Charlie Loften: The questions we wrestle with as Christians about who God is, how do we live out our faith, what is the Bible, what is the truth of the Bible, what are we supposed to believe? How are we supposed to live? There are really big, deep questions that we ask each other, that we ask God, that we wrestle with ourselves. And that's why the Cultivate podcast exists, to help us go deeper in our understanding of who God is, his word, and the way that he's called us to live. Everyone, welcome to the Cultivate podcast with The Grove Church.
I'm Charlie Loften, the lead pastor there, and we are here with support female coffee producers.
Abigail Boone: Oh, so my hat says I was like, that is off the wall.
Charlie Loften: It's not off the wall. It's you encouraging all of us to support female coffee producers.
Abigail Boone: Yeah. I have a pile of hats in my room, as you could assume.
Charlie Loften: What are gonna say? You have a, like, a whole bunch of female coffee producer friends, but
Abigail Boone: I actually don't know a single coffee producer. That's a woman.
Charlie Loften: What about Douyuan coffee?
Abigail Boone: I think it's a, like, possibly if I went to Walmart and I bought a bag of Onyx and I didn't look at the one it was, I could have bought that one. But that is a type of Onyx. Think they're an offshoot of Onyx. Oh, okay. But I don't buy Onyx coffee as a Northwest And Arkansas
Charlie Loften: this podcast is sponsored by Onyx, but then you just kinda we just kinda updated
Abigail Boone: I do air shit.
Charlie Loften: I did it.
Abigail Boone: I love coffee, and some people in the past have called me a coffee snob, but I think it knocks me down from that level when I chose a different coffee brand because there's one I could get on Walmart delivery.
Charlie Loften: No. There you go. There you go.
Abigail Boone: I was willing to shift for that. But, yeah, my pile of hats, I just look at it and I just grab whatever one. But then if someone references something and they're looking a little above me, it takes me a minute to register what they might be talking about.
Charlie Loften: There you go. Anyways, this is Abigail Boone, by the way.
Abigail Boone: Whoop whoop.
Charlie Loften: Our creative director and podcast producer. It's good to see you.
Abigail Boone: Good to see you.
Charlie Loften: Good to see you. Alright. We are we are nearing the end. We've got a few more weeks of podcast, on Parables.
Abigail Boone: Are you willing to back that in? Is it really a few more weeks?
Charlie Loften: How many is a few? Three? We have more than a few. We have several weeks left. Okay.
How many is several?
Abigail Boone: That could be like eight to 10.
Charlie Loften: Okay. Eight.
Abigail Boone: Oh, wow. That's close.
Charlie Loften: But when you have done, I don't
Abigail Boone: know A million? Yes. That's what it feels like.
Charlie Loften: Yes. I keep waiting that at some point offline you're gonna be like, hey, bro, can we just call Can
Abigail Boone: just call that was my thought actually when I was editing, not the last episode, but the one before that I was like, we've been doing this forever. Okay. But we're close.
Charlie Loften: We're close. We're close. And then we'll see. You you guys can just stay tuned to see if Abigail convinces me.
Abigail Boone: Like, cut the
Charlie Loften: cord clearly. Me, it's not like I'm so invested that we have to do all of them, but it's like it's like say saying, I wanna run a marathon, and you go 24 miles.
Abigail Boone: Actually, I don't wanna run a marathon.
Charlie Loften: If one were to run a marathon.
Abigail Boone: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Charlie Loften: Yeah. Not 24 miles is close enough. Alright. You're gonna like this one. It's called the rich man and Lazarus, Luke 16, starting with verse 19.
There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and lived in luxury every day. At his gate was a laid was laid a beggar named Lazarus covered with sores and longing to eat what fell from the rich man's table. Even the dogs came and licked his sores. The time came when the beggar died, and the angels carried him to Abraham's side. The rich man also died and was buried.
In Hades, where he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away with Lazarus by his side. So he called to him, father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue because I'm in agony in this fire. But Abraham said, son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony. And besides all this, between us and you, a great chasm has been set in place, so that those who want to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from here to us. He answered, then I beg you, father, send Lazarus to my family, for I have five brothers.
