Ep 1291 | Jase Robertson Issues a Wake-Up Call to Men Who Won’t Lead Their Families

Welcome back to Unashamed. We are coming to you from our prospective boxes today. I'm back in the Gulf Shores. Had a couple of events.

“Chase, you had an event this last week as well, I think.”

Oh, I did. You know what I went? Where? You're not going to believe. You're going to be in for a big surprise. I mean, just a really big surprise. Was it Canada?

No, it was a little place called Surprise, Arizona. Uh, I did that. What a nice surprise. I did that same joke. I get a, there's overflow crowd.

All men, men's event. There was a thousand in the little arena, which was all at home. Overflow and, you know, watch no video. And I said, this is just a really nice surprise.

And it's like, "Okay, we have either my, my impression was off." Which probably didn't, you didn't live or he was off. That's what he promised. What the delivery was off, but, but that silence doesn't bother me. No, days, days were relishes this hour.

You let it sit for a second.

“I let it sit for a second and then that song came on”

and the back of my head at the sound of silence. Or how does that? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Is there a kind of movie? Then I had another joke in my hip-hop pocket

because Willie had done the same event last year. And so, which is kind of ironic. I mean, they're like, they schedule Willie and then the next year they're like, "Well, let's get his brother." Yeah.

I mean, it's Surprise, Arizona. And it doesn't ring like it's Redneck Central USA. It's right north of Phoenix. So, you say a mere job may be on the document for next year. Yeah, it's already.

It's a wonderful town.

And so, I have my second joke ready

because they usually don't land because I can't be on purpose funny. But, I said, "So, I know what you're thinking. What's the biggest difference between you and Willie?" And I said, "About 50 pounds." [laughter]

He rubs you. He rubs you. He rubs you. And all that. That landed.

[laughter] That's not a bad technique.

“You give them an awkward, like where you say the joke and everybody feels the awkwardness.”

Then it builds the tension. Yeah. And then when you deliver the next joke, it's kind of a bait and switch. It's a good tactic to use. Because, I mean, we're all good at that.

The one thing we're all good at is that when each other gets a lot less, because the member Jason said, "Yeah, I was in California last year." And you had been there like two months before in this same place. Totally different event. But, and I said, "How many of y'all saw Jason a couple of months ago?"

About a third of the audience, right? I said, "Well, you know what you got tonight? Upgrade." And so, that got a huge laugh. So, I was in Brenham, Texas while you were in surprise Arizona days.

And the home of Bluebell Ice Cream.

So, my opening line was, you know, I always say,

"Who the hell has been in Texas and they out here?" And I said, "This is the land of Bluebell and black belts." And I had a bottle of water. The sea force water. Because Chuck Norris' ranch is just right outside of Brenham

in between there and some other town. Never saw that. And he has a water thing that aquifers that he found on his property. And so, he makes water now. And so, in all the thing, it says,

"The roundhouse kick of water." And so, even Chuck Norris' water is, you know, special. And so, I said that. And then I gave one of my Chuck Norris' jokes. You know, you got all those Chuck Norris' jokes.

And one of my favorite was, "When the boogey man goes to bed at night, he checks his closet for Chuck Norris." And people laugh. "Oh, they were hard." You're in different crowds.

I don't think that would end up for me. But it wouldn't. I'll tell you this. You have funny, you said that about Willie. I looked on his Instagram or Cories,

and she got him a birthday gift. That I mean, when he opened this thing up, it was like, like, literally, like, Christmas morning. Because he thought, you, to see what he get excited, like, that is his rare.

And you know what the present was. He got so excited about, "I'm on a scale." No. I want to say, "I'm on a scale. I'd be good, press me."

I don't know. So, just some kind of all you can eat, buffet. It was a cheese grater, a commercial cheese grater.

I'm out. I think I was too excited. I think it's so excited. A massive amount of cheese grating. You know what I mean?

That's something going on there. There may be a problem, as I just said.

“Oh, it was, yeah, I mean, it was like a legit.”

This is the kind of thing you could press. I thought that thing, I was, I was just as impressed as he was. I was wishing I had one. And I don't even grade that much cheese anymore. But that's funny.

That is funny. Well, look, here was what I learned. I couldn't make fun of the town. And I was only do that for humor purposes anyway. We want to make the town known for Jesus,

which I said later in the speech. But we need to surprise people in surprise that God visited the planet. Jesus, and he came here to get his family back together forever.

