March 18, 2025 • 42 mins
The episode dives into the necessity of community in personal growth and healing. We discuss how God created us for relationships and the importance of the church in supporting individual journeys.
• Understanding the connection between personal faith and community
• The role of the church in personal struggles
• Addressing isolation in spiritual growth
• The importance of honesty and vulnerability in faith communities
• Real stories of triumphs and struggles within church experiences
• Encouragement to actively engage in communal healing
Free Resources to help you on your journey to Becoming Whole
👉Men's Overcoming Lust & Temptation Devotional
👉Women 21-Day Prayer Journal & Devotional - (Women overcoming unwanted sexual Behavior)
👉Compass 21-Day Prayer Journal & Devotional - (Wives who are or have been impacted by partner betrayal)
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Listeners, you cannot do this journey of healing, of
sexual integrity, recovery inyour marriage or parenting well
alone.
You weren't designed to do thisalone.
Last week we spoke about howGod remembers us.
He puts us back together, herestores our souls, as Psalm 23
(00:21):
says.
But he doesn't just remember usindividually.
He doesn't just remember usindividually.
He seeks to actuallyreintegrate, remember the
members of his body, the body ofChrist, the community of God,
the church of Christ.
So I'm James Craig.
I'm a director of projects hereat Regen and spiritual coach,
(00:43):
and I'm here with Josh Glazer,our executive director.
Welcome, Josh.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
Yeah, glad to be here , and the other side of this
that's so important for us isGod remembers us, puts us back
into the body of Christ, intothis in a minute or later.
(01:08):
That to be in the body ofChrist means something
significant about ourrelationship with God, and we'll
talk about that more too.
But what we're going to getinto today, as throughout the
rest of the series, really isimportant for those who want to
walk in sexual integrity, andJesus is good news, has good
news for those of us who are,who are pursuing that.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
So, josh, why, why can't we do this journey alone?
Isn't you know?
Isn't me, in my prayer, closetwith Jesus?
Plenty like shouldn'tencountering Jesus on my own and
whatever settings, or evengoing to church and kind of
getting that individualexperience of of, uh, connection
during worship or whatever.
Isn't that enough, or why?
Why isn't it if it's not right?
Speaker 2 (01:48):
Right, yeah, let me.
Let me start by saying yourindividual time with the Lord in
the prayer closet, yourindividual experience with him
in church, is so important, sovitally important.
Go into your prayer closet, goto church, expectant, hopeful
that God is going to speak toyou, meet you, touch you
specifically.
I can't understate how valuableand important that is because
(02:12):
Jesus does, in fact, uh,remember you specifically,
desire you specifically.
We are not designed to be thethe the Borg, the old Star Trek
reference there For those whoremember that like we're not
designed.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
I don't, I don't know what you're talking about.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
It's just this, it's this, it was this, some kind of
creature or computer orsomething that just sought to,
like, bring all creatures intothis oneness where they lost
themselves and ceased to exist,and they, you know everybody.
I think the line was like weare the Borg, you know.
Like it was just kind of thatis not God's heart for us,
that's not God's heart for hischurch, his body.
Um, he does love each of usindividually and, to answer your
(02:48):
question, I think I think theanswer is and there's probably a
lot more to it than this but Ithink the answer is he didn't
design us that way.
Why can't you do it on your own?
Like we want to be able to doit on our own, like, especially
in the American West, like weare individualistic that's like
we uphold, like people who arecan do it on their own.
I can think about, like, um,just this whole idea of maturity
(03:09):
.
If we kind of unpack what mostpeople think about when they
think about getting older orgetting more mature or getting
better at what they do, I thinka lot of us would say, like, if
I'm, if I'm better at what I do,if I'm mature enough, I can do
it on my own.
But if you follow that to itslogical conclusion, what that
would mean then is the holieryou are, the more isolated you
(03:30):
are, the less you have to dowith other people, and you will
never find that in scripture.
There's no place for it inscripture.
Matter of fact, like if youread the letters of Paul, you
cannot walk away from Paul'sletters.
You cannot walk away frompaul's letters having studied
them and think that there's anysuch thing as a christian who is
(03:51):
not a part of the church, likechurch and and being a follower
of jesus are one for paul, likethat's just the way he talks
about it.
I think you were even saying,weren't you saying there's like
a bible translation out now,that every time the, the, the
noun, it's the y'all, the y'alltranslation.
Speaker 1 (04:06):
It's kind of trying to give us what the King James
used to give us.
King James gave us ye, whichwas you plural, and now we have
the y'all translation, the y'alllike.
Speaker 2 (04:15):
So this is out for our Texas friends here Y,
apostrophe A-L-L, because we canread the you so often and just
think he's talking just to me.
Like, even though the letterstarts with to the church in
Philippi, like, which means toy'all in Philippi, we still read
it and go like this I'msupposed to be able to do this
on my own, but we aren't.
(04:35):
We aren't.
Yeah, again, to be short, likeGod didn't design us that way.
It is not in our DNA because itis not in his DNA.
Speaker 1 (04:44):
Yeah, our DNA, because it is not in his DNA.
Yeah, you know, last week Italked about how we are limited
creatures.
I mean, in Genesis, chapter two, we beat this drum a lot.
It wasn't good that Adam wasalone, even though he was with
his creator walking in thegarden.
It wasn't good that he wasalone.
It's shocking, it's not good.
I mean, we need things likeoxygen, we need water, food I
(05:05):
shared a lot about that lastweek but we also need the body
we were actually designed forthis union both with God, but
also with one another.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
So good, yeah, I mean , think about the makeup of our
individual bodies.
They are relational through andthrough everywhere.
I mean, like, what are our eyesdesigned for?
They are designed for anenvironment around us.
Um, and the neurochemistry ofbonding that takes place when
you engage eye contact withanother person is and there are
(05:36):
people that know much more aboutthat.
You probably articulate thatmore than I could but, um, like
there's something that's meantto be relational about our eyes.
If you've ever, if you've ever,had a conversation with somebody
outside in the summer andthey're wearing a pair of
sunglasses that reflect, and,and so you're kind of looking at
yourself in their eyeglasseswhen you're having a
conversation, it's verydisconcerting.
It's like it's very difficultto connect, Um, our our voices.
(06:00):
What we're doing right now, ourvoices, are directly connected
to what we do with our earsright now, which is listening to
each other.
My ears are not just designedto hear my own voice speak for
crying out loud, and there'sreally some like mysterious
things that happen.
So, anyway, and then, of course, because it's the regen podcast
, let's talk about this Oursexuality is relational to its
core core.
(06:20):
We've said this in otherpodcasts too that, if you um,
sexual sin is relational at itscore, even if you're
masturbating alone in yourbedroom, like it's still
relational.
Sex by God's design isrelational.
Um, I heard uh, I think it was,it was Dr Todd White in his book
mere sexuality, I think I'mgetting that name right.
(06:41):
Um, he says that if you look atthe organs of the human body
the lungs, uh, the heart, um,the liver, they all work.
They're kind of self-contained,they work within the body to do
what they're supposed to do inthe body.
You know, they need air, theyneed other things, they need
food to be nourished.
So we're not really isolated inthat way.
But, um, but there's one organand one specific organ in the
(07:04):
human body that actually can'tcomplete its function without
another person, and that's oursexual organs.
They you don't even christian,to kind of steal from
christopher west here.
They don't even make sense,apart from the other gender,
like male genitalia, femalegenitalia.
They like if, if we were aliensfrom a different planet and we
(07:24):
came and we're kind of pokingand prodding.
We have no idea what this partof the human body means or does
unless, um, or without the other, like it's just, that's what,
that's our, that's our design soeverything about us.
Speaker 1 (07:39):
I've actually never really thought about the fact
our eyes, our, our ears, ourmouths, um, you know, in some
ways our touch are, they'reoriented to the other, they're
oriented to connection, and soyou're making me think about
this, this really importantreality that jesus actually came
bodily.
It's another thing that we liketo focus on here at Regen,
(08:02):
because it's so important.
The incarnation is so important.
Cs Lewis actually says thegreater, the harder to believe a
miracle of Jesus's life, deathand resurrection isn't his
resurrection, because if youbelieve in the virgin birth, the
incarnation, believing theresurrection, is not a
significant step.
So actually, that's kind of the, that's the, that's the
(08:25):
beginning, you know, that's theinitiating point, and so I want
us to get to reflect a littlebit and remember, you know,
think about contemplate Jesuscoming into this world bodily
and part of that.
