.0. Oh, Tom Sizemore's in it too. Yeah. So what happened was... An aging widower seeks justice after the callous sons of a wealthy businessman kill his beloved dog. Yeah, so he's fishing. They try to rob him. I've never seen this movie. Look, the kid... The reason I remember the movie is because the kid is... He's carrying around a Browning A5 shotgun that you always loved, and I have several of those. And he just...

Shoots the man's dog. I mean, like, at five feet. So you're like, where's this going? But it was old school because the man basically goes and finds out. He did two things. He didn't call the police. He did two things. He went and found out where the father of this kid was, and he just knocked on the door. And so the guy let him in and said, well, what will you need? He's like, well, your son shot my dog.

So he called his son down there, and the son said, wasn't me. Of course, he's looking at him. He just saw him yesterday shoot his dog. He's like, oh, yeah, it was you. And he had his buddy with him. He said, you was with him. Tell him. And the dad was like, hey, said he didn't do it. That was it. So the whole movie is about basically this Cox fellow,

He just couldn't let it go. He's like, you need to take responsibility for your kids. And the second thing he did, he went and talked to a lawyer. But the crime was considered a misdemeanor. It was like cruelty to animals. He's going to get a fine and get 30 days in jail. And he's like, he blew my dog's head off, tried to rob me. What are you kidding?

And so I won't, if you want to watch the movie, it's fine. It's rated R. So I can't remember if there's anything suspect in it. But the reason I remember that movie is because now that kind of behavior seems crazy. And it, but it reminded me when that school shooting, when I read that, because when they confronted the threats the year before, well, the kid was like, I didn't do that. Yeah. Wasn't me.

And then, you know, I'm sure they have it. It's not like once you put something online, you know, they, yeah. And they had a quote from the dad is like, well, we had guns, but he wasn't allowed access to them. So problem solved. Well, he got access to an AR 15 and shot the school up, but it just reminded me of that story. I was like, I mean, the movie is a quirky movie, but, uh,

I think you see when we're in the context of what we are of models of families and husbands and wives and your kids and talking about discipline and what we call old school. Because now I just thought, you know, you won't see movies like that ever again. No. You know, because in his mind, he thought, well, I'm going to go. Where's the dad at around here? Let's go have a conversation. But then you saw where the problem was. Yeah. Dad was like, hey, he didn't do it.

He just, it was just like the guy, dad, that time when we were living in apartments before we moved out here and you looked over and saw there was some twins that lived across from us and they had your fishing poles. Yep. And so. Rod and reels. Rod and reels. And so dad goes over, knocks on the door, the dad opens the door and he's like, your kids have taken my fishing poles out of my truck. And he, he looked at you and he said, well, they weren't locked up.

And you said, no, they were in the back of my truck, but they're mine. And he says, well, you don't lock stuff up. That's what happens.

I mean, now this is a dad whose kids are there, and he's defending them stealing because it wasn't under. Yeah, you're the problem because you didn't lock it up. Yeah, and it's your fault, you idiot. Did Phil give him the option to fight him? I don't remember what happened, but this guy didn't know. Dad was a brand-new Christian and a pretty rough hombre. I don't know that this man knew. And I'm sure he was armed. Yeah, I don't know that this man knew just how bad of a move. But you didn't do anything to him that I recall. I don't remember. Just.

took when I didn't got my stuff. If you ever gave me the option to fight you or to take, I would have taken the butt whipping, but I'd heard the stories, you know, and I'd heard my dad, mom told me a story. I don't know if it's true or not.

that you killed a bobcat with your bare hands. You reached inside of the cage, thought it was dead, and it was alive. It was a steel trap, and I put him to sleep. I said, if you kill a bobcat with your bare hands and you offer... He's not a man to be trifled with. And you say, do you want to fight me or take a butt whip? And I say...

