WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:09.520 Music. 00:00:09.515 --> 00:00:18.571 I'm Pastor Luke. I'm Pastor Cameron. And this is the Uncut podcast where we have uncut, honest conversations about faith, 00:00:18.868 --> 00:00:20.714 life, ministry. 00:00:21.005 --> 00:00:27.005 And today, we are finally having our first ever mailbag episode. 00:00:27.005 --> 00:00:28.240 Mailbag episode, yep. 00:00:28.725 --> 00:00:38.525 So we've got a list of questions. We're going to just kind of take them as they kind of sit and see where that kind of takes 00:00:38.525 --> 00:00:42.445 We'll see if we get through all of them or probably not. Yeah, probably not 00:00:42.445 --> 00:00:46.154 we'll see if maybe they take us down an interesting Avenue or not, but, 00:00:48.747 --> 00:00:54.705 Cameron do you feel like There's one there that you saw that you wanted to start with or do you just want to start that top one? 00:00:54.705 --> 00:01:00.545 I mean, I guess we can just there's you know without trying to make one question more important than the other we can just kind 00:01:00.545 --> 00:01:09.365 Of start at the top and all right take the go through the list So so the first one is about your sabbatical. So yeah, it says Cameron 00:01:09.365 --> 00:01:12.525 Can you reflect on your sabbatical? Did you have? 00:01:12.525 --> 00:01:16.285 Have any encounters with God. 00:01:18.841 --> 00:01:25.206 You know, a little background first, maybe if you weren't aware or don't cut a conduit or 00:01:25.206 --> 00:01:33.926 have just been listening or whatever. I took my first, I'll call it my first real sabbatical. 00:01:35.054 --> 00:01:45.992 In 18 years of full-time ministry this past summer. So about 12 to 14 weeks, 00:01:46.055 --> 00:01:51.806 weeks, something like that. I was off for most of the summer, most of July, August, 00:01:51.806 --> 00:01:54.766 September and like the first week or two of October. 00:01:54.766 --> 00:01:57.173 About three months. 00:01:57.766 --> 00:02:07.688 Yeah. And the purpose of the sabbatical was to get a little bit of space away from the. 00:02:08.408 --> 00:02:17.726 Daily tasks of ministry, I guess what you could call the grind of ministry. A lot of people don't 00:02:17.726 --> 00:02:28.926 always... They romanticize it. They romanticize ministry and work in churches as being just 100% 00:02:28.926 --> 00:02:38.286 percent, spirit-filled, full of miracles every day, like the most incredible job that you 00:02:38.286 --> 00:02:39.349 could ever possibly have. 00:02:39.646 --> 00:02:44.086 And I'm not saying it's not a great job. I mean, I like the job, but it's not that. 00:02:44.086 --> 00:02:48.046 I love my job, but it's also just a lot of hard work. 00:02:48.046 --> 00:02:58.146 When you've been pastoring long enough, if you're not incredibly self-aware 00:02:58.486 --> 00:03:05.401 and incredibly intentional right from the get-go, you end up carrying a lot emotionally with you. 00:03:05.617 --> 00:03:09.758 Things that you don't always deal with right away or that you don't process through. 00:03:09.966 --> 00:03:14.966 You have a lot of very difficult experiences. 00:03:17.356 --> 00:03:22.830 I've been with people on the worst days of their lives. Yeah. 00:03:23.829 --> 00:03:34.125 Also been with people on the best days of their lives. I've been at gravesides and I've been at the front of the sanctuary for a wedding. 00:03:34.125 --> 00:03:38.548 And all of the experiences in between. 00:03:39.556 --> 00:03:45.125 And then you have... You're still your own person and you have your own family things that you go through 00:03:45.125 --> 00:03:49.125 and insecurities and fears and anxieties and all of that. 00:03:49.125 --> 00:03:53.685 So sabbatical is an opportunity and it really is a gift, honestly. 00:03:53.685 --> 00:04:01.395 It's a gift that my church was able to and willing to give to me. 00:04:03.605 --> 00:04:10.525 They've become more common in people helping professions in recent years, haven't they? 00:04:10.525 --> 00:04:16.114 Sabbaticals, like I think they used to be kind of primarily just a unique thing to the past, 00:04:17.005 --> 00:04:21.005 but the world and outside of this, like people are becoming to recognize. 00:04:21.929 --> 00:04:25.665 That seasons of longer breaks than a long weekend 00:04:25.665 --> 00:04:27.952 are occasionally needed for like. 00:04:28.231 --> 00:04:29.599 Recalibration. Yeah. 00:04:30.005 --> 00:04:37.045 Yeah, to give some space to refresh and renew and recalibrate and all the RE words, 00:04:37.045 --> 00:04:38.791 then the only other place that I see them, 00:04:39.349 --> 00:04:46.065 maybe semi-regularly is in the academic world where maybe a professor is given a sabbatical 00:04:46.065 --> 00:04:50.908 for a semester, but that's almost always a working sabbatical. 00:04:51.085 --> 00:04:56.425 They're given a sabbatical from their teaching load so that they can go and write a book 00:04:56.425 --> 00:04:57.825 or whatever the case may be. 00:04:57.825 --> 00:05:06.405 I did not write any books on my sabbatical. What I did was I just got out of the, 00:05:07.265 --> 00:05:12.144 I got out of the every day, every week rhythm of Just Link. 00:05:13.062 --> 00:05:21.569 Churning out sermons and counseling people and leading staff and just the everyday, 00:05:21.957 --> 00:05:27.872 the everyday of work and pastoral ministry. And I got the opportunity to spend some extended time 00:05:27.872 --> 00:05:32.512 with my family, especially over the summer months when my kids are off school, five kids at home. 00:05:33.822 --> 00:05:41.152 My wife, we have a little farm that we manage and run. And as a family, we were able to do some 00:05:41.152 --> 00:05:49.152 things that we don't normally get the opportunity to do, both financially and time and stuff like 00:05:49.152 --> 00:05:58.832 that. We took an extended family vacation where we were gone for a week and a half, 10 days, 00:05:59.392 --> 00:06:06.752 almost two weeks, where we drove to Hershey, Pennsylvania and spent a day at Hershey Park. 00:06:06.752 --> 00:06:12.272 And then we got a hotel and kids did the pool thing and then traveled to Washington, DC 00:06:12.352 --> 00:06:16.352 and we walked around the concrete jungle on the hottest day of the summer with five kids. 00:06:16.432 --> 00:06:21.472 It was so much fun. Uh... Uh... 00:06:21.552 --> 00:06:24.432 And then stayed there the night again and then we went down to Myrtle Beach, 00:06:25.224 --> 00:06:28.798 and spent, you know, almost a week on the beach, which was really life-giving. 00:06:30.356 --> 00:06:39.610 Got an opportunity to do a counseling intensive with my counselor down in the Louisville, Kentucky area. 00:06:41.832 --> 00:06:53.192 Which was really helpful and I think long-term beneficial to me, encouraging, but also just helping me to process, 00:06:54.072 --> 00:06:59.512 through some of the things that I've carried with me, not just in ministry, but throughout my whole life. 00:06:59.512 --> 00:07:09.312 You know, you go into, as part of our like policy here at Conduit, we do have a sabbatical 00:07:09.312 --> 00:07:14.062 policy as part of our employee handbook. And so as part of that policy. 00:07:15.016 --> 00:07:22.830 I'm required to submit a sabbatical proposal, which gives here are the stated purposes or 00:07:23.066 --> 00:07:27.898 the hopes for the sabbatical. 