Obviously he came to forgive usour sins.
He lived a perfect life, hemodeled, he taught our sins.
He lived a perfect life, hemodeled, he taught.
(08:46):
But he also came to establish achurch.
He came to establish the churchin some ways, and so there's
something important about,there's some sort of connection
I want to explore between thephysical, incarnational reality
of God with us, god coming to bewith us, and this thing that we
call the church or the body ofChrist.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
Yeah, so good.
Yeah, I, I, I'm an, I'm anovice, I'm sure if we were
looking at, like the, thewritings throughout church
history on on this, uh, letalone what Jesus and Paul and
others in the New Testamentunpack for us.
I know I missed so much hereand I wanna just be honest that
(09:32):
I wrestle with being a part ofquote unquote the church, like I
don't mean just in my-.
Speaker 1 (09:38):
Yeah, let's talk about that, Cause I think
probably a lot of our listeners,especially if they've tried to
bring some of their sexualbrokenness whether it's their
own sin, their betrayal or theirkids being seemingly out of
control or whatever like many ofus, have not, you know, always
been engaged the best by thechurch, it seems.
Speaker 2 (09:56):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And or our growing upexperiences, if we grew up in
the church.
You know, I was just at a youthretreat recently and a lot of
kids who are churched kids, it'stheir environment, they grew up
in the church.
You know, I was just at a youthretreat recently and a lot of
kids who are church kids, it'stheir environment they grew up
in and a lot of them reallystruggle to be honest about the
things that are real for themthe hurts they have, the fears
(10:17):
they have, the doubts they haveabout God themselves, the sins
they're struggling with and oneof the things I was telling a
group of them.
I was just sharing an experienceI had years and years ago when
I'd been up late the nightbefore acting out sexually and I
wanted to go to church and Imade you know, dragged myself
out of bed and went to churchand stood in this large
(10:37):
congregation and felt like sucha hypocrite, like I didn't
belong there.
And it's too long a story toshare in its entirety, but I I
had a an encounter with the lordthere that morning that changed
my view of church and itchanged it in this way that that
so often we show up on a sundaymorning.
We wear our sunday best.
We put on our smiles.
People ask us how we are and wegive the four letter f word I'm
(10:57):
fine, how are you?
like but if you show up in achurch on a sunday, it ought to
have, it ought to smell likewhat it's like when you show up
at a 12-step meeting, an AAmeeting, a narcotics anonymous
meeting, a sexaholics anonymousmeeting those meetings the first
thing out of your mouth whenyou start talking is hi, I'm
Josh and I'm an alcoholic.
(11:19):
Or hi, I'm James and I'm a drugaddict.
Or hi, I'm, I'm James and I'myou know, I'm a drug addict,
like um, and that's.
It's a whole nother podcast totalk about, kind of the labels
we wear, the identities that wemight, that we pick up Um.
So I'm not trying to make acase for against that right now,
but but my point is just thatwalking into a church is
automatically and we ought toview it this way is
automatically an admission thatI cannot do this alone.
(11:41):
Uh's something so disordered,so off, so broken, so sinful
about me that, left to my own, Iwill continue towards sin and
death and brokenness and disease, disordered living.
I need Jesus and I need hisbody.
I mean, that's why I draggedmyself out of bed that morning
(12:02):
and really it's why we attendevery week and, yes, it's to see
our friends and worship's funand to be inspired by a message.
But the gathering together ofChristians is a statement of we
cannot do this alone, and wereally ought to view it that way
.
I don't think that we do, andthe ambivalence in me about that
ranges anything from my pride Iwant to be able to do it alone.
(12:24):
My fears, like like the, theparts of me that cannot do it
alone mean that somebody else inthis body needs to know that
the collective here or a groupof people here need to know I
can't do it on my own.
And and what exactly?
I'm talking about?
Not being able to do it on myown?
And that's scary, because whatif they're not okay with me
(12:44):
being in their midst?
What if they think that I oughtto be more together than I am?
Um, there's certainly parts ofme that think I ought to be more
together than I am.
So, um, why wouldn't they thinkthat?
What if they kick me out?
And we've heard stories herepeople who come into our
coaching office who went to apastor or a friend at church and
said I'm struggling with thisarea of my sexuality, and they
could tell in the person's facethat that they were.
(13:08):
They were disgusted In some,some cases they heard from
somebody like that is disgusting.
I don't ever want to talk toyou about that again.
Or you shouldn't come back hereor we can't help you here.
You know people like you aren'twelcoming, like that kind of
horrendous stuff which you neverfind in the life of Jesus.
But unfortunately people haveexperienced in church not all
(13:28):
churches- We've also had theother side of that story, where
people have been scared to deathto speak the truth about the
things they deal with and thewounded parts of them, and found
welcome and open arms andembraces and great, great
support.
Speaker 1 (13:43):
Yeah Well, I'm reminded of this quote I came
across today from JohnChrysostom, a church father.
It says even if we stand at thevery summit of virtue basically
even if we are like all puttogether, you know truly what
the Sunday's Best is attemptingto represent.
Even if we stand at the summitof virtue, it is by mercy that
(14:03):
we're saved.
That really is striking.
And so when we're talking aboutthe church, it's so easy on
either side to either demonizethe church, it's easy to insult
the church.
I actually, I remember I'mrecalling, as we're talking,
dallas Willard says he'll neverinsult the church because he
knows whose husband she is.
I think that's such a beautiful.
But here's the thing we needwhat Jay Strickland talks about
(14:23):
knows whose husband she is.
I think that's such a beautiful, but here's the thing we need,
what Jay Stringer talks aboutWhose wife she is right, whose
bride she is, whose bride she is.
That's what I mean.
Jesus's bride is the church,and so we need to have what Jay
Stringer talks about as honorand honesty for the church.
We need to recognize man.
There are broken people and,frankly, there are spiritual
(14:47):
leaders who should be moremature spiritually, emotionally
and otherwise than theycurrently are, and that's a lot
of where the hurt and brokennesscomes from.
And there's still thisincredible power and
commissioning and strength tothe church.
The church has never folded andall these thousands of years of
persecution and lukewarm faithand disasters and disease, it's
(15:14):
not folded because God isseeking to do something really
powerful in it.
And so there's something aboutlike, if we're trying to connect
with Jesus, you know, god, thefilled with the spirit, who have
the spirit of the living God inthem, then for me to stick
(15:47):
around the next couple thousandyears, um, when, when, you know,
uh, instead I'm going to leaveand then I will return, but it's
better that I leave, becauseI'm going to actually pour out,
um, the antidote.
I'm going to pour out my veryself, my very spirit, into your
hearts to try to, you know, tonot try to build this human
(16:09):
community.
That, again, not yet perfect,but is meant to be like a
hospital, it's meant to be arefuge, it's meant to be a
bastion of truth and grace and,most of all, love.
And so the church is kind ofthis like physical embodiment,
this incarnational embodiment ofrepresenting Jesus.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Yes, yes yes, and even more than that.
So the question like, how didthis ragtag group of people for
the last 2000 years with the,their immaturity, their sin, the
scandal, the secrets I meanthere's?
It feels like you can't go ayear without just another
(16:49):
scandal, another secret, moreabuse being exposed.
How did this thing last, youknow, is it?
And some would say, well, it'sthe sovereignty of god, kind of
working through all things,absolutely, they'd say.
Well, they're, they're, youknow, there are true believers
that are active?
Yep, absolutely.
But I'd propose that the thereason that the church lasts is
goes back to that.
(17:10):
Um, saint john, uh, how do yousay?
His last name?
Speaker 1 (17:14):
chrysostom chrysostom , I think I'm not positive.
Speaker 2 (17:16):
Yeah it goes back to his quote.
It's not the virtue of of thechurch, it is that the church is
infused with one, with,marinated with um, the god of
the universe, through the powerand presence of his holy spirit,
and that's, that's an elementof the universe, uh, through the
power and presence of his Holyspirit, and that's that's an
element of the oneness that bothmakes us, as a church body, one
(17:40):
, uh, and also our oneness, it,it, it is our oneness with God
himself, god who is eternal.
It doesn't mean that we'rewe're perfect.
It doesn't mean that we'rewe're perfect.
It doesn't mean that we are, um, like god in all ways, but
there's something about beinginfused with the eternal,
(18:02):
undefeatable, never-ending,unextinguishable god that I
think has has upheld the churchcapital C.
If you can, can we bring thatback to?
What does that mean for theperson struggling with sexual
integrity?