I'll take the back with me. Then that was dad's point to us because all those guys with me that day were older than me. And he realized if y'all want to act like real men, then all right, let's do real men stuff. I remember this vividly. He said, hey, and there's four of you. Y'all may whip me. He said, but you'll never forget it the rest of your life. Right.

I mean, we really do need more of that. Guess what, Zach? There were no takers. We all lined up. Yeah, y'all chose wisely. But, you know, we laugh because one of them guys became one of our better friends.

But look, I'm just going to tell you, at that stage of his life, he was a bully. Yep. And there's a lot of bullies on our campuses, you know, in high school. And that's the only way you can deal with them. Somebody's got to step up and say, hey. Who was the bully, Bill? W.E. Oh, was he? He bullied me because I was trying to turn them in for all the... I'd already been telling Bill and Kay all what they're doing, but they were like...

They weren't believing me because I was the snitch. Yeah, he was the snitch. Al did a pattern where as soon as he got away from our parents, he would act totally contrary, but in my presence. And so I would turn him in.

And we know how Jay says about hypocritical things. That's right. It's about integrity, Al. It's about integrity. Oh, it was. It really didn't bother me what you were doing. It bothered me that he was lying about it. And I was like, just integrity. But as it turned out, they all turned out sons of God. We did. Well, it all happened at the back of a Cadillac with a belt. That's it. Good.

It was a Chrysler day. They were old enough. That's why I was surprised you said you were that age because they were older. They were all a couple years older. They seemed like grown men to me. And I thought, is he literally fixing to whip the butts of these men that he doesn't know? He didn't. And that's what he did. But what y'all did was really bad. I mean, it was a public. Y'all went and got all drunked up.

And a lot of people saw y'all. Y'all disrupted them. It was a bunch of camps. They're still down there. And we tore up a bunch of stuff that wasn't ours. I mean, we wreaked havoc. It was vandalism. It was a night of havoc. Yeah, I remember it. And then I didn't realize that Keith Powell was sitting there on the porch with me that day. He witnessed it. I never knew that. It was actually criminal behavior that you could have gone to jail for. Yeah, that's exactly right. Because we had to go apologize to all the people we messed their stuff up. And it was a walk of shame.

We're down here on the edge of our hunting property. Not always good cell coverage here, Jase. Have you noticed that? It's called spotty. Spotty.

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No, but it wasn't long after that, Dad, because that didn't turn me, which probably says something about we get to the point where it's a heart issue, which it was with me. So a year later when I was 16, I graduated high school, and by now everything's catching up with me and my lies wouldn't cover me. You lie so much, to Jay's point, sooner or later it's all going to pile up on you. But you sat me down and said, you got to go.

You got to change or leave. That's what you tell me. He said, we want you here, but you got brothers. You got your lifestyle. If you want to go live it, go do it. But you can't do it here. And so I did. That's when I left. So I was gone a couple of years. How old were you when you left? I just turned 17. You repented and came out there in the yard. We were sitting there. You would come walking up. And that's when...

I said, well, get the fish out. Your exact line was, welcome home, son. We got duck calls to build. And I represented the older brother in Luke 15. I said, don't do it. He's lying. He's lying. Don't let him back. I was the younger brother in the story, but the older brother and Jason, we were flipped. I said, don't do it. Were you nervous about going back, Al? No.

Oh, yeah. But, I mean, I knew I had messed up. But I also knew what they didn't know was I really had a moment. Because I almost died. It was a dangerous moment. Oh, I almost died. I mean, I came very close to losing my life. Yeah, and after I heard the details and watched for a while, you know, I came around. But then you knew, right? Well, right. All I knew was terror. I was like, this guy's made my life miserable. Get him out of here. Yeah.

Jace, will you vouch for him now, though, after all these years? Oh, yeah. We're very close now. He did good. But, Zach, you said in the last podcast, and I thought you said it well, that you can change. Absolutely.