00:07:28.266 --> 00:07:36.730 So I did that and a lot of it was around feeling renewed and restored and refreshed and revived 00:07:36.883 --> 00:07:40.474 and recalibrated and all of that. 00:07:40.906 --> 00:07:44.516 And I'm not gonna say that none of those things happened or those things didn't happen 00:07:44.746 --> 00:07:48.386 because there was a lot of that in that time away. 00:07:49.706 --> 00:07:56.219 But I think as it happens with most of life, you go into something with an expectation, 00:07:57.426 --> 00:08:01.906 you go into marriage with an expectation, you go into parenting with an expectation, 00:08:01.906 --> 00:08:06.906 you go into a new job field with an expectation. 00:08:07.466 --> 00:08:12.379 I know how it's gonna be. or at least I hope this is how it's gonna be. 00:08:12.506 --> 00:08:17.951 And then you get into it and you realize that for whatever set of circumstances, 00:08:18.586 --> 00:08:23.586 reality is not what the anticipation or expectation was. 00:08:24.906 --> 00:08:31.436 And that was somewhat true of me for sabbatical. I felt like it was going to be just completely restorative. 00:08:31.646 --> 00:08:46.926 And what I experienced was that God was eager, I think, to get me in a space where I slowed 00:08:46.926 --> 00:08:55.206 down a little bit on the day-to-day so that I was more keenly aware of the things that 00:08:55.206 --> 00:09:06.966 he was trying to reveal in my life that I was unwilling because of my pace to sit with 00:09:06.966 --> 00:09:08.966 long enough to become. 00:09:10.947 --> 00:09:19.037 Primary realities for me. Yeah. So all of those words like refreshing, renewing, restoring, 00:09:19.037 --> 00:09:29.117 recalibrating all the RE words, you know, really kind of sat to the side of a different RE word, 00:09:29.117 --> 00:09:38.717 which is revealing, like God, God, God needed to reveal some things to me, primarily around, 00:09:38.717 --> 00:09:46.797 you know, the relationship with my kids and my own upbringing and my own relationship with my parents. 00:09:47.830 --> 00:10:00.797 And my expectations of myself around my family and our kids' lives and their own histories. 00:10:00.797 --> 00:10:05.997 I think some people here, maybe many people know that we have five kids. They're all adopted and 00:10:05.997 --> 00:10:13.917 four of them are adopted out of the foster care system. And so there are some complexities to 00:10:14.026 --> 00:10:19.058 life and parenting for the line hearts that are, you know, maybe not everyone will have 00:10:19.211 --> 00:10:29.677 experienced before, but that were really important for me to see and to work with. 00:10:29.677 --> 00:10:34.797 So I think sometimes the assumption is that a pastor is going to come out of sabbatical 00:10:35.172 --> 00:10:45.557 with some having come to some really significant conclusions. And I feel like sabbatical led me 00:10:45.557 --> 00:10:50.035 to a place of introducing me to, 00:10:51.305 --> 00:10:57.129 a new family rhythm or a new family perspective. Yeah. Yeah. 00:10:58.920 --> 00:11:04.986 You know, if I can share just my reflections of- Right, because you certainly had a big role 00:11:04.986 --> 00:11:10.398 in the sabbatical as well. Yeah. You made it possible for me to do this, so. 00:11:10.766 --> 00:11:18.437 Yeah, I mean, it was a, that was, you know, that's a whole other like stepping into it as like a, 00:11:18.506 --> 00:11:25.466 stepping in for my first time as acting as like a senior pastor without any safety rails, as it were. 00:11:25.466 --> 00:11:31.546 You know, I wasn't calling you up and saying, like, hey, Cam, what do you think about this? 00:11:31.546 --> 00:11:39.836 Right. You know, which like I love doing now. I just walk over to your office and ask you a question if I'm like, you know, a little unsure about a decision or something. 00:11:40.844 --> 00:11:44.866 But there was an interesting, it's just different. 00:11:48.586 --> 00:11:53.026 Like that was the only way I really could like kind of articulate it was I remember coming in 00:11:53.026 --> 00:12:02.066 that first week when you were off and you were on sabbatical and I was just like, oh, like I'm the backstop. 00:12:02.226 --> 00:12:08.733 Like I'm where the book ends a little bit. Not that I was by any means alone. 00:12:09.306 --> 00:12:15.466 I had the staff team and I had lots of support from people, but there is a certain weight, 00:12:16.268 --> 00:12:21.946 that is just emotionally there. That's hard to describe unless you've kind of carried that. 00:12:24.406 --> 00:12:29.226 But I think one of the things that, and this applies to anyone who's listening, 00:12:31.786 --> 00:12:39.226 not just pastors who have the ability to take sabbaticals, but I think the temptation is to 00:12:39.226 --> 00:12:47.479 think that a sabbatical or a vacation or a particular singular event will, 00:12:49.522 --> 00:12:58.332 be the bandaid that fixes an unhealthy rhythm of day to day. Sure. Right. So like if, and I'm not 00:12:58.332 --> 00:13:03.612 telling you anything, I don't think you know. Um, like I know, you know that cause we talk about it 00:13:03.612 --> 00:13:09.612 here, like at staff and like constantly reminding each other, we need to be taking weekly Sabbaths. 00:13:10.750 --> 00:13:17.532 We need to be living with inside of our, our bodily earthly, emotional, mental limits. 00:13:17.532 --> 00:13:24.672 And if we're not, no, like if we are consistently pushing into the red, we're revving our RPMs up 00:13:24.672 --> 00:13:28.106 there and we're constantly living in the red, no, 00:13:29.112 --> 00:13:31.512 sabbatical will be long enough to fix that. 00:13:31.552 --> 00:13:38.392 Nope. And like that's, and so, same thing for anyone who's listening, whether you take sabbaticals or 00:13:38.549 --> 00:13:40.992 not, you just regular vacations or long weekends. 00:13:41.808 --> 00:13:50.272 If you are consistently living in the red, like Like there are days, weeks where you're gonna have to push into the red a little bit to get 00:13:50.272 --> 00:13:57.232 things done. But if you're living in the red all the time, like what at least what I've, 00:13:57.232 --> 00:14:02.752 I think has happened to me is like when I live in the red for a long time and then I get a bit of 00:14:02.752 --> 00:14:08.432 a break, I get sick. Yep. It's kind of what happened like the last couple of times I got sick on my 00:14:08.432 --> 00:14:14.432 honeymoon. And I don't think, I think some of that was due in part to just how frantic my life was 00:14:14.666 --> 00:14:16.592 up until the wedding. 00:14:16.592 --> 00:14:18.069 Yeah, well, it's not. It's. 00:14:19.185 --> 00:14:27.955 And that's not even really a mystery to modern biology or medicine is that when you push and push and push 00:14:27.955 --> 00:14:31.077 and push and push, you often have to draw, 00:14:31.795 --> 00:14:36.235 off of hormonal increases like adrenaline. 00:14:36.235 --> 00:14:43.995 Like your body produces adrenaline to keep up with the emotional, mental and physical pace that you're pushing yourself through. 00:14:44.115 --> 00:14:52.628 And so you're upping your threshold of response because adrenaline is not meant to live on. 00:14:53.155 --> 00:14:58.995 Right. Adrenaline is meant to be fight or flight responsive, right? 00:14:59.155 --> 00:15:05.673 But when you're constantly living in a place of adrenaline overload and then get a break, 00:15:06.575 --> 00:15:13.655 all of that adrenaline dumps out of your system and your physical body dysregulates so much, 00:15:14.615 --> 00:15:19.615 that it actually physically becomes sick. 00:15:19.615 --> 00:15:31.464 And I describe it sometimes in like, when you go to your dentist and everyone knows. 