What does that mean for us withour desires?
(18:23):
Do you have a thought for that?
Speaker 1 (18:30):
Because I could keep going, yeah, no think, um, one
of the things coming to mind iswhen we do face these places in
the church that are notrepresenting jesus the way he is
representing scripture, therecan often be a gut thing of like
I'm just going to leave andfind another one, especially
speaking speaking to fellowProtestants, there's probably,
(18:53):
you know, there could be 10great, you know, bible-believing
, spirit-filled, whatever youknow churches in your vicinity
that you could go to, and Itotally want to honor the fact
that sometimes we do need toleave, sometimes we do need to
sound the alarm when there'sabuse happening, but there's
also a lot of times where thespirit has led you to that
(19:15):
church.
I actually, like several of thechurches I've been at in the
last few years, I felt like thisstill small voice of God kind
of said this is your church,this is your church home, and
that really helps me to stick itout when things are not perfect
.
And part of what that allows meto do is to do what Jesus
designed the body to do, whichis to be a blessing, to be a
(19:38):
purifying I don't know force, tobe a force of love, a presence
of love in my local body, evenwhere she's imperfect, even
where Jesus came to make aspotless bride, and so there's a
good chance that for many of ushere, especially if you're
dealing with unwanted sexualbehavior or betrayal or other
(20:00):
brokenness in your family life,god might actually be wanting
you to kind of set the tone.
To set the tone of, hey, Idon't know if I can change the
whole church overnight orwhatever, but are there a few
people I can gather around mewhere we can go deep and be
honest?
Are there some people, like I'mdoing right now in Pasadena,
where I live, california?
Are there some people I can gothrough one of these like sexual
(20:23):
integrity programs, like MANA?
I'm taking men through MANA orOasis for Women or, soon to be
released, compass, forleasedcompass for betrayed wives.
Can I take people into thisreally deep content as part of
the antidote, as part of thesolution to deepening the church
, to making the church more andmore like a hospital, a place
where we can say, hey, I'm asinner, I'm broken, I need the
(20:46):
grace of God, I need the mercyof God.
Even if I was perfectlyvirtuous, as we just said, I
still would only be saved by hismercy.
I mean, that's a beautifulpicture and so, again, not
saying everyone's called to thatand obviously there's times
where we just kind of need toreceive and be loved.
But I wonder how often we arequicker to kind of duck and run
(21:06):
instead of being part of thechange that God wants to see in
his local body, where you are.
Speaker 2 (21:19):
Yeah, I mean it's, I mean it's right on the mark
James, I mean part of part ofthe.
The truth about being being thechurch is that, um, when
there's a problem, you are,you're in it.
You know, like I.
I mean, if you think about afamily, and especially family
with young children, like if mykids are having trouble, I don't
(21:40):
say, well, you know they'regetting bad grades, they're
rebelling, um, I think I mightgo find another family.
I mean I could do that, but butthat would be we'd all
recognize that.
That what a breach, what a whata failure to stand and to be a
part of the loving solution forthis person.
And I think we'd probably dowell to consider, seriously
(22:03):
consider that when it comes toour involvement in local
churches, like, rather thanducking and running, running and
the other reality about it andthis goes back to the family, uh
, concept again too is that, inthe context of relationship is
like relationships are where allour crap gets bumped.
You know, like I, I've oftenthought I'm a father of six, got
(22:25):
a wife, I've often thought thatI'm I am the best christian, I
can be in the morning beforeanybody else is up and I'm
spending time with Jesus, sotrue.
But the moment my kids are upand in my space or my
three-year-olds running aroundasking for something or
disobeying like man, anotherpart of me comes out.
Wow, and that's eithercondemnation or invitation.
(22:50):
And the enemy wants to make acondemnation like you're a
hypocrite.
You're not, you know, really agood christian, whatever.
And the spirit of the lord ishis invitation.
Man like I love you, so glad wehad a time together, just you
and me, in your prayer closet.
Um, but I'm exposing somethingso you can press further into me
and be healed, become more likejesus but the church is the
(23:12):
same thing.
Speaker 1 (23:18):
Yeah, this is so key, like sorry that, listeners,
you're getting more of a dose ofDallas Willard than you
bargained for this series.
But Dallas talks about the factthat so much of what we think
of as righteousness is reallyjust kind of our blindness.
You know, before everyone's upand around us, right?
So much of what we think ofrighteousness is.
I read my Bible, I had myprayer time but he actually
helped reframe my understandingthat true righteousness is to
(23:40):
love, including to love yourenemies, and reading the Bible
and prayer and connecting withGod in various ways.
You know, bible study all thesekinds of things are disciplines.
They're like he describes itlike batting.
You know, if study all thesekinds of things are disciplines.
They're, like he describes it,like batting.
You know, if you want to hitthe ball out of the park like
your favorite baseball playerand you could perfectly emulate
(24:00):
their swing and you kind of knowexactly how they swing the ball
you walk up to that probaseball play.
You're not going to hit theball out of the park why?
Well, not only because you knowthere's probably a lot of like
awareness stuff you don't yethave.
But even if you had, that youdon't have the strength unless
you've done the weightconditioning and the training in
the background.
So Dallas argues that truerighteousness are the acts of
(24:23):
love.
True righteousness are when theagape from the Holy Spirit is
coming up and out of us.
And so I think this is a reallyimportant thing, josh, because
a lot of the guys I walk with incoaching don't realize that
lust seems like by far thebiggest sin.
This was true in my own life.
Like lust, it's the, I imagine,like an IMAX.
(24:46):
You know, film like this is theblockbuster that came out over
the summer.
But I've read this greatarticle we'll try to link in the
show notes that so oftenunderneath the sin of lust are
so many other things.
They're like that thing playingin theater 13 that no one's
seeing anymore because it's beenout for a while.
Pride, envy, I mean thesedifferent struggles, and I'm not
saying any of this to condemnus, but I'm just saying so often
(25:08):
when we're bumping up againstreal people our wives, our
friends, the church it'sactually bumping and jarring the
crap in us that God wants toheal and so part of him,
remembering his body,reconnecting his body, is making
us people who are reallywilling to engage those places
that block us from fromcommunion with, with the body.
Speaker 2 (25:33):
Yeah, yeah, it's so good, james.
It's interesting too becauseyou and I both have experienced
this and I hope our listenershave.
If you haven't, as a listener,uh, we pray that you will.
But I'm I'm a teacher, I loveto teach.
I'm a writer, I love to write.
(25:55):
Uh, awaken is is somethingJames and I have worked on for a
number of years.
We're really proud of thecontent.
But if you were to ask peoplewhat has meant the most to them
about joining a group likeAwaken360, none of them say it's
the teaching.
They all say it's this space.
When I gather with these othermen and I tell them what's real,
and they tell me what's real,and something happens there.
It's, it's powerful, it'sbeautiful, it's union, it's real
(26:18):
connection, um, and it's whatwe're made for.
And so many of them begin tolearn as as we learn, at least
in that setting, that what I'vebeen pursuing in lust, the urge
to merge that I've been chasinghere and there and everywhere
with lust, is actually a desireto be truly known, truly seen,
(26:40):
to truly know and truly seesomeone else.
It's it, it.
It is beyond a sexual desireand one of the reasons that I
think lust has such power andcan be so compelling and so
addictive is because, um it, inthe, in the lack of satisfaction
there, it still seems to holdout this promise.
(27:00):
You just need more.
The irony in when we come toour senses like, oh, I don't
need more lust, but the?
The irony is that you actuallyit's actually speaking the truth
you do need more.
You need much, much, much morethan you would ever find in lust
and, as a matter of fact, much,much, much more than you would
ever find in the beautiful unionof sex in marriage.
(27:21):
You need more than that, like.
The goal is not to get freefrom your lust so you can get
married and have a happymarriage.
That's, that's one, um, goodgoal, it's a good desire.
But even that union as good asit can be and we're here to help
people make it as good as itcan get but even that will leave
(27:41):
you wanting because you weremade for a union.
That's even bigger than that,even more than that.
Speaker 1 (27:48):
And this is what we don't have a lot of time to get
into this, but this is what thesacraments point to.
Now I know again there'sdebates are there two, are there
seven, whatever?
But just think about communionor the Eucharist.
This is meant to be this icon,or you know the real presence?
Most Christians, throughout allof Christian history, have
(28:09):
believed at least in the realpresence of Jesus in the
Eucharist.
History have believed at leastin the real presence of Jesus in
the Eucharist.