But here was, here's what's interesting,

because this is a good story. So the town was originated in 1938 by this woman, Floor of May Statler.

“And the name stemed because she was going to make it a farming community,”

which I stopped right there and said, "You're in a desert." It's kind of hard to farm things when you have a lack of water. But we know what you say to that. Yeah, but she made this statement.

She said, "She would be surprised if the town ever amounted to much." So they named it surprise. And look, nothing happened until the 1990s. And then it took off.

It took that long. So now I looked up how many people live there. 167,000. That's pretty big. That is 25 or 30 minutes outside of Phoenix.

So it may be just that Phoenix got so big. Yeah. It's kind of become a bedroom community. They call it, yeah. But it's an interesting town.

Really nice. I love the people. They have two spring training major league baseball teams that visit there. So that was because I could see the ball fields when I was coming in. So yeah. And then I dropped the ball out because I was going to at the end. The only notes I had.

I had first Thessalonians 5-4.

Do not be surprised when Jesus comes back. No one should be surprised. I was going to do that. When Jesus comes back, it's the faith. This would that surprise you.

And since we're in first John, I was going to read first John 313, Do not be surprised. My brothers, if the world hates you. You know what's interesting?

“Is those two words translated surprise or different in the Greek language?”

Really? So I'm glad I did that because I thought I don't want to. I don't want to use something if it's not the word for surprise. So the one in first John 3 is more about our English definition of surprise.

But first Thessalonians 5, which I've quoted hundreds of times at events,

it actually is not like our English word surprise. It's more because in the context, it says you don't live in darkness where this day, the day of the Lord coming back, should surprise you like a thief. So it's actually in the Greek, seems like it's a little more about... More about prepare?

Well, about being grasp by like a thief came in. I mean, it still has a surprise. Yeah, connotation, but you don't want to be like surprised by a thief, and then he grabs all your stuff or grabs you and you're like, "Oh, what's happening?" That's more of the idea.

What's I thought was interesting? I did that on the plane. I was looking up various words for surprise. Did you include that in your thing? No, I forgot.

Oh, it's just so embarrassing that I thought it was so good, you know, and then that was going to be the big ending and then I forgot it. But I wanted to say it here because we probably picked up a few listeners. These people were fired up. I mean, when I stood up to speak half the audience stood up,

and I said, "What are you all doing? I haven't even started yet." Lower your expectations. They were already dear to you.

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Offer is valid for a limited time terms and conditions may apply. Anyway, but I really loved it, but I wanted to tell you this when I was on that plane and I just took this as a sign. I was also going to share this story for God all about it. I got so centered and focused on Jesus during the presentation. I forgot my little things that I was going to add and maybe that's for the best.

But so out, I'm up toward the front of the plane and it's a long flight from Dallas to Phoenix. I say long, you know, almost three hours. So at some point I'm looking at the little bathroom light, it's time to go.

So I get up and go out there well for some reason.

I didn't see there was a woman in playing clothes like sitting where the stud is usually set. And I thought, oh, there's a line, so I stopped. So now I'm in the little in between the aisles.

“And she's like, oh, did you need to go to the bathroom and I was thinking, well, aren't you in line?”

So that's what I said. I said, oh, no, go ahead. And she's like, no, I'm a ride along, which I didn't really know what that meant at the time. I don't know if I ever really figured it out, but I thought in my opinion, I think she's like a stewardess and training kind of thing. Maybe I don't know if they do that. She's just been, yeah, but they also like if they're off duty, they can still fly places.

I think if they weren't for their lives. Well, something to call them, she's a ride along. Young girl. Yeah. No, thank you.

You know, enter twice. Yeah. And so she's like, no, I'm a ride along. So I was like, oh, okay, so I get to the bathroom door. And she kind of moves back where you get off the plane.

You know, but we're 30,000 feet of water. And she said, Mr. Robertson, well, then that kind of made me think, this is different. How does she know my name? Because she said, Mr. Roberts, I thought she's riding along. What do you know? All the passengers?

Yeah. And, but then kind of her lip started quivering, and I thought, oh, no. What's fixing to happen here? And she's just like, I listen to y'all's podcast. And I just, I'm really on fire for the Lord.

And she started telling me what she's involved in. All great stuff. I mean, warm my heart. Here's a 20-something year old woman. And she's just fired up.