00:15:35.695 --> 00:15:39.917 Double hygiene. Last time I went to the dentist, 00:15:41.975 --> 00:15:46.095 the hygienist would ever started flossing my teeth and my gum started to bleed. 00:15:46.095 --> 00:15:50.252 She's like, so how often are you flossing? 00:15:50.855 --> 00:15:54.555 And I was like, well, I mean, at least every time I eat popcorn. 00:15:57.095 --> 00:16:00.455 And what happens, you like, okay, you know you're going to the dentist 00:16:00.455 --> 00:16:04.095 and so you brush your teeth extra long that morning. Yeah. Right? 00:16:04.385 --> 00:16:09.095 If you save up all of your teeth brushing, 00:16:10.903 --> 00:16:16.593 Until a half hour before your dentist appointment your teeth aren't actually going to be clean 00:16:16.593 --> 00:16:20.333 No, right. You need to be brushing them every single day, 00:16:21.562 --> 00:16:30.357 And it's the same with Sabbath You know there needs to be a regular consistent rhythm of rest in order for health. 00:16:32.599 --> 00:16:41.473 To be maintained and and And while, are we commanded to take Sabbath? 00:16:43.193 --> 00:16:50.279 Yes, we are. We are commanded to take Sabbath. And I think that the command to take Sabbath 00:16:50.353 --> 00:16:54.564 often makes it something that we do begrudgingly. 00:16:55.131 --> 00:16:58.903 Yep. Because no one likes to be told even from the Lord God, 00:16:59.473 --> 00:17:00.695 you must do something. 00:17:00.833 --> 00:17:09.593 Yeah. that is a theological biblical interpretation pet peeve. Yeah. Okay. So people like to make a 00:17:09.593 --> 00:17:14.633 distinction between the ceremonial law and the Old Testament and the moral law. And the simplest 00:17:14.633 --> 00:17:18.987 way to make that distinction is to say, well, the moral law is the 10 commandments and the, 00:17:19.433 --> 00:17:26.953 ceremonial law is all the other stuff in Leviticus and stuff. Except, so they say all the 10 00:17:26.953 --> 00:17:30.753 commandments apply except for the one about Sabbath. Yeah. 00:17:32.301 --> 00:17:41.953 Right. And I'm like, that is bad. Theological technique. Horrible. It's not like if, if you're going to accept that as a genuine division, 00:17:42.366 --> 00:17:44.913 which I think is somewhat dubious, but if you're going to, 00:17:45.994 --> 00:17:51.073 you cannot just say, well, all the 10 commandments, except for the one, I think, 00:17:51.393 --> 00:17:59.033 isn't it right. You might as well just say, listen, I'm not going to listen to this commandment because I think God is encouraging laziness, 00:18:00.393 --> 00:18:08.313 right? By taking a day off. But like in Jesus' life, in Jesus' ministry, he was found to say, 00:18:09.211 --> 00:18:14.713 you know, that Sabbath is a gift. Like it is a gift from God. 00:18:16.251 --> 00:18:26.468 He certainly doesn't teach us to be slaves to it. No, but it's not like we like, um, we are not, we are not slaves to Sabbath. 00:18:26.567 --> 00:18:32.553 Right. Sabbath is a gift that we get to enjoy. Man was not made, um, for Sabbath, 00:18:33.229 --> 00:18:35.606 but the Sabbath was made for man. 00:18:36.434 --> 00:18:35.939 Right. 00:18:37.037 --> 00:18:47.461 Um, so, but going back to, you know, like going back to the conversation on sabbatical, like I, I... 00:18:50.999 --> 00:18:57.089 You know, responding to like the way that you felt when I was gone. 00:19:00.389 --> 00:19:07.329 I want to say like there is, I don't know how to say it other than to say I feel a little 00:19:07.329 --> 00:19:19.249 vindicated by hearing you say that because there's always, there is this sense or this 00:19:19.249 --> 00:19:32.209 feeling of weight. Like I carry the weight. That's not to say that I have an unhealthy, 00:19:32.209 --> 00:19:38.209 I think we all journey into unhealthy thought patterns, right? 00:19:38.209 --> 00:19:49.209 It's not to say that I fully believe that the continuance of ministry here depends on the mantle of the pastor. 00:19:49.209 --> 00:19:58.209 That's not what I'm saying, but what I'm saying is that the reality is that when God places that mantle or that calling, 00:20:00.129 --> 00:20:04.791 or that position on someone is not insignificant. 00:20:04.953 --> 00:20:12.189 And there are often, not often, there is an invisible to the rest of the world 00:20:12.569 --> 00:20:14.459 and invisible to the rest of the people. 00:20:17.529 --> 00:20:27.089 Weight of responsibility and accountability and attack that comes upon you and pressure, 00:20:28.689 --> 00:20:33.689 that we don't often afford our pastors the grace. 00:20:38.829 --> 00:20:43.769 Or our prayers that indicate that we see and understand that. 00:20:44.169 --> 00:20:53.421 Yeah, yeah, I mean, just to again emphasize what you just said, like my, my role didn't change massively. 00:20:54.312 --> 00:20:56.662 I wasn't doing anything I had never done before. 00:20:58.129 --> 00:21:04.107 Like the way we kind of operate, there's a lot of things that cross between our desks, right? 00:21:04.169 --> 00:21:07.489 And so there will be things that you'll toss over to me and vice versa. 00:21:07.489 --> 00:21:12.569 So it wasn't like I was like, oh my gosh, I've never done any of this before, 00:21:12.569 --> 00:21:13.969 or I don't know how to do it. 00:21:13.969 --> 00:21:19.869 Or there was, there was a fair amount of continuity between how my job looked while you were here 00:21:19.869 --> 00:21:23.869 when you were gone, it was just this, like. 00:21:24.902 --> 00:21:30.752 Emotional spiritual weight that was different. I hadn't figured out how to get took me a bit and 00:21:30.752 --> 00:21:36.432 I still hadn't really figured it out. But it was like, how do I carry this? Right? Well, 00:21:37.406 --> 00:21:44.432 yeah, and like, and not by myself and not independent of Christ. And how do I manage that? 00:21:44.617 --> 00:21:48.352 And it was such a shock to my system for the first couple of weeks, you could ask, 00:21:48.641 --> 00:21:54.466 I need to ask those close to me, like did Luke feel the difference? 00:21:54.832 --> 00:22:05.112 Like they would say, yeah, we saw like Luke felt different. There was an adjustment period there for sure. 00:22:05.112 --> 00:22:09.283 I definitely had not gotten entirely used to it by the time you came back. 00:22:10.130 --> 00:22:17.072 Yeah. Yeah. It makes me feel really grateful that we get to do ministry together because before you 00:22:17.072 --> 00:22:24.132 were here, there was a period of time here, maybe 18 months or so where there wasn't another pastor on staff. 00:22:24.132 --> 00:22:33.332 Not that I didn't have support, great support, great team here, but that there's a weight 00:22:33.332 --> 00:22:35.452 of calling that exists there. 00:22:35.452 --> 00:22:41.772 And it's interesting because the reverse was also true for me in the first month of my 00:22:41.772 --> 00:22:46.772 my sabbatical or so, it was really difficult to not wake up. 00:22:49.832 --> 00:22:56.977 In the middle of the night feeling like, oh my gosh, like got a sermon to write or got like this person to like 00:22:57.112 --> 00:23:01.001 to pray for or, you know, like there was this, 00:23:01.312 --> 00:23:10.328 it took me a while to, for lack of a better term, detox from the responsibility. 