teaching/sermons/col-1-15-20/expansion/icoc_alpha_omega/clean/12-digging-deeper-dom-emily-camerino.md

Digging Deeper | Dom & Emily Camerino

Col 1:15-20 prep relevance: RELEVANT

Why kept: Bible-study-method workshop that uses Colossians as its working example. Walks the Colossian situation, the elemental spiritual forces of Col 2, and the supremacy of Christ as the letter's core argument. Useful as a primer on how the original audience would have heard the letter.

Key excerpts:

00:00:00 All right, we'll go ahead and get started. Good morning, everybody. Morning. >> Heard there was some traffic on the way in with the elevator and everything like that. Um, don't know what's going on there, but thanks so much for being here, guys. Y'all excited about ICMC so far? >> Awesome. Great. Well, who stayed up the latest last night? Let's go with that first. >> I did. You did? >> I definitely >> What time do you go to bed? >> Like probably 2:00 in the morning. >> 2 in the morning. Anyone got that beat? >> What time? >> 3. Three.

00:00:30 >> Three. You got a beat? >> 3:30. >> 3:30. >> Just Just a little one uping. Y'all are psychos. I was in bed by like 10:15 and I felt great. >> But uh but for those who don't know, I don't think I know anybody in here, but my name is Dom Camarino. This is my lovely wife, Emily Camarino. Uh we hail from the great state of South Carolina. Let's go. Home of the South Carolina Gamecocks. Uh this here is a picture of us and our family. That is our two twins

00:01:00 right there. Uh that one is Addie on the left and that's Millie on the right there. Is it the other way around? Pictures sometimes hard to tell the difference. They are identical twins. Yes, they are hard to tell the difference. Um and that's Super Mom right there. Uh this is our campus ministry. This was at our fall retreat there. Uh we are at the University of South Carolina, which is the best football team in all of the Carolinas. Come on. >> Wow. Uh it's not really a high bar, but we take pride in that. But you guys are in this class digging deeper. So

00:01:33 hopefully you guys are in the right place. But uh what we're hoping to do today is we're going to talk a lot about digging into the Bible. But let me just start by asking some questions of you guys. Let me see if any of you guys relate to me or maybe even some of your peers. But has any of you guys ever read the Bible and just thought, man, what did I just read? or have to go back and man I got to read that again and again and again right it's like man I I don't know what this is saying right or how many of you ever like you're going through the Bible and you're like oh man

00:02:03 book of numbers you know what sounds really great not reading the book of Numbers let's just skip over that right because it's just too confusing or not relatable how many of you guys have ever gotten to like a family tree and you're like how is this going to help my life right man there's just like so many parts of the Bible that were like this just does not seem relatable at all Yeah. >> Or how many of you guys if you've ever like spoken to somebody and they have like that hard-hitting question and you're just like a deer in the headlights, I have no idea how to answer you, right? Or man, are there just

00:02:34 passages in the Bible that you come across and you're like, I have no idea how to reconcile this. I have no answers for this, but I'm uncomfortable with this. >> And if I'm honest, I don't like it. >> Yeah. Yeah, >> you know, or honestly, we know that we should study out biblical convictions on things, but I don't even know the first place to start, right? >> How many of you guys relate to me or am I the only crazy person in this room? >> You know, how many of us feel like we want to go deeper in the Bible, but we just don't know where to start? >> Yeah. >> You know, this is real cuz all these

00:03:05 things I have felt, I feel, and man, I remember years ago uh going to my first ICMC. My first ICMC was 2016 and it was in St. Louis, Missouri. We got any Missouri people here? Okay, well, you know, a couple Missouri people. And it was a 16- hour trip. We lived in Florida at the time. So, we drove 16 hours all the way there. And like I got to ICMC. It was my first time. I had just become a Christian a year prior. And I was like, "Wa, there's like 2,000 people here. This is awesome." You know, every lesson is like, "Oh, man. It's awesome."

00:03:36 And you, you know, you hear all the lessons, you get super hyped and stuff. I had never been in a campus ministry. I had no idea what that meant. So, I came back and I was fired up. I'm like, man, we're going to go baptize a thousand people. It's going to be great. And then you get on campus and you start sharing your faith and getting in Bible studies and you learn real quick, oh, people don't want to follow Jesus. >> Like, that is the thing people do not want to do. And I remember I would get into these Bible studies with people and there would just be questions that would

00:04:07 come to me and there were like gauntlets being thrown. It's like, you know, is baptism really essential for salvation? How many of you guys have ever had to answer that question in a Bible study, right? Or man, like all these evil things that are happening in the world, just look at the news, look at the media. How could there be a good God and this stuff happened? Man, that was really challenging for me. I remember sitting in one of my science classes and going through the theories of evolution and all this stuff, and I'm like, hang on, that that's not in the Bible. Uh-oh. Right? And I remember just wrestling and

00:04:39 thinking and man like how do I reconcile this thing? Or even as a young college student, you're starting to learn how do I make biblical convictions on things? What do I think about dating? What do I think about boundaries? What do I think about sharing my faith? What do I think about all these things? My peers would be talking about. I'm like, man, well, I don't have any answers. I don't know what to do. And I remember these things because each of these things were gauntlets that were being thrown down. And often what I learned about myself

00:05:09 was I was not ready to answer those questions. They really poked holes in my faith. What I found was that my understanding of the Bible was shallow and underdeveloped, which honestly in me led to a lack of confidence in my faith because I didn't have good answers for them. You know, 1 Peter chapter 3 uh says this in verse 15, "But in your hearts revers, always always, always, always

00:05:41 be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect." I I I repeated this word a lot when I read this verse. The word that sticks out to me is that word always. Always is a very definite term, right? How many of you guys ever been in a conflict with somebody and they're like, "Man, you always do this." Most of the time it's not always, right? It's a little bit of an exaggeration, but this is the Bible

00:06:11 speaking, right? So, it says always, a definite every single time. always is such a strong word cuz what it's commanding us here is we should at every moment we should be prepared to have an answer to the question that's being thrown at us that anybody who throws something at us we should be ready and prepared. What I take this to mean is that we need to be people that aren't reactive in our faith but are proactive in our faith. Meaning that we're not waiting for the world to throw another

00:06:42 gauntlet at us. We're preparing for that next gauntlet to come anyways because we know it's going to come. Amen. >> Amen. >> Meaning we should be preparing. You know these questions. What I learned about myself was that honestly I had holes in my faith that the world just has an easy time of just kind of poking holes and kind of finding them for me and really showing me that I just was not prepared enough. I know that's me and I know many of us probably relate to that story. But the question I want us to ponder as we jump into this lesson this morning is

