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Episode 624: In this episode, we delve into a passage from 2 Kings 12, discussing King Joash's reign and his efforts to repair the temple. We analyze Joash's leadership style, noting how he finally took charge after 23 years of inaction from the priests. I draw parallels between Joash's situation and our own experiences in church leadership, emphasizing the importance of delegating responsibilities to experts and ensuring that resources are used wisely.
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You're listening to the Bible Guys, a podcast where a couple of friends talk about the Bible in fun in practical ways. Well, good morning, good morning, what we talk through? Good morning? Oh, good morning? You and you and you man. This is a double feature this week. Yeah, twice twice in a one. Oh my goodness. I don't know if we can contain all of just the overwhelming joy of the moment. Yeah, I'm sure. I'm sure people out there are so joyful. Man, you know, if we can have what made Chris mad this week, this is like the best week ever. It's the best week ever. You always act like people just love it. They do love it. We get a lot of comments on it. That's funny. People comment about all the time. They love they love it. I love it. Well you know, you know you sing that to people in the morning and then they walk around singing it all day. Good morning. Yeah. Yeah, And somebody just told me that on Sunday yep, so, which is really funny. And by the way, I want you to take this moment too. If you care about that segment or that little tidbit that I just did, then I want to take this moment to say, watch Singing in the Rain. Okay, watch it. You've never seen it. I have seen Singing in the Rain. Oh you have seen Yeah, yeah, Okay, I just don't know all the songs, right it. Well you say it, you say it like I'm not a music guy. Music guy. Well, so didn't you tell us last week that you listened to movies or you watch movies in the shower. You just watch movies all the time. I watched today. I was taking a shower and I put my phone up on the little ledge there in the shower, and I only had you know, it's like a ten minute shower. But I said, oh, I'm gonna I'm gonna watch this one scene. So I put on the ending of a movie. It was. Endgame. Remember when remember when Captain America? Uh, you know, it was like this and all of a sudden it goes cap on your left, and then all of a sudden the doctor Strange gets the army and then they do that final battle. I was like, oh, I was just move to see that. So I watched that ten minute segment. Okay, well it's showering. I think that's the difference between like you being this committed movie guy in me occasionally watching movies. Right, So you watch it for entertainment, it informs you in your life and a those things. I watch it for amusement and amusement amuse no thought, Well, I literally watch a movie tomorrow. I may or may not remember the plot. But man, it was a good movie. Somebody said, you say movie, Yeah, it was. Good, and I think it's I saw, and I think the core before we get into that, the core of any movie, any great movie, is storytelling, right, and so telling a story. Is and blowing stuff up. Blowing stuff up is a big stuff a big part of it too. Yeah for most of the movie you watch, yes, but story for any great movie is and that's what life is. Life is storytelling, living stories, identifying with stories. Because because movies, at the core of great movies is all about story. Well, maybe that's why we loved the Bible. Guys, the way we do it the way we do the Bible, guys say, maybe that's why we do it that way. It's because we love the story of the Bible. Okay, so very quickly, tell us did you like Wicked? Really? Yeah? I thought visually it was really impressive. Yeah, I thought musically it was less than the original. So I saw Wicked twice with the two originals. Sure, sure, phenomenal was good and I felt like, particularly that who played Glinda, I felt like she was hitting her marks, not acting. Oh like, I did not think she was funny in it. I felt like Christian Chenowith in her little segment was twice as funny as Ariana ever was in the whole movie. So I loved the callback to that piece. And then the deviations from the original were significant. You said that they weren't significant. I thought they were significant enough. Yeah, so it was good. It was good. I didn't think it was great. Yeah, I'm going to have to significantly disagree. That's okay. It visually it was stunning. Yeah yeah, So so did you did you feel like? I felt very mechanical. Ariana Grande specifically felt very mechanical. And then the lady that played Alpha Ba just doesn't have Adina's voice, so musically the live was back with the originals. Was they should have made the movie with them? Huh? Yeah? And then the chemistry between Christian, Kristin and Edina were was over the top versus the chemistry of those two where they definitely were hitting their lines and saying their parts, and it was right. Did they did it correctly? Did you get emotional? No? Yeah, in tear upts okay, and I went, I get it. It was very well done. Okay, but then the additions. I don't think any of the additions added to the story. Oh god, that's no. Stop. Every