Ep 907 | Jase Claims Missy Avoids One Bodily Function at All Costs & It’s NOT What You’d Guess
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I am unashamed. What about you?

I mean, I do. I let it out. Me too. But that's the purpose of a sneeze. The purpose of a sneeze is you got to let it all out. It's taken me 33 years to get my wife to sneeze out loud. I said, just do it once. You can't hold it in. What does she do? She goes, ah, choo. Ah.

That's what it sounds like. I don't know. Yeah, and I was like. I cleared the room. I have to turn away from people. Her eyes water. I was like, just do it once and see what it feels like. Yes. It is great. Taste a little of the glory. So she finally did it, and she went, that's disgusting. And she's never. She didn't like it? Nope.

Oh, I find it the most cleansing of all things. Your body is saying, you got all this junk in here. We're going to clear it out. The Almighty put it in us. She said she felt like she lost a part of something. And I said, well, you did.

It was the junk in your head that wasn't supposed to be there. Yeah. The foreign particles were expelled. I love it. I mean, I could... Well, where did the... Where did the say... Why does gazoontite or God bless you, where did that come in? It came in because God designed us to do that. I've made the same illustration about other bodily sounds that I'm like, we should just...

Do it. Especially during COVID, we all had masks. Let's just break that cycle right now. Well, you know what's crazy is now they say there was no scientific fact that proved having a mask prevented anything. Or the six foot either. The problem ran into me when you preach the gospel, the ones that believe it, you say, you know, baptize them in the name of the Father, Son, Holy Spirit.

So I said, well, let's see. If I get this contraption on, this mask, whatever they're hollering about, do you need to do that? I said, how are we going to baptize somebody? Because you have to have them in your arms, basically. Six foot. It's hard to baptize somebody. All they were saying is baptism has now been bunked. Yeah. We even found you. So I just weighed the thought and I said, look, we're dealing with it.

creator of the cosmos here. And he said, baptize them. And you can't baptize them unless you're close enough to push them down out of the water. I said, that ain't going to work around here. So I went out on a limb, like they say. That's right. You did it. You had a higher calling. So, Jace, when Si comes over to the house, every time he eats a meal at my house, then he'll let out the biggest belt you've ever heard. And everybody looks up and he says, hey.

It ain't bad manners if it's good food. There's another bodily sound where I think the French got that right. And I think we should just deal with it.

You shouldn't hold stuff in. No, it's not good for you. It's not good for you. Unless you're on an airplane with me. Unless your body wants to release it, you got to let it go. Unless you're on an airplane with me, please hold it. That's the message. If you sound it off, own it. Well, there's a bumper sticker. Chase, there's a new T-shirt.

If you sound at all about it. So it was interesting. We talked on a previous podcast. You didn't see this because you were on the golf course Sunday. But I was thinking about how times change. So Lisa made her first. She came back to meet with us for the first time. She was so excited. You know, we've been dealing with this cancer and the surgery and all that.

And so she was back at WFR. So I was going to just say, you know, she was there, maybe have her stand up. And then I just thought this where, you know, things change over time, I think for the better. And I just thought, well, you know, everybody's been praying about her and all the people that watch our live stream. We got two different services going the same time. And I just brought her up on stage and she came up and I said, I said, she's back. And everybody started clapping, you know, and I said, I just wanted you to take a look at what answered prayer looks like.

She's doing great. And then here's the part that's changed. I think about me over many years of preaching, especially at our church. And then I just handed her the microphone.

And I just thought, who in the world do you think years back that your wife gets up on stage with you and you just hand her the microphone? I don't know what she's going to say. Yeah. I mean, that's what, but she did great. She was tearful, but she just thanked everybody for the prayers. And then we had a prayer to the Almighty at Thanksgiving. Then I went about preaching my sermon. But I just thought, you know,

That's real. That's like, that's the way it always should be. And we made it so formalized. Yeah. That's the only time I get nervous is because used to, I was always nervous when I got up and spoke because I have shy tendencies. But when I had to speak with my wife, I wasn't nervous when I was talking.

