Episode 12 - Part 4 of "Things I used to know - Debunking Christian Myths".

Tim 00:00:24 Welcome back, everybody. At least we hope you're all here with us, again. We are still in the middle of our series on debunking Christian myths or things I used to know. And before we get started, I would like to mention one thing about that title, we are not, in our effort to explain our understanding of grace and how faith and grace work, we are not trying to attack anybody. We're not trying to say that, you know, the pastors that don't preach you what we're preaching are heathens, and you know, shouldn't be listened to and you should leave the church or anything like that. What we're just trying to do is we're trying to clarify the word of God and we're trying to clarify what grace is and how it impacts our lives, according to the scriptures and of course, most of this comes in the New Testament because the New Testament is the new covenant. And most of our source material probably comes from Paul because he was the biggest advocate of this and brought, I guess, a majority of the New Testament letters. So, it's not about us saying that everyone else is teaching it wrong or doing it wrong, although we don't necessarily completely agree with how they're presenting some of the material, we're not attacking anyone. We're not looking at anybody in specific, no church, no pastor, nobody like that and I don't want anyone to confuse that, and, and cuz, you know, if we're graceful and full of love of our Father, we're not gonna be like that towards people. And before I go ahead and kick the rest of us off Mark, Ajai, do you have anything to add to that? Mark 00:01:56 Well, you know, that our working title for this series and for the upcoming New York times bests seller list was things I used to know, debunking Christian myths. Well maybe we need to add one more line in there in order to reveal the pure one, true gospel. A little wordy, maybe you think, but <laugh>, that's really what we're trying to do. We're dealing with things that at one time, we too accepted as gospel truth, but then as we, as God gave us the spirit of wisdom and revelation and revealed to (us) His gospel and started purifying our understanding of it, we realized some of those things we believed were not true and so what we're trying to do now is debunk those things and show why they're not true. Not to attack anybody, but so that the true gospel might be revealed because I mean, one of the things Tim likes to joke about a lot is that Ajai and me, really, all of us, are hair splitters is the word. You know, some people would say picking nits. But one thing I realized today is that the gospel, the pure gospel is the power of God. The apostle Paul told us it's the power of God for sozo, which is the word for salvation. That means so much more than just the forgiveness of sins, it's healing, deliverance from our enemies, it's wholeness, it's the most powerful force in creation is this gospel. So even just one little hair split of greater understanding can open us up into a world of power and freedom in the power of sozo in our life. So that's what we're trying to do here. Basically, another way of saying, getting deeper and deeper into scripture and in our understanding of, of the glorious gospel of the grace of Jesus Christ. Tim 00:03:49 Excellent. Ajai, anything else to add? Ajai 00:03:52 Yeah, I couldn't agree with you both. You know, our goal is not to attack anyone, but to proclaim the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ with clarity. And our only goal is to glorify our Lord, Mark 00:04:05 You know, Ajai, you accidentally just started on that by saying I could not agree with the two of you. You meant you couldn't agree more with the two of us. Right? That's Ajai 00:04:14 What I said. Yeah. Okay, Mark 00:04:15 Good. I don't know if anybody else caught that. I Ajai 00:04:18 Oh really? Yeah. I thought I said more with the two now. <laugh> Mark 00:04:22 So anyway, as we jump into this, as we, as I hand this back to Tim to jump into our first myth to be debunked this week, just wanted to point back to last week's podcast. If anybody hasn't had a chance to listen to that, it was one of the main subjects we dealt with, which is what I would call the believers confession of sin, in 1 John 1:8 that instructs us, that we need to confess our sins if we wanna be forgiven of them or purified from all unrighteousness. And that one just leads perfectly into this first one, because our right understanding of the sufficiency of the cross of the perfect and finished work of Christ is just so integral to every other part of our lives. Every other thing we believe, the way we think, the way we speak and then eventually the way we act, which also gets into the way we act in our gatherings and, and what becomes part of our church. So, on that we're gonna, Tim, I'll let you take it into our first subject. Tim 00:05:28 Well, thanks Mark. And we are going back into our Christian myths and we are gonna be talking about communion today. Now I grew up in the, in the United Methodist churches as a child and have been to churches of several different brands and denominations and one of the things that was common between many of 'em was that we would take communion on some sort of a basis, whether it was weekly, monthly, quarterly, but we would take communion and the pastor would stand up in front and tell, you know, walk through that scripture of the Lord giving