Let him warn them so that they will not also come to this place of torment. Abraham replied, they have Moses and the prophets. Let them listen to them. No, father Abraham, he said, but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent. He said to them, if they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.
Abigail Boone: That's a meaty passage. It didn't say who he was talking to.
Charlie Loften: Alright. So if we scroll up, alright, this chapter kind of starts with, your favorite your new favorite parable.
Abigail Boone: The most confusing parable of the shrewd manager. And then he is Okay. Talking to his disciples.
Charlie Loften: And then verse 14, the Pharisees who loved money heard all this and were sneering at Jesus.
Abigail Boone: Wait. But he was talking to his disciples.
Charlie Loften: Well, we're at verse 14.
Abigail Boone: The Pharisees happened to be there too?
Charlie Loften: The verse 14. So it's in so now we're switching audience. The pharisees just seemed like they were always just kind of hovering around. Okay. But Well, know know you can get out of the room.
But sometimes, you know, the author will add, okay, but it's funny. There may be a whole lot of people we
Abigail Boone: speak you're to directing to them.
Charlie Loften: Now we've kind of switched here. You know, the Pharisees who love money heard all this and were sneering at Jesus. So he wasn't talking to them, but they did hear it. Okay. And so you are the ones who justify yourselves in the eyes of others, but God knows your heart.
What people value highly is detestable in God's sight. And then talks a little bit about where the change in the Old Testament and then immediately goes into the story about rich man and Lazarus. So he has the pharisees in his crosshairs at this point.
Abigail Boone: So this well, this feels feisty towards someone who is not a Pharisee because I feel like the Pharisees would be like, check. We're good.
Charlie Loften: Well, again, it's it's one thing for like, I I think there were, you know, in in a lot of his teachings, especially his parables, when he would direct them at hit at them Mhmm. You know, they thought they were good. He would say something they still thought they were good, but they definitely would have gotten the impression, Okay, this guy thinks taking a shot at us. It's not like they would respond to this and go, You're right. We have lived a life of luxury at the expense of other people, and we need to deeply repent.
Abigail Boone: But they would have thought that
Charlie Loften: they They would would have have the thought that Jesus was throwing shade at them.
Abigail Boone: Yeah. But I guess also on top of all of this, they're like, who does he think he is? Who does he think he is? Teaching in general. Right.
So before we dive deep into this, is this the same Lazarus as It's not a parable.
Charlie Loften: Have taken like You have something very important in
Abigail Boone: this. Really?
Charlie Loften: Is that this is the only parable that we have done to this point and will do after that actually has someone's name
Abigail Boone: in Okay.
Charlie Loften: So that is So it's the dude? So not oh, no. Not only that. Because the Lazarus that we are aware of was brother to Mary and Martha.
Abigail Boone: And he's the one that he raised from the dead.
Charlie Loften: Yeah. And they had a significant amount of resources.
Abigail Boone: They were relatively wealthy people. Unless he fell on super hard times. Right. Post
Charlie Loften: his own resurrection, he kinda fell on hard times.
Abigail Boone: It's pretty rough. Right. Okay, so this is he just gave someone a name.
Charlie Loften: Why so the first thing that you have to take note of as someone who is a, now that you are slowly becoming a parable scholar,
Abigail Boone: First I'm thing you
Charlie Loften: to do is you want to take note of the thing that is most unusual.
Abigail Boone: Yes, And that is it.
Charlie Loften: And that that is it. That makes you stop and go, okay. You you would not normally give someone a name.
Abigail Boone: Yeah. Well, even distant story, even, like, a kid's book, a name is kind of innocuous if it's not someone that's, like, someone that you would recognize.
Charlie Loften: Right. It's just like a filler. But there are two care I mean, I'm not counting Abraham. Right? Right.
There are two characters in the story.
Abigail Boone: Oh, wait. No. He just talks about Moses.
Charlie Loften: Two characters in the story.
Abigail Boone: Right? K.
Charlie Loften: The Lazarus and the rich man. In fact, that's what it's called Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus. Yes. You got two person. One is Lazarus, and one does not get a
Abigail Boone: name. Mhmm.
Charlie Loften: What's the significance of that?
Abigail Boone: Probably knocks him off his pedestal a little bit. Yeah. You think you're notable because you have all these things, but actually you're just a man?