There's something about, hey,there's an ache in me that's not
being satisfied by the, asChristopher West would say, the
fast food of this world.
And we need to consume, we'remade to consume, but what Jesus
gave us to consume was his bodyand his blood, more of him.
(28:31):
So I don't know how much you'vedone, josh, around this.
You know how communion peopletalk about these days, how it
can be something that we do andengage in for physical healing,
for connection, for grace.
But I imagine that there's acomponent of this act, this act
(28:51):
of engaging the sacrament, thatthere's a component of this act,
this act of engaging, thesacrament of engaging what
everything that this bread andthis blood mean, that helps
transform us, you know into likeit's like this foretaste.
You know it's not the fullthing, the full wedding supper
of the lamb like we see inRevelation, but there's
something still substantialabout it.
Speaker 2 (29:12):
Yes, yes, yes it, yes , yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.
I've said this on this podcast,maybe some time ago, but I grew
up in a christian traditionthat, um, if they meant more
than this, they never explainedit to me in a way that I
understood.
They meant more than this.
But the the concept of jesusthe last supper.
When he says, do this inremembrance of me, he breaks the
bread, pours the wine, saysthis is my body, this is my
(29:36):
blood, do this in remembrance ofme.
The institution of thesacrament of communion.
And I grew up thinking in mychild brain what that means I'm
supposed to do some kind of, I'msupposed to think about
something, do some mental workwhile I take this you know tiny
little plastic cup and this tinylittle octagon wafer or
whatever it is, and that somehowthis is supposed to serve as a
(30:00):
good reminder of what Jesus did.
Like the fact of rememberingsomehow does me good, transforms
me, and, yes, remembering whatChrist did does us good.
But there's more going on therethan just that, if we accept
(30:20):
that there's mystery here and wecan't explain it all, and that
there is, in a real way, anunexplainable, invisible, maybe
even tasteless way.
Tasteless in the sense that wedon't experience it through
tasting.
When I take this bread, I am infact taking the Lord Jesus into
(30:47):
my body.
He is absorbed into my body,becomes one with my body,
strengthens my muscles,strengthens my will, strengthens
my heart in some real way.
And I drink this cup believingthat in some real way this is
the blood of Jesus.
And the Old Testament says thelife of the blood is in or the
life is in the blood.
So I'm taking in the life ofJesus into me and it is being
(31:08):
absorbed into me in some way.
That's a space for great faiththat something is going to
change in me.
Because I am coming to thistable.
Whose table?
My table?
The Lord's table?
The one who said it to me?
And I think I, you know, stronghead nod to a Roman Catholic,
brothers and sisters and thosein the body of Christ who do, at
(31:31):
minimum, talk about the realpresence of God being in these
elements.
Because if you search yourself,you will find there is a hunger
.
Like Lord, I long to be onewith you.
I do not find in of myself,inside myself, what I need, what
I long for, what I want.
I can't pull myself up and stopthis sin, I can't pull myself
(31:55):
up and love like you.
I need you in me and so, byfaith, I take this body, by
faith, I take this blood.
Would you transform me?
It became this beautiful,prayerful expression of an ache
and of invitation to the Lordand I hope you heard, listeners,
(32:18):
as I said, like we're talkingabout becoming one with God.
I mean like that's, our bodiesbecome one with what we eat and
drink.
Speaker 1 (32:29):
And we're doing it with our brothers and sisters
right next to us.
At least that's the typical waythat it's done.
Listen to this quote that tiesa lot of this together, from CS
Lewis.
He says next to the blessedsacrament, he's referring to
communion.
Next to the blessed sacrament,he's referring to communion.
Next to the blessed sacramentitself, your neighbor is the
(32:50):
holiest object presented to yoursenses.
And so, lewis, you know he hasa way in his brilliance of just
cutting through so much of thequestions, the division, but
what he's saying is Read itagain, James.
Yeah, he says, next to theblessed sacrament itself, your
neighbor is the holiest objectpresented to your senses.
And so there's something aboutboth the bread and the wine and
this fact that both in general,we're around people, but also in
(33:11):
that moment of taking communion, we're doing it in communion
with the body, the body thatwe've been baptized into.
We've been baptized as a signof life with Christ.
We've died with Christ, we'vebeen risen with Christ.
And this is really interestingMartin Luther the reformer.
So we're pulling from a wholevariety.
(33:31):
As many of you can tell by now,we serve and have people on our
team who are Roman Catholic,anglican, various Protestant
denominations, but Luther saidthat when he was in spiritual
warfare, the main thing he'dcall upon is his baptism.
Do you know this, josh?
The main thing that lutherwould call upon is his baptism,
because his baptism was atangible marker of him dying
(33:55):
with christ, a tangiblesacrament of him dying with
christ and being raised withChrist into this body.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
What does that mean?
He would call upon it.
Speaker 1 (34:10):
He would basically yeah, I know that was probably a
funny way of saying it, butbasically he would say Satan,
you have no power here, becauseI have been baptized.
I remember my baptism, I diedwith Christ and I live in the
life of Christ.
Speaker 2 (34:19):
Oh see, that's a guy who gets his union with Christ
and I live in the life of Christ, oh see, that's, that's a guy
who, who gets his union withChrist and his union with
Christ's body, Like that's atleast in, in, in, in some ways
that that I seek to grasp, likethat's powerful.
Speaker 1 (34:38):
Yeah.
So, friends, we want to closeout this episode with one more
call to remember.
This is our final in ourRemember series, but we want you
to remember the Christianfamily throughout history.
So, if you've noticed, I'vebeen referencing these quotes.
I'm actually pulling them allfrom this awesome ministry that
I've come across called OurChurch Speaks.
It's an Anglican deacon out inRichmond Virginia.
(35:02):
They actually wrote a book, himand his priest wrote a book, I
think, just called our churchspeaks.
My wife and I are going throughit each week, where it gives a
vignette of Christiansthroughout the last 2000 years,
a quote, um a little bit aboutthem, some devotional, but they
also have stuff online, and sothose quotes I was just pulling
from were some of the images Iwas engaging with today the
(35:27):
quote from Lewis, the quote fromChristophson and many more, and
so one thing that we canremember is that we're not the
first to go through this First.
Peter 5 says that thesufferings you experience are
being experienced by theChristians throughout the world
we could also say throughouthistory, christian history and
so there's something reallypowerful about recognizing.
(35:49):
I've been baptized into Christand his family, you know, raised
into the life of his family.
I take communion to be unitedwith Christ and his family, and
I'm part of a family that'sgoing back right around now.
It's been about 2000 years.
We're actually coming close tothat specific milestone of
Jesus's death and resurrection,and so there's something really
(36:13):
powerful for our walk towardintegrity, our walk toward
healing, when we allow the voiceof the martyrs and the voices
of great Christians, the saintsthroughout history, to speak
into our hearts.
We remember they've suffered insimilar ways, different times,
different contexts, but they'vesuffered in similar ways.
(36:34):
And there's kind of thisincredible witness of the cloud
of witnesses, a witness of thecloud of witnesses.
And we have, you know,thousands of years of history of
our family of God, startingwith, you know, adam, and then
Abraham and Moses in the Bible.
But we also now have, you know,a couple thousand years of
history of of saints, of peoplewho have been in Christ.
(36:56):
And I don't know about you,josh, but there's something so
encouraging for me aboutremembering those who have come
before, about you, josh, butthere's something so encouraging
for me about remembering thosewho have come before.
Speaker 2 (37:03):
Yeah, yeah, I don't know if one, one way that we
might think about it is like ifyou you've done any family tree
work for your own family, ormaybe you even have like a
father or grandfather orgrandmother, somebody kind of
closer that you may have evenknown, who did remarkable things
.
Like you know, they're knownfor x, y and z.
They started this foundation.
Like you know they're known forX, y and Z.
They started this foundation.
(37:23):
Or they, um, you know, earned apurple heart and whatever the
war was.
Like um, you hear the stories,it wasn't you.
But you feel something insidelike, hey, that's my, it's my
granddad.
Like that's my grandmother,that's um, or that's my great,
great, whomever I mean.
(37:50):
Like we kind of by um, byassociation, we feel something
like raising up in us, like,like I have his or her blood in
me, like, and I think, um,that's, that's the way we're
meant to think about our, ourquote unquote spiritual brothers
and sisters who have gonebefore us.
Like, um, I've got um, yeah,I've got the, the, the, the, the
same spirit I'm, I'm, I'm partof the family.