one of them was. It's not like I went, oh, thank god, they finally got it right. I thought I thought the original was better. Yeah. Anyways, all right, hey, okay, So so those those of you that are out there that are are wicked haters, yes, I'm with you. I don't hate it. I just don't care about it. The movie, I didn't care about it. You're you're with them, the wicked haters. Like it was unnecessary. Wow, there you go. Wow. Well you know what, Jeff, It's why we make a good team. It's the But I was excited to watch it because you love. It so much. Oh, I appreciate that. I appreciate that. So it was for you, Chris that I watched it. Okay, Well we have and I and I'll be honest with you, I wanted to like it. Yeah, I wanted to. I really did. Okay, So okay, right, Well, so we're going to answer a question we've answered three times two times in the past. Yeah, and we only have a couple of minutes. We've wasted a lot of time there. This next part has one big idea and that I think, so we're gonna be. Okay, okay. So this is a stump the pastor question. And this question comes from Ashley N and so, and the question is simply this, do you think dogs go to heaven? What kind of dogs? Kind of dogs? Yeah, that's funny. So so first of all, I'll just give you the short answer and you can give the long answers. The short answer is nobody knows, right, That's usually how something past their questions go anyway, right, But I personally think yes, yeah, yeah, there are animals in heaven for sure. Just everything that we know about heaven and God restoring things, I would say, there's no reason not to believe that. Well, there's no solidifying reason not to believe that dogs don't go to happen, So I'm gonna I'm. Gonna choose to believe. Yes. So I think the logical question would be, then do you think all life goes into eternity like Mosquito's Yeah, how far down does that go? Is it sentient beings? And how do you know that mosquitoes aren't thinking, oh no, what's that big hand right right before it smashes me or whatever? So I don't know about that. So there is that one argument that, wow, there's a lot of creatures on the planet and whatever. But the other side of it is, and I think we've answered it this beforey before, God is good and when the Bible says that God created everything, he looked on the planet he made with dogs on it and said. It's very good. It's very good. Yeah, I really like it. I like it just like that. He liked it the way he made it, and then we messed it up. So now he's gonna have to make a new one. So he's going to make a new one. There's kind of a restoration kind of a concept in this new world that he's going to make at the end of time. Right, it's a restoration more than it is a I'm going to get rid of the old idea and get a new idea. Right, It's like I'm going to make it all new again. I'm going to bring it back to what it was supposed to be. So if that's the case, I think it's very likely. The Bible mentions Isaiah, man, we we did a fun thing. But we've answered this question before, and we set all these answers. But then we did a fun thing, and right before the program, I typed in do dogs go to Heaven? And chat GPT and it gave the same answer as you and I always give right, But it mentions there in Isaiah that the animals. It mentions that animals are in peace in the New in the New Kingdom, right, and that kind of thing. So yeah, it's not unreasonable to say, man, I hope my pet is there, whether it's that pet or pets in general, or animals in general or whatever. Right, but we do know that animals are in eternity, which is really cool. Yes, so yeah, very cool. I'm not against I'm not against you saying I think my dog went to heaven. Yes, Now, if he was a bad boy, I don't know. But if he's a good boy, that's not how that's not how people get to heaven, but it might be out to always get to have it. That's so funny. That's awesome. Yeah. Well, hey, thank you Ashley, for writing in and listen. If anybody else wants to write in. Please do. But we actually love questions that come in, and we would love to consider your question and comments. By the way, we love comments and feedback. So actually I think our summary is we think it's totally possible. Yeah, right, the animals go to heaven, yeah, yeah, or that we do know animals are in heaven, are in eternity, so yeah, yeah, Well. Hey, I just want to say this, that segment needed a lot of work. You know, there's a lot of work. Yeah yeah, yeah yeah. And speaking of that, you know what else needed a lot of work? But the temple, Yes, you're right, especially after somebody took over. Yeah, and so the temple had gotten in disrepair. Huh, and so they did a lot of work to redo it. So Joe Ash takes over, Yes, repairs the temple. What do you think? It was a terrible transition. I love it, Thank you, thank you. I volunteered to do every trends. Every transition this week. That's why I went back and restated our answer, hoping that you go, oh we should. I forgot actually, and then finally I just remembered. Good. Okay, so we're in Second King's Chapter twelve, verse one, and it says joe Ash began to rule over Judah in the seventh year of King jay Who's reign in Israel. He reigned in Jerusalem forty years. His mother was Zibia from Beersheba. All his life, Joash did