Charlie Loften: Yeah. Your attention is drawn to the fact that one of them gets a name when when no one else gets a name.
Abigail Boone: Gives dignity to the lower We
Charlie Loften: shouldn't you know, the people who are hearing Jesus tell this parable aren't going around going, well, in all the other gospels, there are no other parables where Jesus gives a parable a name. It's really not you know, we can think that, and we should, but specifically, I think our hearts, minds are to be drawn to the fact. You've got this guy, Lazarus, and some generic rich
Abigail Boone: guy. He's kind of like giving dignity to the lower man.
Charlie Loften: Giving dignity to the lower. Whoo.
Abigail Boone: All right, we can finish. Let me dig into the actual scholar. Would you ever call yourself a scholar?
Charlie Loften: Depends on what you mean, I guess. I do not have scholarly degrees. I have a pastoral degree. That's Amateur what scholar.
Abigail Boone: Okay. Sure. Is Lazarus, like, a typical name of that time slash, does it, like, mean anything?
Charlie Loften: Yeah, like, it means, like, God is a helper. Interesting. God helps.
Abigail Boone: Okay. Was that a typical name? Like, would it be similar to us saying John Doe?
Charlie Loften: Well, no. I mean, it's saying, is my helper, God helps, that kind of thing. And like, it is a common enough name. Okay. And so again, scholars are drawn to, was there some intentionality in that?
Or would it be like, and there was this rich man, and then over there was Bob. And it's just kind of like Bob. I don't think Lazarus is a Bob Okay. Joe kind of name. I don't think it's like that.
So imagine there's some attention being drawn to that. I mean, like, you've got this guy who has nothing, is as impoverished and sick and got all these issues, and his name is essentially God is on my team.
Abigail Boone: Okay. Because they were a culture that knew what names mean. Yeah, who,
Charlie Loften: of these two guys, whose team is God on? Yeah. Rich guy. Right? Rich guy.
He's got all the money and all the stuff and all the other. God is blessing him. Mhmm. So you got this rich guy who's got all this stuff, you've got this poor guy who's got nothing and his name is God's on my team. Yeah.
He's got That's again, we're just You get
Abigail Boone: their bases loaded on his And
Charlie Loften: it would have absolutely, and you do make a really good point to say names, when they hear a name, that means something.
Abigail Boone: Yeah. Well, even in our culture, not identifying someone with a name is like, I didn't even give you the time of day to identify you. Well, and
Charlie Loften: then also being named something has significance to Yeah. It's not just, Oh, that was my aunt's name. That was my grandma's maiden name. We just kinda like it.
Abigail Boone: My niece never stops telling people that she's named after me. Right now, I've gone to the pool with her a couple times, and she'll walk up to any random adult, not just kids, adults too, and she goes, Hi, I'm Abigail May Pains. That's Abigail. She points across. Is she confused that you don't share all three names?
She, whenever I ask her what my full name is, she says Abigail Maid Boone. Okay. So, it's kind of there. She ever
Charlie Loften: says you have a different last name.
Abigail Boone: Yes, she'll learn different middle names at some point. Okay. But it did also, she calls me Abba, typically, but it took her a while to realize, like, Oh, Abba is Abigail.
Charlie Loften: Abigail. Yes,
Abigail Boone: yes, yes. So she's growing every day. Soon she'll learn my middle name.
Charlie Loften: What else stands out to you in
Abigail Boone: this? Honestly, I got pretty hung hung up when it said carried to Abraham's side, and then I had to go back up and realize that it said the angels carried him.
Charlie Loften: Mhmm.
Abigail Boone: But, like, I guess everyone knew who Abraham was. Right.
Charlie Loften: The he is the father of Okay. The Jewish people.
Abigail Boone: So they knew he was talking about they knew who he was talking about, but it kinda caught me off guard that that line was in there. And it took me a minute to catch back up with you because I got really hung up on that. I was like, what do you like, did they take him to his grave?
Charlie Loften: So essentially, this would be the same in our if we if I told us you know, a lot of jokes start like this.
Abigail Boone: Mhmm.
Charlie Loften: You know? Three three people die and go to heaven, and they're sitting there at the pearly gates with Saint Peter, and, like, Saint Peter is the guy who is, the warden or whatever.