00:07:13 what holes in your faith has the world exposed already? Yeah, >> cuz it's always going to throw gauntlets. You know, here's the thing. As a generational hole, I think we can all agree our generation has a lot has a lot of holes that have been exposed over the last few years, right? You know, we are called as Gen Z the most irreligious generation in the last h 100red years in America, right? You know, in America, I don't know if you knew this, there's about 50% of people in America would profess being a Christian of some sort, right? And we've seen Bible reading on a

00:07:46 consistent basis being extremely low across the board across all age demographics, everything than ever before. Only about 11% of people actually read the Bible on a consistent basis. And actually, most of that number is over the age of 70. >> Wow. >> Meaning they got nothing better to do with their time but read the Bible anyways, right? That's what that number means. What does this fruit lead to? You know, there was a study done a number of years ago by far uh and they were asking

00:08:17 the most basic questions to the American Christian. Hey, like what happens after we die? What hope is there in the world? You know, why do bad things happen in the world? Like the basic questions that tell us what is our worldview? How do we view the world? How how do what is the lens at which we see everything around us? And what they found is that amongst professing Christians, only about 4% of Christians actually have a true biblical worldview. 4% of Christians, meaning most people who profess Jesus see the world through

00:08:49 a lens that is not through the Bible, >> but it's through something else. It's through media. It's through social media. It's through everything else except Jesus. This I think is a problem and I think this should be alarm bells to all of us that man what we're talking about this morning about digging deeper into the Bible is not just so we can answer questions but it's because honestly I think our faith is being hijacked more

00:09:19 than ever by the world around us that it can sound really spiritual but it itself is not. >> Yeah. >> Our faith will be as shallow or as strong as we build it to be. Our generation's faith will be as strong or as shallow as we build it together to be. Amen. >> What we need to build is not shallowess but deep roots that is prepared to give an answer. Not just so we can sound smart, not just so we can look cool, but because ourselves we want to be

00:09:50 confident that Jesus is supreme. Amen. >> The title lesson uh this morning is digging deeper. What we're hoping to do this morning is we're hoping to accomplish a few things, but I'm hoping to offer some tips, some tricks. We're hoping to get really, really practical with some stuff here, but it's to help you guys go deeper into the Bible. Cuz here's the thing, I can't give you every answer to every question about the Bible. Cuz one, I don't know every answer, but two, the Bible is something we're going to have to study for the rest of our life. This is something I

00:10:21 want to give you guys as many tools we possibly can, the things we've learned so we can build a deeper faith. >> That's the goal. And so we're going to talk about today is we're going to have like five points. They're going to be super practical. We're talk about deep spiritual humility. We're going to talk about how to choose what to study. This whole thing about context with the Bible, the three most important questions, and of course, we're going to just hook you up with some practical tools that we use to study the Bible on a normal basis. Amen. So before we get into that, M's going to come up and share about kind of the goal of all this.

00:10:54 >> Um yeah, so the Okay, so uh before we get into the practicals, I realize the mic is over here, I want to really talk about why we do this, why we should want to go deeper into understanding the Bible. Um James 1, oh nope, my scripture is not up there. Um, so James 1:22-25, it says, "Do not merely listen to the word and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says." Anyone who listens to the word

00:11:26 but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror and after looking at himself goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But whoever looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom and continues in it, not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it, they will be blessed in what they do. Um, I love this verse. A lot of y'all have probably heard it, but I love it how it describes what the word does to us. When we dig deeper, we see ourselves clearer and can let the word transform

00:11:56 us. Um, this verse compares the Bible to a mirror. In biblical times, mirrors were not made of glass and they certainly didn't have like the giant ones where you can see your whole outfit and like we do in bathrooms and all that. Like they were typically made of polished metals, which meant if you wanted to see your face in the mirror, you had to look closely with um and with a discerning eye, making sure a blemish you saw wasn't just a smudge on the metal, but an actual blemish. And

00:12:27 depending on the metal that it was made of, it could like tint your skin color. And so knowing what your undertone was to know what colors best fit you. Um, and but with that being said, like in Jesus's time to look at yourself in the mirror meant it wasn't just a glance at it as you walked by to make sure your hair wasn't too crazy, it was it was to really like study your features and make sure what you saw was legitimate. Um, even though my mirror at home is made of

00:12:57 glass and not polished metal, uh, when I wake up in the morning, I look closely. I'm blind as a bat. I wear contacts. So, if I stood even like 5t back and looked at myself in the mirror, it would be a really shallow view. Um, and I would miss a lot. I look closely to make sure, are my eyebrows okay? Do I have a stray hair here? Do I have any nose hairs I need to pluck? Like, >> yep. >> Do we do the same with the Bible, though? Do we just read the word,

00:13:27 skimming it to say that we read it? or do I look closely at what's being said and examine the word thoroughly to learn and take things away? >> The Bible compared to a mirror is such a great analogy because it means that the word can reflect back to us what we need to grow in and how to transform ourselves. That's >> right. >> And transform ourselves to be more like Jesus. >> How silly if I looked in the mirror looking like a hot mess, thinking I look like hot stuff. But we do that so easily with the Bible when we just skim the

00:13:57 easy feel-good stuff without going deeper into God's character and our own. >> Do you let the Bible expose you to your true self and transform you to be more like Jesus? Or is it just another book collecting dust on your shelf? If I look in a mirror and I don't do anything with what I saw, what a waste of the mirror. Like there was no point in even having the mirror. Do you just >> We need to let the Bible shape us.