what was pleasing in the lord's sight. Because of Jehoida, the priest instructed him. Yet even so, he did not destroy the pagan shrines, and the people still offered sacrifices and burn incense there. So he followed the lord, but he didn't make his people do it. One day, King Joash said that the priest collect all the money brought as a sacred offering to the lord's temple, whether it's a regular assessment, a payment of vows, or a voluntary gift. Let the priest take some of that money to pay for whatever repairs are needed at the temple. But by the twenty third year of joe Ash's reign, the priests still had not repaired the temple. Well, that took a while. Yeah, that's like me when I started a painting project, right twenty three years later, twenty three years Yeah, So King joe Ash called for Jehoida and the other priests and asked them, why haven't you repaired the temple. Don't use any more money for your own needs. From now on, it must all be spent on temple repairs. So the priests agreed not to accept any more money from the people, and they also agreed to let others take responsibility for pairing the temple. And Jehoyaa, the priest, bored a hole in the lid of a large chest and set it on the right hand side of the altar at the entrance of the Temple of the Lord, and the priests guarding the entrance put all of the people's contributions into the chest. Whenever the chest became full, of the court secretary and the high priests counted the money that had been brought to the Lord's Temple and put it into bags. Then they gave the money to the construction supervisors or used it to pay the people working on the Lord's temple, the carpenters, the builders, the masons, and the stonecutters. They also used the money to buy the timber and the finished stone needed for repairing the Lord's temple, and they paid in any other expenses related to the temple's restoration. The money brought to the temple was not used for making silver bowls or lamp snuffers, or basins, or trumpets or other articles of gold or silver for the Temple of the Lord. It was paid to the workmen who used it for the temple repairs. No accounting of this money was required from the construction supervisors because they were honest and trustworthy men. Oh I don't know about that one. However, the money that was contributed contributed for guilt offerings and sent offerings, was not brought in the Lord's temple. It was given to the priests for their own use. Yeah, okay, so there you go. Yeah, I would not say it's advisable to not expect your construction management. Yeah, foreman to not keep it attention. Yeah. Yeah, Well, these were guys who were working on the temple. And have you ever have you ever had a bunch of construction people do a building project and they all come together and and like like like we build a building in my previous church that I worked at, and uh, and and everybody who was super excited who sort of took the reins. They were in construction for business, but they're Christians and dedicated. To that church. And uh, and that felt great. Yeah, you know what I mean? That felt great. So I can imagine that these were people who attended the church or the temple, right. Yes, and and and uh, and that they were all in they just happened to do construction. Uh. You know that reminds me of do you remember Jim Gaffigan? You remember him? Yes? I remember? Do you remember that? Remember that? What you're talking like, Okay, what I meant to say was do you remember the bit? Yes? I don't know that he that he talked about gates in heaven? Yes, why do you need gates in heaven? He's He's like, they talk about the gates of heaven. He goes, why do you need gates? He goes. What kind of neighborhood is this? He goes, Yeah, we had to install some gates because all the kids kept on sneaking in. And use the pool, he goes. He goes, we had to build the gates all the way around. He goes, it was terrible. It was hard. He goes, we had to go all the way down to Hell and find construction workers and everything. So it's really funny. So so it's like that that one joke is sort of like my son who's in construction would love that joke. Yes, right, but yeah, in this case here, these guys are honest and trustworthy men, and to be honest with you, it almost seems like in this passage, they're the ones that are honest, and the and the the priest for the ones who uh didn't didn't step up at the beginning. Right, So it's not it didn't say they abused the money, did it. It didn't say it's they used it for their own needs. Right, So, so own needs doesn't mean there's no indication. That it was, you know, used in a terrible manner. In fact, I would venture to say it's it's a really good assumption that it wasn't used in a bad manner, because usually when that happens, the Bible will go out of twitter say so right like it had it had it been abused or squandered or stolen or miss misused, the Bible would say that she the pre squandered the money, they used it for their own selfish needs, they used it for sin. It didn't say any of that, right, It just says they just used the money. It's almost like they got a raise. Yeah, right, Hey, we want to do this much ministry and now we have more money coming in. And now we're doing this much money. Well, you and I, so we lead