Abigail Boone: Okay.
Charlie Loften: The gatekeeper of of heaven.
Abigail Boone: So they would just have metaphorically talk popped up
Charlie Loften: in their mind. He died, and now he's with Abraham. Okay. It's the same way that we would also say, you're at the gates with Saint Peter.
Abigail Boone: Okay. Okay. So, yes, that really caught me off guard, and then I caught back up a little bit further on after
Charlie Loften: I've been thinking about the our vernacular Uh-huh. It would be the rich the Lazarus died and went to heaven
Abigail Boone: Mhmm.
Charlie Loften: And the rich man died and went to hell. Yeah. Which is referred to here as Hades.
Abigail Boone: Right. It also seems like just such a human plea of him asking if you sent someone after they had died, they would, like, come on, give them, like, one more chance. Like, that sounds like such a human And what does Jesus
Charlie Loften: say at the end?
Abigail Boone: They should have listened to who was already there.
Charlie Loften: Very, very last thing.
Abigail Boone: They will not be convinced.
Charlie Loften: They do not listen to Moses and the prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.
Abigail Boone: Okay. I thought he was talking about himself there.
Charlie Loften: Right. So in the context of the parable, what he's saying is That hadn't happened yet. What he's in context of the parable, what he's saying is if we brought Lazarus back from the dead to talk to your brothers, they wouldn't listen. But what He says is, in the broader sense is, if you're not hearing God right now, you're not going to hear it if someone rises from the dead. And again, I think you know, it's one of those things that probably, you know, Luke is writing this and he's like, Oh yeah, then you Wait.
Abigail Boone: Woah. Woah. Woah. Woah. Woah.
Yeah, Woah. That lead.
Charlie Loften: So I think that definitely plays into it. I mean, I think there is a an intentional play on words there. Now he's speaking directly to the prophets. You're not listening to you. You are not listening to what Moses and the prophets had to say.
And you won't be convinced even if someone were to come back from the dead. And the idea would be that maybe that ring in your ears a little bit and Jesus does come back to life and maybe those Pharisees that hear that are like, Oh, oh, Right? Maybe
Abigail Boone: it could
Charlie Loften: trigger something.
Abigail Boone: Well, I know there's a lot of the parables where it's like, at this point this person's getting called out and at this point this for like it's different groups could kind of take to heart a different part of it, but that part feels separate from just the sting to the Pharisees like that's such a like you watch, like, a movie that you haven't seen in a while, it's like, oh, I just wish someone would tell them before they go down that hallway. Right. Right. Right. And I just it's if someone could just swoop in right before x, y, or z decision, Like, that's so natural for them to wish that.
And so, like, they're asking a really natural desire of, like, can't you just, like, really give them the warning they need? Right. But then, basically, trump card down is like, well, there's no big enough warning that if you didn't I've given you the big enough warnings. Right.
Charlie Loften: You you have you you have had enough instruction Mhmm. That you ignored.
Abigail Boone: Yeah. And he's so is him saying referencing Moses and the other prophets similar to him referencing Abraham Abraham that they would have just, like, known that he was talking about?
Charlie Loften: Oh, yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So let's just kinda get to the big picture idea, and then I wanna go from there to kind of dive into a little bit of whether or not we believed and to what degree we believe that this gives us an accurate theology of heaven and hell.
Because it is a fictitious story. Yeah. It's a made up story. Yeah. And so that doesn't mean a made up story can't have true elements to it.
Right. I mean, there's a lot of controversy right now around the Odyssey, right? Is a fake made up story. Know, it's not a real story. And so how important is it that it be historically accurate for the context in which The time, yeah.
The time and place in which it's happening? There's a lot of controversy And around so Jesus is telling a fictitious story about two real places, how much of what he's saying is true, and how much of it is just imagery.
Abigail Boone: Can we hit the sidebar for like two seconds? Like off camera or on No, on camera, they can hear this.
Charlie Loften: Okay.
Abigail Boone: And this might be a really stupid historical question, but is the Odyssey where the Trojan horse comes in?
Charlie Loften: Yes. It is? Okay. Yes.
Abigail Boone: Okay. Sidebar done.