But so that's why the first couple of times we did events together, I just did most of the talking. Right. Which she did not like. What'd she say afterwards? Can I talk? Can I speak now, Jay? Yeah, we got in the car after our first event, you know, because they whisk you away. Everything's on a schedule. And she was like, well, can I talk now? And I was like, do what? Babe's free. You're free to talk anytime. She said, well, that didn't happen in the last hour. Yeah.

I love it when mom, if we do a Q and a and mom and dad are on stage and dad will be going off doing his thing. And mom was like to put her hand on his arm and say, can I speak now? Okay. Well, we've made a deal for all future ventures. Let's just only do Q and a. And so we've made that agreement and that's worked. Yeah. That's what we're doing at least in a couple of weeks, our first event. So Zach, have you and Jill ever spoken together?

Yeah, we've done it quite a few. Yeah, we've done it a few times. Is it comfortable? I mean, Jill's so good. Your wife is amazing. Yeah, I think it goes well. I mean, but I preach every Sunday. Well, not every Sunday, but I preach quite a bit. So it's kind of hard for me to – it's harder for me than it is for her. Yeah, right.

When's the transition? Now, if it's an interview style, that's a lot easier, actually. Yeah, that's where we're at. I mean, Al does a lot better job. Well, he's not doing it all around the country. Well, I'm saying you, but you preach with other people. Yeah, that's right. Simultaneously. I couldn't, I'm just not built for that. I tried it, and it

Yeah, Mike and I have done it for years together, and it works for us. It wouldn't work for everybody. I have tried to do it with some people before, and it just didn't. One time I was teaching a class, and you get to thinking, like, well, I can do this with anybody. It was me and Paul Stevens, one of our good friends. We were teaching a youth class, so we had like 100 teenagers. And we're going, you know, and so I make my point, and I look over at Paul, like to kick it to him, which is what I would normally do with Mike. And Paul looks at me and says, Mike.

I don't, I don't know where you, I don't know where you went with that. I don't know what to say. He just like blocked. He just shut down. I was like, okay. So I like went back and reframed it and then tried to pull him in. But I was like, you can't do this with just anybody. That's for sure. That's true. That would be a challenge. It would be. Where did we leave off? So we're in Ephesians one and we've been kind of camping out here one, three through 14. And, um,

We've been talking about the different themes that are here. We looked at the text overall. I think we've done a pretty good job at showing you the big picture of how important this is. Last time we talked a little bit about sanctification, this idea of holy and blameless. It kind of led us into this concept of truth where Dad was talking about. And we did the, for he chose us in him before the creation of the world. I went through the world. There's two worlds. Right. In Christ and just without.

without Christ. Right. And obviously in that context, Jase, we didn't say this on the last podcast, but when he says that, he's meaning that is the, that's everything. Well, right. That is everything. We talked about the different meaning. You can go back and listen to it. I think it's worth a listen. So I wanted to bring up the one, and there's two or three more I want us to hit before we move on to 15. Cause this is kind of like, I don't know if we said this in a past podcast, but one of the guys we're kind of studying his outlines are going through this.

He talked about this almost being like poetry. And he did some throwbacks. Like one of his was Exodus 2 when the children of Israel came out. You know, when they were going to come out of Israel, Moses was going to lead them.

Some of these same themes are even way back then, which I find fascinating. And so when Paul writes this, it's almost like he's writing a song. Oh, no, I agree. You have a new world. There's a new exodus. There's a new creation. There's a new temple. There's a new kingdom. I mean, just think about those analogies that were basically, I guess you would call them signposts.

You know, they were God's chosen people and he liberated them and set them free and brought them into the promised land. I mean, you can make it doesn't take a smart person to make that analogy and see how what we have in Christ is being fulfilled in a much greater way. Right. So one of those themes that comes out is a word here.

That is really interesting, and it's the word adopted. We were talking about the idea of predestination and chosen to be adopted as his sons. And this is an interesting concept that I wanted us to talk about today.

is this idea of adoption. Cause this wasn't a, you know, Paul is a Hebrew of Hebrews, but adoption is not a Jewish concept. You know, their, their construct on family, they wouldn't have even understood what this meant. I mean, because their deal was the family took care of the family. That means extended. So something happens to somebody, you just meld into this other family, but they didn't see it as like a stranger concept.

that you would take in. They would never do that. I mean, even a Gentile had to be proselytized, was the word they used, to go through all the Jewish customs and all the circumstances and all the things they would have to do to even be considered part of the Jewish community. But that wouldn't be in your individual family. But the Romans, on the other hand...