the first first supper or excuse me, last supper, Mark 00:06:04 The first, last supper. Tim 00:06:06 Yeah. Right. <laugh> and they would always have this part where they said, you gotta be careful how you take communion cuz if you take it wrongly, it not only not gonna benefit you, it's gonna be ill benefiting to you. And so they would have this period of time where they'd say introspect, look into yourself, ask forgiveness for all your sins and make sure you're in a right place with God before you take communion. And that was, I mean, very common among a lot of brands of church, a lot of denominations. So, I didn't, always like that because it was a very uncomfortable thing to be honest, to sit there and try and drag up; “Okay, what have I done since my last communion that I might need to get forgiveness for or confess or whatnot?” it always, to me, took my mind off of what I was there in the moment for which was the communion itself. So Mark, what do you think of that practice? Mark 00:06:59 I think it's bad. <laugh>, that'll be the end of this show. We'll see you next week. You know, <laugh> when I got the picture of, when you were talking about your experience there, which I've experienced and pretty much not all, but on, I'd say 95% of the churches I've been involved with, either going to being a member of, or being a worship pastor in that's what you experienced. And it's almost like when you sit, when, when they tell you to examine yourself for sin, you're taking a magnifying glass and you're looking back for the last week trying to remember every little weakness, every little thing you did wrong. And I, I think inherently, they want you to feel bad about it, so that you will confess it and be forgiven and purified from it, which we discussed last week as being completely wrong because Christ died once for all. So, I, I can't tell you how vehemently I am opposed to that. So the best thing to do then is to go into scripture and find out what the Lord Jesus himself, and what the apostle Paul, who was the primary preacher of the one true gospel defined for us in scripture. And he's not ambiguous in what it is and what it isn't, so you would've thought that we wouldn't have gotten it wrong. You would've thought wrong, but you would've thought that. So, 1 Corinthians 11 to me is one of the quintessential writings on what communion needs to be by Paul and Paul says “for I receive from the Lord, what I also passed on to you”. One thing I wanna point out here, that's awesome about that first line there is Paul says this many times, he also refers to the gospel as have not been taught it by any man, but that he received directly from the Lord, Jesus Christ. He wasn't one of the original apostles, he was the last of the apostles who received directly from Christ in first of all, his encounter with the risen Christ on the road of Damascus and then through the Spirit. But he said this “the Lord Jesus on the night He was betrayed, took bread and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, this is My body, which is for you, do this in remembrance of Me”. And if you have a yellow highlighter, highlight that in your Bible, do this in remembrance of me. “In the same way after supper, He took the cup saying this cup is the new covenant in my blood, do this whenever you drink it in remembrance of Me. For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until He comes. So, then whoever eats the bread or drinks, the cup of the Lord and an unworthy manner will be guilty of sinning against the body and blood of the Lord. Everyone ought to examine themselves before they eat of the bread and drink from the cup for those who eat and drink without discerning the body of Christ, eat and drink judgment on themselves”. So really the line that I think is tripped up people is that line 27. “So, then whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner”, and none of us wants to do that, right, he says, “we will be guilty of sin against the body and blood of the Lord”. But then he tells us to examine ourselves. But then he goes on to explain what we're examining ourselves for. Does he say, I want you to examine yourself for every sin you've done in this last week and you better feel pretty bad about it <laugh> you know. No. He says that the unworthy manner that you wanna stay away from is not discerning the body of Christ. What does that mean to discern? It means to understand, to think, to remember as Christ himself said. So, these very well-meaning pastors who tried to get us to examine ourselves for sin, because they don't want us to take communion in an unworthy unworthy manner, they have it 180 degrees wrong, and they're actually causing us to take communion in an unworthy manner because we've taken our eyes off the Lord, off of discerning His body, His death, His body and blood that were shed and broken for us and putting it on ourselves. Oh, look how bad we are. I have this new thing I've come up with I call it the 180 degrees wrong factor and that when you find false teaching, most of the time that false teaching is predominantly based upon adding the law back in legalist is legalistic thinking and because the law is 180 degrees opposite of grace (works are opposite of grace), when you start adding them in, you're not just a little bit wrong, you're 180 degrees wrong. This is another perfect example of that. Ajai 00:12:03 Yeah, that's an excellent point. Mark, you know, like about 180 degrees, you know, when