Charlie Loften: Okay. Tune in next week for Abigail and Charlie's of the Odyssey. I talked about this on Sunday, two scales. I know. Was it good and was it fun?
Yeah. It was really good, but it is so tense nonstop. I wouldn't say it's fun. It's like there's never a like, Oh, okay, and everybody's okay for a little bit, I can take a deep breath. Oh, that was a funny part.
It's just like for two hours and fifty minutes.
Abigail Boone: Yeah. Feel like there should be more categories than just fun.
Charlie Loften: Did I enjoy it is really what I mean.
Abigail Boone: Like, did you have a good time
Charlie Loften: watching Was it did I enjoy watching it? Was like, it was fun. I enjoyed that. I enjoyed that.
Abigail Boone: Because there's some that's like, I didn't have fun watching what I've seen so far of Paradise season two, but it is, like, objectively good. Right. And I enjoyed that I cried at the right parts and was intellectually stimulated at the right parts.
Charlie Loften: It sounds like you, being an artist, enjoy things that are good more than I do. Okay. It seems like good and enjoy really overlap
Abigail Boone: for me. Because there are movies where I'm like, I would never watch that again, but, like, well done, and everybody should watch that because the artist did what they were supposed to do, and you walked away with the right experience. Right. Good.
Charlie Loften: Right. Yeah. So you, and your categories might be But again, using an example, the dumber the Fast and the Furious movies get, the more I'm enjoying, I'm having a great time. Would highly recommend, but don't for one minute think that I'm telling you to go see a good movie.
Abigail Boone: You're right. You wanna know my one hot take for this episode?
Charlie Loften: What's that?
Abigail Boone: There's probably not enough time for us to get into it. La La Land, horrible movie. Know?
Charlie Loften: There's something paradoxical about me. I really love certain musicals, And then also, I'm like, I'm I'm really would not say that I'm a fan in general of musicals. Yeah. Like, and then anyways.
Abigail Boone: Let's say that movie is, like, two and a half hours. It is about fifteen minutes good. The rest of it is way too long. Interesting. Absolute waste of space.
Charlie Loften: That is a hot take. Anyways, so the big picture idea here is actually pretty straightforward. We get lost in some of the crazy dynamics of it, is that whether or not how you behave in this life will affect your next life. Eternal. Yeah.
So the implication of this rich guy was not just that he happened to have resources, and despite what some people might say, Jesus does not have a full blanket statement, All rich people are bad always.
Abigail Boone: Right.
Charlie Loften: Right. Because some of his friends, we've already mentioned this, Mary, Martha, and Lazarus were were doing pretty well.
Abigail Boone: Mhmm.
Charlie Loften: And there were people that had enough resources to be able to financially support what Jesus was doing. And so it's not quite as black and white as some people would want it to be, but I think there is a sense in which rich gets associated with bad in the same way that we can talk about it too. It's like rich people are bad, even your most liberal politicians take donations from Billionaires are bad. They don't mean every single person who has a net worth of a billion dollars or more evil. They don't mean that.
They mean that by and large, as a category, these people have gotten this way through the oppression of other people.
Abigail Boone: Yeah.
Charlie Loften: I'm not trying to get into the politics of that right now, but honestly, I think that is less true now than it was two thousand years ago.
Abigail Boone: Yeah.
Charlie Loften: That people that were rich, it was very easy to associate a large percentage of rich people as being definitively immoral.
Abigail Boone: And
Charlie Loften: so that basically what he's saying, you chose to be a taker in this world to do harm to build yourself up, and as such, you are going to reap the consequences of that. We get no sense of which from Lazarus directly that he was a, quote, good person, but the way that he is described, let's say He was covered in sores? He's a beggar. He definitely poor, but the idea is that people who are takers and herders will be punished and people who who get the worst of what life has to offer are are going to
Abigail Boone: right. And
Charlie Loften: so he and he's saying that to Pharisees. Basically, what he's saying is you guys are the most well off people here. Mhmm. I don't believe that you have done this in a moral ethical way. I think you are a harm to people, And the more you build yourself up in this world, the more problems you're gonna have in the next.
Abigail Boone: So the Pharisees had, like, no monastic tendencies?
Charlie Loften: No. Okay. No. No. Okay.
They were more like overlords. Okay. K?