They had this idea of adoption, that a complete stranger could be brought in and then have the rights as a son. So I think it's interesting that Paul uses this term when he's talking about us. Of course, in the same context, he was talking about how people are going to come into now the kingdom and the community that weren't a part of it before. So we've talked about this overarch, where it's the idea that Gentiles now being added in and he uses...

this phrase. And I want to get y'all's take on that because at the same time we have adoption. Zach, you guys adopted a child that was not part of your biological family. And yet at the same time, she has every right as a Dasher and a family member, right? I mean, she's not considered by your other children as anything less than each other. I mean, is that a fair assessment? Yeah. I mean, I have kind of a funny little

joke I do when I talk about this publicly, but I tell the story of when we started to think about adopting and Jill was all into it. She was all in from the very beginning. She felt like she had heard from the Lord on this and told me. I was like, I didn't get that memo. I was like, not. I'm just being honest. You're like, why didn't he tell me?

Yeah, he didn't tell me. So, you know, so I kind of like squelched it. And then over the course of probably, I don't know, eight years or so, I got, I just, my heart inched closer to it. But I was like, yeah, I don't know if I could do it. And my biggest fear was that I wondered, could I love this child forever?

Like I love my own kids, like my own biological children. And, and the joke that I tell when I, when I say this, I set it up with that. And I, and I say, I'm, I'm here to tell you, I actually love Ruth more than my biological children, which is hilarious because they're using the audience. And, but, but I mean, it's kind of a joke, but it's true, man. Like it's crazy how much that,

I love Ruth as my, like, I don't, I don't view her as not my daughter in any form or fashion. Right. And, and it really is a testament to how someone can be not your people and then be your people. And I know, I think that's what's going on here with this language too, because I think a lot of this, I mean, we know this, I mean, this is, we, we,

show this over and over again in the book of Ephesians about this mystery of not my people becoming my people from God's perspective. And so this is the adoption that's happening in it's he's adopting in. Now he's adopting in Jew and Gentile into the same family because the truth is, is that we're all adopted. And the way that you're adopted in is, is by faith and faith alone. Right. Excellent point.

We were talking about recently on the podcast, Job, who was a very ancient guy. And yet he said something that fits so well into the modern world. He said in Job 31.1, I made a covenant with my eyes not to look lustfully at a girl.

Which, you know, for an ancient guy, when everybody was like the only thing they were seeing were eyes and ankles, that's a pretty amazing statement when you say that one we could use today in our culture. So, you know, when we look at and we see what happens with pornography, it's so damaging and it destroys so many lives, relationships, marriages. We need help to be able to deal with that. And our good friends at Covenant Eyes,

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raised a baby from two days old the first year of his life, and then was part of the transition of reconciling him with his mom. And so now we see him every other weekend or so, but I didn't have that question because ours was more like in the moment, just having this come up. There's a woman incarcerated,

She's signing over custody of her baby to Missy and I right at the time that we just became empty nesters. And so, you know, I always look at that standard kind of like Zach, but mine was framed in there's very few people I would just without hesitation give my life for. I mean, Jesus said that, you know, for a good man, someone might possibly dare to die. You know, I'd give my life for my wife.

or my kids. I mean, I really don't even think I'd have to think about it, but you know, it wasn't long after bonding with this little baby that, Oh, that was, I felt the same way. I mean, I love this kid. Love every, everything about it. It made me think though, you know, back when I had my kids, you know, I was trying to make a living life is, is I was younger. Things were happening faster. I didn't stop and appreciate, uh,

the subtle things of what new life, you know, on this planet is about. Right. And for whatever reason, maybe it's because we're empty nesters, you know, I literally enjoyed every little process that went along with this little boy. And so, you know, even though we didn't adopt him, I will...

do what I can to be a father figure and to be a mentor to this kid as long as he lives or I live. I mean, that's just the way it is. That was the deal that happened. But I, like Zach, thought a lot about this from a spiritual application because even though he's not my flesh and blood, I'm like, what I'm a part of is that we're all adopted in Christ. This is the method that he chose to do that.