00:23:12.632 --> 00:23:20.032 And which is why, at least I can only speak for our field, that if you're out there and you're, 00:23:20.752 --> 00:23:24.392 for some reason you're from a different church or you're a pastor or, you know, 00:23:24.392 --> 00:23:31.168 and you're considering a sabbatical for your pastor or for someone on your team or whatever, 00:23:31.232 --> 00:23:34.247 that you need to understand that short sabbaticals. 00:23:34.512 --> 00:23:44.092 Really are, I would say, almost a waste of time in your resources because it's going to take 00:23:44.092 --> 00:23:48.182 a significant period of time to. 00:23:49.389 --> 00:23:57.266 For that person that's on the sabbatical to take a deep breath and enter into the formative parts of 00:23:57.365 --> 00:24:04.359 what the sabbatical sets out to do. Yeah. Yeah. There's a, I think this is an apt quote, 00:24:04.485 --> 00:24:08.999 and I'm going to butcher it because I don't know it by heart, but there's a desert father, a monk, 00:24:09.779 --> 00:24:15.319 who said that like when going into a retreat of silence, at first you lock yourself like in your 00:24:15.319 --> 00:24:22.199 room in silence. And at first, it takes a while for the noise of the world to retreat and to 00:24:22.199 --> 00:24:31.618 recede, to stop hearing the noise of the world. And then after that, it takes a while for the noise 00:24:31.699 --> 00:24:38.568 of yourself, your own voice to recede. And then it takes a while for the noise of the enemy 00:24:38.937 --> 00:24:45.159 to retreat and to recede. And then finally we can hear the gentle, small whisper of the Lord. 00:24:45.879 --> 00:24:52.279 And his whole point being is that like, it's not as simple as going and retreating. 00:24:54.016 --> 00:24:58.839 And thinking that like, okay, I've gotten to a secluded place, I've taken some time off and 00:24:58.839 --> 00:25:05.479 immediately I'm going to be connecting with the Lord. It's a slow removal of the noise. 00:25:05.479 --> 00:25:09.079 It's kind of like if you leave a really noisy concert and your ears are still ringing. Yep 00:25:09.266 --> 00:25:13.279 it's like that right it's gonna take a little bit for your ears to stop ringing for you to be able to, 00:25:14.919 --> 00:25:22.359 Re-acclimate in order to reprocess and receive what the Lord has for you So yep, yeah agreed. I feel that, 00:25:24.011 --> 00:25:25.128 Okay, how's it? 00:25:26.239 --> 00:25:31.439 Probably keep going about good. Yeah, I got I got more questions to follow up with but okay 00:25:31.439 --> 00:25:33.788 What's the next mailbag question? You're not see, okay? 00:25:34.976 --> 00:25:35.723 Okay. So... 00:25:36.993 --> 00:25:40.603 All right, so this one, I'll summarize this one because it was a little bit longer and it's got 00:25:40.603 --> 00:25:47.643 some specifics to it. But the essential part of this is that somebody wrote into us asking some 00:25:47.643 --> 00:25:54.683 questions about how to maybe handle or what to think about and how to handle a situation in which 00:25:54.683 --> 00:26:00.603 they felt they were encountering maybe something supernatural or something maybe named as a ghost 00:26:00.603 --> 00:26:03.603 in like a place that they frequent. 00:26:05.224 --> 00:26:08.223 And so, yeah. 00:26:11.111 --> 00:26:14.523 I'm eager to see what Pastor Luke has to say about this. 00:26:14.523 --> 00:26:16.483 Well, you know, because I'm going to be honest with you, 00:26:16.483 --> 00:26:18.160 this is a tricky one for me. 00:26:18.502 --> 00:26:25.563 It's tricky. So like, OK, so let me start super general. Yeah, because I think ghosts came up, 00:26:26.649 --> 00:26:28.639 in like conversation with my wife. 00:26:28.738 --> 00:26:33.303 My wife was like, do you do you believe in ghosts? I was like, wow, that's an interesting question. 00:26:36.103 --> 00:26:42.263 Well, the only thing I can think of, so, you know, we have a very popular when I say the word ghost, 00:26:42.263 --> 00:26:47.623 we think of everything from Scooby Doo to poltergeist Casper Casper, right, like friendly, 00:26:47.623 --> 00:26:53.943 ghost friendly, right? Like, you know, so we have a gazillion associations from pop culture, 00:26:54.691 --> 00:27:00.264 and secular media around what a ghost is. Right. I mean, like, yeah, oh my gosh, Dan Aykroyd and. 00:27:01.863 --> 00:27:07.383 Bill Murray. Ghostbusters. Who you gonna call? Right? Right. We have a gazillion things that 00:27:07.528 --> 00:27:12.660 pop into our minds. I'm like sitting here and thinking, all right, what does the Bible have 00:27:12.759 --> 00:27:19.783 anything to say on this topic? The only thing that I can think of is there's a small story that's 00:27:19.783 --> 00:27:29.303 often not talked about is when King Saul gets a diviner, comes and the prophet Samuel is dead, 00:27:29.303 --> 00:27:36.823 comes to Samuel's grave and then kind of brings Samuel back from the dead, not back from the dead, 00:27:36.823 --> 00:27:41.623 but talks to his ghost. I would have to go back and look at the passage to see exactly the language 00:27:41.623 --> 00:27:51.223 around it. But he ends up talking with Samuel beyond the grave. And then Samuel kind of essentially 00:27:51.223 --> 00:27:57.383 just rebukes him from beyond the grave. What are you doing? Why are you talking to me right now? 00:27:58.183 --> 00:28:01.623 He just kind of yells at him, which was kind of Samuel's thing with Saul. 00:28:01.623 --> 00:28:13.043 That's the only thing I can think of that even approaches the classical understanding of ghosts 00:28:13.043 --> 00:28:28.783 that we have. Yeah, did you find the passage? Yeah. So it's the first Samuel, chapter 28. 00:28:31.321 --> 00:28:34.778 He goes to the witch of Endor, Saul goes to the witch of Endor. 00:28:37.011 --> 00:28:40.873 Find me a woman who is a medium so I may go and inquire of her. 00:28:43.111 --> 00:28:48.931 Saul disguises himself and he says to her, consult a spirit for me, he said, 00:28:48.931 --> 00:28:51.685 and bring up for me the one I name. 00:28:53.971 --> 00:29:01.182 And she replies, surely you know what Saul has done. He has cut off the mediums and the spiritists from the land. 00:29:01.551 --> 00:29:04.135 Why have you set a trap for me to bring about my death? 00:29:08.031 --> 00:29:09.751 Then he goes on to say, 00:29:12.951 --> 00:29:18.187 so they're gonna call up a spirit. I see a spirit coming up out of the ground. 00:29:18.391 --> 00:29:22.797 What does he look like? Saul asked. An old man wearing a robe is coming out, she said. 00:29:23.111 --> 00:29:29.026 Then Saul knew it was Samuel and he bowed down and prostrated himself with his face to the ground. 00:29:29.191 --> 00:29:36.591 Samuel said to Saul, so it seems to be like there was some, was it actually Samuel? 00:29:36.591 --> 00:29:39.910 Who knows, was it a deceiving spirit? Right, right. You don't know. 00:29:40.831 --> 00:29:43.079 Why have you disturbed me by bringing me up? 00:29:45.171 --> 00:29:50.511 I'm in great distress. The Philistines are fighting against me. 00:29:50.511 --> 00:29:54.231 So I've called on you to tell me what to do. Samuel said, why do you consult me 00:29:54.231 --> 00:30:07.491 now that the Lord has turned away from you become your enemy. He essentially cast judgment on him for, you know, his continued disobedience 00:30:07.491 --> 00:30:08.491 from the Lord. 00:30:08.491 --> 00:30:10.626 Typical Samuel. 