Abigail Boone: So then you would say the inability to heed warning is like a B. Yeah. And so then
Charlie Loften: and then and then to that is, and because of who you are, you are like this It, like, necessitates your truth now.
Abigail Boone: Okay.
Charlie Loften: And nothing is gonna get you to where you can hear truth.
Abigail Boone: Okay.
Charlie Loften: Because you are so locked into how good and perfect and awesome you are. Mhmm. Just like all of these rich people who are takers and abusers, you are the same sort of thing. You are so locked up in yourself that you are building yourself up and you've got doom waiting for you, and you are so, again, just kind of in your own little world that you can't even read the scriptures right. Yeah.
And foreshadowing alert, even if somebody came back from the dead, you wouldn't even listen.
Abigail Boone: Yeah. So it's almost like they think they're God.
Charlie Loften: Right. You think you're awesome now, and you are doing everything you can to make yourself awesome, and you think you're so awesome you can't listen to sense, you're in trouble. But someone who has a more humble life and a more humble mentality will be exalted in the next life. Again, I don't think that we are meant to take from here, to use our theological terms from last year's year plus of podcasts. I don't think we're necessarily to make a soteriology point out of that.
What makes you go to being rich makes you go to hell. Being poor makes you go to heaven. Right.
Abigail Boone: Think that
Charlie Loften: is not what Jesus Yeah. Is saying. I think you can be rich and have a poor man's attitude, and you can be poor and have a rich person's attitude as far as it comes to entitlement, you know, focusing on self, those sorts of things. I think he's using these as two categories because by and large, those are
Abigail Boone: Also, it provides a little bit of shock value Yeah. To where it's, like, memorable.
Charlie Loften: Well, yeah, in those two categories, it would really turn things on its head if it, you know, by and large, this group of people over here needed humbling, and these people over here, by and large, were the people who were seeking hope in God.
Abigail Boone: Did they have like a middle class?
Charlie Loften: The middle class is a relatively new phenomenon historically. It's not that they would say they didn't have any middle class, but by and large it was pretty separate. That is
Abigail Boone: a relatively new phenomenon. Wide chasm between the two Yeah. Okay.
Charlie Loften: All right. So that's kind of the big idea, but we can't avoid
Abigail Boone: the symbolism used.
Charlie Loften: Yeah. Is what what do we what do we learn if we take everything literally that he is saying about heaven and hell, what are the things that we know? Okay. We would say, one, Abraham is the guardian of it. Mhmm.
K? He is the guardian slash spokesman.
Abigail Boone: Also k. Angels are gonna carry you up there. Yeah. I'm gonna go, like, everything. Okay.
Angels And you can tell me what's not important to get
Charlie Loften: in there. Well, then we answer the side. Angels angels take you there. Mhmm. Abraham's the guardian.
People in hell can see people in heaven.
Abigail Boone: Yes. It's like excruciating physical torment.
Charlie Loften: You can communicate to Abraham
Abigail Boone: Yeah.
Charlie Loften: From there.
Abigail Boone: Yeah.
Charlie Loften: You can you can you can communicate to him. You can see him.
Abigail Boone: Maybe that's what happened with, like, a mysterious, like, huge gust of wind. What? A huge gust of wind, and it's like, oh, they're talking between heaven and hell.
Charlie Loften: That's what that is. That's Percy Jackson book kind of thing right there. It's just like, how do I explain normal phenomenon? I guess Harry Potter's got a little bit of that too, but I associate it more with Percy Jackson. How do I explain normal phenomenon in Greek god terms?
Yeah.
Abigail Boone: But the torment is I guess we didn't really talk about that in other Hell
Charlie Loften: is place where you are objectively
Abigail Boone: In pain.
Charlie Loften: In some sort of pain. Mhmm.
Abigail Boone: And, well, it seems like they are able to reflect in regret. Yeah,
Charlie Loften: he is aware of has happened to him. But it's interesting, he doesn't ask for, get me out of here.
Abigail Boone: He just wants a little bit of relief. Also, says very specifically, in this fire, which sounds very cartoonish. Like if there's like a cartoon of hell, there's like Satan with a little pitchfork things. Right. And then there's flames everywhere.
Charlie Loften: Yeah. And so there there there's definitive amount of fire imagery Mhmm. Which is very common in hell imagery.