that. We lead a church has a it's a large church, large budget. A lot of money comes in. Yeah, we give clear accounting, and I mean we're really careful with it. But you know how it can be. It doesn't matter how much money comes in. Our staff can find things that their team needs. We're not saying they're wasting it, but they can consume all the money comes in. So on occasion, you know, you and I and the other key leaders, we have to redirect and say, but there are priorities, right, there are these. We make sure we ten percent of the income that comes into heritage or more goes outside of heritage. It's not spent insight on us, right. It's actually eleven percent. Yeah. And the staff if we said hey, this extra you know, hundreds of thousands of dollars is available to you, they could use it and use it in. A good way. Oh they'll hire people, yeah, get offer more services, offer more ministry things whatever. Right, And so what happened was I think it was just a fade. It wasn't that the Levites were bad guys or the priests were bad guys. It's just they were consuming everything coming in on what they viewed as necessary things. And finally, Joe ash I don't know why he didn't attention when you're young. Maybe he just didn't notice it, or you're believing all the reasons. Well, you know, we need to increase the budget by fifteen percent in order for us to get this. Project done or whatever. You know, he doesn't know. Finally he realizes, wait a minute. He's thirty years old at this point. He goes, wait a minute, get it done right, And I love that about him. Right twenty three years in, he only has seventeen years left in his rain. But he says, get it done, no more excuses, and that there is a leader moment there that we finally see. This is the first really big leadership moment you see Joe ash in Is. He had said, Hey, I want the temple repaired, and that's cute. Little kid wants temple repair. That's great, we'll work on it. We'll get there. We got budgets to balance, we got we got ministries to run right out all these things. But find this kid. Yeah. Yeah, But finally he's an adult and he's like, get it done, and they buckled down and they did. And then he had trustworthy men that are are doing you know, the finished stone and all the wood and all that kind of stuff. And apparently it was a very fair rate that they're that they're charging to do these things. It must have been you know, I don't know. The Bible is not hinting that it was a discounted rate hitting that at all. Right, there's no hint here that there was an expectation that these guys would do it for free. There's no expectation that they do it as a discount. But it must have been very fair because he's not even needing an accounting on it, right when they say, well, these timbers here and we're fixing up this this wall is going to cost ten thousand bucks and they go, oh, yeah, that's a fair price. That's a good price, right, And so I think that's the hint that when you get that there's no real accounting necessary. Was everybody everybody could see through the transparent pricing that's going on. That's a fair price. Yeah, go ahead and get it done if you can do it for that, Go ahead and do it. And if this is typical you think about like we know, we know if you're a bibble guy or gal, which I'm referring to the audience here right there, the listeners, all of us, and if we've been sort of hanging around and listening to the series, we understand how big the temple is? Yeah, I mean how big is it? It's pretty big, right, I mean it's one of the most massive things ever built. Wasn't that? It was one of the most majestic things. Yes, sitting on top of the mount, that whole, that whole complex was. The temple itself was a good sized building, but it wasn't like the penticle. He's not referring to the whole. I don't I take it to be the building itself because it's talking about what goes in it, right, So it didn't. It didn't include the bowls, and it didn't include the lamp snuffers and the right talking about the furniture, I. Met the holy holies area, Yeah. Yeah, I think you're talking about the holy place, Okay, hoes the courtyard probably, ok Yeah, So the temple mount is big, but that space probably was just that. Yeah. Yeah, Well either way though, there's it's extravagant, right, it's it's it's beautiful. It's one of the most you know, wealthiest. Oh yeah, well David built it, when Salomon built it, it was a billion billions and billions, hundreds of millions billion dollars, so it was crazy. And so so anyway, the point is is that my whole point of that is to say this, you know, it took time. So when they say no accounting was needed because these were honest construction workers, you're probably talking about years and you're probably talking about uh, you know, they were in such a rhythm and routine that it was just like clockwork. It's like, hey, I mean there's trust, there's uh, there's honesty, there's integrity. Uh, there's fairness, there's there's you know, they're they're paying good wages and uh and it sort of, you know, it sort of just ran itself because everything really went well with this entire restoration, which is pretty great. I mean, you think about that, that's a that's a pretty great statement in the Bible, isn't it. Yeah. I