But she's emotional. And she said, I just, I'm taking this as a sign. Because you're on here. And I've been wanting some advice. And I just, I think, God led you here.

So I was like, go, what advice is she gonna ask? And she said, here's the problem. And she tearfully said, she's like, I'm dating a guy. He's Luke Warren. And I was waiting for the rest of it.

And I was like, now, here's a woman on fire for the Lord. She is emotional. Because she's dating a guy that she depicted as Luke Warren, which I know where she got that revelation chapter three. Yeah.

Where this illustration at the church,

And evidently, there were some springs there and that region. And they used hot water for some things in cold water. But he's like, but you're, you're Luke, you're hot nor go. Yeah, you're Luke Warren. And then he says something that should make all of us pause.

And I appreciate our attitude because he said it literally makes me want to gag and vomit that you're Luke Warren. And so I gave her scripture advice.

I basically just told her how I met my wife.

You know, when we were in the dating world.

“And I said, I think you need to come to Jesus meeting.”

And I think you need to sit down with him and tell him where you're headed and what you're all about and see how serious he is about doing this. It was basically the just of my advice. I said it'll say to you some time if he's not on board. Yeah.

Did she take that well? I mean, she, oh, she did. I mean, she kind of told me her story, you know, which was fascinating.

She said, you know, when she was in her mother's womb,

they detected some problems or whatever, and they encouraged her mom to have an abortion. And it's like T-Boster. Yeah, that's what it reminded me. And so I think she really more than other people having that experience. And then being told that story, she's like, God's got a plan for me.

And I'm all about it. And so, no, it was moving. And I thought here I am going to a men's event. And what are the odds of me meeting a young woman who's whole issue right now.

“The most important thing in her life is trying to figure out how she can get her boyfriend fired up for the Lord.”

Which has just made me think about men needing to lead and to step up. So it did affect my speech because it made me think of the creation story. And you know, Eve gets, let's face it. She gets the brunt of what happened. And it's so interesting that when you get to the new testament, you know, Adam kind of gets all the blame.

I mean, I think he's, I think the writers, you think Romans 5, what he's like, "For an Adam all seeing, you know, and then the new man, Jesus comes to redeem." But it's like, well, shouldn't Eve be included in that? So, but what it made me think is really it's true because when you think about Adam and what happened and how that went down, he should have stepped up.

Yep. He should have stepped up and said, "Wait a minute." It shows some leadership here, but he did, part of the, the priestly role is that you, you're there to guard and protect the garden as you expand it. So, I mean, there is an element of, there is an element of a, of a, of a guarding role.

And so, the fact that Satan even got in and was able to have that conversation with Eve, yeah, a lot of the illusions, I believe that that was primarily came out of Adam, essentially advocating his priestly role to protect the garden. So, Adam allows this conversation, he allows this threat, he allows this intrusion into the garden, which paves the way for the deception.

So, he certainly was like a part of it, even though he wasn't the one that, like, actually sent first.

He did, he did at least like step back and advocate his responsibility. I think you see that in the scripture. Well, plus knowing that, it's the, in my opinion, the number one responsibility of a husband and a father is to protect, is to protect your wife, is to protect your children, your household, your, your family, both from evil, but also from anything.

“I mean, like, that, that's how number one role. So, I, I definitely think today's your own to,”

him advocating his responsibility as protector. And I hadn't thought about as much about the garden, but I think you're right about that too, but also just of his wife. I mean, she came from him. She is a part of him. And so, I think when we become one flesh with our brides, which, by the way, is that, I, I'm worried for you because we had, you, you had a meeting, a big meeting you had to do.

And so, Jill stepped into your spot. I'm worried that unashamedation is going to say, we need more Jill. See, what's so good. What's she, not days was Jill, not a big hit. Yeah, and you could still get the credit for it. You could just say, Jill, you say, you can become a contributor and you said, well, how do I contribute? Well, I'm sending my wife.

when it says, dear children, let us not love with words or tongue, but with actions and, and in truth.

It makes me think, if you're, you're a guy and you're leading your family or, in our dating relationship, you know, you should, it's not about what you say. You, you lead an actions and truth. If you have to say, I learned this in year one of my, I'm a marriage. If I, and I said it, I was like, look, I'm leading this thing. That meant nothing. And because my wife said, well, you could have fooled me.

Yeah, it's just words.