And we think people will say, you know, oh, that old guy, leopard never changes his spots. When you give in and submit to Christ fully and whatever it takes to get you there. And put this into practice. That's exactly right. Then your life can completely change. And that's what happened to me. I mean, for four years, I was a liar, a

A drunk, an adulterer. And your dad, the one that was now putting discipline on the table. Had been there too. I...

I was walking in your shoes or my shoes. And part of that, the psychology of that was part of my response, I think, when I got to that age. Because I had already seen the lifestyle. It was terrible. I lived it. It was miserable. So why would I want to go and do the same thing? You talk about the evil one playing a trick on you. And yet I was walking down the same path. But the good news is I figured it out at 18.

because I meet a lot of people that don't figure it out like you to 28 or 35. And then you just have a, just a trash bags of, you know, litter in your life from stuff you've done. But what I'm saying is that's where we're at in Ephesians five and six. And that, you know, as we were all growing in our faith at that time, Phil was relatively a new Christian. You became a new Christian. I became a follower of Jesus during that, just a couple of years after that.

But I've always had a heart since then for people in our society, not so much based on that story, but seeing that story lived out as evidence of what Ephesians 5 and 6 is saying. Yes. And I've told the story many times on this podcast, but when I was newly married and I had a neighbor who I thought was 30 years old and he was getting drunk with my other neighbors.

And, uh, and just acting weird. He was hanging out in my backyard. He was scaring my wife is what he was. Every time I saw him, he was drinking beer. And so I pulled up one day after work and, uh, he was standing in my backyard. Cause there was a fence with a little gate on it, you know, that connected my yard and his yard. But I'm like, you're all, you know, I'm all for you coming over if you're invited or whatever. But when my wife's

here by herself and you're he was just drinking beer in my backyard yeah so i decided to confront him about because i pulled in i was like what is this guy doing and so because my wife had told me she's like this guy is like hanging out in our backyard i don't feel comfortable alone and uh so when i approached him when i got close to him he's a huge fella i would say

Probably six, four, 320 pounds. He looked like an offensive tackle. But when I got close, I realized in the face he was a kid. And, of course, I didn't know how old he was, but he's a huge human being. And I was like, hey, what are you doing in my backyard drinking beer? There's beer cans on my grass.

That dude started cussing me and threatening to kill me kind of in gangster lingo. Half of it, I wasn't even getting, but I mean, he was like, I'll shoot you with a nine millimeter blankety blank, blank, blank. I'll put a cap in you. Yeah. It was that kind of language. But, you know, I went back to that because I thought we got a Cadillac story, right? We're at the back of the Cadillac. I'm not going to be threatened on my own property, but

by some drunken teenager who's bullying people, you know? And I literally gave Phil the same speech. I was like, well, I'll tell you what. You don't seem to be armed right now. So if you want to fight like a man in my yard, do it. And you may whip me, but you will never forget what's fixing to happen right now. And so I said, where's your daddy? And he was like, I ain't got no daddy. And I was like, well, I'm fixed to be your dad. Yeah.

I'm your daddy. I'm your daddy. I went with the I'm your daddy line. Pedro Martinez. And I did. And I kind of shared my faith. I mean, I was like, here's who we are. I'll help you. But, you know, and if you shoot me, shoot at me, you better not miss. I'm a good shot because you will go down.

That was the nature of the conversation. This was mano a mano. So about two hours later, I hear a knock on the door. We were actually fixing to have a men's Bible study group that night. Well, it's him. And in his hands, he had, I didn't know what it was at first. Turned out it was all his marijuana and drug paraphernalia.

And I said, what's that? And he's like, this is all my drugs. I was like, I ain't doing any drugs with you. And he's like, no, I know. I'm saying you're going to be my daddy. I'm ready to give it up. Let's get rid of this. That's quite the story. I remember. So I turned on the garbage disposal. And that's the first thing we did. Because I thought he was trying to set me up. I thought the cops would fix the show up at any moment.