00:14:28 Otherwise, we'll just be calling ourselves hot stuff spiritually when we're really just a hot mess. >> Amen. All right, let's get into some of these practical points. Y'all still with us? >> Man, we sound really tired in here. Turn over to the book of Galatians, chapter 5. Let's talk about this idea of deep spiritual humility. And I think when we talk about a class like this, I'm just going to share one of my fears. I think sometimes we can go to a practical class to learn

00:14:58 how to study the Bible to try to make the Bible say what we want it to say rather than letting God speak to us through his word. >> We can use really smart and spiritual language >> to just justify the desires of our flesh. Anyways, >> I wanted to start with this scripture in Galatians 5:1 16. So it says, "So I say, walk by the spirit and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the flesh desires what is contrary to

00:15:30 the spirit and to the spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are in conflict with each other so that you are not to do whatever you want." Look, I love that last part there cuz how many times have we said, "Man, I'm a grown adult. I can do whatever I want." Right? But what the Bible actually is trying to teach us is the goal actually shouldn't be to do whatever you want. >> It should be to do what God wants us to do. Amen. And that sounds so basic, but our job as Christians is not to know all the answers, but to try to be in step

00:16:00 with the spirit as much as we can. Let him be the boss of our life. This is so important as we approach the scriptures because what we don't want to start with is I already believe something and I just need to get the Bible to back it up. rather I need to let the Bible teach me and I just need to come to a place like most of the time my ideas are not good right like I I just don't have good ideas so we should be trying to discover what the original meaning of the text is and ultimately walk with the Holy Spirit

00:16:32 >> because God wrote the Bible God wrote the Bible in such a way it would be foolish of us to suggest God maybe you got it wrong here a little bit >> maybe I need to change it a little bit to fit our times today. God knew exactly what he was doing when he wrote it. Amen. >> So, when we're talking about these tools, a mark of true spiritual humility is killing the flesh and allowing the spirit to rain. So, let's talk about this. These are just some some things that we have to consider here. Again, it's the original meaning of the text to

00:17:03 walk in step of the spirit. But there's a couple big words here kind of in the scholarly realm. One is called ex Jesus. Say ex Jesus. >> Exesus. Man, you guys are all Bible scholars now. Amen. Let's go. Right. But what this word means, it means to draw out. To draw out. And in the context of the Bible, it means to draw out the original meaning of what the text was actually trying to get at. When the author wrote down what he wrote, what was he trying to say? Not what I think he meant, but what did he mean when he

00:17:35 say, right? You know, how many of you guys ever been to a Bible study group and everybody just gets in a circle, you read a passage and you're like, "What do you think it means?" >> Oh, what do you think it means? Right? Everybody has wildly different interpretation of things. How many of you guys, some of you guys might know this guy, but y'all know Dwayne Johnson by chance? How many of you guys know his earlier persona, The Rock? Yeah. Right. Y'all know his one of his most famous catchphrases. He would go up to people and he'd be like, "Hey, what's your name?" And right before he would say, "It doesn't matter what your name is,

00:18:06 right?" Think about if we were like that with the Bible. It doesn't matter what I think. It matters what God thinks. >> Matters what the Bible thinks about this, right? Again, a humble heart is asking, "What is the Bible trying to say? And what did the author mean when he wrote this?" That is the heart of ex Jesus. A better way of putting it might be the Bible wasn't written to you, but it is written for you. meaning there's an original audience, an original hearer of the term that they had in mind. So

00:18:36 whatever it meant for them is what it has to mean for me today. Maybe the practicalities look a little bit different, but I can't change the original meaning just because we've quote unquote evolved over time. Amen. >> The opposite of ex Jesus is this other thing we call isog Jesus. Say is Jesus. >> Jesus, >> which means to read into. It's this idea that I already have an idea or a bias or something that I'm bringing in and then I interpret the text around that thing. Right? This process gets us into trouble

00:19:07 and it will lead us to miss exactly what God has to say. You know, here's a good example of this, but ex Jesus versus is of Jesus. Y'all ever get hit with like a text or someone comes up to you and they're like, "Hey, I need to talk to you later." You know what I mean? How many of you guys like it when someone's like, "Hey, can I talk to you later real quick?" Right. >> Now, real quick, what are you guys thinking when that happens? Just shout it out. >> I messed up. >> I messed up. Right. What else? >> They're mad at me. >> They're mad at me. What else?

00:19:37 >> I did something horrible. Why do we always go to what did I do wrong? >> You know what I mean? What if they were just like, "Oh, actually, I just wanted to hang out with you." Right? Or, "Hey, I just wanted to ask you a question about something." What? It's like, "I just wanted to get your advice about something." Right? We immediately go into, "Oh man, I must have did something. I must uh right like we go on a spiral when honestly the first step we should actually do is what do you want to talk to me about?" Right? What do you mean by that? Instead of just going with

00:20:08 our preconceived notions. So we walk in there with so much anxiety when really we probably could have just asked them, "Hey, what do you want to talk to me about?" >> You know what I mean? That's what we do with the Bible sometimes. We read something and instead of going, "What do you want to say to me, God?" We start thinking, "Man, all these things and these things come in there." And we read it in there. The thing that we have to remember about the Bible is that when we approach it, the Bible isn't meant to simply be read. It's meant to be

00:20:38 studied. It's something that we actually have to do some work on here because it was written over 2,000 years ago in languages and cultures that are vastly different than our culture today. It's something that we actually have to put a little bit of work towards in order to understand it well. Amen. >> So, we're going to have to do a little bit of work when it comes there. So again, the whole goal of deep spiritual humility is I want to understand the original meaning behind the scripture and what God has decided is important

00:21:08 for me to hear. Amen. >> Amen. >> M's going to share on point two on what to study. >> Um yeah, I love what what Don was saying about starting with deep humility towards the Bible. But I know for me when I try to decide what to study, especially if I'm fighting to be humble to the Bible, I get really overwhelmed. I feel overwhelmed at the size, depth, length of the Bible and have no idea where to go to next. Um I'm trying to

00:21:39 think of Okay. Uh so the scripture that I love is in 2 Timothy 3:14-17. And it says, "But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, and how from infancy you have known the holy scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All scripture is God breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work."

00:22:09 Um, this verse illustrates that the Bible is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, training so that we might be thoroughly equipped. Meaning, the Bible isn't just a good tool. It's the whole toolbox. When I get stuck on what to study, I first think through if there's something I need to study out to help me be more equipped in life as a disciple, as a leader, as a, you know, whatever stage of life that I'm in. Um, and if I usually try to think through

00:22:39 um, you know, we'll get into, oh, there we go. Like a topical study, like I'll think through a topical study. So, you know, what does it mean to be a good friend? Patience, humility, boldness. If it's topical that I do, I'll look up scriptures based on those topics and take time to dive deeper into a few verses or a story a day. um and study around the scripture to really understand the context and execute the scripture. Well, um for example, like when we found out that like right before

00:23:10 our twins were born, I really wanted to study out biblical motherhood. So, I looked up as many stories like I, you know, wrote down a list of stories of different women in the Bible. And each day, sometimes for multiple days, I would study out that woman. I would study out her faith. I would study out how um she gave her child to God. I would study out how she, you know, like that's what it means to do a topical study. Um and if there isn't something