And there's a lot of passages about that. I mean, I want to get into Romans 8 at some point. That's where my fingers at, James. Let me just say this about it, because I said this, but I want to clarify this even more. How do we get—he chose us to be adopted. He predestined us to be adopted. How do we get into this adoption? How do we get into this relationship with him? The religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this—

To look after orphans and widows in their distress, which is exactly what you two have done. James 1. And to keep oneself from being polluted by the world. Yep. By the world. That's James 1, 26, 27. Yep. Faultless impurities help people out, widows and orphans in their distress, to keep from being polluted by the world. Simple.

That's difficult. No, that's really good, Zach, because you think about it. We've talked a lot about the word kingdom, but the Bible and Jesus and the writers always put family in the concept of that kingdom. In other words, it's more than just a subject matter.

The idea is we're family, we're sons. I want to read this Romans 8. We've mentioned a couple of times. I want to read this 12, Romans 8, 12. This goes to the heart of what he's talking about, I believe, in Ephesians 1, 2. He just fleshes it out a little bit more. Therefore, brothers, we have an obligation, but it's not to the sinful nature, to the flesh, to live according to it. For if you live according to the sinful nature, you will die.

But if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live. Because those who are led by the Spirit of God, and here's where this concept comes in, are sons of God. Family. Fully in air. That idea. For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, Abba, Father.

And that's that daddy, you know, that closeness, that idea is the concept. The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God's children. Now, if we are God's children, then we are heirs, heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ. If indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in

In his glory. Then, of course, he goes into that in that next text, but he mentions again in verse 23, not only so, but we ourselves who have the first fruits of the Spirit grown inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons. That same concept again, he uses the word. Well, but he uses it. I think a lot of people view the atonement, you know, Ephesians 1, 7 is like, okay, the

He dealt with my sins. Now all I got to do is wait and he punched my ticket. Yeah. And then I'll get a new body and we'll live forever. But there's a middle part in there. Yeah. Which is we are the children of God. That's right. He offers us life in him and with him forever.

now we're sons and daughters now and later that's why it makes you realize you have a job to do you know as the body of christ to make his presence known you have the holy spirit of god and even to prove that if you look at this idea of suffering which is what really you know the romans 8

18 is kind of the backdrop because he says, I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. That's kind of the transition there. And he goes on to say, there's nothing, nothing. And he goes through all the ways we suffer that can separate us from the love of Christ. And then it's like, we're more than conquerors. This 28, we are more than conquerors.

I mean, think of conqueror. Think if you listed the top 10 conquerors of the world, the world has ever known. He's like, no, you're more than that. Right. In your position in me as adopted sons and daughters, you, you, even if you were to die, you, you're going to get a new body. You're more than conquerors. And there's nothing that can separate you from the love of Christ. Is,

Because if you're an heir of the universe, a co-heir with Christ, that automatically makes you better than anybody that would conquer anything on the earth. Well, we tend to skip to the end. That's a good point. And miss what it means to be a child of God. Like right now, you're like, oh, you're watching this kid and you're loving this kid and you're helping this kid so that sometime later he can flourish. Well, of course. But I'm helping him right now. Yeah.

So we've been talking quite a bit about adoption, fostering, different ways that we're engaged in the lives of people. And really, it's all kind of this battle for life.

I mean, it's the last place of innocence on earth are these little babies, which are gifts from God. Yeah. And dad, you recently read James 1 26. I mean, we're no closer to being like Christ when we're looking out for kids. And so one of our sponsors preborn does a great job in this battle and they're at the very front edge of it because they're dealing with abortion and

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That's pound 250 keyword baby, or go to preborn.com slash unashamed. That's preborn.com slash unashamed. I mean, how many times have you heard this Romans 8 passage? Therefore, there's no condemnation at all for those who are in Christ Jesus. All true. But how many times have you heard that line used to basically make you feel better about

Am I in? Am I out? Am I in? Am I out? There is that truth in it, but the point is not, hey, no, you're good, man. You're good. You were done. Remember what you did? You did the magic password. You said the thing. You did the prayer. You did the baptism, whatever. You're good. The point is what you just said. It's life in Christ. That's because he's coming out of Romans 7 when he asked that question. Romans 7 is about the inner turmoil. Paul's like, man, I'm like...