And, you know, it was a long journey, but I really became that guy's dad for a couple of years. Whatever happened to him? I don't know. The last time I saw him, he was actually, you know, had a little uniform on one of the fast food restaurants, walking down the road, and I picked him up and carried him to work. But the fact that he was working, because we had moved from that house then, I just happened to see him. He's hard to miss. Yeah.

And, yeah, he came to the Lord. It took two years for him to come to the Lord. He just listened for two years. I carried around. I tried to get him in football, but, you know, in different things. I was like, you need to be on the offensive line. But, I mean, I think it was a positive experience. I mean, at least he didn't wind up.

being the focus of some kind of shooting investigation. - He had the potential to do it. - Exactly. He was into that gangster world. It was the same thing you see, the violent video games, the watching pornography 24/7. All he had was his grandma. What's she gonna do? And here's this guy who's bullying everybody and somebody needed to step up. Now, was I uncomfortable in the moment? Yeah. And I thought, could he have killed me? Yeah, probably still could.

but and way back then you weren't that much older than him maybe just a few years oh yeah i mean you were young yeah i'm not saying i was gonna whoop him but i'm just saying that like you you weren't even thinking to take on a role i mean you your kid you don't even have kids at that point did you yeah i well i think we might have just i don't believe it did yeah i don't we're talking maybe not you were you were in your early 20s early 20s yeah but uh

And since then, I've had various roles where, because what our society needs are these father figures, you know, when things like in cases like that. That's what's missing. I'm involved in one right now. Same kind of deal. But I think we, I mean, the text is talking about the ideal father.

And husbands and wives in Jesus becomes a beautiful thing. I think it shows that there is a creator. This was God's design because it is beautiful and it is best.

so i don't know about you guys uh but when my wife is fired up you know she's been to a conference or she's read a great book and man she finds something great spiritually it fires me up zach does are you affected the same way i am al i love it when when i love it when jill loves jesus more yeah it just makes everything better right

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And Zach even, he painted that picture in the last podcast saying,

of sexuality as God created it. And then it creates life. But the, the idea is, is the responsibility continues on generationally. So you got the, you got the parents, then they become grandparents and the beautiful things that we all get to the point physically, obviously we're married as long as we all have been, you don't have kids anymore, but you get the joy then of your kids now having created that same life. So you got those children, grandchildren, but when you can do that generationally,

You have that influence. You have those memories. Just what Jason described. It's a natural built-in device to be able to keep people from going off course and getting into all this stuff. I love that picture of the family too. Like even like extended family. Like we live here in North Carolina and

You know, I've got my brother and his wife and their whole family lives here, my sister, my dad. And then when we were in Louisiana, we had even like all the cousins. But if you look at the amount of influence that

Just for my people that I'm blood related to that love Jesus, that it's just a it's a community that surrounds my children. And that is an accountability. And that is a I mean, you want to my life. That's it. And I keep I love this painting, this picture of it ever again, that the opposite of that is awesome.

all by yourself and alone. It's what I guarantee. I don't know the story of the school shooter in Georgia, but I can guarantee you one thing. He was a loner because they all are right. You think, man, you get, it's not good for man to be alone. And that's, you get to look at like, I think sometimes we, we hear these, uh, we hear them as rules on sexuality. We read first Corinthians six, that, you know, flee from sexual morality. And we're like, man,

Man, that's limiting. On the surface, it does, right? You're limiting my pursuit of pleasure. This is, I mean, man, who would want to be a part of anything like that?

And even the way it's painted in the press and in current cultural media is that these are oppressive and these are limits that are put on your freedom. And it's painted in that way. But to see it in that way is actually to misunderstand it completely. God is not limiting you at all. What God is doing with these commands is he's actually giving you the pathway to

to experience true fulfillment and ultimate life, which by the way, you know what it is?