00:23:41 off the top of my head though, I'll usually like ask my discipler. Um if there's something that they see in my character that I need to grow in, and if or like someone close to me, like a roommate, and if there's nothing, then I usually just try to read where I feel less confident. Um, and so that's where you can get into book study and character study or even topical book study. Um, a few years ago I just wanted to read through the Bible. So I started in Genesis and read through the whole Bible. I don't like the Bible in a year plans. Um, I feel like they're really

00:24:13 rushed and strict. When I've read through the Bible, it's taken me years, but that's because I'll also pause at different times to read what I need to read partway through. Like one time I was reading through the Bible and I was in Leviticus and it was great, but I really needed to study out prayer. So I paused Leviticus, I studied out prayer, and then I came back to it. Like you don't have to stick with something super hardcore. Like it's it's what you need it to be. Um, and you know, right now I'm reading

00:24:44 through the New Testament where I read one gospel and then Acts through Revelation and then I'll read the next Gospel and then Acts of Revelation and so on to where I'll have read the New Testament through four times in a row. I'm doing that right now to familiarize myself more with the New Testament. I may read it in ESV, in a study Bible, in my regular Bible um, and just to see what else I can learn. But I just want to feel really confident in the New Testament. And um again, like

00:25:14 when we don't know what to study, I just really encourage people to pick something and stick with it until you feel like you need something different. Um we have a lifetime to study out the Bible. So if you have a laundry list of things you want to study, know that's why life is long. And if you're the opposite and you have zero idea where to start, ask a good friend what you need to grow in or study something to that you um want to familiar familiarize yourself with better or the parts of the Bible that you feel maybe less like a little more scared of or less familiar with. Um so again, for example, like

00:25:46 these are these are typically things that I'll kind of think through with what to study. So topical like I talked about it could be forgiveness, patience, leadership, surrender, find scriptures and break them down. Um a book study that would be like picking a book of the Bible. And what I recommend with that like if let's say you want to read like a big theme is Colossians this uh this weekend. And so if you're reading Colossians like read through the whole book and then you like in one sitting

00:26:16 because especially in the New Testament a lot of those books are letters. So, they were meant to be read all the way through. So, we read it all the way through in one go and then go through it again slower, picking out and really breaking things down um to really understand the book and its depth. Character study is usually just pick a Bible character and read passages about them. There's many many characters in the Bible, right? Um so if you pick David I would you know read the story of his life read

00:26:47 his writings like the psalms and then read few like the books later about the references made back to him um like later in the scriptures David's talked a lot about in reference to like in the New Testament and later on with other kings. Um and then you could even just do a topical book study. So using a spiritual book, make sure the author is credible. Um and read it. And you know, for example, I love this book. It's called Humility. It's by Andrew Murray. And so what I recommend with topical

00:27:18 book studies, um typically again like it's you know, I read humility because I was really needing to grow in my humility. Always am. Um, and so as I read that book, if there are scriptures in it, I go back and read around the scriptures and make sure that one, what the author is saying is true. So really fighting to be like a Berean um, in Acts 17 and um, making sure that my conviction is not based off of the topical book, but based off the Bible. Um, so those

00:27:49 are just a few a few practicals on on what to study. Again, the Bible is long and life is long and there's always stuff that we can be learning from it. So, just pick something and a run. >> All right. Next thing, let's talk about this idea of context, right? Look, anytime we're talking about how to go deeper in the Bible, context, context, context. This is I I would say like this

00:28:19 is probably the most important thing in our entire lesson beyond just like basic humility, but context is so important when it comes to the Bible. Again, the Bible is not written to you, but it is written for you, which means whatever it meant originally is what it has to mean for us today. Amen. So, these are just kind of some basic ideas of context. I kind of group them into three. So you have literary context which focuses on the overall flow, the structure, the meaning in the passage or greater

00:28:49 chapter of the story, right? Then you got historical context. We got any history nerds in the house? Okay, we got two. Amen. You guys are with me. Let's go history nerds. But this refers to like the politics, the geography, the history, the social, and all the stuff that's going on behind the text and in the text, right? These events are really, really important. And then finally, cultural and linguistic context. This is like how did they see the world, right? What language are they speaking? What words do they mean? We'll

00:29:20 talk about these things. So, let's get into that a little bit. Let's talk about this literary context for a second. You know, in the Bible, I don't know if you guys knew this, but there are well, one, there are 66 books in the entire Bible. Most of you guys probably knew that it was written over the course of a few thousand years, but it's across different genres, right? I remember as a young Christian finding out for the first time like, wow, the Bible's not just one book, you know? It's like, wait, I I thought it was called the Bible for a reason.

00:29:50 Like the whole purpose of the Bible, it's actually more like a library of books >> written over the course of thousands of years in three different languages. And there are some amazing amazing different genres including things like narrative talking about story, poetry, right, which is very artistic in his communication, wisdom, prophecy, letters, apocalyptic. Here's the thing. Sometimes when we look at all the genres, we're like, you know, the way that I would wish that God would speak

00:30:20 to me is just one story, right? One narrative or like a science textbook or like just give me the facts and stuff. But here's the thing. God chose to speak to us through all these different genres and literature ideas for a reason. >> Think about it. Have you ever tried to communicate emotions to somebody using scientific terms? You know, when I when I feel about you, girl, I I feel the dopamine hitting in my brain and like, you know, how weird would that be? You know what I mean? But like if we were like, "Girl, I feel the butterflies in

00:30:51 my stomach when I'm around you." You know what I mean? That gets across what's going on there. We understand that language there that you could not communicate in a scientific way. >> These are important things to understand. But each genre is extremely important for God to communicate everything about what it means to be a human. Each genre is trying to communicate things. Uh and genre plays an important role in interpretation because again what I just said about there about the butterflies being in my

00:31:21 stomach. If we're talking from a scientific thing, you'd be like, "Bro, you need to go to the hospital, man." Right? That's a little weird, but we all know I'm being like metaphorical with that, right? I'm not talking literally, but sometimes I think we get ourselves into trouble by trying to interpret everything in the Bible like a science textbook or everything in the Bible as just purely metaphorical, right? We have to put it in its right genre. But then there's this other part of literary context with this idea of flow and

00:31:51 structure. Hear me when I say this. 95% of misinterpretation from the Bible comes from people just not reading around it. >> I would say 95% of misinterpretation is because people grab one sentence in the middle of a book and go, "This is what I believe, right?" Without reading the rest of what's going on there. You know, there's kind of two ways that we do this. You know, one is this idea of stringing along text to say what we want it to say. Let me show you why this is bad. You know, in the Bible, actually,

00:32:22 it commands us that we're supposed to cook bread over feces. Did you guys know that? >> No, I'm I'm not I'm not joking, right? Look look at these scriptures here. You know, in Ezekiel 4:12, it says, "Eat the food as you would a loaf of barley bread. Bake it in the sight of the people using human excrement for fuel." Yuck. Right? But then look, Jesus said this. Jesus told him, "Go and do likewise." So all of you go and do likewise. As soon as Judas took the bread, Satan entered into him.