00:30:12.984 --> 00:30:17.411 Yep. Immediately Saul fell full length on the ground filled with fear because of Samuel's 00:30:17.411 --> 00:30:23.731 words. That's like probably one of the only things that we see. 00:30:23.731 --> 00:30:28.999 It's like the only thing that approaches the traditional understanding of ghosts. 00:30:29.143 --> 00:30:40.371 Yeah, there certainly is a significant biblical history and evidence of obviously, 00:30:41.296 --> 00:30:43.763 I guess what you could call the supernatural. 00:30:43.979 --> 00:30:49.091 Yes. Which would be just like not the natural, not natural things. Non-natural. 00:30:49.091 --> 00:31:02.131 The presence of evil spirits and the demonic, the presence of angels. Sometimes angels are 00:31:02.131 --> 00:31:16.931 distinguished from messengers from God. And Satan himself being a fallen angel, but being the prince 00:31:16.931 --> 00:31:26.731 of the air or the devil or and so there I would we're certainly not saying that there 00:31:26.731 --> 00:31:30.091 There is no evidence for supernatural. 00:31:31.637 --> 00:31:37.487 Well, this is the way I, so whenever we come to topics like this, right, I'm always dubious. 00:31:37.487 --> 00:31:42.407 This kind of falls into a category of like, so if you were to say, like if you were to 00:31:42.737 --> 00:31:48.651 say, Luke, I found this book that summarizes and explains and teaches all the things that 00:31:48.727 --> 00:31:53.407 the Bible has to say about demons and the supernatural and the occult, and you bring 00:31:53.407 --> 00:32:00.192 me this massive book, I will say something is wrong because the Bible doesn't say that much about it. 00:32:00.633 --> 00:32:05.087 The book should not be that bit. Yep. Yep. So there's a number of topics that like, 00:32:05.087 --> 00:32:09.752 and this being one of them where people love to expand and expound and speculate. 00:32:13.480 --> 00:32:20.047 And create a, an illusion of knowledge and certainty around when in which the Bible actually, 00:32:21.287 --> 00:32:25.696 says in teaches very little. Yeah. Um, 00:32:26.488 --> 00:32:30.746 And so that gives me, like that gives some groundwork. 00:32:30.927 --> 00:32:36.390 And so I'm not interested in, and the Bible obviously was not interested in giving us 00:32:36.471 --> 00:32:42.971 a full understanding of the spiritual realm, of the roles of angels, the demons, like the 00:32:43.407 --> 00:32:48.787 Bible's not all that concerned with expounding and teaching us that. 00:32:48.787 --> 00:32:57.247 And so I take that and receive that as a bit of just like a, the Lord has kind of said, 00:32:57.247 --> 00:33:01.723 you don't really need to know this that much. 00:33:02.007 --> 00:33:04.447 Like, know that I am God. 00:33:05.612 --> 00:33:10.995 Christ conquers these things, right? And that you should not intentionally go and explore and, 00:33:11.862 --> 00:33:18.342 seek these things out. Yeah. You're certainly going to encounter them. Yeah. You know, you're, 00:33:19.043 --> 00:33:25.542 it's not that, you know, we're not saying put horse blinders on and refuse to talk about or 00:33:25.542 --> 00:33:30.982 think about or see that there's anything supernatural going on around you. Right. No, 00:33:31.151 --> 00:33:36.022 you do want to be aware of that. Yes, you do want to know that that occurs. Certainly, 00:33:37.174 --> 00:33:44.384 a significant ministry of Jesus was the exorcism of demons that he sent out at the very least, 00:33:44.582 --> 00:33:51.382 the first apostles and disciples to do the same. Right. Yeah. It's not clear whether or not that 00:33:51.382 --> 00:33:54.022 that ministry extends into the generations. 00:33:54.022 --> 00:33:55.702 Right. Right. Yep. 00:33:57.262 --> 00:34:02.262 And so the evidence is absolutely there. 00:34:06.314 --> 00:34:13.582 That we are to be aware of the schemes of the enemy who prowls around us like a roaring lion 00:34:13.582 --> 00:34:15.542 seeking whom he may devour. 00:34:16.942 --> 00:34:24.822 But even that is not an illusion to him continually attacking us with a demon around every corner. Yep. Right? 00:34:26.262 --> 00:34:32.259 So I think that the, if you're gonna talk about the supernatural in the realm of, 00:34:33.062 --> 00:34:34.617 does it like, does it exist? 00:34:34.682 --> 00:34:42.206 Yes, of course it exists, but we need to weight it properly against the other things that we know. 00:34:42.728 --> 00:34:49.462 We need to weight what is unclear in scripture against what is perfectly clear in scripture, right? 00:34:49.462 --> 00:34:52.109 And what is unclear in scripture is... 00:34:53.198 --> 00:35:02.164 Demonology, angelology even. What is perfectly clear in scripture is that Jesus Christ, 00:35:02.335 --> 00:35:07.168 whom we have by faith, his Holy Spirit indwelling in us, 00:35:07.844 --> 00:35:12.400 is ultimate authority on every creature above the earth. 00:35:15.866 --> 00:35:22.608 And below the earth and in the earth, right? And that every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord. 00:35:22.950 --> 00:35:34.086 And that our security in the midst of the supernatural is not on our own authority, 00:35:34.168 --> 00:35:41.288 or not because we have a tremendous understanding of how to speak to a demon, 00:35:42.215 --> 00:35:48.248 but that because Jesus is the authority and Jesus dwells in us by faith. 00:35:48.526 --> 00:36:02.758 Yes. So, yeah, it's, I guess to like move to some practical advice, we kind of answer, I know that we answered this, the person who answered this question specifically outside of the context of the podcast. 00:36:03.248 --> 00:36:13.248 So let's just not worry about that. But let's just kind of give some general generalized advice, not specifically directed towards that situation. 00:36:13.248 --> 00:36:16.848 I feel like we already addressed that off camera off. Sure. 00:36:18.017 --> 00:36:25.648 I would say like, well, at first I just affirm that real things don't look like Hollywood. 00:36:26.209 --> 00:36:29.448 Yeah, that's like Hollywood is Hollywood. 00:36:29.675 --> 00:36:36.688 I would, I think like if I were to give, if someone were to say like, oh, I'm experiencing 00:36:36.688 --> 00:36:47.648 something like I think my general advice would be ensure that it's not. 00:36:51.128 --> 00:36:54.422 Just ensure that it's not something else or something ordinary, right? 00:36:55.203 --> 00:37:04.280 Like I think fear might take hold in the midst of an uncertainty or a nervous or a scary experience. 00:37:04.478 --> 00:37:13.615 Like let's just, like let's not immediately assume that it's a spiritual demonic thing. 00:37:14.470 --> 00:37:21.969 If it's pertinent, ignore it and kind of move on would be, I think, some advice. I think. 00:37:28.283 --> 00:37:37.083 Obviously, that has to be applied super situational. But just don't seek these things out. 00:37:38.155 --> 00:37:48.843 Like if and I wouldn't want to give a whole lot of fear and air time to something that doesn't 00:37:48.843 --> 00:37:55.803 need it or doesn't require it. So yeah, I would, I think that to kind of speak along the same lines, 00:37:55.803 --> 00:38:00.603 I think that one of the things that has been discouraging or concerning to me in the church 00:38:00.603 --> 00:38:11.603 is that there is a line of thinking or a line of thought that any negative thing 00:38:11.603 --> 00:38:18.203 that you encounter or circumstance that you are under is the result of the demon 00:38:18.203 --> 00:38:24.323 of something or a flu yeah the demon the demon or the spirit of the spirit of 00:38:24.323 --> 00:38:29.243 anxiety or the spirit of depression yes is upon me and I I need to exercise that 00:38:29.243 --> 00:38:34.803 demon from my life and as soon as I... I've encountered that. Right, sure, we all 00:38:34.803 --> 00:38:39.843 have. Right, or the reason that I'm sick is because the enemy is attacking me. 00:38:40.037 --> 00:38:41.843 Yes. 00:38:43.206 --> 00:38:51.776 That, I mean, like the reality is that line of thinking is we just don't see that in scripture. 