Abigail Boone: Is that what Hades mean? Or is that
Charlie Loften: what the word was? Hades would just best be described as the land of the dead. Okay.
Abigail Boone: Was that like a physical location at that time? Like, they're referring to the hottest place in Well, Egypt or something I mean, like there's
Charlie Loften: where do dead people go? Right? And so it referring to, again, we would now call it hell. A person's concept of Hades would be as diverse then as, said, what do you think hell is like when you talk to 10 to 15 different people? You're gonna get a wide range of answers, but essentially all, it's where bad people go when they die and they are being punished or tormented internally or externally in some way.
So we're getting to another one where there's a flame lot and flame imagery to describe it. The biggest thing that I think that is said here that is the one of all of this is like, Charlie, are you gonna take anything from this as Jesus is giving definitive teaching about what the afterlife is like? The biggest one is is when he says, And besides all this, between us and you, a great chasm has been set in place so that those who want to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from there to us. I think that is the most definitive piece of teaching that he is doing. Mean, to me, just feels very differently than, Oh, Lazarus has access to water and can put it on my side.
He's like Abraham can talk to people in hell. I mean, to me, that that has more of a fantastical element to it, kind of an exaggerated feel to it. But the idea of these are two places that once you are there, you cannot move back and forth.
Abigail Boone: Yeah. But he's he's touching on that and that, like, you can't make a decision afterwards.
Charlie Loften: You have this lifetime to make those decisions. Your regret now cannot get you to hear. Right. And their compassion for you can't get them to hear.
Abigail Boone: To help.
Charlie Loften: So, again, I don't think there's like, would it be possible for someone to go?
Abigail Boone: Was that a type of theology that people thought?
Charlie Loften: Think there is a very specific again, that's what I'm saying. We want to take it at its simplest. You don't have choices after death. Hebrews nine twenty seven, As much as it's pointed that everybody's going to die once and after this comes judgment. Right?
Your judgment is set based on what happens in this life alone.
Abigail Boone: I've heard that verse a ton of times and had absolutely no idea what it meant, so thanks.
Charlie Loften: You die once
Abigail Boone: Uh-huh.
Charlie Loften: And then comes then judgment comes immediately after that. Right? There's not a again, all due respect, any Roman Catholics who would accidentally fall upon this. Right? I mean, there is no purgatorial element.
There's no, like, you can't work you don't work your way out of it.
Abigail Boone: Not like a way ruin comes,
Charlie Loften: and there are there is a Mhmm. There's a two choice there's two choices. Right? There's there's there's there's a binary here.
Abigail Boone: Mhmm.
Charlie Loften: Good, bad. There's no bridge between them, and there is no amount of regret because there's a lot of people, we'll call them Christian Universalists, that would like to believe that God is still pursuing people Even after. After death, and that someone like this rich guy would be like
Abigail Boone: I'm wised up now.
Charlie Loften: I'm so sorry. Can can we work some can we work something out here?
Abigail Boone: Which is interesting because, like, based off of the in imagery that Jesus used, I don't know anyone that would be like, yeah. I'll just take this. Like that. Like the of course, if you'd like someone you tell a kid not to touch a stove over and over and over they touch it and they're like sick. That was all like, yeah, they're going to be like, woah, wait, sorry.
I wish I wouldn't have done that right.
Charlie Loften: But also at the same time, you don't get the sense that the the
Abigail Boone: he's repentant. Yeah. He doesn't want out. He just wants a little relief before he goes back in, I guess.
Charlie Loften: That's interesting too. This is just just more layers to the story. He knew Lazarus' name. Yeah. He was aware Of someone who had.
Of this guy Mhmm. To the point to where he knew that this was a poor man that had nothing and knew him well enough to have known his name. Yeah. The implication being there, and you
Abigail Boone: And you still
Charlie Loften: did nothing.
Abigail Boone: Yeah. So did they have like, did they think there was a guardian over heaven? Like, why did why did they why did he describe Abraham as the person that he would talk to about the guy that's in heaven and not God?
Charlie Loften: He would be the he would be you know, I mean, they they will have a they probably would have a,
Abigail Boone: you know An exec board?