you add law to grace, right, you know, it's not yet just perverting grace a little bit, you're actually totally nullifying grace and perverting back to the law. And you know, there's one line in the scripture that you read, you know, that I would like to draw our attention to is, “this is a cup of the new covenant.” You know, since the law, Jesus Christ and Paul himself mentioned during communion, the new covenant, it behooves such to know, you know, what new covenant is. So I would quickly like to go to Hebrew chapter 8 and read a quick passage where it talks about the new covenant. From Hebrew chapter 8, from verse 7 - 12 “For if that first covenant had been for less than no place would've been sought for the second, because finding fault with them, he says, behold, the days are coming, says a Lord when I'll make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, because they did not continue in my covenant. And I disregarded them, says the Lord for this is a covenant that I'll make with the house of Israel. After those days says the Lord, I'll put my laws in their mind and write them in their hearts and I'll be their God. And they shall be my people. None of them shall teach his neighbor. And none his brothers saying no, the Lord for all shall know me from the least of them to the greatest of them. And the reason for this is, you know, there's a for, therefore I'll be merciful to their unrighteousness and their sins and their knowledge deeds. I will remember no more”. So clearly the new covenant, the main point of new covenant is I'll be merciful there to their unrighteousness and their sin and their lawless deeds I will remember no more. So, in other words, you know, when we partake in the cup of the Lord, we are coming to celebrate the new covenant and the new covenant. The whole point of new covenant is I will remember your sins no more. Then why are we actually making the cup a remembrance of our sins, which is exactly the opposite of what the Lord said. Then again, in the new, in the passage that you just read, Mark, you know, if you don't mind, I'll read it again. “And when He had given thanks, he broke it and said, take eat. This is my body, which is broken for you. Do this in remembrance of me. And again, in the same manner, he also took the cup of cup after supper saying this cup is a new covenant in my blood, do this in remembrance of me. So, two times he's saying do this in remembrance of me, but we are doing it in remembrance of our sins. So, like you said, Mark, like you often say, our communion is not as remembrance of our sins, but it is a remembrance of a savior. And clearly it says, you know, as often as you take the cup, right, you proclaim my death. So, this whole communion is about remembering the Lord Jesus Christ and proclaiming his death again. What does the death mean? The death means He took our sins upon Himself and He took away our sins completely, right, not to remember them anymore. So, in other words, again, going back to the 360, right, we are bringing the old covenant mentality to the communion also. We are taking in the spirit of the old covenant where in the old covenant, you know, the old covenant, the old covenant sacrifices is all about remembering our sins, but the new covenant sacrifice is about Lord taking away our sins completely. So now we come not to remember our sins, but to remember our Savior. Mark 00:15:54 Oh, Ajai, that is so, so good. <laugh>, Tim 00:15:56 I'm a simple guy. So let me see if I can make this simple, anything that tells you to take your eyes off Christ and put it on something or someone else, even yourself, is something you need to inspect because our faith says to keep our eyes upon Jesus and that's where everything comes from. So, if it says, take your eyes off Jesus, and look at your sins or take your eyes off Jesus and listen to this guy's teaching or whatnot, that that should be a red flag. Mark 00:16:27 Absolutely. Absolutely. Ajai 00:16:29 In fact, that is a litmus test of grace. I would say, Tim, what you just said, right, if you want to know, you know, whether a message is from the Lord or not, whether they're preaching grace or not, the it's a simple, litmus test; Who are they talking about? Are they talking about the Lord Jesus Christ and his finished work? Are they talking about you and what you have to do? I think that's an excellent point, Tim, Mark 00:16:51 Ajai, your point on the new covenant and, and communion being so a celebration of that new covenant in his blood, and that was just like, water for a thirsty soul, man, I could just feel my spirit rising. That is so, so, so true, and it's gotta be heartbreaking, you know, that we would mi that his children are missing that [Yeah.] you know, that they're turning themselves on what he already paid a dear price to completely get rid of. And we were talking a little bit before that, on that scripture you love to mention that, I love too, and I'm sure Tim does, where God says in as a prophecy of when Christ came a time is coming when their sins and lawless acts, I will re remember no more. And one of my responses to that has always been why in the world, if he's chosen not to remember our sins, would we want to remind him? But then today it just occurred to me; if God has chosen, there was no benefit to us, of Him remembering our sin anymore, in fact, great benefit for him, not remembering our sin anymore. Why you think our Father in heaven that sees us as His sons and daughters