I'm part of the lineage of all,of Peter, of John, um.
(38:14):
I'm part of the lineage of ofCorey Ten Boom and Jim Elliott
and, um, I mean the the theseheroes that I would, that I
would think about and look toand go like, I want to be more
like that.
And, um, I've got in myheritage Jesus Christ, because
he wasn't a phantom, he wasn'tuh, he, he wasn't just just kind
(38:39):
of artificially here, he washere in the flesh and we are
baptized into his family.
He is the last Adam and we aresons and daughters of the last
Adam.
Speaker 1 (38:52):
And that's exactly how we've been ending every
single episode in this shortseries.
He remembers us.
I want to ask you to pray in asecond, josh, but I just want to
read, from Our Church Speaks,this little quote from Polycarp,
and I don't know if thewaterworks will come out as I
read it, but I was cryingearlier as I read it, because
I'll just let it speak foritself.
And the picture, by the way andwe'll have this in the show
(39:15):
notes is him holding up hishands, like you know, kind of in
front of him, and flames,flames enveloping him, and it
says 80 and six years I haveserved Christ and he has never
abandoned me.
How, then, can I abandon myKing and my Savior?
(39:35):
So, friends, whether you're inthe flames of betrayal, trauma,
sexual sin, you just can't seemto stop past trauma.
Wherever you're at, jesusdidn't abandon polycarp and he
doesn't abandon you.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
Yeah, jesus, thank you.
Thank you that you don't createus as little solitudes, but you
create us for relationship.
You create us from relationship, lord, of the very fact that we
are created, from the union ofFather, son, holy Spirit, the
(40:27):
overflowing love of you, lord,that's why we exist, that's what
we image, that's who we are,and as we walk this path
together, as the church, as welook to our left and our right,
Lord, would you fill us with adeeper sense that we belong,
(40:47):
that you made us to belong withyou and with one another, and
would you lead us away fromtemptations to go solo or to
grasp at false intimacies, tograsp at false intimacies.
And, lord, heal us, open us,charge us, help us to move
towards the intimacy, the unionwith you and your body that
(41:10):
we're made for and that we arein by your grace.
And we pray these things in thename of the Father, son and
Holy Spirit, amen, amen.
Listeners, you cannot do this journey of healing, of
sexual integrity, recovery inyour marriage or parenting well
alone.
You weren't designed to do thisalone.
Last week we spoke about howGod remembers us.
He puts us back together, herestores our souls, as Psalm 23
(00:21):
says.
But he doesn't just remember usindividually.
He doesn't just remember usindividually.
He seeks to actuallyreintegrate, remember the
members of his body, the body ofChrist, the community of God,
the church of Christ.
So I'm James Craig.
I'm a director of projects hereat Regen and spiritual coach,
(00:43):
and I'm here with Josh Glazer,our executive director.
Welcome, Josh.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
Yeah, glad to be here , and the other side of this
that's so important for us isGod remembers us, puts us back
into the body of Christ, intothis in a minute or later.
(01:08):
That to be in the body ofChrist means something
significant about ourrelationship with God, and we'll
talk about that more too.
But what we're going to getinto today, as throughout the
rest of the series, really isimportant for those who want to
walk in sexual integrity, andJesus is good news, has good
news for those of us who are,who are pursuing that.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
So, josh, why, why can't we do this journey alone?
Isn't you know?
Isn't me, in my prayer, closetwith Jesus?
Plenty like shouldn'tencountering Jesus on my own and
whatever settings, or evengoing to church and kind of
getting that individualexperience of of, uh, connection
during worship or whatever.
Isn't that enough, or why?
Why isn't it if it's not right?
Speaker 2 (01:48):
Right, yeah, let me.
Let me start by saying yourindividual time with the Lord in
the prayer closet, yourindividual experience with him
in church, is so important, sovitally important.
Go into your prayer closet, goto church, expectant, hopeful
that God is going to speak toyou, meet you, touch you
specifically.
I can't understate how valuableand important that is because
(02:12):
Jesus does, in fact, uh,remember you specifically,
desire you specifically.
We are not designed to be thethe the Borg, the old Star Trek
reference there For those whoremember that like we're not
designed.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
I don't, I don't know what you're talking about.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
It's just this, it's this, it was this, some kind of
creature or computer orsomething that just sought to,
like, bring all creatures intothis oneness where they lost
themselves and ceased to exist,and they, you know everybody.
I think the line was like weare the Borg, you know.
Like it was just kind of thatis not God's heart for us,
that's not God's heart for hischurch, his body.
Um, he does love each of usindividually and, to answer your
(02:48):
question, I think I think theanswer is and there's probably a
lot more to it than this but Ithink the answer is he didn't
design us that way.
Why can't you do it on your own?
Like we want to be able to doit on our own, like, especially
in the American West, like weare individualistic that's like
we uphold, like people who arecan do it on their own.
I can think about, like, um,just this whole idea of maturity
(03:09):
.
If we kind of unpack what mostpeople think about when they
think about getting older orgetting more mature or getting
better at what they do, I thinka lot of us would say, like, if
I'm, if I'm better at what I do,if I'm mature enough, I can do
it on my own.
But if you follow that to itslogical conclusion, what that
would mean then is the holieryou are, the more isolated you
(03:30):
are, the less you have to dowith other people, and you will
never find that in scripture.
There's no place for it inscripture.
Matter of fact, like if youread the letters of Paul, you
cannot walk away from Paul'sletters.
You cannot walk away frompaul's letters having studied
them and think that there's anysuch thing as a christian who is
(03:51):
not a part of the church, likechurch and and being a follower
of jesus are one for paul, likethat's just the way he talks
about it.
I think you were even saying,weren't you saying there's like
a bible translation out now,that every time the, the, the
noun, it's the y'all, the y'alltranslation.
Speaker 1 (04:06):
It's kind of trying to give us what the King James
used to give us.
King James gave us ye, whichwas you plural, and now we have
the y'all translation, the y'alllike.
Speaker 2 (04:15):
So this is out for our Texas friends here Y,
apostrophe A-L-L, because we canread the you so often and just
think he's talking just to me.
Like, even though the letterstarts with to the church in
Philippi, like, which means toy'all in Philippi, we still read
it and go like this I'msupposed to be able to do this
on my own, but we aren't.
(04:35):
We aren't.
Yeah, again, to be short, likeGod didn't design us that way.
It is not in our DNA because itis not in his DNA.
Speaker 1 (04:44):
Yeah, our DNA, because it is not in his DNA.
Yeah, you know, last week Italked about how we are limited
creatures.
I mean, in Genesis, chapter two, we beat this drum a lot.
It wasn't good that Adam wasalone, even though he was with
his creator walking in thegarden.
It wasn't good that he wasalone.
It's shocking, it's not good.
I mean, we need things likeoxygen, we need water, food I
(05:05):
shared a lot about that lastweek but we also need the body
we were actually designed forthis union both with God, but
also with one another.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
So good, yeah, I mean , think about the makeup of our
individual bodies.
They are relational through andthrough everywhere.
I mean, like, what are our eyesdesigned for?
They are designed for anenvironment around us.
Um, and the neurochemistry ofbonding that takes place when
you engage eye contact withanother person is and there are
(05:36):
people that know much more aboutthat.
You probably articulate thatmore than I could but, um, like
there's something that's meantto be relational about our eyes.
If you've ever, if you've ever,had a conversation with somebody
outside in the summer andthey're wearing a pair of
sunglasses that reflect, and,and so you're kind of looking at
yourself in their eyeglasseswhen you're having a
conversation, it's verydisconcerting.
It's like it's very difficultto connect, Um, our our voices.
(06:00):
What we're doing right now, ourvoices, are directly connected
to what we do with our earsright now, which is listening to
each other.
My ears are not just designedto hear my own voice speak for
crying out loud, and there'sreally some like mysterious
things that happen.
So, anyway, and then, of course, because it's the regen podcast
, let's talk about this Oursexuality is relational to its
core core.
(06:20):
We've said this in otherpodcasts too that, if you um,
sexual sin is relational at itscore, even if you're
masturbating alone in yourbedroom, like it's still
relational.
Sex by God's design isrelational.
Um, I heard uh, I think it was,it was Dr Todd White in his book
mere sexuality, I think I'mgetting that name right.
(06:41):
Um, he says that if you look atthe organs of the human body
the lungs, uh, the heart, um,the liver, they all work.
They're kind of self-contained,they work within the body to do
what they're supposed to do inthe body.