“It actions and truth. That's what you should bring to the table.”

But look, to finish that story. So then I turn around because now it's, we've had a 10 or 12 minute conversation. Well, I had just a, just a, it's a question because my go to the bathroom a lot on airplanes.

And were you still waiting to go to the bathroom?

Oh, yeah, I'm still, and I'm like, see, that would have been a problem for me. I would have said, I will be right back. That's not just you. It was a problem. I had moved to 9.5 out of 10. So Jason, I don't get surprised very often.

Tim T. Bow was coming on. I didn't even know about the book that he had written. Yeah, if the tree could speak, which was convicting because this was really clever. And this is really well done.

“I think it's for everyone and it's a great conversation starter about why we're here.”

What we're supposed to be doing here and what happens next in the Lord. So the idea behind the book is, what if the cross itself could speak? And so it's wonderful. It's well thought out. It gives you a different perspective on the cross. Because the cross is the closest witness in a sense that Jesus hung on that day. And one of the things that convicted me about it was the cross thinking, Oh, no, this is the worst job I could have to be a place where Jesus died.

But then the cross realizes that it's also the place to hold Christ up, which is very, very special. Very good. Even if you heard the Easter story a thousand times, this one will challenge you and deepen your faith. It's well written, it's beautifully illustrated and makes you slow down and really fill the way to what Jesus did for us. What you get from this book will stick with you long after you put it down and you want to pick it up year after year as you prepare to celebrate Easter.

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And I thought, Oh, here we go. And she said, you're not going to believe this. She said, I was face time in my husband earlier in the day.

“And I noticed he was wearing a shirt that I think you might be interested in.”

And I thought, well, I was looking down at my wardrobe thinking, How did you make that connection? But I thought she was making fun of what I had on us. But when she showed me the picture of her husband, he was wearing an unashained sweatshirt. And she said, he has listened to every one of your podcast. And I am truly grateful for your podcast because this made him such a better man and husband. So I thought, well, wow, we're just having quite the come to Jesus made in here.

Well, you are 30,000 feet above the planet days when all this was happening. Yeah, I thought that was really encouraging. I want to share that we appreciate on the same nation out there. It was really encouraging. Let me give you this for a quick.

This is interesting. I just pulled it up. This is in Genesis chapter two. Let me call my Bible back a little bit. This is so interesting.

This is the commandment that God gave to Adam. I think about this. He's not in the picture when God says this. The Lord took, this is Genesis 215. The Lord God took the man. That would be Adam.

And he put him in the garden of Eden to work it and to keep it. And the Hebrew, the word work and keep those are two different words. One is to cultivate the other is to protect and to guard. So cultivate the garden expanded. But as you're doing it, protect it from any intrusion and corruption.

And the Lord God commanded the man that would be Adam.

But of the tree of the knowledge of good naval, you shall not eat for in the day that you eat. You will surely die. So what's interesting, the very next verse is that God said it's not good for man to be alone. So I'll make a suitable helper for him. So then he, so he creates the Eve after he gives this command.

I think about the setup here. So you think what was Adam's role? He was the one that received this word from the Lord. So in this instruction from the Lord, then the serpent comes in. And he says, they God really say that you can't eat from any tree in the garden.

The one who should have responded first was not Eve.

It was Adam. Adam was the one that received the command. And he could have easily just said it. That's not how the conversation went down. Actually what God said was I can eat from any tree in the garden except one. But he remained silent.

“And so I think his silence was, it was like a, it wasn't ignorance.”

It was a silent participation in the lie. He allowed that lie because in whatever level he wanted it. And it wasn't just that he advocated his responsibility of it. He was actually participating in the lie because he knew. Because he was the one that God actually said it to.

Which is so that it makes that verse in 1 John 3. I read so much more profound because the reason he didn't say any words is because he didn't want to take any action. And he didn't want to hold to the truth that God said. And I also would remind you when you read that verse, the English translation that says he put him in the garden. It's the same word for God resting. He rested Adam in the garden.

And the point there is way more powerful because he's like God's mission is I've given you everything you need.

Trust me. Even though you're resting to work the garden, it's not the work that we tend to think about working for your salvation. That's the resting. It's like this is your salvation. This is the gift I'm giving you.

You don't have to worry about it. You don't have to stress about it. You just trust me. And I've given you a job to do. There's your action.