would want us to remember them to be fixate on them, to be condemning ourselves and walking around guilty? No, he wants us to remember them no more. He wants us to remember Christ, especially in communion. So, this whole, this whole paragraph here, these points are just so crystal clear, aren't they? Ajai 00:18:30 Yeah. In fact, adding onto that Mark, Hebrew chapter 10, verse 1-4 “for the law, having a shadow of good things to come and not the very image of the things can never with the sacrifices which they offer continually year by year, make those who approach perfect for then they would have ceased to be offered for the worshipers once purified would have no more conscience of sin, but in those sacrifices, there is a reminder of sins every year for it is impossible that the blood of bulls and goats could take away our sins”. So here again, there's a clear distinction between the old and the new right, the old sacrifices, it says, you know, but in those sacrifices there's a reminder of since every year. So ,we have taken that mentality and we have brought it to the communion. What they have done is, you know, in that communion, there's a reminder of sins every week, that's what we have done with that. But you know, if you go back and read just one verse before that for, they would have ceased to be offered for the worshipers once purified would've no more consciousness of sin. What the sacrifice of Lord Jesus Christ did is it has taken away our sin as far as east is from the west and now, we do not have any consciousness of sin and we don't have the guilty conscience, so when we come to celebrate the Lord’s supper, we are not coming to remember our sin, but we are actually coming to celebrate the work of our Lord Jesus Christ. So again, it goes back to, you know, bringing the old covenant mentality or the old covenant approach to the new covenant. You know, if you add a little leaven to the dough, it leavens the whole dough. That's what is happening, right. If you add a little bit of the law to grace, right, it spoils all of grace. Mark 00:20:18 And as Paul told us again and again in 2 Corinthians 3 and many other places; that why in the world would, we want to turn back to the old covenant, it's a ministry of death of condemnation. It was only meant as a transitory ministry to make us feel guilty of sin so that we would turn to the savior. [Yeah] That's fulfilled. It's perfect. We've, we've turned to the savior. Why would we wanna turn, as, as Paul said, in pretty guttural language as a dog returns to its vomit, why would we wanna turn back to that? [Yeah.] So, so 1 Corinthians 11 is so instructive and the stuff you added, Ajai, I just can't see how anybody could wanna return to the old <laugh> and, what what's great about 1 Corinthians 11, is it not only defines what community is as being in remembrance of Christ and discerning his body a complete focus on Him. It says that when believers come together and do that, here's what you're actually doing. and he says, “whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup (and I'll add in a worthy manner, which means focused on Christ) we proclaim the Lord's death until He comes. Who are we proclaiming it to? We're proclaiming it to the world. We're pro proclaiming it to the forces and the spiritual realm everywhere that believers are proclaiming, that Christ died for us, that He rose again, and that He's coming again. So, it's just, just a wonderful, wonderful passage there. Ajai 00:21:55 Yeah. I think Mark, like you said, I think people have taken two phrases here, right, and ran with it. Like the first phrase is in worthy manner and the second is examine yourself. So, what the interpretation of that is if I have sins in my life, right, if I committed some sins, I'm partaking in an un-worthy manner and the way to become worthy is examine myself, confess my sin and then get the forgiveness through confession and then become worthy. So, in all these things, right, there's no Lord Jesus Christ. There's no work of Lord Jesus Christ. There’s no shed blood. It's again going back to what I do, But I think, you know, when you talk about examine yourself, I think, Mark, you already mentioned, right, not discerning the Lord's body, you know, they're not discerning the Lord's body. And if you look at the context, right, you know, Paul is saying like, the way they're approaching this, if you read from, first verse of the chapter and all the way through the last verse, at the beginning of the chapter, right, you know, he's actually admonishing them or reprimanding them like for actually treating, not understanding what the Lord supper is about. They're just coming to this as a party right. In India. And I don't know if it's here as well, right, if someone invite us to a wedding, right, we know there's going to be really good food. So, we kind of stay hungry the whole day <laugh> so that we can go and attack and eat as much as we can. So that is approach they're taking. And they're taking the Lord’s Supper, they're not understanding it's about the Lord’s Supper. They're thinking, know there's a place where you can, I can go and eat as much as I want and they're also not considering others. You know, before everybody shows up, they're going first and finishing up the food. That's why Paul says, if you go towards the end of this passage, he's saying that, you know, don't you have, if anybody is hungry, right, eat and come, right. Don't you have your own homes to