Charlie Loften: Yeah, and there's still a gap between people's ability to kind of have direct access to God. Okay. But Abraham's kind of our great, great, great, great grandfather who kind of oversees all of us. And so that would have even if they didn't literally believe that, that would have been like but we're not Roman Catholics to the point that we think that Peter literally holds keys to the gates of heaven.
Abigail Boone: But more so
Charlie Loften: than A they Catholic definitely does, but we would still use that same sort of Wait, really? Imagery and talking. Interesting.
Abigail Boone: But is he more so just, like, acknowledging that they think they don't even, they're not even worthy enough to talk directly to God so they would be talking to someone
Charlie Loften: Again, I think it's just imagery that they would have connected to. Yeah, if there is an afterlife and a good one, Abraham's probably the, he's probably the the king down there. Mean, he's he would be kind of God's right hand man in that situation more than more than anyone else. And so it just again, I don't think it's meant to be literally true, but I think that would have been an image like, oh, yeah. Okay.
Abraham and the boys, right? Abraham and all the other faithful Jewish people, yeah. And the representative that you could talk to would be Abraham. But again, I think that's just imagery.
Abigail Boone: Do you think it would have caused them more confusion if he said the guy could call directly up to God?
Charlie Loften: Yeah. I I just I think I think probably too, you just wanna add to it, like, they consider themselves to be the faithful followers of Abraham. Okay. Even Abraham's not going to take your side. Okay.
So the things that I would say, there's there are there are two places and two places only. Faithful people go one place, unfaithful people go another. Mhmm. There's no gap in between them, and whatever hell is, you are experiencing are experiencing pain. I'm on where you can go back.
You can find the podcast episode if you want, where we do talk about hell. I mean, there's three images that are very often used for hell, darkness, fire, destruction.
Abigail Boone: And
Charlie Loften: they all three can't coexist literally in the same place. And so I'm not willing to say it was It's a none other. It is most definitely literal fire. Yeah. I don't I don't I don't think that's part of it.
I just think, as always, it is the best image to describe of what torment feels like. Mhmm. And so hell is bad, and you're actively feeling bad while you're there, and you go there when you're unfaithful. Faithful people go here, and there's no after death, I can change my mind and regret and repent and get there. I think that is one of the big picture ideas of the whole parable.
What you do in this life is what is going to determine your next life. So all the other stuff, I don't think Abraham's a spokesman, I don't think people from hell can communicate with people over in heaven. I would be really surprised if you could even see it. But again, maybe, like maybe, but I don't think that's the point of this. Think as far as like, if we're gonna add, like, what can we theologically learn about heaven and hell from that, I think it's limited to the things that I just said.
Okay. Then because again, just big picture, who you are in this life is what determines who you will be in the next.
Abigail Boone: So then the lower part where he's talking about, like, you wouldn't even responded to someone who raised from the dead, would've do you think that was The he's talking to the Pharisees would have that been like a cause them fear of like or they still would have just been like
Charlie Loften: I think that would have just I think they were all so mad by this point that they wouldn't have really even necessarily heard that. Again, I just think that is just beautiful foreshadowing on Jesus' part to talk about even once the greatest miracle
Abigail Boone: of He used all time one sentence to say two huge things.
Charlie Loften: Yeah, and when that moment comes, it's a prophecy about how they're going to respond, and also a, again, a foreshadowing to what is about to happen the
Abigail Boone: next You
Charlie Loften: want year to believe me. I'm going come back to life and you're not going to believe you don't believe me now, you're not going to believe me then. There's a layer to that that I don't think anybody got at the time, like you said, upon second and third viewing, you're like, oh, dude's a genius.
Abigail Boone: Yeah. Runs out to the kitchen. Guys, got it.
Charlie Loften: Well, thank you, Abigail.
Abigail Boone: Of course.
Charlie Loften: Thank you for your support of female female coffee producers. Always. And thank you for joining us, and we should hope look forward to talking to you next time. Thank you for listening to the Cultivate Podcast. Our hope is that you are taking steps to go deeper in your faith, that you are asking big questions, and you're looking for answers.
We hope that we can be a resource for you through our podcast and any other way that we can help you. You can find all our episodes anywhere that you can find podcasts, including YouTube. And again, thank you so much for joining us.