You know, they need air, theyneed other things, they need
food to be nourished.
So we're not really isolated inthat way.
But, um, but there's one organand one specific organ in the
(07:04):
human body that actually can'tcomplete its function without
another person, and that's oursexual organs.
They you don't even christian,to kind of steal from
christopher west here.
They don't even make sense,apart from the other gender,
like male genitalia, femalegenitalia.
They like if, if we were aliensfrom a different planet and we
(07:24):
came and we're kind of pokingand prodding.
We have no idea what this partof the human body means or does
unless, um, or without the other, like it's just, that's what,
that's our, that's our design soeverything about us.
Speaker 1 (07:39):
I've actually never really thought about the fact
our eyes, our, our ears, ourmouths, um, you know, in some
ways our touch are, they'reoriented to the other, they're
oriented to connection, and soyou're making me think about
this, this really importantreality that jesus actually came
bodily.
It's another thing that we liketo focus on here at Regen,
(08:02):
because it's so important.
The incarnation is so important.
Cs Lewis actually says thegreater, the harder to believe a
miracle of Jesus's life, deathand resurrection isn't his
resurrection, because if youbelieve in the virgin birth, the
incarnation, believing theresurrection, is not a
significant step.
So actually, that's kind of the, that's the, that's the
(08:25):
beginning, you know, that's theinitiating point, and so I want
us to get to reflect a littlebit and remember, you know,
think about contemplate Jesuscoming into this world bodily
and part of that.
Obviously he came to forgive usour sins.
He lived a perfect life, hemodeled, he taught our sins.
He lived a perfect life, hemodeled, he taught.
(08:46):
But he also came to establish achurch.
He came to establish the churchin some ways, and so there's
something important about,there's some sort of connection
I want to explore between thephysical, incarnational reality
of God with us, god coming to bewith us, and this thing that we
call the church or the body ofChrist.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
Yeah, so good.
Yeah, I, I, I'm an, I'm anovice, I'm sure if we were
looking at, like the, thewritings throughout church
history on on this, uh, letalone what Jesus and Paul and
others in the New Testamentunpack for us.
I know I missed so much hereand I wanna just be honest that
(09:32):
I wrestle with being a part ofquote unquote the church, like I
don't mean just in my-.
Speaker 1 (09:38):
Yeah, let's talk about that, Cause I think
probably a lot of our listeners,especially if they've tried to
bring some of their sexualbrokenness whether it's their
own sin, their betrayal or theirkids being seemingly out of
control or whatever like many ofus, have not, you know, always
been engaged the best by thechurch, it seems.
Speaker 2 (09:56):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And or our growing upexperiences, if we grew up in
the church.
You know, I was just at a youthretreat recently and a lot of
kids who are churched kids, it'stheir environment, they grew up
in the church.
You know, I was just at a youthretreat recently and a lot of
kids who are church kids, it'stheir environment they grew up
in and a lot of them reallystruggle to be honest about the
things that are real for themthe hurts they have, the fears
(10:17):
they have, the doubts they haveabout God themselves, the sins
they're struggling with and oneof the things I was telling a
group of them.
I was just sharing an experienceI had years and years ago when
I'd been up late the nightbefore acting out sexually and I
wanted to go to church and Imade you know, dragged myself
out of bed and went to churchand stood in this large
(10:37):
congregation and felt like sucha hypocrite, like I didn't
belong there.
And it's too long a story toshare in its entirety, but I I
had a an encounter with the lordthere that morning that changed
my view of church and itchanged it in this way that that
so often we show up on a sundaymorning.
We wear our sunday best.
We put on our smiles.
People ask us how we are and wegive the four letter f word I'm
(10:57):
fine, how are you?
like but if you show up in achurch on a sunday, it ought to
have, it ought to smell likewhat it's like when you show up
at a 12-step meeting, an AAmeeting, a narcotics anonymous
meeting, a sexaholics anonymousmeeting those meetings the first
thing out of your mouth whenyou start talking is hi, I'm
Josh and I'm an alcoholic.
(11:19):
Or hi, I'm James and I'm a drugaddict.
Or hi, I'm, I'm James and I'myou know, I'm a drug addict,
like um, and that's.
It's a whole nother podcast totalk about, kind of the labels
we wear, the identities that wemight, that we pick up Um.
So I'm not trying to make acase for against that right now,
but but my point is just thatwalking into a church is
automatically and we ought toview it this way is
automatically an admission thatI cannot do this alone.
(11:41):
Uh's something so disordered,so off, so broken, so sinful
about me that, left to my own, Iwill continue towards sin and
death and brokenness and disease, disordered living.
I need Jesus and I need hisbody.
I mean, that's why I draggedmyself out of bed that morning
(12:02):
and really it's why we attendevery week and, yes, it's to see
our friends and worship's funand to be inspired by a message.
But the gathering together ofChristians is a statement of we
cannot do this alone, and wereally ought to view it that way
.
I don't think that we do, andthe ambivalence in me about that
ranges anything from my pride Iwant to be able to do it alone.
(12:24):
My fears, like like the, theparts of me that cannot do it
alone mean that somebody else inthis body needs to know that
the collective here or a groupof people here need to know I
can't do it on my own.
And and what exactly?
I'm talking about?
Not being able to do it on myown?
And that's scary, because whatif they're not okay with me
(12:44):
being in their midst?
What if they think that I oughtto be more together than I am?
Um, there's certainly parts ofme that think I ought to be more
together than I am.
So, um, why wouldn't they thinkthat?
What if they kick me out?
And we've heard stories herepeople who come into our
coaching office who went to apastor or a friend at church and
said I'm struggling with thisarea of my sexuality, and they
could tell in the person's facethat that they were.
(13:08):
They were disgusted In some,some cases they heard from
somebody like that is disgusting.
I don't ever want to talk toyou about that again.
Or you shouldn't come back hereor we can't help you here.
You know people like you aren'twelcoming, like that kind of
horrendous stuff which you neverfind in the life of Jesus.
But unfortunately people haveexperienced in church not all
(13:28):
churches- We've also had theother side of that story, where
people have been scared to deathto speak the truth about the
things they deal with and thewounded parts of them, and found
welcome and open arms andembraces and great, great
support.
Speaker 1 (13:43):
Yeah Well, I'm reminded of this quote I came
across today from JohnChrysostom, a church father.
It says even if we stand at thevery summit of virtue basically
even if we are like all puttogether, you know truly what
the Sunday's Best is attemptingto represent.
Even if we stand at the summitof virtue, it is by mercy that
(14:03):
we're saved.
That really is striking.
And so when we're talking aboutthe church, it's so easy on
either side to either demonizethe church, it's easy to insult
the church.
I actually, I remember I'mrecalling, as we're talking,
dallas Willard says he'll neverinsult the church because he
knows whose husband she is.
I think that's such a beautiful.
But here's the thing we needwhat Jay Strickland talks about
(14:23):
knows whose husband she is.
I think that's such a beautiful, but here's the thing we need,
what Jay Stringer talks aboutWhose wife she is right, whose
bride she is, whose bride she is.
That's what I mean.
Jesus's bride is the church,and so we need to have what Jay
Stringer talks about as honorand honesty for the church.
We need to recognize man.
There are broken people and,frankly, there are spiritual
(14:47):
leaders who should be moremature spiritually, emotionally
and otherwise than theycurrently are, and that's a lot
of where the hurt and brokennesscomes from.
And there's still thisincredible power and
commissioning and strength tothe church.
The church has never folded andall these thousands of years of
persecution and lukewarm faithand disasters and disease, it's
(15:14):
not folded because God isseeking to do something really
powerful in it.
And so there's something aboutlike, if we're trying to connect
with Jesus, you know, god, thefilled with the spirit, who have
the spirit of the living God inthem, then for me to stick
(15:47):
around the next couple thousandyears, um, when, when, you know,
uh, instead I'm going to leaveand then I will return, but it's
better that I leave, becauseI'm going to actually pour out,
um, the antidote.
I'm going to pour out my veryself, my very spirit, into your
hearts to try to, you know, tonot try to build this human
(16:09):
community.
That, again, not yet perfect,but is meant to be like a
hospital, it's meant to be arefuge, it's meant to be a
bastion of truth and grace and,most of all, love.
And so the church is kind ofthis like physical embodiment,
this incarnational embodiment ofrepresenting Jesus.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Yes, yes yes, and even more than that.