also think that there's there's some value. I think you're right on that. I think there's some value in understanding. We've done a lot of construction projects at our church as things grew and whatever. And I always tell the businessmen, I am not asking you to put your families in jeopardy. I'm asking you to be fair, that's all. Just just be fair, because I think businessmen should make money, right. Yes, and they should do that they have. So if you look at the priests, the priests were given the responsibility to repair the building and took twenty three years and they never got to it. The priests did what they do, but they never got to the construction. And so there's something to be said about having experts that you rely on, that you lean into. So you need good godly men and women around you that are experts at what they do. And you know, I was just talking. To a young guy that's you know, getting ministries or getting a business started, and so I was saying to him, you. Need a good godly lawyer. Do you have lawyer? Well, I don't have any legal issues yet, I said, not now, but lawyers can help you set up a business where you can prect yourself, protect your family, do other things. You need a good godly lawyer. You invest in a good because you don't know law, you know your business right, and then you need a good accountant that you can rely on as CPA. But you also need a good financial advisor who can help you with strategic ideas. So you need this little team of godly men or women that can help you, advise you on the business side, advise you on the legal side, and buys you on the tax side right those four years. And you shouldn't have to be an expert at those things. But what happens a lot of times if we have any pastors listening to day, pastors sometimes will ask how do you make the leap from being a regular sized church, you know, to a giant church? And one of those is you stop trying to do everything and be everything. I can remember when I was working in a small church. We had to balance the budgets, and we had to plan the weekend services, and we had to make sure the kids thing was great and the adults thing was great, and we had to literally I remember watching my senior pastor mo the lawn one time. Yeah, I went out and got it, stopped him and I went and mow the lawn because he was my senior pastor. I said, now, I'm all the lawn. You know, I was busy that day, but man, I'm gonna let my senior pastor go out there mo the lawn. We need him doing senior pastor stuff, right. I literally I cleaned the toilets every week in the whole building, right. And I remember thinking at the time, I'm not below cleaning toilets. I'll clean toilets, right. It's a good work because it's necessary, so somebody needs to do it. I'll do it if nobody else will do it. But I remember thinking it would be better if we've built teams to do those things. People who are really really good I'm not great at cleaning, you ask my wife. But people who are really good at it that love to do it. There are people who love it. They just love to make everything sparkle. And they love that first impression thing. Man. And not that anybody's like, ooh, sign me up to clean the toilets, but there are people who love that first impression thing. And this is what I think the wisdom of Joe ash And is in his thirties now instead of in his childhood. In his thirties, he's like, dude, let's let the priests do what the priests are supposed to be doing, right, lead the people in worship, do the sacrifices, declare God's word, and we're going to need some experts to go do these other things. But it's not right, I think for pastors to expect. Now we've had people come in and voluntarily donate. Thank thank God for it sometimes thank God, but man alive. If work needs to be done, pay a fair wage charge r fair wage. If you're in business, Christians, be willing to pay a fair wage, and trust me, things will be better. It'll get done quicker. Right, it'll be probably done better than you're doing it, and both you and the businessman benefit. Right. And this is what I think you see happening here is Joe ash finally realizes, let's Joheida, you're good at some things. You're apparently not very good at project management. So let's pay these guys over here. And they're good, gudly people that you could trust. And there's something about you know, you don't have to do everything. You don't have to be great at everything. I think men in particular sometimes feel driven. I should be really good at all the things in life. Yeah, And I don't think you have to be good at everything. You need to know well you're Italian. You just need to know a guy. Yeah, right right, Every Italian I know knows a guy. As a matter of fact, Remember. I asked you the other was a couple weeks ago about home Paragrad, and I was like, I just don't know, like a pro like I know some big construction guys. I don't know, like a home remodel guy. And I said you have. Yeah, I got a couple, but I got this one guy, right, I said, I know a guy. Man, there's something to that. To be that guy, be the guy who knows a guy, and you can get a lot done if you know a guy. That's true. Hey, that's a good word. And so hey, that's our time, and so hopefully we will see you next time on the Bible guys. H