eat? So, eat and come and come with an understanding of the Lord's Supper. Come with an understanding, you know, this is about discerning the Lord's body. This is about remembering the Lord Jesus Christ and it's about proclaiming His death. It's not about just all you can eat, if that is a case, you know, go eat at your homes and then come Mark 00:24:08 That it's funny because that's been one of my eating philosophies, my whole life <laugh>, especially when we go to buffets, I don't eat like the whole day. So, I'm glad that wasn't communion though, so. One little final thought on one of the outcomes of that thinking; well, something you mentioned that I thought from last week on con the confession of sin for believers, which is not, it's not something we're to be doing, is that beside turning us back to the old covenant, which has no glory in comparison to the new, as a ministry of death and condemnation, it's also making little making less and little of what Christ did on the cross. What some in theology would say the sufficiency of the cross. In a time when we're supposed to be focusing on Christ and proclaiming the cross, we're making little of the cross. We're saying it's not sufficient enough, I've gotta confess all my sin. I need to do this. And once you start doing that, where does it stop? I have to give a tithe. I have to read so much scripture. I need to have good church attendance. I need to be serving. And I need to be a small group. I shouldn't dance. I shouldn't swear. You know, it just keeps going and going and going. You're going down a dangerous path when you start adding, because there's no such thing as adding to the gospel. Anything you add is actually detracting, it's putting up a veil between you and God and it's, you know, it's just adding darkness in the light. So, Ajai 00:25:44 Amen. Tim 00:25:45 Mark, you've said a couple of things here that I think are gonna move us into our next topic, cuz it's gonna be a real easy segue for me here [Good.] talking about not having to confess our sins and things like that. We, when we came to Christ, it was with the knowledge that we couldn't save ourselves, so Jesus came and was a sacrifice for us, for our forgiveness of sins for our salvation. And then we start going to church and we learn (that) now we have to straighten up and fly, right? Pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps. We have to behave. We have to it's it becomes very much about what you and I have to do to please God, or to give us the veneer of Christianity for people outside the church to see God forbid, they realize we're humans and we still make mistakes. And this is just, it is overwhelmingly after a period of time, it is just overwhelmingly burdensome. It is I can't keep every week I get a new message on how I should behave and what I should be doing. And you, when you hear enough of those, you just realize, I, I, I just heard this story last week. Now they want me to look at this this week, then next week is gonna be a seven-part series, starting seven-part series on something five or six years of that and you realize I can't, I just can't, I can't keep all those balls in the air. I can't keep focusing on this and do that. So that's one part of it. Mark 00:27:23 When you were speaking that I got the picture of a giant gerbil wheel <laugh> and they're encouraging us to run faster, run faster, try harder you're gonna get somewhere. But all that happens is the wheel spins faster. And you know what? We couldn't do that well enough to gain salvation. Do we really think we can do it well enough to somehow add to Christ's perfect work or I'll use the, the spiritual words, you know, biblical words, sanctification. We couldn't do it well enough to gain salvation. We definitely can't do it well enough to gain sanctification and thankfully we don't need to because there are, I have at least a dozen scriptures, if you guys want them email and I can send them to you, that tell us that sanctification belongs to the Lord. The sanctifying spirit of Christ in us, the cross sanctifies us. You know, we're never gonna be any more righteous than on the day we ask Christ to take our sins and become our, our savior. So, you could work the rest of your life, doing every good deed in the, in on earthly level, you might look great, you haven't gained any more righteousness at all, not even one iotta nor have you caused God to love you anymore than He already did. Tim 00:28:40 All right. So I'm gonna interject a really quick thought here. You said we couldn't, we will never be more righteous than we are at the point of our salvation. I want to add, and we will never be less righteous. Mark 00:28:52 Absolutely. [Yeah] Tim 00:28:53 No matter what we do. [Yep.] At least not in the eyes of our Father, Mark 00:28:57 The great reformer Martin Luther said that only one type of righteousness even exists and that's an alien righteousness, meaning it's foreign to us, outside of us, and that's the righteousness of God. There is no other righteousness. Unless He gives it to you through Christ, you're never gonna have any righteousness. In fact, your righteousness will be as filthy as rags, or is, Ajai likes to point out more like dirty diapers. <laugh> Ajai 00:29:29 <laugh> Mark 00:29:30 When you think about that dirty diapers metaphor, it's pretty literal. <laugh> You know, we cause our righteousness is, is like the way a baby treats a diaper. So I know you can move on Ajai 00:29:43 <laugh> Mark 