So the question like, how didthis ragtag group of people for
the last 2000 years with the,their immaturity, their sin, the
scandal, the secrets I meanthere's?
It feels like you can't go ayear without just another
(16:49):
scandal, another secret, moreabuse being exposed.
How did this thing last, youknow, is it?
And some would say, well, it'sthe sovereignty of god, kind of
working through all things,absolutely, they'd say.
Well, they're, they're, youknow, there are true believers
that are active?
Yep, absolutely.
But I'd propose that the thereason that the church lasts is
goes back to that.
(17:10):
Um, saint john, uh, how do yousay?
His last name?
Speaker 1 (17:14):
chrysostom chrysostom , I think I'm not positive.
Speaker 2 (17:16):
Yeah it goes back to his quote.
It's not the virtue of of thechurch, it is that the church is
infused with one, with,marinated with um, the god of
the universe, through the powerand presence of his holy spirit,
and that's, that's an elementof the universe, uh, through the
power and presence of his Holyspirit, and that's that's an
element of the oneness that bothmakes us, as a church body, one
(17:40):
, uh, and also our oneness, it,it, it is our oneness with God
himself, god who is eternal.
It doesn't mean that we'rewe're perfect.
It doesn't mean that we'rewe're perfect.
It doesn't mean that we are, um, like god in all ways, but
there's something about beinginfused with the eternal,
(18:02):
undefeatable, never-ending,unextinguishable god that I
think has has upheld the churchcapital C.
If you can, can we bring thatback to?
What does that mean for theperson struggling with sexual
integrity?
What does that mean for us withour desires?
(18:23):
Do you have a thought for that?
Speaker 1 (18:30):
Because I could keep going, yeah, no think, um, one
of the things coming to mind iswhen we do face these places in
the church that are notrepresenting jesus the way he is
representing scripture, therecan often be a gut thing of like
I'm just going to leave andfind another one, especially
speaking speaking to fellowProtestants, there's probably,
(18:53):
you know, there could be 10great, you know, bible-believing
, spirit-filled, whatever youknow churches in your vicinity
that you could go to, and Itotally want to honor the fact
that sometimes we do need toleave, sometimes we do need to
sound the alarm when there'sabuse happening, but there's
also a lot of times where thespirit has led you to that
(19:15):
church.
I actually, like several of thechurches I've been at in the
last few years, I felt like thisstill small voice of God kind
of said this is your church,this is your church home, and
that really helps me to stick itout when things are not perfect
.
And part of what that allows meto do is to do what Jesus
designed the body to do, whichis to be a blessing, to be a
(19:38):
purifying I don't know force, tobe a force of love, a presence
of love in my local body, evenwhere she's imperfect, even
where Jesus came to make aspotless bride, and so there's a
good chance that for many of ushere, especially if you're
dealing with unwanted sexualbehavior or betrayal or other
(20:00):
brokenness in your family life,god might actually be wanting
you to kind of set the tone.
To set the tone of, hey, Idon't know if I can change the
whole church overnight orwhatever, but are there a few
people I can gather around mewhere we can go deep and be
honest?
Are there some people, like I'mdoing right now in Pasadena,
where I live, california?
Are there some people I can gothrough one of these like sexual
(20:23):
integrity programs, like MANA?
I'm taking men through MANA orOasis for Women or, soon to be
released, compass, forleasedcompass for betrayed wives.
Can I take people into thisreally deep content as part of
the antidote, as part of thesolution to deepening the church
, to making the church more andmore like a hospital, a place
where we can say, hey, I'm asinner, I'm broken, I need the
(20:46):
grace of God, I need the mercyof God.
Even if I was perfectlyvirtuous, as we just said, I
still would only be saved by hismercy.
I mean, that's a beautifulpicture and so, again, not
saying everyone's called to thatand obviously there's times
where we just kind of need toreceive and be loved.
But I wonder how often we arequicker to kind of duck and run
(21:06):
instead of being part of thechange that God wants to see in
his local body, where you are.
Speaker 2 (21:19):
Yeah, I mean it's, I mean it's right on the mark
James, I mean part of part ofthe.
The truth about being being thechurch is that, um, when
there's a problem, you are,you're in it.
You know, like I.
I mean, if you think about afamily, and especially family
with young children, like if mykids are having trouble, I don't
(21:40):
say, well, you know they'regetting bad grades, they're
rebelling, um, I think I mightgo find another family.
I mean I could do that, but butthat would be we'd all
recognize that.
That what a breach, what a whata failure to stand and to be a
part of the loving solution forthis person.
And I think we'd probably dowell to consider, seriously
(22:03):
consider that when it comes toour involvement in local
churches, like, rather thanducking and running, running and
the other reality about it andthis goes back to the family, uh
, concept again too is that, inthe context of relationship is
like relationships are where allour crap gets bumped.
You know, like I, I've oftenthought I'm a father of six, got
(22:25):
a wife, I've often thought thatI'm I am the best christian, I
can be in the morning beforeanybody else is up and I'm
spending time with Jesus, sotrue.
But the moment my kids are upand in my space or my
three-year-olds running aroundasking for something or
disobeying like man, anotherpart of me comes out.
Wow, and that's eithercondemnation or invitation.
(22:50):
And the enemy wants to make acondemnation like you're a
hypocrite.
You're not, you know, really agood christian, whatever.
And the spirit of the lord ishis invitation.
Man like I love you, so glad wehad a time together, just you
and me, in your prayer closet.
Um, but I'm exposing somethingso you can press further into me
and be healed, become more likejesus but the church is the
(23:12):
same thing.
Speaker 1 (23:18):
Yeah, this is so key, like sorry that, listeners,
you're getting more of a dose ofDallas Willard than you
bargained for this series.
But Dallas talks about the factthat so much of what we think
of as righteousness is reallyjust kind of our blindness.
You know, before everyone's upand around us, right?
So much of what we think ofrighteousness is.
I read my Bible, I had myprayer time but he actually
helped reframe my understandingthat true righteousness is to
(23:40):
love, including to love yourenemies, and reading the Bible
and prayer and connecting withGod in various ways.
You know, bible study all thesekinds of things are disciplines.
They're like he describes itlike batting.
You know, if study all thesekinds of things are disciplines.
They're, like he describes it,like batting.
You know, if you want to hitthe ball out of the park like
your favorite baseball playerand you could perfectly emulate
(24:00):
their swing and you kind of knowexactly how they swing the ball
you walk up to that probaseball play.
You're not going to hit theball out of the park why?
Well, not only because you knowthere's probably a lot of like
awareness stuff you don't yethave.
But even if you had, that youdon't have the strength unless
you've done the weightconditioning and the training in
the background.
So Dallas argues that truerighteousness are the acts of
(24:23):
love.
True righteousness are when theagape from the Holy Spirit is
coming up and out of us.
And so I think this is a reallyimportant thing, josh, because
a lot of the guys I walk with incoaching don't realize that
lust seems like by far thebiggest sin.
This was true in my own life.
Like lust, it's the, I imagine,like an IMAX.
(24:46):
You know, film like this is theblockbuster that came out over
the summer.
But I've read this greatarticle we'll try to link in the
show notes that so oftenunderneath the sin of lust are
so many other things.
They're like that thing playingin theater 13 that no one's
seeing anymore because it's beenout for a while.
Pride, envy, I mean thesedifferent struggles, and I'm not
saying any of this to condemnus, but I'm just saying so often
(25:08):
when we're bumping up againstreal people our wives, our
friends, the church it'sactually bumping and jarring the
crap in us that God wants toheal and so part of him,
remembering his body,reconnecting his body, is making
us people who are reallywilling to engage those places
that block us from fromcommunion with, with the body.
Speaker 2 (25:33):
Yeah, yeah, it's so good, james.
It's interesting too becauseyou and I both have experienced
this and I hope our listenershave.
If you haven't, as a listener,uh, we pray that you will.
But I'm I'm a teacher, I loveto teach.
I'm a writer, I love to write.
(25:55):
Uh, awaken is is somethingJames and I have worked on for a
number of years.
We're really proud of thecontent.
But if you were to ask peoplewhat has meant the most to them
about joining a group likeAwaken360, none of them say it's
the teaching.
They all say it's this space.
When I gather with these othermen and I tell them what's real,
and they tell me what's real,and something happens there.
It's, it's powerful, it'sbeautiful, it's union, it's real
(26:18):
connection, um, and it's whatwe're made for.