00:38:51.776 --> 00:38:54.170 No. It's just not there. 00:38:54.701 --> 00:39:00.576 Right. Right. And so we can say what we, you can say what you want about what you believe, 00:39:01.606 --> 00:39:07.376 the reason I have a cough and a cold as well. It's the enemy attacking you because he doesn't 00:39:07.376 --> 00:39:08.754 want you to preach this Sunday. Yeah. 00:39:09.384 --> 00:39:12.256 He wants you to have a cough instead of preaching. 00:39:13.896 --> 00:39:17.496 Could also just be equally that you haven't been taking Sabbath, 00:39:17.496 --> 00:39:18.736 you've been running yourself ragged. 00:39:18.736 --> 00:39:23.976 I haven't been eating well, or it's cold season, or like all, it could be that. 00:39:23.976 --> 00:39:26.056 It's that little kid that came up and sneezed on my face. 00:39:26.056 --> 00:39:31.776 Right, so I think that we, similar to what you said about the, you know, 00:39:31.776 --> 00:39:34.429 six volume book on demonology, 00:39:34.576 --> 00:39:46.336 we need to be honest with what we see in scripture what we don't. And we just don't see that type of understanding of the work of the demonic or the 00:39:46.336 --> 00:39:53.256 supernatural in scripture. That everything that goes wrong in our life is the result of an attack 00:39:53.256 --> 00:40:05.776 by the enemy or the imposition of an evil spirit upon us. It's just not there. Pray about it and 00:40:05.776 --> 00:40:06.945 take some cold medicine. 00:40:07.096 --> 00:40:11.869 Right, you know, yeah, 100%. Yeah. 00:40:12.130 --> 00:40:18.288 Like, or in a situation where like, let's say, like the person who wrote in this question 00:40:18.423 --> 00:40:22.696 had a situation that they were experiencing in the physical location that they were at, 00:40:22.696 --> 00:40:30.056 where maybe some, they don't know how lights got on and off or whatever, or was even feeling internally, 00:40:30.536 --> 00:40:34.330 a sense of spiritual oppression. 00:40:35.167 --> 00:40:37.536 Yeah. which I would say is a... 00:40:38.948 --> 00:40:45.780 Much more legitimate like Okay, then the lights flickered it must be a demon, right? 00:40:47.437 --> 00:40:55.710 But the sense of like right the Spirit of God or the Spirit in me is Sensing, 00:40:56.478 --> 00:41:03.838 feeling Experiencing something that darkness. Yeah, and it is like a darkness or a heaviness. It's not a 00:41:03.838 --> 00:41:08.925 a nervousness or a fear necessarily, those things might be present, 00:41:09.398 --> 00:41:15.318 but at least in my experience, it's a feeling that is not easily equated 00:41:15.318 --> 00:41:16.838 with something else we've experienced. 00:41:16.838 --> 00:41:19.764 Exactly, it is decidedly dark. 00:41:20.862 --> 00:41:25.021 Yes. And I have experienced this before, I've experienced it with people before, 00:41:25.118 --> 00:41:26.822 I've experienced it in places before, 00:41:27.659 --> 00:41:36.823 where I walked into a place, there were people there, And there was this sense of like, there is evil in this room for sure. 00:41:37.120 --> 00:41:38.363 Yes. Or in this place. 00:41:39.263 --> 00:41:48.958 And in those moments, um, it's been, at least in my experience, um, there has not 00:41:48.958 --> 00:41:55.899 been any fear, like there's been darkness and heaviness, but no fear. 00:41:56.665 --> 00:41:57.204 Why? 00:41:58.249 --> 00:42:03.738 Yeah. The reason I don't think at least you know this is kind of conjecture based on what's not here, right? 00:42:03.738 --> 00:42:09.398 Right it word we're moved into the space of you and I's personal experience, right? 00:42:09.817 --> 00:42:13.678 The reason that there was no fear was not because the thing wasn't real. 00:42:15.668 --> 00:42:23.358 The reason that there was no fear was that it was very, very, very real, but that the Spirit of 00:42:23.358 --> 00:42:34.033 Jesus Christ within me has authority over the Spirit of whatever was in the room. And so there 00:42:34.398 --> 00:42:43.358 is no need to fear. Fear not, right? Because there literally is nothing to fear. I do not fear demons. 00:42:43.737 --> 00:42:55.398 Why? Because I stand firmly on the biblical witness that Jesus Christ, who lives in me 00:42:55.398 --> 00:43:03.238 by faith through His Holy Spirit, has all authority over those things. I do not fear 00:43:03.238 --> 00:43:08.318 that. I do not fear that at all because I do not feel like I need to because I believe 00:43:08.318 --> 00:43:15.918 Jesus is with me. Jesus is in me. And so there have been times where I have in a physical place. 00:43:17.334 --> 00:43:31.278 Literally spoken the name of Jesus out loud or have spoken the authority of Jesus into the room. 00:43:31.278 --> 00:43:44.728 Right? I have asked demons to leave or spiritual darkness to leave in the name of Jesus, right? 00:43:45.124 --> 00:43:54.238 I have read scripture over people and in places where there was obvious demonic activity. 00:43:58.465 --> 00:44:03.290 As a proclamation of the authority that they do not have. Right. 00:44:05.190 --> 00:44:11.941 And it's in those moments where it's been really, really clear that the Lord, that, you know, 00:44:12.112 --> 00:44:19.540 that it's, we're not, that while we may wrestle with flesh and blood, Right. 00:44:20.421 --> 00:44:24.715 Or we don't wrestle, like that we wrestle against the principalities and rulers of the air, 00:44:24.806 --> 00:44:31.275 that in the supernatural realm, there is no question who the authority is. 00:44:32.340 --> 00:44:37.035 Like there is no, like demons aren't walking around thinking that they run everything. 00:44:37.679 --> 00:44:49.755 They know. And the proclamation of that truth is often the only thing, or is often the thing, 00:44:49.755 --> 00:44:56.075 just the thing that needs to happen. I feel like, again, we're in the land of conjecture, 00:44:56.075 --> 00:45:05.675 and personal experiences that I think that the primary weapon that the enemy and the spiritual 00:45:05.675 --> 00:45:13.275 forces of wickedness and darkness has against us is the weapon of deception. That Satan is the 00:45:13.275 --> 00:45:19.955 father of lies, though scripture says that when he speaks, he only speaks. It is his native tongue 00:45:19.955 --> 00:45:27.075 to speak and deceit. So when he speaks, he speaks, you need to be afraid of me. You need to fear. 00:45:28.029 --> 00:45:35.482 You need to, you know, like everything is like deceit, deceit, deceit, deceit, deceit. Right? So 00:45:35.835 --> 00:45:42.755 when you begin to speak, how do you defeat deceit or lies? You speak the truth. 00:45:42.755 --> 00:45:47.315 Right? You speak the truth, the truth of God's word, the truth of God's promises, 00:45:47.315 --> 00:45:50.291 the truth of Jesus' authority, right? So... 00:45:51.417 --> 00:45:56.067 Spiritual forces of darkness are walking around, floating around, flying around, whatever they're 00:45:56.067 --> 00:46:02.947 doing, crawling around, trying to convince you, me, all of us that we need to fear them, 00:46:04.407 --> 00:46:14.067 that they have more power than they have, and that they are around every single bush, 00:46:14.067 --> 00:46:18.227 Yeah. And every single sickness and every single infirmity. 