00:32:53 Of course he would if he's eating poop flavored bread. Amen. So Jesus told him, "What you're about to do, do it quickly." Do you see why this is wildly not good what we're doing here of stringing together texts that are going on here? Because what I'm doing is I'm ignoring that this took place few hundred years before this happened, right? And there's a totally different context of what's going on in each single one of them, right? However, we do this at times with each other. We're like, "Let me take this passage and this passage and that passage and bam, string

00:33:23 them together, right?" It ignores the context of all. But then the other one that we do is we also can isolate texts in the Bible. Sometimes we forget those little numbers that are next to each of the passages were actually added in later so we can know how to find scriptures in the Bible a lot quicker. But when the original authors are writing, they didn't write the numbers next to the verses or anything like that. They all were individual letters that were going on here. Here's the thing. If we isolate sentences of the Bible, and

00:33:54 that's the only way we interpret it. We have to allow this, which is this. Did you guys know that biblically I have beautiful feet? >> Yeah. >> You know, here's the thing. You have beautiful feet and you have beautiful feet and everybody here has beautiful feet regardless of how they look. Even if they look like this, right? >> I'm talking like grimy toes. They got calluses and bruises and stuff cuz look Isaiah 52:7 which is an individual verse says how beautiful on the mountain are the feet

00:34:24 of those who bring good news right who proclaim peace who bring good tidings who proclaim salvation who say to Zion your God reigns. How many of you guys have ever preached the gospel before to somebody? How many of you guys have shared the good news with about peace and good tidings and things to other people? Well, guess what? You have beautiful feet. >> Right? But here's I know this is a joke, but we do this sometimes. We take individual sentences out of its context,

00:34:54 ignore what's going on around it, and use it to justify things. >> How many of us have used that Romans 14 scripture before to say, "Well, I can do whatever I want, right? Because if it doesn't affect my conscience or anything like that, then I'm good to go, right?" without reading around it to see there's a greater debate that's going on in there, right? We do this at times. Amen. >> Amen. >> You know, the other one that's going on here, that's literary context, but then we got historical context. These are just some questions that I'm always asking of the text. Anytime I'm coming

00:35:25 to it, I'm asking when was this written? Who was this written to? What people group? What language did they speak? What culture were they a part of? Where were they located when writing this? You know, often when Jesus says something, he's actually looking at something that he's speaking about, right? You know, think about it. That great passage in Matthew chapter 16 where he's talking about the gates of Hades is not going to overcome my church. He's actually looking at a physical place called the gates of Hades.

00:35:55 And you know, when he's talking about mountains, he's literally sitting on a mountain and pointing at the mountain going this is the mountain, right? Like he's talking about these things. There are certain places that we should take note of. Where are the reciprocants located? What issues or trials were the people encountering? Uh why did this person write this book to them or this letter or this poetry or this wisdom or whatever it was? Or are there any major historical events that are going on? You know, one of the most important uh events in all of the Bible to the Jewish

00:36:25 people was the fall of Jerusalem in 586 B.C.E. by the Babylonians, which was kind of the point where they're like, "Wow, like God left us." >> Mhm. >> God completely left us. And that was a pivotal moment for them because prior to it, they have kind of one part of their story and after it, there was another part of their story. And that's important for us to recognize that they're actually multiple books in the Bible that tell the perspective of what was going on during that time. >> Yeah, >> that's important to really recognize

00:36:55 there. Uh the last little bit of context that's going on here is this idea of cultural or linguistic context. You know, the Bible was written in three different languages. It was written in Hebrew, Aramaic, and quen Greek. Uh and it focuses on one major group of people known as the Jews. But it encompasses more and more as time goes on of the Gentiles and the Greco Roman world. You know, here's the thing. Our culture today is starkly different than that of

00:37:26 the people of the Bible. I know that sounds really simple, but sometimes when we read the Bible, we don't we do this without even noticing it. But we tend to think that the people reading this think exactly like we do in America in the West, right? You know, here's the thing. Their culture values different things than we value today. Here's just some examples here, but there's kind of this western versus eastern divide that's going on here, right? You know, in the west, we are more about the individual.

00:37:58 >> Yeah. >> The individual is the first and foremost thing. Think about all the talking points that are going on in the media. Think about all the things we've said before. How many of us have ever said like, "Man, it's all about your personal relationship with God." >> Here's the thing. The Bible actually never talks about a personal relationship with God. That should be alarming to us. Right now, I'm not saying it's untrue, but what's interesting about the Bible and the people of the time is they were more collective before they were individual. In fact, there's a phrase that is quoted

00:38:28 in Eastern cultures. It's the tallest blade of grass is the first one that gets cut. Meaning, it's not about the individual standing out and looking different than anybody. It's actually to make sure our people are taken care of. It's about making sure our clan is taken care of. my family unit is taken care of. My village is taken care of because that was the most important thing to them. Meaning that if we grew up in the American West, the first thing we have to understand is we're going to think more about ourselves rather than other

00:38:59 people just in general. Amen. >> That's what we notice that's going on here. The other thing, we're more focused on chronological time than cyclical time. You know, think about it. The first things that we're usually trying to figure out in the Bible is we're like, "Okay, so when did this happen and what was the next thing that happened after that and the next thing that happened after that?" We're very focused on give me things in order and in chronological order with time periods and dates and all that stuff. To Eastern people, they actually don't really care about that and they're actually willing to take liberties with kind of

00:39:30 reorganizing the time period and events in a different type of way. How many of you guys have ever read through the Gospels, like all four gospels, and tried to figure out, okay, so Jesus is crossing the lake at this time, and oh wait, he's over here at this time. You know what I mean? It's like, I'm scratching my head. I don't know how to reconcile it. That's on purpose because the gospel writers were not interested in giving you a chronological account of what he did. They're trying to do something else because it's a different cultural value to them. Amen. >> Yeah. You know another thing they're

00:40:01 more or culture we're more about guilt innocent driven they're more honor shame driven meaning this idea it's again it goes back to that individual thing meaning when we hear a great sermon or a great message you're expected to feel inwardly guilty and convicted to them the moment they actually recognize they're in sin is when somebody else comes and points it out to them or they understand like oh me doing this action would bring great shame not only to me but to the rest of my family or my clan