Lead your life. Trust what I say. I mean, look, look at the results two days. The immediate reaction to them now recognizing evil and seeing for what it is. And their actions that put them in this position.

It was hiding, it was fear and it was blame.

I mean, the first thing he does is say it was the woman you gave me that gave me the fruit.

So he blamed God, he blamed Eve, he blamed everybody but himself. Which is what men do. I'm guilty. First, we were raised in a spirit of blame. No matter what happens, you get that straight.

Whose fault was it that this happened? Exactly. You had to assess that before you could even deal with whatever the situation. I used to joke and say, if you come home with a board, a nail stuck in your foot and a board on the bottom of it.

“Before we could deal with that, we had to deal with why were you at the dump or why were you at this place?”

You know, it was like, well, I'm an idiot. But can we get this nail out of my foot? You know, is the situation? Well, I remember Phil one time. He was sick.

We took all went duck and tore up his equipment. All that got back and it was just a withering interrogation. And I remember it just kept the intensity kept intensifying. And finally, I quoted Colossians one. I said, "Dad, I am free from accusation."

By the blood of Jesus, I cannot be accused. And to my dad's credit, he went. Well, wait a minute. You figured out the one thing you could deal with that.

“If you had a scripture, if you had a scripture, you could mine out of there, then you could probably get out and get off the hook.”

Well, that's one thing he appreciated in any argument or any kind of anger management figure out who screwed up. You better bring your Bible. You start quoting Bible verses. He's like, "Okay, pretty clever." Pretty clever. Then he said, "Okay, now let's back to it." But it was a moment of an oasis in the desert of that conversation.

A lot like surprise. I'm telling you, I could live there.

Well, there's a, I had similar experiences. Several people came up to me. And when I was in Texas, I loved the podcast. One lady came over to my table. She said, "I don't even know if I'm supposed to come over here." Because we were about to get ready to get up and speak.

And I said, "No, it's okay." And she said, "I just love your podcast." And my son's love it.

And we never missed an episode. She said, "Now, Jace, you're going to tell Jace."

He is too mean to that. Yeah, I said, "Well, I will tell him."

“But you know what we're just doing that in fun, right?”

And she said, "I need to." And Annie told me, "You love me." So we got it. I told her that. She said, "Yeah, but he was sarcastic." She knew. She was 80% sarcastic.

We've been sad, but she was 20% sincere. That's funny. But yeah, it's really nice to meet you guys out there. My Jace was saying, "And come across." And we do know how much you guys love the podcast and where the same way.

Yeah. What's funny about this story when I got back to my seat. Of course, my sister, she's like, "Is everything okay?" She has no idea what happened. I went to the bathroom and you come back 25 minutes later.

She thinks there's fixed to be a story here. And unfortunately, it was all Jesus conversations. Which was really the theme of the whole trip.

“Because on the way back, there was a storm in Dallas.”

And we have such a people in our world now, which disrupts everything. And the flight. And it was one of the more miserable tracks home. Took me 14 hours from the time I woke up to get back to my house, which was about midnight.

But I had so many Jesus conversations because you're like, "What do you do in the airport when there's so many people you can barely move?" And multiple flights are canceled and gates are being changed. You're spending a lot of time. I spent two hours on the runway before we took off.

Yeah. And we had so many Jesus conversations. So it was just like a revival. Every little group that I managed to find myself. And then we had a wonderful break because I got to the,

we landed in the international section of the Dallas airport. And we were going to go to one of these little club things. You know, because our flightgate canceled.

“So we're going to hang out for eight hours.”

And so we put our name in. Well, there's a two-hour wait in this where you can even get there. And I'm like, what do we do? I'm just looking at this sea of humanity. I mean, and people are grumpy because everybody's flights are changed.

You could just sense it. It just, the humans were restless. Kids were crying. So Jill, you wouldn't know anything about this. But Zach probably would.

As we've gotten older, it's been a little harder to manage our weight. She's not just that in those Zachary. I mean, maybe a little bit. Maybe a little around the middle. It's such a good life to stand in for a reason.

Well, I'll go ahead and just talk about me then because I've tried everything. I'll try keto, paleo, weight watchers, intermittent fasting. If it's the diet out there, I've tried it.

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Or you can visit my Ph.D. weight loss.com. So we need to find a spot. And I looked down and there was one little spot. Because we were way up on this escalator. You could just kind of see.