It's serving others. That's the whole picture that he's painting with the husband and wife in Ephesians 5. Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church. How did he do that? I've mentioned in the previous podcast, Philippians 2. He says, man, that's where real fulfillment is. It's like laying down yourself for somebody else and serving in sacrificial love. That's where fulfillment is. That's the picture that we keep moving toward. In our culture,

that's countercultural and you don't get there by sitting in the boat, drifting down river. You gotta, you gotta go against the, the, the flow of culture to get to that place that God wants us to be. Now, I'm glad you brought that up because, uh, you know, one of the guys in my inner circle brought up a, a good thought and he usually does just discussing what we discussed on the podcast, uh,

And the reason we're telling these stories is because you can read Ephesians 5, and if you're just looking at it from a rule standpoint, it becomes uncomfortable for people. But if you really look at it for how thrilling it is, what you have in Jesus,

and knowing what will work and what will become beautiful. We're putting real-life flavor into these texts. Well, it's being seen, and he brought up an interesting passage I'd never thought about that there's a story, and we can look it up, where a queen was inquiring about Solomon's kingdom, and she had heard all this stuff, but when she actually showed up, she had a line like,

Only half of what I heard is true because it was way more thrilling on what she saw. And the reason that he brought this up was, you know, this idea of hearing something or thinking something from a factual basis rather than seeing it for yourself.

Well, Jesus brought up that same story in Matthew 12. The story, by the way, that Jesus told me is 1 Kings 10. Yeah, the Queen of Sheba. There it is. And so Jesus brings that up in Matthew 12 where it says, the Queen of the South will rise at judgment with this generation and condemn it. For she came from the ends of the earth to listen to

to Solomon's wisdom. And now one greater than Solomon is here. And that's why when you read that story, you'll see that the whole point of it was she was saying that little line that said,

Only half of that, what I heard was true. Cause she was thinking, let me go look at this for myself. Well, Jesus is tapping into that. And the reason I brought it up is because the next paragraph gets into this idea. When Jesus was still talking to the crowd, his mother and brother stood outside wanting to speak to him. Someone told him your mother and brothers are standing outside wanting to speak to you. He replied, who is my mother and who are my brothers?

pointing to his disciples, he said, here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother. And he wasn't, you know, people who read that who are only looking at half-truth is saying, oh, Jesus was against family. Oh, no. It's just the contrary. He was saying there's something bigger that's motivating family dynamics and relationships, and that's me.

And so that's why when you read the previous verses to the husbands and wives, you remember this interesting thing where he says in verse 12 of chapter five, he says, for it is shameful even to mention what the disobedient do in secret, but everything is exposed by the light becomes visible for it is light that makes everything visible. That is why it said, and he makes this quote, wake up, oh sleeper, rise from the dead and

And Christ will shine on you. And that is kind of a mystery as far as where that came from, because it's not in any other verse in the Bible. You say, where's that from? So evidently it was a hymn or a song. But when you start thinking about the context of Ephesians and looking at how thrilling it

Being in Christ and having Christ as your focus is for your marriage, for your kids, you know, for your life, for your community, being a part of the church. I mean, it is thrilling. Once you come to him, it becomes way more thrilling and interesting.

It's not some set of rules or, you know, how do we get this right or what did he mean by that? I think that was his point, saying who my real family is. And I just think that's how we should approach it, the thrilling aspect of that. And even dissecting into that phrase, you think about, well, that's what happened.

When your old life that you shared your story was exposed, when it was brought to light, Christ started shining on you. And all of a sudden, everybody knew what the problem was. There was no secrecy anymore. There was no lie. It was just out there. It became visible. Well, that includes all these verses that we read. You remember the John 3 after the most famous verse ever?

For God so loved the world, he sent his only begotten son. Well, then that next section gets into the becoming exposed for Jesus.

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So it says verse 19 of John 3, "This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men love darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light so that it may be seen plainly that what he has done has been done through God." And I think that's what that little phrase means.

It's like you were dead, which is obviously a reference to what he had said earlier in Ephesians 2. Remember when he said, as for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins. And because of that, you were objects of wrath. But what happened? But Christ shined on you. You became alive.