00:40:33 or my people or whoever it is, right? >> It's very big on I don't want to bring shame to my people. I want to bring honor and think about the times we're talked about to honor our parents or to honor God and to live in such a way to do that. Right? Lastly, they are we are very skeptical of the supernatural. You know, how many of you guys ever seen like those ghost TV shows, you know, where they're like hunting all this stuff going on in there, right? How many you guys actually believe that stuff's like real? Maybe like a couple of us, right? Or but most of the time we're

00:41:03 probably watching that like, dude, you just made that up, right? Like somebody had to plant that there. But you know, I was in uh in uh South Africa last year in Zimbabwe and it's interesting like just walking around they're just talking about like, "Oh yeah, that guy practices dark magic. Like that's just totally normal." I'm like, "Wait, pause. You believe in that stuff?" And to them when they were hearing me talk that they're like, "Oh, you just don't believe in the spiritual world anymore." >> Yeah. >> Like, and it dawned on me. I'm like, "Wow, we have gotten to a place in our

00:41:34 culture where we have just like outscienced everything and we just think we have an answer for everything anymore. And there's not enough room for the mysterious workings of God in the supernatural world." Here's the thing, guys. We believe in a God of the universe that rose from the dead. That is supernatural. >> Yeah, >> you can't explain that with science. And the Eastern culture is very willing to just say there are things we can't explain by science and that's fine. >> That's how we have to understand the

00:42:05 Bible. But you see the difference here. There's different values that are going on between the west and the east. You know, let me give you an example. There's a scripture that we love to quote at times and I think we miss it because there are different cultural values that we automatically assume of the text but honestly that's just not how they think. How many of you guys have ever heard this scripture in Revelations 3? I know your deeds that you were in neither hot nor cold. I wish you were one or the other. Right? So because you're lukewarm, >> neither hot nor cold. I'm about to spit

00:42:35 you out of my mouth. Right. Man, we've heard this one so many times about this idea like, man, God wants you to be hot or on fire for him, right? But, you know, he doesn't want you to be cold, but he'd rather be one or the other, right? Here's the thing. In their culture, they actually would have looked at hot or cold as both positive things. Hot was seen as this idea of refreshing, of of healing. But cold wouldn't have meant spiritually dead. In fact, it was actually again a time of refreshing. You

00:43:06 know, in the culture that I was speaking to here in the city of Leodysia, it actually was a very rich city that had one problem. They had no way to get water. So, they had to import water from two nearby cities. And there was one that had hot water, one that had cold water. But by the time it got to them, it was uselessly lukewarm and disgusting. It's like Dani. You know what I'm talking about? How many you guys like Dani water? And I'm like hating on Dan. Somebody loves it here, right? But it's this idea. I'm using

00:43:37 this example. We look at the scripture and automatically assume, oh, hot means like on fire, like zealous, like passionate, and cold means like aloof and like callous and like kind of passive, right? But that's not how that culture would have assumed or heard those things of the text. That make sense? >> Yeah. >> So, this is kind of an example again of our cultural blinders that are coming up here. Uh, next thing I want to talk about here very quickly, every time we're reading the Bible, these are just

00:44:07 three basic questions that I'm trying to answer to kind of help me grow in my walk with God, which is one, every single time I'm reading the Bible, what can I learn about God? You know, I appreciated what Kyle shared last night. I don't know if you noticed, but like literally the first like 20 minutes of his sermon, he was just talking about how great Jesus was, right? >> He was just talking about, man, reading through this passage of Colossians, what can I learn about God? Amen. Right? And then look, what was the next thing? What can I learn about people? Man, we really don't think God is all that supreme. >> Man, we think so little of God. And what

00:44:38 can I learn and change about myself? Well, I need to have a higher view of God so that way I change and I become a person of faith rather than a person that relies too much on myself. Amen. I appreciate how he did that last night. But these are always just three important questions. Every quiet time you have, every time you're reading the Bible, these are the things that I should be focusing on trying to answer. Amen. All right, last thing. I'm going to get super practical. Y'all want some tools? >> Yes. >> All right. These are just some tools here. These are things we use personally

00:45:09 in our everyday studying of the Bible. You know, the first thing is get a good study Bible. Now, what do I mean by that? Uh there's this uh Bible. It's called a Thompson Shane reference Bible. The whole point of it is it's literally uh a Bible that is going to help you be able to find uh topical studies way way quicker. you know, next to every scripture, it's going to probably list like five other scriptures where, oh, this idea is mentioned and this theme is mentioned, and you can look at every single time that word pops up. Uh, it's

00:45:39 a great resource. You can get it for 20 bucks on Amazon right now. Super cheap, right? It's actually cheaper than breakfast here. Amen. Like 30 bucks. >> Yeah. Come on. Right. Uh, number two, this is what's called a freaking cordage. Blueletterbible.com. You know what I learned really quickly about languages is that there's not always a word for word direct translation between words of different languages. >> How many you guys have ever stuck like a sentence into Google Translate translate into Japanese and then back into English

00:46:10 >> and it comes out like super clunky. You know what I mean, right? Because there's not always a direct word for word translation. you know, uh my wife's father, uh he's of Taiwanese descent, and I asked him, uh how do I say like just kidding? And his response to me, he's like, we don't really have a way of saying that in Chinese. And I was like, how do you not have a word for just and kidding? He's like, well, it means something really different. >> And that was fascinating to me. But what this resource is going to help you do is

00:46:40 it's going to be able to list the English translation, but then the word that is there and every single other time in the Bible, that word pops up and the translations that the translators give, right? >> You know, think about it in Greek or actually let me say this. In English, we only have one word for love. In Greek, just in the Bible alone, there are four different words for the word love. There's like a brotherly love. There's a love for God. There's a romantic love. There's a friendship love, right? Like there's different ways of love, but we I

00:47:11 love my wife the same way that I love cheeseburgers, right? Like it's the same word. It's weird, right? But again, it's different cultural values that are at play there. And this is a great resource that's been helpful for us. Um, Bible Project's a great resource. They got an app. They got YouTube. They got all kinds of stuff. Uh, this is what we call a commentary. Let me add one caveat to commentaries. I think sometimes we are too quick to run to commentaries without doing the hard work first. >> Yeah. >> Like commentaries for me are like the last resort of I have gone through

00:47:43 studying out every scripture I possibly can. I have gone through, you know, going through the Greek and the Hebrew and things. But honestly, here's the thing we have to remember about commentaries. It's not scripture. >> Yeah. >> It's just some guy's opinion. Maybe they're smarts and it's helpful sometimes, but it's like if I were to be in a Bible study group and ask, "Hey, what do you think this means?" That's all a commentary is, is somebody else telling me what they think it means based on how they've studied it out. It's a great conversational tool, but we should not value this above the word of