There was one little spot that there seemed to be no activity. And I said, let's go there. And so we went and sat down.

And there were no people. I couldn't figure it out. So we sat there about 30 minutes and I thought, why is this spot like that in my sister?

Finally looked up and said, because we're sitting at the Turkish Airlines terminal gate.

And I thought, oh, they ain't nobody flying to Turkey. There's a war going on over there. And the few people that came by, nobody was speaking English. And so we sat there for a couple hours in Colorado, our breath and comfy chairs.

If only it had some Turkish coffee to go with it, because they make some really good strong coffee. Thank you. Exactly. You had a head of going on.

“Well, Zach, so did Jill say she enjoyed her time with us here?”

She did. That was great. She had a great discussion. And she enjoyed it. I was on the road last week.

I went to Nashville, came back. Then we went and ended up in and Raleigh, North Carolina. And then back the next day. So we've been all over the place. But unfortunately missed out.

I missed being here that I really didn't. So I've got to know that. The number one thing that I hear from fans is they love it. When our wives are on the podcast. So I hear that every time.

Especially from the ladies that I meet that listen to the podcast. So we'll have to do that more and more.

So we want to get a little bit into the first shot where we left off.

Here in our, we've talked up most of our podcast. I guess we did a little bit of a gym's a study today. I've been trying to get to first shot. I mean, we're getting into the love section. So we are, which is what we did.

So Zach, Jay's had a little. He had a rabbit hole about greater in greatest, which we spent a couple of podcasts talking about. Because it was in that, what verse was it? Days where it said the, well, there were three times. Yeah, so that one that says in verse 19 of chapter three,

this then is how we know that we belong to the truth and how we set our heart,

“which that's why I brought up that point about at rest in his presence.”

So when God rested at him in the garden, he set him at rest in his presence. Whenever our hearts condemn us, for God is greater than our hearts. And he knows everything, which that story in Genesis shows that verse explicitly. I mean, God knew what was going on. Why are you hiding from God?

Remember, it wasn't just the blame shifting after this end. Then they're hiding. And so he knows what's going on. And where it says, God is greater than our hearts. Which is, you know, I think for us, we tend to look at it from our perspective.

And he is clearly saying one verse after another here. You know, this is love, which we're going to get to, not that we love God, but that he loved us. Well, we think about us coming to know God. And then when you come to know God, what's the first thing you realize? Well, he knows us.

Yeah. This is about him.

“And I think that's John's really trying to draw out those contrast.”

He's greater than our hearts. And he kind of continues that theme with two other times where he uses that greater. You know, four, four, four is one. Four is in use greater than the one who is in the world. To my point.

Yeah. And then the other one is in five nine. Yeah, five nine. Good job, pal. And I really love this one because most people, you know, when you show up at a religious establishment,

they're like, well, share your testimony. And well, first on five nine says, God's testimony is greater than mine. Yeah. So let me share God's testimony. Yeah.

Through me. And it says, we accept man's testimony, but God's testimony is greater. Because it is the testimony of God. So I kind of went down a rabbit hole about when Jesus shared a Matthew 18. Who is the greatest in the kingdom?

And because Peter had profoundly said that he, Jesus, is the son of God. But when he said, who do you say? Who do people say I am? Yeah. And right after that Jesus rebuked Peter because when Jesus said, I'm on a dime,

me bearing raised and Peter's like, no, that's never going to happen.

But anyway, an argument broke out among the disciples about who was the greatest

“because Peter had made that profound statement.”

And God was, Jesus was like, that came from God. You saying that. So all of a sudden, fast forward a couple chapters in your, you're getting them asking Jesus, who's the greatest? Because we're obsessed with that.

We're obsessed with being the greatest man the best. But the point is, God is greater in every category. But John seems to bring that up. Yeah. Well, I want to read this little bridge text and then we'll get into chapter four,

which is kind of new ground for us. But we've read this before. But here's how I kind of bridges the thought of what you just said, Jesus, dear friends and verse 21, if our hearts do not condemn us, because he just mentioned that, then we have confidence before God.

So we've read a lot talking about this idea about the approaching, you know, the presence of God with confidence and how that works. And receive from him anything we ask because we obey his commands to do what pleases him. And this is this concept of living within the will of God.

And you say, well, how do you do that? Well, he tells you exactly how. And this is his command to believe in the name of his son, Jesus Christ. And to love one another as he commanded us. So this is that back to basic command that Jesus said to him when he was here as well.