00:29:44 I probably perseverated on that enough. Ajai 00:29:46 So on this topic, you know, when I went to India, I've been, you know, listening to various, gospel channels, like, and the preaching and then, you know, I sent a message to my sister. You know, why is that, you know, everybody's talking about what we have to do instead of talking about what the Lord Jesus Christ did for us and his finished work. And she gave me a profound answer. She said, because they think grace is only for salvation and not for Christian work. You know exactly what you said, Mark, you know. So most of us think, you know, when we, you know, most of us know the scriptures, we are saved by faith alone in grace, alone in Christ alone. Right. And not of ourselves and not of works, any man should boast. But they confine it only to the point of salvation and they think, yeah, we all agree with you. And in fact, you know, whenever we talk about grace, in fact, you, I even had a comment, you know, once, couple of times, you know, I shared the grace message in, the church that I go to in India and after that, you know, one of them commented that, you know, this message is good for unbelievers. So, thinking that, you know, the grace message is only for salvation. So that is, (the) kind of thinking among most of the churches, unfortunately. They, again, like fortunately, you know, most of them are truly saved because at least for salvation, they did accept the grace of God without any of their contribution, but once they are saved, they think that, you know, it's up to them. And Paul clearly addresses (this), right. You know, Mark, you mentioned many scriptures, but I just want to read one scripture just to make that point. Galatians chapter 3:1 onwards “Oh, foolish. Galatians who has bewitched you before your very eyes, Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified. I would like to learn just one thing from you. Did you receive the spirit by the works of the law or by hearing of faith? Are you so foolish after starting in the spirit, are you now finishing in the flesh? Have you suffered so much for nothing? If it really, for nothing, does God lavish his spirit on you and what miracles among you because you practice the law or because you hear and believe. So, also Abraham believed God and it was credited to him for righteousness”. So what Paul is saying is that, you know, after being saved by faith now will be perfected by the law. You know, that's what is happening everywhere, right? So, they all accept, okay, we are saved by grace. No problem. But you know, we are sanctified by the law as Mark, you said. But again, the interesting point here is right, you know, when he is saying that, you know, are you so, I mean like, does God lavish his spirit on you and what miracles among you because you practice the law or because you hear and believe and then he says, so also Abraham believed God and it was created to him righteousness. So, he is right away pointing back to the justification scripture, right? We use this, you know, Abraham believed God and it was created to him for righteousness, for our justification, but Paul is using the same scripture in reference to sanctification. What he's saying is that, you know, just as you are justified by believing, you're also sanctified by believing. So the net net of this is just as you are believed, and just as you are, righteousness is by faith alone, your perfection in Christ or your sanctification is also by faith alone. In fact, the Bible says, we know we are already perfected in Christ. What we are doing in our Christian walk is we are simply aligning our walk with who we are already in Christ. The Bible says in Corinthians, 1 Corinthians chapter 1, towards the end, it says, you know of God here in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us redemption wisdom from God sanctification and redemption, right, and righteousness and redemption. What he's saying is that the Lord Jesus Christ is not only made our righteousness, not only made our redemption, not only made our wisdom, but is also our holiness. So, everything is in the Lord. Jesus Christ, and all we need to do is believe that we are righteous and holy in the Lord Jesus Christ. Mark 00:34:09 Okay. Hair split coming up here. <laugh> what you said. Ajai was, we are aligning our walk and where I would split a hair there is we aren't aligning our walk, the spirit of God is aligning our walk. Cuz I love what Paul says here, he says, he calls salvation beginning by means of the spirit. God sent us his spirit to draw us to Christ so that we might be saved. It was the Spirit's job. And now Paul's saying, are you gonna take the job now of making yourself holy of being sanctified? That's the flesh. That's doing it yourself. No, that's the Spirit's job and I know it was just a, a ma you know, a figure of speech you were using. We we're aligning our walk. We're not doing it. The Spirit's doing us in us, in us. And the problem with that language is so many throughout the centuries over spiritualized that, oh, you know, it's the spirit. No, it's the spirit. Paul means what he says, he's not trying to be spiritually flowery in his language. It's the spirit of God that's gonna do the work in you. We have one thing to do, look to the Lord. Jesus Christ. As we already mentioned in our first topic in communion, that's not just for communion that's our everyday life remembering Christ discerning his death, keeping focused on him. He's