00:48:14 God. There are so many times over the years in in campus ministry, we have heard people like, "I have a new conviction." And I'm like, "Great. What is it?" And they're like, "I heard a new podcast." I'm like, "No, podcasts are good. Commentaries are great, but it's not God's word." Amen. >> Remember that. Uh, these are just two good books that you can read that can kind of help you. One is how to read the Bible for all it's worth. Really great books about this thick, but it's literally just a book on ex Jesus. It's not going to tell you what the Bible

00:48:45 says, but it's going to tell you how to read the Bible better, >> how to go through each genre and things like that. And then this other one here is a great book. Uh, it's called misreading scripture at Western Eyes. And the whole point of the book is we read the book like an American. We need to start reading it like a first century Jew. >> And it's trying to get us to understand like, oh, this is how an Eastern person views the world. And this is how honestly the Bible should be viewed in that way. Amen. >> So, these are just some great tools that have been helpful. Um, here's what we're

00:49:15 going to do. We have >> 20 >> 20 minutes. Amazing. All right. All right, here's what we're going to do. We're going to do a little bit of a group activity cuz I thought that'd be fun. So, being that we were talking about the book of Colossians throughout this entire conference, what I want you to do is get to like a group of like I don't know three or four just the people around you and we're going to spend about 10 minutes >> going through the book of Colossians together and you guys are going to answer these questions uh using all the stuff that we talked about. You could download the Blue Letter Bible app if

00:49:46 you want to. Uh, but honestly, a lot of these questions just read carefully, go deeper into the Bible. Amen. So, that's what we're going to do for the next like 10 minutes is we're going to go through this. All right. Three, two, one, break. >> Two people do. >> We'll see.

00:50:16 Are you okay? to the church.

00:50:46 They were different. like

00:51:17 people were looking like awardly. I like it. This is a nice

00:52:05 They were a new church that like all they need is love and they were looking outward. They don't believe that they were looking outwardly for different things. Oh, no. I

00:53:05 Usually the letters remain purposes. Yeah.

00:53:35 Whatever. like you guys talking

00:54:07 Where do they miss? They worship angels.

00:54:44 >> Thank God. Elementary makes it clear that they teach you.

00:55:24 And he's talking. with him. a slave company run away from his owner who might have

00:55:56 left Washington and now he was he was leaving but then he's sending him back But why? >> No,

00:56:35 >> we just finished the last one. I'd say

00:57:09 I'd rather be like I'd be like But that's later. Is it later?

00:57:40 >> Well, a prisoner took Therefore, although in Christ I could be bold in order to do that on the basis of love. There's none other than Paul and now also prisoner that I have healed for my son.

00:58:10 No, that's not his but his son >> who became my son while I was in chains. to be adopted. >> Yeah. So look the here's >> formerly he was useless to you but now he has become useful both to you and to me. I'm sending him who is my very heart

00:58:44 back to you. >> I'm in chains >> do. Oh my goodness. If you consider me a partner, welcome him. Welcome him as you can welcome me. If he does anything wrong or owes you anything, charge it to me. But he took on all of like the stuff that police and then he back to >> so we can like

00:59:17 so he basically everything. 30 seconds. Confident of your obedience. brother

00:59:58 up the conversations. Wrap them up. It's okay if you don't answer. >> Just know this will be graded. a bill. I see empty. >> Oh man. >> All right. How we feel like we did? Thumbs up, thumbs down. Kind of meh. >> Me. Couple men, couple.

01:00:31 >> Great. Well, this is good practice. All right, let's start going through these. All right, here's here's what we're going to do. Uh I don't have a slide for this. Uh just for sake of time, I'm just going to go through kind of what we got from these and just share with you guys and we'll just do honor system here. >> So if you got it right, great treasures in heaven. If not, God still loves you. Amen. >> All right. The purpose of writing the book of Colossians. Here's the thing we have to remember about the book of Colossians. Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. Well, first of all, what kind

01:01:02 of genre is this? >> An epistle. Man, come on. Let's use a scholarly word. It's a fancy word for letter, right? Meaning that when someone writes a letter, there's a reason they wrote a letter. So, here's what we This is what I got. Colossians was written to the church to combat false teachings, strengthen unity because there was a lot of disunityity that was happening and encourage further growth as they embrace the gospel of Jesus through transformation.

01:01:32 >> That's kind of the main goal of what Paul is trying to do there in the book of Colossians. Number two, the elemental spiritual forces, right? That's interesting. Like he mentions that thing here. Look, here's the thing we have to understand about the city itself about Colasse. Colasse was a place that really believed in the spiritual realm. >> Like it was not uncommon there for people to practice dark magic or to worship angels or any kind of other demonic forces. And honestly, a teaching

01:02:03 that they had believed before they were Christians was that the elemental spiritual forces were something to be feared, something that had power over them, something that there is no way we can break the bonds of them. And so when people would invoke the elemental spiritual forces on them, they would crumble. So they're like, "Oh man, I don't want to like tick off a demon, right?" Like that would be terrible. But here's the thing, but Paul is trying to encourage him through the letter. They have no power over you. Yeah, >> Jesus has power over you and Jesus has

01:02:33 power over them, which means you have nothing to fear. Amen. >> Uh the next thing, this idea, three sentences explain the flow and the argument that Paul is making through this letter. Meaning that again, it's kind of this whole literary context idea. Paul is making an argument here. He's not just throwing a bunch of scriptures together that's like a scripture bank of, "Oh, I like this one and I like this one." Right? Look, it's just this idea. Jesus is supreme. Amen. He's invited everyone here to come and

01:03:03 take part in his work in his kingdom. Because of that, you are free from human rules, dark forces, and your own flesh. And because of that, this changes the way that you should live down to the fundamental ways, including your characters and relationships with other people. You know, he talks about the end of the book of Colossians, how wives and husbands should submit to each other. He talks about how slaves should treat their slave masters and vice versa. He talks about the fundamental relationships of those people because

01:03:34 Jesus is now supreme. Amen. And so that's kind of the flow of what's going on there. Now this last one, how many you guys got the last question? >> Yeah. How many of you guys caught that Onesimus comes up somewhere else in the Bible? >> What book does he come up in? >> Liman, right? Or fellan. I like that. Fame. Let's go. Uh >> but uh here's something interesting to recognize. Phileiman, you know, or not Phan Onesimus, he comes into the church

01:04:06 and he's carrying with him something. He's coming with the guy who's delivering the book of Colossians. Right? So how letters worked in that time, again, not everybody read. They would actually read this entire letter verbatim to the entire church. >> So think about it. You know this guy Onesus, the church knows about him. And they mention in the book of Phileiman, he had really hurt the church. He had really done something to his owner at some point. So think about it coming in. You're hearing this book of Colossians. You're hearing this letter for Paul. And

01:04:36 you see, oh, Onesimus is here. Uh-oh. Right? There's a lot of people with a lot of feelings, right? And guess what letter he had with him, too? The letter to Phileiman. And it was read to the entire church there. So imagine the whole church hearing about this idea of Jesus is supreme. It should change our relationships with one another. It should cause us to forgive people. It should cause us to be unified. And all of a sudden in comes a guy who has hurt them very deeply.