You went from darkness to light. It's the same concept. And it's all over the New Testament. Yeah, and it becomes something that motivates you when you recognize it. I want to read you guys this. In 1 Kings 10, you were talking about the Queen of Sheba. Listen to what she got. When she looked and she saw all that Solomon had, she saw all the wisdom, here was her response.

And this is first Kings 10, nine praise be to the Lord, your God. So it's not her God, but she's recognized how great God is just from meeting Solomon who has delighted in you and place you on the throne of Israel because of the Lord's eternal love for Israel. He has made you king to maintain justice and righteousness.

Isn't it interesting that she took out of that the idea that there was goodness there because of who God was? And then she gives him 9,000 pounds of gold. 9,000 pounds. Four and a half tons of gold and precious stones and spices. But the reason why she did that is she was giving it to God. Right.

I mean, I firmly believe she was making that. Oh, that was it. That was an offering. And that was my point. She was trying to figure out what this guy was all about, but she was only listening to what other people were saying. Exactly. The whole point, I think, why Jesus brought it up was like, look,

Once you experience me, it's way more thrilling and way more beautiful than you could ever imagine. And I think that's what gets lost when you come to passages like this, because people are like, well, why would God set this up like this?

because he knows what's best for your life. And it's way more thrilling. Don't fight it till you try it and see it. And that's why we talk about this so much on this podcast, because I know there's so many of you out there listening. You're young. You're young in the faith. Maybe you're young in your marriage, and you got the stuff every day. And we mentioned how the evil one is setting all these traps and attacks for you and trying to get you to look at stuff you're not supposed to and talk to people. And you're like, man, I just don't know. It just seems like, how can I do this? We're trying to say...

You're on the right path if this word is leading you and the Spirit is living in you. Just be patient. Live it. Admit to it. Don't give up. Yes. I was thinking that 1 John 5 passage, and it talks about how we know we love God. And basically the answer is, well, you keep his commandments. But there's this amazing caveat he says in verse 3, and his commandments are true.

not burdensome. So if you view the commandments of God as a burden, as a joy kill or joy still, or like limiting or whatnot, you're, you're really misunderstanding what God has for you. And I would argue that, that you're, you're missing the, the, the benefit, the real joy of coming to him. And you see this in the old Testament too, in Psalms 84, it says the Lord, God is a son and shield. The Lord bestows favor and honor.

No good thing does he withhold from those who walk.

in him and do what is right. And I think that that's the big shift. I think that's why the world says they want you to see anything that is in the scriptures, anything that is in front of the kingdom ethic, which by the way, it is called an upside down kingdom for a reason because everything seems backwards, right? But they want you to view that as limiting or the evil one does. He wants you to view that as limiting and as a limitation of your own personal life.

pleasure and joy, but it is a life in the pits of hell. And all you got to do to know that it's a lie is just go the opposite route and say, what happens if I just pursue everything I want? Like nobody who pursues everything they want ends up in a place that's good. They end up either dead, hooked on drugs or in prison that you don't end up in a great place. When you say, I'm just going to, I think what I'm going to do, I'm going to serve myself.

Whatever I want, I'm just going to go after it and I'm going to get it. If that's how you approach life, I promise you, you are not going to end up in a place of joy, peace and fulfillment. You're going to end up in quite the opposite. So we know not doing this doesn't work. So, you know, why not at least try to understand what God has for us here and walking in his ways?

Yeah, and that's why we're bringing this up because I've had, as all of y'all have, numerous conversations on the couches and had people say, well, I love Jesus, but I'm not submitting to my husband. Yeah. I'm just out on that. So you're like, what do you do? Well, you read the text and say, yeah.