I don't know how I'm going to do this. Who will rescue me from this body of death? And then the answer is not just that first line, therefore there is no condemnation, because it says, thanks be to Jesus Christ our Lord, therefore there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

Then he makes the argument for what that means. And you cannot separate this of being in Christ Jesus from the spirit, because he says, however, in verse nine, you are not in the flesh, but in the spirit, if indeed the spirit of God dwells in you. But if anyone does not have the spirit, this is a capital S, by the way.

of Christ, he doesn't belong to him. So how do I know I'm in Christ? Well, you have the Holy Spirit. You can't separate these two. So sonship, adoption, by him we cry, Abba, Father. All of this is the spirit living in us is God.

So important to this conversation as we even read through the book of Ephesians, because what does it mean that God's going to dwell with his people? This is what it says. And this is the point of the book of Hebrews, by the way. But and this is in Ephesians.

Romans 8. But if by the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, see the language there? He dwells in you. He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his spirit who dwells in you. So there's this continual language there.

It's temple language. But we are the living stones built on the cornerstone because God now lives in people. So I think all of this stuff is linked up. You can't separate it out because it's like a big spider web of these truths about our position in Christ. And you see it here in Romans 8 clearly. That's what I was going to say. There's so many.

when they start categorizing all the things that Jesus accomplished on the cross, if you just focus on the atonement and you getting your ticket punched to the afterlife, which is what regretfully most preachers do, every sermon involves you being saved and going to heaven. There's no middle ground. Would you agree with that? I mean, that is the heart of it. So when you think about his point here about being adopted, right?

Well, it makes more sense when you skip over and read Ephesians 4, when he starts talking about the church, the whole purpose of the body of Christ, and this is 4.12, so that it may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son. We talked about that a couple of the podcasts ago. And become mature.

Well, we're going back to what happens to babies. They mature and you help them along the process to understand life. And not only are you protecting them, but they're growing because then it goes on to say, verse 14, then we will no longer be infants.

Tossed back and forth by the waves and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming. Instead of speaking the truth, there you go, Phil, in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the head of

That is Christ. Yeah. That's why I said this whole point is that you need to get to know Christ better. Yeah. And you grow up and it's a perfect analogy of babies. They're innocent. They're sponges. They need protection. They need security. They need all the good things that Christ offers us in him. But then we start.

to be something that is going to be productive to society. And in Christ, to use the same illustration, we have the greatest thing that's out of this world for the good of society. I mean, you literally can be born again.

I mean, that's where I always go to this. That's why he used that analogy. Because you think, well, I was born, everything was good for a while, and then all of a sudden we have that moment and it all goes bad. And if you claim that that didn't happen, you make God out to be a liar. We all sin, we all fall away. And it's just one day somebody asks you a question, what if you could be born again? What if you could start over? Well, absolutely. Absolutely.

And I love the idea of sonship that is enjoyed within the relationship of the family in the now. Dad, you raised us.

I mean, we were babies. Yep. Then we were young boys, and you instilled things in us, and you tried to teach us things. Now we're all older men. Yeah. And yet we're still your sons, but we're enjoying what we're doing here, talking about the Bible, as a life. Well, just think of all the movies and TV shows where all these people without Jesus are putting most of these shows on. Yeah.

How do they all work? They go back to somebody and say it's a serial killer. How many movies or shows has there been about serial killers? What does it always go back to? Well, when they were a kid, it didn't go well. That's right. And what do you know? And so they're like, well, they're trying to find the answer without a way of being born again. Well, guess what?

There's still serial killers running around today because of that system. I mean, there's the two worlds here. That's right. Without Jesus, this is what happens. So I want to read this. This is in this topic. This is Paul addressing it to the Galatian church, but a little bit different languaging, but making the same points we're making from the other passage in Romans 8. This is Galatians 3.26. You are all sons of God.

through faith in Christ Jesus. For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. Jace, we mentioned that about your Matthew 22, the wedding feast, the idea that's how we're presented is clothed in Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, which we've been making that point strong, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. So no division.