Love God, love your neighbor. He says those who obey this, those who obey his commands live in him. And he and them. Well, how does that work? This is how we know that he lives in us.

We know it by the spirit he gave us. So his transition into this next chapter is the reintroduction of the Holy Spirit. And the idea that this is how you know. This is literally he lives in us. I mean, it's a deposit.

Paul would call it the Holy Spirit. A taste of eternity. A presence that is now with us. And it's a conscience challenger. It's a teacher.

It's a guy. I remember all the words he used back in John 14, 15, 16 to describe the role of the Holy Spirit, a fruit bearer.

“And so that's how he's going to get into this thing about love and sort of the,”

I would just call it the essence of what love is because it is God. It was God first. And so the whole, that's why if you don't have Holy Spirit, it's hard to fathom or do any of these things because how would you ever know. If you don't know Christ at this level, you know.

So I love the transition.

Let me read the first six verses.

Well, and I just wanted to say before you read those six verses, when you see these commands and you remember this takes us back to John 15 when he's talking about the vine. I am the vine. You're the branches remain in me.

And then he long said, yeah, I'm calling you friends and do what I command. And here's my command. I mean, it's like a drum roll. Love one another as I have loved you.

“And I think you're, you're seeing that echo in the New Testament about Jesus's new creation.”

Because we went through the garden. And, you know, God basically had one command. Don't eat that tree. Just reflect my image. Lord over the creation and the animals.

Here's your wife. He gave the tool become one flesh. I mean, these were the basic guidelines here. But it was pretty simplistic.

Of course, then that moved on to an actual encounter with Moses in this process of him getting his family back after the first sin.

And it made me think that, you know, in our tech world, somebody said this as a joke, but I thought it was pretty funny. They said, you know, actually in an era of Moses, there's no cell phones or anything like that. But technically, Moses was the first one to download God's instruction from the cloud onto his tablets. [laughter] I thought it was not a bad point.

That's pretty good. Okay, see what we're doing here. Same basic idea. I mean, that weird how we use that terminology. And you had this story here back there that uses similar language in a totally different way in the presence of God.

But here, I mean, here's Moses in the presence of God getting instruction.

And so now I just think you fast forward and you see this idea of what Jesus brought by his death and burial and resurrection and being at the right hand, he's talking about commands. But then he's like those who obey his commands live in him and he and them. And this is how we know that he lives in us. What's different than Moses having these tablets where you're like, well, how are you doing?

How are you doing with these reals? Here, it's like we know it by the spirit he gave us. And that's the transition into that new creation and learning what it means to trust God's commands.

You now have his presence inside of you.

That is there to provide rest.

“That's why it has that little part about if our hearts condemn us. Why do our hearts condemn us?”

Because we just have a hard time doing what God says. But he's given us that spirit and I think that's what we need to pursue what that means. Remember when he got back down from the mountain, he had to reboot the tablets because he, his operating system crashed because he broke them because the people were all down there worshiping the goat and calf remember when he got to the bottom. It's a great point out there had to be a reboot.

All right, let me read this verses and we'll mainly talk about it on that spotcast, but I want to get him in. So you can kind of carry him over.

So he's going to come back to his dear friends. He keeps coming back to dear friends and dear children.

It's kind of a circular every time. Which is just so to me, so makes it familiar. You know, it's just such a family setting, which is John's kind of, he said like a sweet old man. He reminds me of Bill Smith when he was in his 80s. He said, dear friends, do not believe every spirit. But test the spirits to see where they are from God.

“Did you ever remember when all this is happening, there were some things, some letters that had been circulated by this time.”

But it was hard, you know, a lot of things were still, this is the frontier of Christianity. So you know, there's a lot of false stuff going on too. And he didn't enter a reminder in 226, remember he just profoundly said, I am writing these things to you about those who are trying to lead you astray. So that's been a theme throughout his sermon. Exactly. And he says again here to your point, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.

This is how you can recognize the spirit of God. And this has been a theme. This is from chapter two as well, does every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God. So this was kind of he keeps coming back to this bell weather of the idea about the incarnation of Jesus. So that's obviously what's kind of been at the heart of the whole problem. But every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God.

This is the spirit of the anti-Christ. Here he goes back into that again, which you have heard is coming. And even now is already in the world. And we talk quite a bit about that already. You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. There's that same phrase again. They are from the world and therefore speak from the viewpoint of the world and the world listens to them.