Yeah, you are. You know? Yeah. This is the way this is designed. And numerous husbands is like, who are abusing their wife in some capacity or whatever. And you're like, this is not, you're not loving her like Jesus loved the church. You're not loving her like, and it seems like it's a detachment. Right. And the bottom line is,

Their own faith in Jesus has to trump anything you can say and to experience. And I usually wind up saying that. Well, why don't you just try? Why don't you both see how you can be Jesus and find your God-given role in that? Just try. With an hour before boarding, there's only one place to go. The Chase Sapphire Lounge by the club. There, you can recharge before the big adventure.

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I've had many opportunities as well. I'll sit with a couple and they're going at it because obviously they've agreed to talk to you. And so they're going to tell you why the other person is wrong. And I noticed through all the years of listening, it's they use the word always and never.

A lot. Well, she never does this, and she never did that. The language of absolutes. Absolutes. He's always been this way, blah, blah, blah. So I listen to the always and nevers, and so, you know, and get to the end of it and say, okay, let me read you something. And I usually turn over to 1 Corinthians 13.

And so many times in the Bible, you see always and never are there, but it's always in love. Yeah. Love never fails. Love always protects. And when you can take that and then put it right up against the language that you're listening to, it sounds so petty. Yeah.

Yeah.

And then we realize that what grows and comes out of that is so special and beautiful. I mean, it's just, and then you're so proud of it, you know, and what it does. We know that anyone born of God does not continue to sin. The one who was born of God keeps him safe, and the evil one does not touch him. We know that we are children of God and that the whole world,

is under the control of the evil one we also know that the son of god has come and given us understanding so that we may know him who is true that's first john you talked about a while ago zach yeah it's a pretty powerful thing jesus makes all the difference in the world no doubt about it i mean it just gives you such an advantage go ahead zach boy yeah the

I was thinking, I mentioned that Philippians 2 passage. A lot of times you hear this. You'll hear someone say, you read that passage out of Ephesians. Your wife's meant your husband's. Husband's love your wife's as Christ loved the church. And the husband's like, oh, I'll die for my wife. No question about it.

But then the question is, but would you serve her? You know, would you put her needs before yours? Would you? And then those are the things. And you look at that Philippians 2 passage to love your wife as Christ loved the church. It's not just that you would take a bullet for her, although it's part of that. But, you know, you look in Philippians 2, the part about submitting yourself to death as Christ did. That's the last thing that's mentioned in a list of things.

And I wanted to read it because I think this is like if you read any of this passage in Ephesians 5 as oppressive,

then you have to understand this Philippians 2 passage because this is what a husband is called to do. The question I would have is, is any of this oppressive to women if a husband would embody this type of spirit? Here's what it says, that we should have the attitude of Christ Jesus, complete my joy by being in the same mind, verse 2, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing,

from selfish ambition. The husband, if he's going to love his wife as Christ loved his church, he does nothing from selfish ambition or conceit. But in humility, count others, count your wife, more significant than yourself. So right there, is that oppressive and limiting to women, or is this actually liberating? Verse 4, "...let each of you look not only to his own interest, but also to the interest of others."

having this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God something, a thing to be grasped, but he emptied himself. So the husband empties himself, taking the form of a servant. The husband becomes a servant, being born in the likeness of men, which that would just be the idea of

condescending way beneath what you are and being found in human form. He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. That's the call to the husband in Ephesians is to embody that type of sacrificial love. And the question you ask yourself, does that sound like an oppressive thing?

Union between man and woman, if that's what the husband is doing, I don't think you could make that case. Whenever I sign a book, Zach, I put Philippians 2, 3 through 5, what you just read, because that is it. And when somebody says, would you die for your wife? I always say I do every single day.

Yeah, well, I usually say, well, when are you going to start living for her? But I'll give you another argument. I tried this at the last marriage. I'm not a counselor, but I'm saying people knock on my door and they come in and here we go. I got a PhD in the school of hard knocks. I tried this one. It didn't go well, but I thought I would try it. And because it was, if you talk to one member of the marriage, now this is when a marriage has gone wrong. Yep.