gonna do that through us effort effortlessly on our part. Ajai 00:35:37 I'm in a hundred percent alignment with you, Mark. Mark 00:35:39 Good, good. Tim 00:35:41 So this may become its own podcast topic in the future. I don't know, but that begs the question. A lot of people hear us talk about we don't, you know, we're not about works. We're not about trying to be righteous and, and all that. And yet, if people look at us, we do stuff, right. I mean, I ended up in Russia because I felt the calling of God. Mark, you're a worship leader. Not just because you think it's a good paying job. I know, you know, all that fame and glory that go with it are great. Yeah. Mark 00:36:11 Thanks Ajai 00:36:11 <laugh>. Tim 00:36:12 But, but we end up doing things, I think that, I think I just wanna stress at least this one little point tonight. And then if we want to take this on more in the future, what we do is I called the, I called what I did in Russia, a calling. I felt the Lord saying, this is what I'd like you to do, so I did it. But my mind said, I'm just serving. I'm not gaining anything. I'm not, you know, I'm, I'm not making myself better in the eyes of God, so, God's not against effort, but he's against earning is kind of how I'd put it. And I don't think that's a fully formed thought yet. And I just wanna say we, the, the, the acts of acts of love and stuff will flow from us through Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit. Those aren't us acting in a way that we believe is going to further our righteousness or our standing in Him. Mark 00:37:11 And the, it's kind of a paradox, as many things are, in scripture. And the reason they're a paradox is because people on earth have a completely different value system. They're not meant to be a paradox. It's just that our thinking is so wrong here on earth. That when we hear the greatest among you shall be the least shall be a servant among you, we think, oh, that's backwards. No, God doesn't have it backwards, we have it backwards, that's why it seems like a paradox. So, it seems like a paradox to say, you know what, you need to stop trying to do good works because unless I try, I'm not gonna have any. But the truth is the good works that come outta you are gonna, that's why the Bible calls them fruit, they grow outta you naturally. An apple tree doesn't try to grow beautiful apples. Okay? It sinks its root deep in the good soil, it drinks in the water and the nutrients, it turns its leave to the sun and what happens? Beautiful fruit grows. That's the same for us. It's you know what, and I do have a problem with the word effort when it comes to anything to do with our relationship with God. Now of course we work, we have jobs, we do other things, we technically use effort, but when we turn to Christ and let Him, He comes and makes His home in us, it really becomes very effortless. That doesn't mean like you said, you're not gonna serve, your not, but we don't ha we don't have everything we do in life doesn't have to somehow, how do I wanna put this correctly? Some things I believe and some things I do just cuz I, it is because I think they're right, not because I have to do them to make God love me more or even because I'm called to do 'em. I can do right or believe a certain way about non like Christian issues because in my wisdom and my experience, I think this is something I should do. I'm not spiritualizing it and thinking if I don't do this then, and I think I mentioned this to Ajai in a conversation, you know, you could spend the rest of your life working hard as a human ever worked to doing good things, serving at the soup kitchen, bringing in the garbage for you could do everything and at the end of your life, you have missed out on everything God had for you to do because scripture tells us at the end of Ephesians chapter 2, that we are God's handy work created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advanced for us to do. We're never gonna do those works if we're the ones trying hard to do 'em. But if we are just living our lives in Christ Jesus, we're gonna do the very ones He prepared for us and those are the only ones He expects of us. Or expects isn't even a good word, it's, He's prepared those as a blessing to us as well as to others. Ajai 00:40:15 Yeah. In fact, you know, I would like to read it was before that as well. And it beautifully summarizes both the points that, we are trying to make. And specifically, you know, Tim, you, called attention to, the same chapter, Mark, Ephesians chapter 2 from verse 8, “for by grace, you have been saved through faith and not of yourself. It is a gift of God, not of works lest anyone should boast. For, we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.” So, we are not saying that we are against works. We doesn't, we are not saying grace means, you know, you sit and do nothing. Like, you both are saying, right, you know, the good works that come out of the finished work of our Lord is Christ. So we are not working in order to get anything from God, but we are working out of the abundance of grace that we already have in Christ. Mark 00:41:22 Amen. I was gonna say Ajai, thinking about what you just said there, you know, if you found a church that had the most legalistic pastor you ever heard and then found another one that was preaching the pure gospel of grace, both of those pastors could have equally good intentions that their congregations would grow, that they would have holy