00:46:18.227 --> 00:46:18.783 Yeah. Right? 00:46:19.666 --> 00:46:27.347 Yeah. You know, I've seen, I've watched my share of horror movies, right? And like the Exorcist 00:46:27.347 --> 00:46:33.507 being probably the most famous and infamous one. And the climax of that movie is priests in a room 00:46:33.507 --> 00:46:39.867 with a demon and they're just constantly incanting. And you get this really dramatized version of like 00:46:39.867 --> 00:46:44.347 an exorcist where you get it's like oh it's like a push it's a pull it's like this fight. 00:46:45.727 --> 00:46:51.867 If that that's not no like that's hollywood dramatization of course it is well because if 00:46:51.867 --> 00:46:58.619 you even just look at the truth of scripture what is like god if you know first john god is light, 00:46:59.240 --> 00:47:04.587 yeah in him there is no darkness at all other places it describes the spiritual uh spiritual 00:47:04.749 --> 00:47:09.787 forces of wickedness as the spirits of darkness the forces of darkness now when you walk into 00:47:09.787 --> 00:47:12.887 to a dark room and you turn on the light switch. 00:47:13.307 --> 00:47:15.957 There is no like epic battle between the light and the dark. 00:47:16.722 --> 00:47:20.747 Nope. When the light enters the room, the dark is gone, period, end of sentence, 00:47:20.747 --> 00:47:23.222 immediately and without question, right? 00:47:23.387 --> 00:47:31.216 There's not gonna be like, in the end of time, right when Jesus comes back, right? 00:47:31.819 --> 00:47:38.732 Like famous art is depicted as this epic battle where like Hollywood, 00:47:38.907 --> 00:47:45.687 Like they're gonna fight, they're gonna be on the battlefield and it's gonna be like this, like you said, 00:47:45.687 --> 00:47:48.068 push and pull and tug and like, 00:47:48.267 --> 00:47:52.839 and Jesus is eventually gonna come out victorious over the forces of darkness. like. 00:47:54.594 --> 00:48:07.378 Not at all the depiction that we actually see in scripture, or what we know about the authority of Jesus already, 00:48:07.909 --> 00:48:12.995 which is, the battle has already been decided. 00:48:13.634 --> 00:48:16.461 Satan has already lost. 00:48:17.444 --> 00:48:22.196 There will not be an epic battle. 00:48:23.690 --> 00:48:34.244 It will be only the victorious one returning to finally stomp the head of the great serpent, 00:48:34.244 --> 00:48:45.079 right? And none that have been entrusted to the Lord will be lost, right? So it's not some like, 00:48:45.444 --> 00:48:54.524 oh, the darkness may gain some ground in the sphere of the light. 00:48:55.225 --> 00:48:57.964 Yeah. It's not. No. 00:48:59.231 --> 00:49:06.244 Right. No. Yeah. It's often quoted, but I think it's often quoted for good reason quote from CS Lewis regarding 00:49:06.244 --> 00:49:14.044 this topic is like the temptation is either to completely ignore the spiritual realm and the 00:49:14.044 --> 00:49:16.803 demonic or to overly fixate on it. 00:49:17.703 --> 00:49:23.627 Yep. So like, I guess the summarize, like that would be my summarizing is just like, don't fixate on it. 00:49:24.230 --> 00:49:29.100 If you find yourself where you feel like there's this back and forth battle, get, 00:49:30.004 --> 00:49:33.804 some help maybe, but in the name of Jesus, I command you to leave. 00:49:33.844 --> 00:49:34.196 Yep. 00:49:34.502 --> 00:49:37.724 Cause like that's not your something, something's happening there. 00:49:38.139 --> 00:49:59.924 Yep. You might not, maybe you're not battling a demon. would be my first question, you know, if, if you feel like there's just this constant back and forth and then, or then maybe you just need the face and help of others, but also to just not, I don't, don't unnecessarily fixate on it, but don't be naive about it either. 00:49:59.924 --> 00:50:03.525 Sure. Would be the, the summarization, I guess that advice. 00:50:03.924 --> 00:50:10.764 Advice. Well, I mean, where does that leave us for we we're so what we're at 00:50:10.764 --> 00:50:18.307 50 minutes. Well I think let's see what else we have here in this mailbag but. 00:50:22.169 --> 00:50:27.379 How about we answer the last one just kind of that last one just as a you know, we'll tie we'll tie a bow on the 00:50:27.499 --> 00:50:36.428 This episode this last question. Is there an appropriate or inappropriate time to give someone, you know a Bible I, 00:50:38.418 --> 00:50:40.459 Mean simple answer is, 00:50:43.045 --> 00:50:43.603 No 00:50:46.223 --> 00:50:55.819 If you feel listening to them come back. If you feel led to, then I think it's an appropriate time 00:50:55.819 --> 00:51:07.939 to give someone a Bible. Now, the more complex answer of that is, do so in a... I gave a 00:51:07.939 --> 00:51:16.599 Bible to a co-worker many years ago, and to me, a Bible is a Bible, right? So, me carrying 00:51:16.599 --> 00:51:22.119 Bible around public does not make me uncomfortable, but it made them uncomfortable. So retrospectively, 00:51:22.119 --> 00:51:27.559 I would have given it to them in a slightly more discreet way because they felt very uncomfortable 00:51:27.559 --> 00:51:35.079 holding a Bible in their place of work or where others might see them. So just to generally say, 00:51:35.079 --> 00:51:37.879 Like, just, you know, be... 00:51:39.291 --> 00:51:49.641 Nice about it or common sense about it. Just like don't like publicly declare to and give them a Bible in front of a bunch of people or at a, 00:51:50.401 --> 00:51:52.110 inopportune time or something like that. 00:51:53.749 --> 00:51:59.960 Yeah, I think like I Can just see the comments on this already. I can just I, 00:52:00.447 --> 00:52:04.961 I don't know. Like I will. Because here's the thing. We don't need to over complicate it. 00:52:04.961 --> 00:52:14.580 Right. But, but, but, but super Christians and I, I say that pejoratively, um, um, you know, 00:52:15.841 --> 00:52:20.801 super Christians will be like, how could you ever say that there's an inappropriate time to 00:52:20.801 --> 00:52:28.344 give someone the word of God? Like that's not what we're saying. Right. But like, but, but listen, 00:52:28.623 --> 00:52:36.481 Okay, like let's say as a for instance, how about this, I was recently with a family. 00:52:38.427 --> 00:52:46.277 That does not attend church regularly, does not necessarily have like a, they would not 00:52:46.475 --> 00:52:52.641 necessarily proclaim themselves to be like have a deep sense of faithfulness, they don't attend 00:52:52.641 --> 00:53:02.321 church. I have relationship with them and one of their loved ones passed away suddenly and tragically. 00:53:03.561 --> 00:53:10.401 Yes. And I was asked to come down to the hospital to be with them in the room with their loved one, 00:53:11.529 --> 00:53:19.161 as he was deceased. As they processed the first stage of their grief, as they said goodbye, 00:53:19.161 --> 00:53:27.021 by as their family came in to see him and to say goodbye as well. And I'm standing there 00:53:27.021 --> 00:53:38.706 as a harbinger of hope and promise and faith. And I could have walked in that room with, 00:53:39.301 --> 00:53:40.861 the stack of Bibles. 