They basically saying, well, it's all her fault, you know, and yada, yada. Married to Rome. And you talk to the wife and she's like, it's all his fault. I mean, it's ridiculous. So when I got to the man, I tried this because in Ephesians 5, you know, 25, it says, husbands love your wives. So I'm reading this because he just told me the nine million things that she has done.

Love your wives, just as Christ loved the church, gave himself up for, to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church without stain, wrinkle, or any other blemishes, but holy and blameless. In this same way, which is what Christ did for the church, in this same way,

Husbands ought to love their wives as their own body. I said in the same way, your job, based on what we just read, is to present her as holy and blameless, which seems to be contrary of what you just did by blaming her for everything. Your job is supposed to present her blameless and holy as a washed new creation. This is your job. That's why it's not making sense to me. Yeah.

It didn't go well. But my point is either this is true or it's not. So, because within all of our relationships,

There has to be forgiveness, accountability, transparency. Things are being made visible by the light. We're having tough conversations. That's what marriage is. It's just not rainbows and sunshines. It's daily struggles where you're trying to see, okay, how is Jesus being glorified in it? What do we need to do? What is the Spirit's model? I think every decision every day

should be wrapped around that. But at the end of the day, we're to present our wives as men.

As holy and blameless. Getting back to that Christ shining on you, look at this marvelous new creation that I get to spend eternity with. Well, he wraps that whole section in 33 by saying, each one of you must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband. So when Lisa and I do presentations, we've got one called lovable and respectable, and

And what we try to tell the people that we're speaking to is that if he's commanded me to love Lisa, you know, as he loves me, then her goal should be to be as lovable as possible.

Because make it easy for me. And if she's supposed to respect me, then I should be as respectable as possible. I should be working on that. So we always have a challenge. Men, Job 31, read it. And that's my assignment to you, Unashamed Nation. If you're a man and you want the respect of your wife, read Job 31. There's many things in there. I picked out seven.

And then wives, you ladies that are listening, if you want to be more lovable, read Proverbs 31.

And you'll see some characteristics and traits there, by the way, from back in the Solomon era that will help you be more lovable. You can't change your spouse, but you can change yourself. And Zach said it well, because of what God can do in you. So if you work on you, I can promise you in humility, you're going to get to where you want to go. And part of those respectable conversations is, I mean, one of the few things I'm good at in our marriage is when difficult situations come up,

with kids or whatever, I'm willing to have that conversation. You know, I mean, because you realize where your wife's strengths and weaknesses are during this process. And you usually grow the most, don't you, from going through something difficult. Oh, exactly. Because look, I'm always like, no matter what's happened, let's have a Jesus conversation. Let's find the path of where Jesus is in this.

And it's amazing. And how we lost sight of him in the process because that's what happens. Because the worldly thing is just to run, get mad. Or ignore it. Or isolate. Hide, yeah. Yeah, ignore. And just one of the practical things, I know we're out of time, but that's why I never, you know, my wife and I had a deal when we were dating. This started when we were dating because we heard so many couples talk bad about the other person.

like outside of their presence, especially with guys. I mean, if you, next time you're around a group of guys, just take note of how many negative things are said about some of their wives in jokes. And so we made a deal to never say anything negative about each other in public. That's a great practice. That's where it started. But it came from this idea of presenting her holy and blameless. And you know what will happen? You'll get in the habit.

of not only not doing it in public, but not even doing it in private. That's right. So if you're only positive, all of a sudden a respect develops from your wife. It's a great practice. I'm glad you said that. I concur with that 100%. All right, we're out of time. So next time we'll try to pick it up here in Ephesians chapter five. Aaron, six. Thanks for listening to the Unashamed podcast. Help us out by rating us on iTunes.

And don't miss an episode by subscribing on YouTube and be sure to click that little bell to get notified about new episodes. And for even more content that you won't get anywhere else, subscribe to BlazeTV at blazetv.com slash unashamed.