If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise. And if you podcast back, Zach, you read that idea about Abraham looking up into the sky and seeing all the stars, and he said, that's going to be your children. But he didn't mean necessarily physically from his body. He was talking about something greater. What I am saying is that as long as the heir is a child,

He's no different from a slave, although he owns the whole estate. So here's that point about when this kid is young, he's an heir, but he can't realize that yet because he's got to get to a certain age. That's his point.

He is subject to guardians, trustees until the time set by the father. So also when we were children, we were in slavery under the basic principles of the world. Jace, there's your point. You have to be born again, not of this world. And then he describes it. But when the time had fully come,

What's he talking about now? Jesus, God sent his son, born of a woman, born under law, to redeem those under law that we might receive the full rights of sons. That's being born again. Because you are sons, God sent the spirit of his son into our hearts, the spirit who calls out Abba Father. Same concept from Romans. So you are no longer a slave anymore.

But a son. And since you are a son, God has also made you an heir. So that's exactly the same point. And even with more direct language for it.

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Use the promo code Robertson30. You'll get $30 off. Or you can visit blazetv.com slash Robertson for the same deal. Either way, sign up for Blaze TV Plus today. That's why I read Galatians 6, 14 and 15 last time, which after you just read that in Galatians 3 and 4, it makes way more sense because it says, may I never boast except in the cross of the Lord Jesus.

through which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world. In the context of his letter, they were trying to make their national heritage part of salvation, being circumcised. So he goes on to say, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision means anything as far as you being from Israel or what country you're from. Right.

What counts is a new creation. And what is a baby? What is it? You want to continue this analogy? What is it like to be born again? You're literally a new creation. That's right. And when you're a new creation in Christ, being born again is allowing God to adopt you now and forever. And that makes your point about the world within the world even stronger.

We're living in a world, and it's just like when Jesus was before Pilate, he said the same thing. He's like, my kingdom is not from this world. Well, you know, Pilate's head about exploded. He's like, what? What? Your kingdom's not of the world? Whoa. Okay. That's why it wasn't a threat, you know? Of course, then it gets it down into what is truth, you know? Because he's like, well, I'm telling you the truth. What is truth?

And he never figured that in, which is what Ephesians, the whole letter is about, is that he embodied truth. The question to ask is who you're so you're claiming to be the truth as a person. And you're talking about a guy in that context that.

was so immersed into being a Roman official, in his case being an occupying force in Israel, that his world was only about might and what you conquered. And he couldn't even imagine somehow a kingdom coming up out of Roman authority. Which is really what the whole book of Revelation is all about. I'm just going to go ahead and tell you. And it's the same kind of...

Logic about being a lot more accomplished on the cross than just atonement. It's a battle of powers that in this world that set themselves up against the power that Christ has. And just to give you a spoiler alert, if you read the book of Revelation, Jesus wins and the lamb, the church, you know, that he purchased wins.

We're on the winning team, but it sets itself up in that framework of apocalyptic language that it's

Jesus and his followers, the bride of Christ, up against this Roman power under the control of the evil one. And that's what the whole thing's about. I agree. So in our last few minutes on this podcast, I want to introduce another thought, and it'll probably take us over to next time. But he mentions it twice back in our text in Ephesians 1.

In verse 9, he says, he made known to us the mystery of his will. Now, we talked a little bit about the mystery part of this, but we hadn't discussed a lot about the will of God according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ. So that's the will of God. And if you drop down to verse 11, he says it again. In him we were chosen, predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will. So he mentions that two different times in this context.

And so, you know, the word that I use, he doesn't use it, but when you talk about the will of God is the sovereignty of God.

this idea that he knows everything, this idea about omniscience. Now, this creates a problem with us because we're limited and finite in our knowledge. So we start trying to grasp the concept of the will of God and his sovereignty. It's a difficult thing for us to navigate, right? And so I want to talk about that and this idea about how people live in

In concert, knowing the will of God is there, and yet we have our own will, which we bend and submit to him. But sometimes it's difficult to do, especially when things aren't going well. Well, and when you talk about sovereignty, you're talking about his power also. Right. His character, his, what else did you say? His will. His will, his knowledge. His knowledge. But I wanted to read one thing before Zach can opine on it.