01:05:06 Oh man. Right. And now being read to the entire church is this book to one individual person in the Colossian church by leader. That's who Onesimus is. Again, it's this idea of literary context. understanding that those letters actually were written probably about the same time and were read probably at the same time as well. Does that make sense? >> It's interesting kind of how the context uh kind of applies with all that. So hopefully you guys aced it and you don't fail ICMC, you know, come on. Um but

01:05:36 that's all we got. We're super grateful you guys came. Here's what we're going to do. We have a couple minutes. We have about 5 minutes before you guys are dismissed. We can just take some time for Q&A. If you guys don't have any questions, you guys are more than welcome to go. Uh, but yeah, do you guys have any questions? Q&A. >> Yeah, back there. >> It's not really a question request. Uh, can you put up the slide three? >> Bam. Magic.

01:06:07 >> Yeah. So when you're talking about exogesis, I couldn't help but think about uh the scripture in Hebrews where it says that the word of God is alive and active. Uh how would you sort of reconcile the two because I know that I can read something from scripture and I can get, you know, like a different thing every single time. Uh all these things I feel like are intended by God, but how do we know if we're really practicing ex Jesus or eyes of Jesus? >> Yeah. No, that's a great question and I think that's kind of a wrestling match, but kind of again I go back to whatever

01:06:37 the core meaning was behind the text. Meaning like if I were to put myself in a first century Jewish mindset hearing this letter for the first time, whatever would mean for them is what it has to mean for me today. Now, they didn't have iPhones and they didn't have cars and they didn't have all this stuff that we have today, but at least the principle of what's going on there has to mean the same thing there. uh we can't just go to well everything is cultural right but there's a core meaning behind what's

01:07:07 going on there that God can still speak to us and teach us today so that's kind of what I'm usually going to is what what's the core meaning for them and how do I apply this today like how would I function in society like that >> yeah and I think even in regards with the scripture of like the word is alive and active it means that not just that it doesn't mean that the word is ever changing because God doesn't change, but that it's ever it's always relevant. It's um because if God doesn't change,

01:07:37 >> why would his word change? >> Um and so it's more about relevance. So, >> Yep. Yeah. Good point. Yeah. >> Um so, how do you know like if things are meant to be read more like in a literary sense or symbolic sense? I feel like especially in the Old Testament, there's a lot of like stories, you know, and um just kind of things that don't have a lot of like context. It's just, you know, this habit that like at least for me, it's kind of hard to tell. >> Yeah. No, that is a great question. I

01:08:07 think the first thing is again I go back to let me put myself in the mindset of a first century Jew. >> So if I'm reading this story, let's say I'm reading about King David, would they have believed that King David is a real person? So it's not symbolic, right? Because they understand that this is a narrative. This is a story that's going on there. But then reading like Proverbs or Psalms or something like that, like they're not taking that literally, but it is the very words of God. So again, I think it just starts with asking what is

01:08:38 the genre that's going on here and how should I read it? It's again science textbook versus like some sort of song, right? We don't equate those as the same thing. They're communicating things and they're both important, but we don't read them the same because it comes back down to genre. Does that make sense? >> Yeah. You have anything to add to that? >> You can also always just look up the genre of this book. >> I do that a lot. He went to Bible college. >> I went to nursing school.

01:09:10 >> Yes. >> Yeah. Yeah. Question back there. >> Um, um, I had a question. basically when you were talking about like um asking a friend or like a disciple like what you need to grow in you don't like know what's studying next um person I know what I need to grow in like as a disciple and as a person in general so like when you're like reading the Bible or studying it and studying things out like how do you like not get overwhelmed with like so much to study out to study

01:09:41 it out and also just like just in general like read the Bible because I know sometimes like stigmas or like notions of like how much you have to read time or like how much like you need to like remember something that sometimes like what you said like sometimes I read and I'm like what did I just so >> yeah you know I think of a scripture a lot I think of Psalm 1 >> where it talks about like this person meditates on the word day and night.

01:10:11 Now, if we were to take that literally, man, we should be reading the Bibles 24/7, right? Like literally just knows in the book. But I don't think that's what it's actually meaning. Like, I think it just means like the way we view the world. We are so much involved with the scriptures that it's just like oozing out of us like over and over. Everything that we see like we can recite Psalms, we can recite all the books of the Bible. Something that I'm impressed by when it comes to like the ancient Jewish tradition is scripture memory was something that was just like

01:10:41 second nature for them. >> I think it was like by the time they're 13, they should have the first five books of the Bible memorized verbatim, which is like I look at that and I'm like, "Wow, where am I?" You know, like that's super convicting. This 13-year-old kid probably memorized more of the Bible than I ever could. So to me like I think it's less about man I just need to like read it for 10 minutes a day or read it for an hour a day but like I want to know God's word like there is no song there is no Netflix

01:11:12 show there is nothing else that is more important than trying to know God's word as much as humanly possible. Um, yeah. Good. >> One quick thing before we have to go. And then also, like I totally get that where I've been like, "Oh my gosh, I have five things to grow in and I'm the worst and I will forever be studying things." >> I usually either try to find what is the root of all of the things cuz it's usually a similar route or I pick the biggest issue and I stick with that for a long time and then keep moving. That's

01:11:43 why I mean God has grace and God is good and he will help us grow if we really want it. Um and so yeah, don't go don't get overwhelmed by by those things. You just pick something. I studied contentment for like 3 years straight. I still can struggle with it, you know, like I still have to go back to that. But that's why life is long and that's why God has grace. So >> when we wrap up, it's 145. >> Y All right. I think that'll be it. So thank you guys. Uh we'll be around if

01:12:13 you guys have any more questions. But thanks guys.