We are from God and whoever knows God listens to us, but whoever is not from God does not listen to us. This is how we recognize the spirit or a spirit. You could be translated either way. The spirit, capital S of truth and the spirit little S of falsehood. Yeah. So back to these competing, competing worlds which we talked about a lot. John talked about a lot. Here he keeps coming back to this idea.

The idea of anti-Christ means your anti-Massiah, which means you don't believe that Jesus really came in flesh, which is obviously going on. And still there are still some people in groups today that don't recognize him as God.

“And so that's how you know he says it's false.”

So before we get to the left part, that's kind of the transition. But I was going to ask out what you thought would just the last couple of minutes and then we'll get into it next time. But about this idea of testing the spirit. Because you still have to test things, right? I mean, there are still falsehoods, there are still things that happen.

There are still people, not just I mean, what is the testing process? Because there are still all these things are still present even 2,000 years later.

And so I mean, that's the first test that I go to is what is this spirit contradicting what the Bible says.

And I think that now granted, I mean, there is a diversity of opinion on a lot of things. I mean, you can read our comments section sometime in the people. You're a heretic or you don't make these, you know, the broad accusations, that's not helpful. You know, we can't have it reading the comments. Let somebody else read it.

I'm on for someone reading the comments. Probably should be asked.

“But the truth is it doesn't mean, like truth matters, right?”

I mean, so like we're not saying the truth doesn't matter. But we can't also be wrong on things. We all are wrong on things. But for me, it's like, what does the scripture clearly say? If this is like directly in competition or contradiction with the scripture, it's out.

And then I found this to be helpful on some more of the kind of areas that are, maybe there's not a clear answer. And you're wondering, is God leading me in this particular direction. You know, the desert fathers were like more from a monastic tradition. And what they would do is they would ask a question, does it lead to the fruit of the spirit? Does this lead to peace, patience and kindness?

Generous. That's where I was going because I think that should be the number one. Well, look, all right. There's two different things. I'll you ask us a generic question.

But I'm saying, what is John talking about?

“I think the chapter didn't really have a chapter break.”

Somebody put these numbers in here. Chapter four is not chapter four. So what did he say? The last verse of chapter three. He said, this is how we know he lives in us.

We know it by the spirit he gave us. Well, in that vein, he's like, so watch out, test every other spirit. Doesn't say other, but that's the point. Yeah, how does it relate to the Holy Spirit so that Galatians 519 through 24 is? You can't be any more clear about two sides of the Holy Spirit and the sinful nature.

Because what is what they produce, right? Yeah, he revisits this idea of the world where it said the viewpoint of the world. Well, what's the viewpoint of the world? You just read that. How do you know that?

Well, he's already said in 1 John 2 what the viewpoint of the world is. And it's a lot like Galatians 519. The acts of the sinful nature are obvious. Yeah. So I would say the number one test is if there's a person who is participating in that list

and they're giving you spiritual truths, they fail that test. Wow.

And let me add to you that because you go back and read the first John.

“How much of first John is talking about loving your brother?”

Being in fellowship with one another. And in the acts of the sinful nature in Galatians 5, there's fits of rage. That's one of the actions. That's one of the decisions. Well, and the fruit of the spirit is love.

Come on back to what you're talking about, these comments. I was using this as an example, but like, yeah, it's going to be a believer. And still like the spirit they're coming at you, it could be not. If they're coming at you to rage and accusation and personal attacks, that does not. That's that is not looked like they're free to the spirit.

That looks more like the acts of the sinful nature. So I'm not going to receive that kind of accusation if we're trying to rob it. I'm not going to let that get into my mind now. I might think about what I said. And I say that writers is right in my arriving at truth.

But I think the problem is that when we say the word truth with Jesus talks about truth, he's not talking about simply a set of right doctrinal beliefs. He's actually saying that truth is personified.

And that is a key point of the whole point of first John as much more about communion with Christ.

They're getting the right ideas about Christ. That's the big difference. And I think you've got to be careful not to let that come in. Doctrine matters. But I've said it's all the time.

But, but, but, but doctrine will save you. Christ save you. Yeah. Yeah. Christ save you.

That's your doctrine. You never remember that. That's good. And we're out of time. So we'll have to, we'll pick this up on the next unochanged and keep filming them.

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