We talk about going back to the garden where when Eve saw that fruit was desirable to gain wisdom. And there's a lot in here about wisdom and knowledge. And I want to send you a spirit of revelation so that you may know him better. Before we get into the deep things on what that means, I just wanted to read this. I want to read this a couple of podcasts ago and I just didn't get around to it. But when he, in Corinthians, the first book to the Corinthians says,

And he was talking about this same concept of bringing Jews and Gentiles together. He kind of puts them in two camps, saying in verse 22 that Jews demand miraculous signs. They want proof that Jesus is who he is. And Greeks are looking for wisdom. But it says, we preach Christ, verse 23, crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles.

But to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ, and what's these two things he says? Christ, the power of God, and the wisdom of God. And so I think before we discuss what all that means,

in christ is where we have to camp out to figure out the power of god the nature of god the wisdom of god i mean you think of all the verses he used to speak through his prophets of old but now he speaks through christ you think about colossians 1 15 and fault you know all the attributes that christ represents in god's nature

I was just going to define, I think, a good definition for God's sovereignty is how God rules over His creation, how He is in charge of His creation, how He is supreme over His creation. And I think that's helpful for us to understand, but I do think it's also helpful to understand that the sovereignty is an attribute of God that comes into play after He creates.

I think that's important for us to understand that. There's certain attributes of God that come into play because they're more descriptive than how God relates to his creation. And then there's other attributes of God that, if you want to call them pre-existing attributes, that relate to how God relates to himself. For example, God wasn't unleashing wrath on

prior to creation because there wasn't any sin. He wasn't lavishing out mercy on anyone because there was no infraction to have mercy on. He wasn't exercising his sovereignty over creation because creation didn't exist yet. But

But what he was doing is he was loving himself, you know, because he's triune. So the first John 4, 8 says that God is love. So when we kind of get into this discussion about words like sovereignty, I think a lot of times the word gets conflated in conversation and people will often say the word. I mean, one thing here.

And then another thing here, and it confuses people. But sovereignty is just real simple. It's just God's in control. He's running the show. It's His creation. We're under His rule. And when it comes to God's will—

I was thinking, you know, because because the question to your point is, you know, do we have will? Does God have will? If God has will, does God get what God wants every time? And then there's all these questions that come up. And what about my will? And what is my responsibility in this? Am I doing anything at all? Is there any pursuit on my part? Any effort on my part? Is it all God? How does all that work out?

And I think the scripture, you know, elevates the sovereignty of God. It certainly elevates the will of God. But then there's verses like the like the like the prayer, the when Jesus, the Lord's prayer, what does he say?

Thy will be done. So we're asking God's will to be done where? On earth, just like it is in heaven. So there's obviously something going on here that we're saying, God, bring your will. We do have a will. And you can't escape that fact. I mean, I know there's people that would say we don't have our own will. I don't even know what that means. I mean, when I hear, I've read all the commentaries, read all the books, read all the philosophies on it. It's nonsensical to me. We do have a will. Because we're created in the image. I mean, it's like...

And the ability to have families and you see how this works. I mean, you know, I heard an illustration about, you know, God didn't make us robots because the same reason when we have kids, because we're kind of walking this analogy of an actual physical baby.

to the being born again. But when you think about it, it's true. I've said this before, but why do we have kids knowing beforehand that they could grow up and be terrorists? Why do this? Because we realize the reward of having that loving relationship outweighs the risk that they may grow up to be terrorists.

I mean, that's just what we do in real life. And to say that that's not going back to being created in the image of God, I don't see another explanation. No, I agree. I want to read you a passage because, Zach, you brought up a good point about sovereignty. And we think about sovereigns on earth.

and see them at different levels of being powerful. You know, they, you know, they're in government, they're this, listen to what Isaiah said. And this guy wrote thousands of years ago, but I want you to listen to what he said. This shows you that people were empowered by the Holy spirit all along. Do you not know? This is Isaiah 40 verse 21. Do you not know? Have you not heard? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Have you not understood since the earth was founded?