lives and help people and give generously. They have the same desire. The problem is, they have the, how wrong, how do I do this? Do I do this by guilting them by doing, 20-part series on being a good husband, 10-part series on giving, or do I turn them to Christ and preach him alone? That's the difference. And, and, and Paula attested to the, to the Jews before him that were underneath the covenant. He said, they are, they are zealous for God, man. I could tell you, there's nobody been going after God as hard as them, but it's not based upon knowledge. And, and that's kind of what the difference is here. So, we will, kind of start to tie this up. I wanted to mention a little of the terminology in Galatians 3:3, Paul uses the word for these Galatians, a couple words; first word he uses is bewitched and then he uses the word foolish. So, if any of us down here right now are trying to add works, Paul would look at it and say, who's bewitched you how foolish. It is. And I don't mean to be harsh with that, but those are Paul's words, and the reason is because this is serious stuff, this is not a hair split, it's not a let's agree to disagree issue, this isn't essential truth of the Christian faith of the gospel, the good news. So that's a point I wanted to add and the other, other thing I mentioned once, the minute you try to add one thing to the all-sufficient gospel of grace, you're just taking away, you're not adding a thing, so why even try to do it? If I might, Tim, I'd like to read Galatians 1 here [all of it.] no, no, just, just a couple lines. <laugh> <laugh>, Tim's looking at the old clock on the wall. So anyway, it says, this is Paul. He starts out the letter addressing the Galatians here, who we're starting to return to the old covenant works, legalistic thinking, adding to the gospel. He says, “I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the One who called you to live in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel”. I'm gonna stop there and look at that last line. “The One who called you to live in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel”. So, he's defining what the gospel is there, he's saying living in the grace of Christ is the gospel. Why, you know, “I'm astonished, you're turning to a different gospel”. And then he says, “which is really no gospel at all”. Tim 00:44:30 Hence, hence the reason we don't use the gospel of grace as one of our, descriptors, because there's just the gospel or the other gospels, which is no gospel at all. Mark 00:44:42 So and so many disagree on what that gospel is. But this one line alone is bibliographical evidence that living in the grace of Christ is the gospel. Any different gospel is no gospel at all, which is the scripture we've gotten the term we've coined the one true gospel from there's only one true gospel and that's living in the grace of Christ. I'm gonna move on a little here. “Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ”. This is 2000 years ago. It's been going on ever since then. It's been going on now, hasn't it. But Paul goes on to say, “even if we, being a very people that preached this gospel to him, if a change in your mind, or even if an angel from heaven should come down and preach another gospel, other than the one we preach to you, let them be under God's curse”. This is such strong unambiguous terminology here and what I love about that one line, other than the one we preach to you, to me, that begs the question, who is we? Well, obviously Paul's referring to himself and all his partners in ministry, and we know from scriptures, other epistles and acts that his partners were Timothy and Titus, Priscilla and Acquila, Barnabas, and Silas, Apollos, Philemon these are the people preaching the one true gospel and, and I just, it's so clear, so clear, so clear. And here's a, here's a great, Ajai, do you have a Galatians 5 open up in front of you? Can you reach that? This really brings it all together for us here in a perfect conclusion. Paul's a very thorough writer. Ajai 00:46:31 Yeah. Mark, what do you want me to read? Mark 00:46:33 Galatians 5. Read it from like 1 - 4, Ajai 00:46:37 1 - 4. Okay. I have a Berean study Bible. So I'm going to read from it. It is for freedom that Christ has set us free, stand firm then and do not be encumbered once more by the yoke of slavery. Take notice, I, Paul, tell you that if you let yourselves be circumcised, Christ will be of no value to you at all. Again, I testify to every man who gets himself circumcised, that is obligated to obey the whole law. You who are trying to be justified by the law have been severed from Christ. You have fallen away from grace. Mark 00:47:14 You can't get any clearer than that. He just perfectly brought it all together. You were not meant for the law. You were not meant to add anything. You were meant for Christ and for freedom. In fact, when you start to add, as I mentioned, you're detracting, you're actually alienating Christ. You're making little of the cross and its sufficiency, and you're falling away from grace, which is the only way you're gonna ever stand. Tim 00:47:41 And with that, as Mark mentioned, I'm keeping an Eagle eye on the clock on the wall. And I think we, that's a good place for us to stop for tonight. A perfect ending, wrapped up well by Paul. guys, great to see you, as I said at the beginning, and let's have a good rest of your week and everybody listening thank you very much. And you'll hear from us next time.