00:53:42.145 --> 00:53:50.427 Yeah. And said, this is the perfect time. I just want to give you this. Right. Right. Now, 00:53:51.570 --> 00:54:01.915 do I think that they would benefit in their walk with Jesus by having a Bible? 00:54:01.915 --> 00:54:14.795 Of course I do. Sure. Like duh. Yeah. Right? At the bedside of their suddenly deceased 00:54:14.795 --> 00:54:23.675 loved one, is it an appropriate time to have like a shove it in their face? This is what 00:54:23.675 --> 00:54:32.396 you need. I would say in a manner of pastoral discernment and gentleness that that is not 00:54:32.558 --> 00:54:39.075 the appropriate time. So the question is there ever an appropriate or inappropriate time 00:54:39.075 --> 00:54:46.715 to give someone a Bible is I understand the question, but I would say well it's always 00:54:46.715 --> 00:54:51.282 appropriate to give someone a Bible. There are times where I feel like it's inappropriate. 00:54:52.395 --> 00:55:04.035 So it's got to both. There's also a spirit in which I could imagine you're talking with someone and they're massively 00:55:04.035 --> 00:55:05.866 depressed. Well, here's a Bible. 00:55:07.487 --> 00:55:14.217 What am I supposed to do with this? What am I supposed to do with that? Like, that is kind of... So, I guess what I would say is that 00:55:14.217 --> 00:55:23.817 maybe the inappropriate way a Bible can be given is in a band-aid or like a kind of the same way 00:55:23.817 --> 00:55:29.017 we would give somebody some Tylenol. Because you give someone Tylenol and then you step away. 00:55:30.154 --> 00:55:35.897 Right? The better thing I would say, particularly say you have someone who is kind of closed off to 00:55:35.897 --> 00:55:41.884 faith or maybe antagonistic or you're just not sure. You could come up to the person and say, 00:55:42.118 --> 00:55:54.457 hey, I follow Jesus and my faith means a lot to me. And I read the Bible and it has benefited 00:55:54.457 --> 00:55:59.817 me in so many different ways. I think it's a really powerful book that God uses to speak to me. 00:55:59.817 --> 00:56:09.497 And I really appreciate who you are and I want to gift that to you in a in a loving way like I 00:56:09.497 --> 00:56:17.577 is this a gift that you would be open to receiving from me like no not giving you an expectation that 00:56:17.577 --> 00:56:21.657 you have to like that's the thing about gifting books right just in general expectation of 00:56:21.657 --> 00:56:26.481 reading expectation like I'm not giving you the expectation you need to read the whole thing or 00:56:26.657 --> 00:56:28.309 or that you need to read so much of it. 00:56:28.737 --> 00:56:33.188 I just simply wanna make sure that you have one. I maybe wanna give you a nice one or something 00:56:33.277 --> 00:56:36.726 because it means something special to me and I wanna gift it to you. 00:56:36.897 --> 00:56:41.038 And if they're receptive to that, 110%, give them that Bible. 00:56:41.777 --> 00:56:45.782 If they're like, I really appreciate the Jesuit, I really would rather you not. 00:56:46.809 --> 00:56:53.219 Right? That I could see that as a really good way of approaching an uncertain situation. 00:56:53.219 --> 00:56:59.539 Yeah. Or just even when you bring the Bible, just like, don't just say, here, I wanted you to have 00:56:59.539 --> 00:57:06.099 this, like, put it inside of a context of a relationship you have with them. And if you 00:57:06.099 --> 00:57:14.019 really want to, like, be the positive version of super Christian, offer to read it with them. 00:57:14.103 --> 00:57:21.219 Yes. Yeah. Like, like just say, Hey, like walk with them. Yeah. I put a, I put a bark mark starting 00:57:21.219 --> 00:57:27.539 in Matthew. Yeah. Like, would you want to get together in like a week and just talk about the 00:57:27.539 --> 00:57:35.219 first three chapters? Yeah. Like, I mean, talk about it. Listen, this is not a saying. 00:57:36.419 --> 00:57:40.979 We want to be abundantly clear. We're not pastors who are telling you to not give by exactly. 00:57:40.979 --> 00:57:44.979 We don't hate the Gideons. Right. Okay? The Gideons are great. 00:57:44.979 --> 00:57:50.590 The Gideons are amazing. Right? Amazing organization. Just like... It... 00:57:51.958 --> 00:57:55.479 It's just not that simple. Yeah. I guess we're... 00:57:55.730 --> 00:57:59.412 It feels a little bit silly because it is that simple. 00:57:59.718 --> 00:58:03.211 But we're just kind of drilling down on maybe some of the... 00:58:04.210 --> 00:58:10.359 I feel like we're socially coaching. Yeah. We're coaching people in like the dimension of... 00:58:12.546 --> 00:58:19.359 Maybe evangelism or discipleship that takes place in context and relationship, not just 00:58:19.359 --> 00:58:22.818 in here's the information that you need to get better. 00:58:23.079 --> 00:58:26.199 And it's in this book, just read the book. Right. 00:58:26.199 --> 00:58:32.039 So you might be hearing this and you might be saying, well, duh, like that's no brainer 00:58:32.039 --> 00:58:34.656 that you would do that in such and such way. 00:58:35.319 --> 00:58:38.199 It's not self evident. It's not self evident to everybody. 00:58:38.199 --> 00:58:43.361 I've seen it done that way. If I probably thought really hard about it, I've probably done it that 00:58:43.559 --> 00:58:49.879 way myself when I was a younger believer. Yep, 100%. So we don't want to overcomplicate it. 00:58:49.879 --> 00:58:55.319 And our first answer to the question remains, yes, please go give them a Bible. 00:58:56.954 --> 00:59:00.679 And listen, if you're listening to this podcast or you're watching it and you need a Bible, 00:59:00.679 --> 00:59:04.919 you want a Bible, or you have someone that you want to give a Bible to, but you don't have one 00:59:04.919 --> 00:59:11.559 to give to them. We've got them here. We have Bibles specifically. The whole cabinet is full 00:59:11.559 --> 00:59:16.599 of Bibles right here. We have got boxes full of Bibles upstairs just for that purpose. So let us 00:59:16.599 --> 00:59:24.199 give those to you. So, well, I think we've probably covered enough for this first mailbag. 00:59:26.482 --> 00:59:30.892 Come back to this with plenty more to talk about and I think it's some of those other questions 00:59:30.892 --> 00:59:34.732 that we left unanswered so if we didn't get to yours it's not because we didn't like it it's just 00:59:34.732 --> 00:59:42.245 we ran out of time. Right and we'll put the we'll of course put the we should make a note in 00:59:42.578 --> 00:59:50.492 in post to put the mailbag number at the beginning of this video as well so in case you 00:59:50.492 --> 00:59:54.652 haven't made it through this whole video and wondering what we're talking about to know that 00:59:54.652 --> 00:59:56.513 that we're talking about our mailbag here 00:59:56.864 --> 01:00:00.192 at the Uncut Podcast, which is just a way that we hope to be able to interact with you, 01:00:00.700 --> 01:00:02.158 and maybe talk about some of the things that are important with you. 01:00:02.852 --> 01:00:08.872 So if you're listening, you can text in any questions that you have to 716-201-0507. 01:00:11.637 --> 01:00:16.852 And of course, if you're watching online or watching on YouTube, we'll put those numbers 01:00:16.852 --> 01:00:20.412 in the show notes as well, or in the notes in the Google and Apple Podcasts as well. 01:00:20.693 --> 01:00:22.252 But anyway, thanks. 01:00:22.320 --> 01:00:34.174 Music.