He, God, sits enthroned above the circle of the earth. Now, before I read the rest of it, just stop right there for a minute. This was written thousands of years ago. Nobody had a view of earth from space. How did he know there was a circle of the earth and that God was above it? I mean, that's just a little hmm. Yeah, I thought it was flat. Yeah, exactly. Everybody said that, right? And its people are like grasshoppers.

He stretches out the heavens like a canopy. Uh-oh. How did he know the universe was flat? Which now we've discovered because we've got telescopes. Well, I've said that before. Whoever claimed that when he changed his mind, even though he didn't give the book credit, he'd probably been reading his Bible. That's right. Exactly. Oh, man. What if it's a floating circle? He stretches out the heavens like a canopy. He spreads them out like a tent to live in. He brings princes to naught.

and reduces the rulers of this world to nothing. No sooner are they planted, no sooner are they sown, no sooner do they take root in the ground that he blows on them and they wither, and a whirlwind sweeps them away like the chase. So it's just a powerful passage which shows you what we see as powerful, what we see as like, oh, how are we ever going to deal with this? From God's perspective, no.

Well, that's the problem. That's what it took. People look around, though, and say, well, God can't be in control because look how bad it is. But that's why we went through the whole thing about the two worlds. Right. And when you hear about wrath, which we'll hear about in the next chapter in chapter two, it's not unlike us comparing to God's discipline. You know, Hebrews 12, there's a whole section in there about God disciplines those he loves because of his holiness and love.

His innocence. Well, it's just like when I discipline my kids, that mean I didn't love them. I'm doing it because I love them. Exactly. I want them to realize that is unacceptable, which gets back down to this idea of atonement where you're dealing with sin while loving the center.

So I wanted to mention, because sovereignty of God and the will of God is easy for us to grasp that concept. When it becomes difficult is when it comes in conflict with our will. Exactly. I mean, that's when the rubber meets the road. Jase, you remember when we were in school of preaching, one of our, we call it our escape hatch verses that they told us about. You would have never known it existed except an instructor told us. It was Deuteronomy 29, 29.

The secret things belong to... The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may follow all the words of this law. Yeah. So, you know, they always say, if you get in a bind and you just don't know, you say Deuteronomy 29, 29. But in a sense, it really is true that ultimately we can't know what he knows. Right.

Well, if we could, he wouldn't be God. You get into that. But I mean, we get the idea of it and the picture, and we are... What I find troubling is most, if not all, believers in God will say in one breath, we're made in the image of God, but then later on come up with doctrines that doesn't seem like we're made in the image of God. Because all of a sudden, the image of God, being made in the image of God looks like he's...

angry, mad at us, taken by surprise that the world turned out this way. There were no surprises. No. In his foreordained knowledge and in his will...

He had Christ in mind and Christ emptied himself. Not that he didn't retain being God. He just took that role of self-giving love to redeem us and to adopt us. I mean, that's what happened. And just because he knew it was going to happen before doesn't negate that.

The choices that we make and the way we were created in God's image. I don't see the big argument about it. I just think when we tend to compartmentalize his attributes and go all in on one certain attribute...

The next thing you know, you're coming up with things that don't make sense. And isn't that really the purpose? Isn't that the reason why the book of Job is included in the word of God for us to understand that? It was a story of one man that lived in ancient days that went through a lot of difficult times and his friends were telling him, it's your fault. And at the end of the day, what did he say? God is God and I'm not.

and ultimately I have to trust in Him. And so to me, it's a great, it's a tough read, but it's a great understanding of the true sovereignty of God and what we have to rely on, especially when we're going through difficult times, which sometimes that's the hardest time to do. If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from His love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion,

Love it.

That's a good place to launch. That's a perfect way to end this Unashamed podcast. We'll see you next time. Thanks for listening to the Unashamed podcast. Help us out by rating us on iTunes. And don't miss an episode by subscribing on YouTube. And be sure to click that little bell to get notified about new episodes. And for even more content that you won't get anywhere else, subscribe to BlazeTV at blazetv.com slash unashamed.