And so many of them begin tolearn as as we learn, at least
in that setting, that what I'vebeen pursuing in lust, the urge
to merge that I've been chasinghere and there and everywhere
with lust, is actually a desireto be truly known, truly seen,
(26:40):
to truly know and truly seesomeone else.
It's it, it.
It is beyond a sexual desireand one of the reasons that I
think lust has such power andcan be so compelling and so
addictive is because, um it, inthe, in the lack of satisfaction
there, it still seems to holdout this promise.
(27:00):
You just need more.
The irony in when we come toour senses like, oh, I don't
need more lust, but the?
The irony is that you actuallyit's actually speaking the truth
you do need more.
You need much, much, much morethan you would ever find in lust
and, as a matter of fact, much,much, much more than you would
ever find in the beautiful unionof sex in marriage.
(27:21):
You need more than that, like.
The goal is not to get freefrom your lust so you can get
married and have a happymarriage.
That's, that's one, um, goodgoal, it's a good desire.
But even that union as good asit can be and we're here to help
people make it as good as itcan get but even that will leave
(27:41):
you wanting because you weremade for a union.
That's even bigger than that,even more than that.
Speaker 1 (27:48):
And this is what we don't have a lot of time to get
into this, but this is what thesacraments point to.
Now I know again there'sdebates are there two, are there
seven, whatever?
But just think about communionor the Eucharist.
This is meant to be this icon,or you know the real presence?
Most Christians, throughout allof Christian history, have
(28:09):
believed at least in the realpresence of Jesus in the
Eucharist.
History have believed at leastin the real presence of Jesus in
the Eucharist.
There's something about, hey,there's an ache in me that's not
being satisfied by the, asChristopher West would say, the
fast food of this world.
And we need to consume, we'remade to consume, but what Jesus
gave us to consume was his bodyand his blood, more of him.
(28:31):
So I don't know how much you'vedone, josh, around this.
You know how communion peopletalk about these days, how it
can be something that we do andengage in for physical healing,
for connection, for grace.
But I imagine that there's acomponent of this act, this act
(28:51):
of engaging the sacrament, thatthere's a component of this act,
this act of engaging, thesacrament of engaging what
everything that this bread andthis blood mean, that helps
transform us, you know into likeit's like this foretaste.
You know it's not the fullthing, the full wedding supper
of the lamb like we see inRevelation, but there's
something still substantialabout it.
Speaker 2 (29:12):
Yes, yes, yes it, yes , yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.
I've said this on this podcast,maybe some time ago, but I grew
up in a christian traditionthat, um, if they meant more
than this, they never explainedit to me in a way that I
understood.
They meant more than this.
But the the concept of jesusthe last supper.
When he says, do this inremembrance of me, he breaks the
bread, pours the wine, saysthis is my body, this is my
(29:36):
blood, do this in remembrance ofme.
The institution of thesacrament of communion.
And I grew up thinking in mychild brain what that means I'm
supposed to do some kind of, I'msupposed to think about
something, do some mental workwhile I take this you know tiny
little plastic cup and this tinylittle octagon wafer or
whatever it is, and that somehowthis is supposed to serve as a
(30:00):
good reminder of what Jesus did.
Like the fact of rememberingsomehow does me good, transforms
me, and, yes, remembering whatChrist did does us good.
But there's more going on therethan just that, if we accept
(30:20):
that there's mystery here and wecan't explain it all, and that
there is, in a real way, anunexplainable, invisible, maybe
even tasteless way.
Tasteless in the sense that wedon't experience it through
tasting.
When I take this bread, I am infact taking the Lord Jesus into
(30:47):
my body.
He is absorbed into my body,becomes one with my body,
strengthens my muscles,strengthens my will, strengthens
my heart in some real way.
And I drink this cup believingthat in some real way this is
the blood of Jesus.
And the Old Testament says thelife of the blood is in or the
life is in the blood.
So I'm taking in the life ofJesus into me and it is being
(31:08):
absorbed into me in some way.
That's a space for great faiththat something is going to
change in me.
Because I am coming to thistable.
Whose table?
My table?
The Lord's table?
The one who said it to me?
And I think I, you know, stronghead nod to a Roman Catholic,
brothers and sisters and thosein the body of Christ who do, at
(31:31):
minimum, talk about the realpresence of God being in these
elements.
Because if you search yourself,you will find there is a hunger
.
Like Lord, I long to be onewith you.
I do not find in of myself,inside myself, what I need, what
I long for, what I want.
I can't pull myself up and stopthis sin, I can't pull myself
(31:55):
up and love like you.
I need you in me and so, byfaith, I take this body, by
faith, I take this blood.
Would you transform me?
It became this beautiful,prayerful expression of an ache
and of invitation to the Lordand I hope you heard, listeners,
(32:18):
as I said, like we're talkingabout becoming one with God.
I mean like that's, our bodiesbecome one with what we eat and
drink.
Speaker 1 (32:29):
And we're doing it with our brothers and sisters
right next to us.
At least that's the typical waythat it's done.
Listen to this quote that tiesa lot of this together, from CS
Lewis.
He says next to the blessedsacrament, he's referring to
communion.
Next to the blessed sacrament,he's referring to communion.
Next to the blessed sacramentitself, your neighbor is the
(32:50):
holiest object presented to yoursenses.
And so, lewis, you know he hasa way in his brilliance of just
cutting through so much of thequestions, the division, but
what he's saying is Read itagain, James.
Yeah, he says, next to theblessed sacrament itself, your
neighbor is the holiest objectpresented to your senses.
And so there's something aboutboth the bread and the wine and
this fact that both in general,we're around people, but also in
(33:11):
that moment of taking communion, we're doing it in communion
with the body, the body thatwe've been baptized into.
We've been baptized as a signof life with Christ.
We've died with Christ, we'vebeen risen with Christ.
And this is really interestingMartin Luther the reformer.
So we're pulling from a wholevariety.
(33:31):
As many of you can tell by now,we serve and have people on our
team who are Roman Catholic,anglican, various Protestant
denominations, but Luther saidthat when he was in spiritual
warfare, the main thing he'dcall upon is his baptism.
Do you know this, josh?
The main thing that lutherwould call upon is his baptism,
because his baptism was atangible marker of him dying
(33:55):
with christ, a tangiblesacrament of him dying with
christ and being raised withChrist into this body.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
What does that mean?
He would call upon it.
Speaker 1 (34:10):
He would basically yeah, I know that was probably a
funny way of saying it, butbasically he would say Satan,
you have no power here, becauseI have been baptized.
I remember my baptism, I diedwith Christ and I live in the
life of Christ.
Speaker 2 (34:19):
Oh see, that's a guy who gets his union with Christ
and I live in the life of Christ, oh see, that's, that's a guy
who, who gets his union withChrist and his union with
Christ's body, Like that's atleast in, in, in, in some ways
that that I seek to grasp, likethat's powerful.
Speaker 1 (34:38):
Yeah.
So, friends, we want to closeout this episode with one more
call to remember.
This is our final in ourRemember series, but we want you
to remember the Christianfamily throughout history.
So, if you've noticed, I'vebeen referencing these quotes.
I'm actually pulling them allfrom this awesome ministry that
I've come across called OurChurch Speaks.
It's an Anglican deacon out inRichmond Virginia.
(35:02):
They actually wrote a book, himand his priest wrote a book, I
think, just called our churchspeaks.
My wife and I are going throughit each week, where it gives a
vignette of Christiansthroughout the last 2000 years,
a quote, um a little bit aboutthem, some devotional, but they
also have stuff online, and sothose quotes I was just pulling
from were some of the images Iwas engaging with today the
(35:27):
quote from Lewis, the quote fromChristophson and many more, and
so one thing that we canremember is that we're not the
first to go through this First.
Peter 5 says that thesufferings you experience are
being experienced by theChristians throughout the world
we could also say throughouthistory, christian history and
so there's something reallypowerful about recognizing.
(35:49):
I've been baptized into Christand his family, you know, raised
into the life of his family.
I take communion to be unitedwith Christ and his family, and
I'm part of a family that'sgoing back right around now.
It's been about 2000 years.
We're actually coming close tothat specific milestone of
Jesus's death and resurrection,and so there's something really
(36:13):
powerful for our walk towardintegrity, our walk toward
healing, when we allow the voiceof the martyrs and the voices
of great Christians, the saintsthroughout history, to speak
into our hearts.
We remember they've suffered insimilar ways, different times,
different contexts, but they'vesuffered in similar ways.
(36:34):
And there's kind of thisincredible witness of the cloud
of witnesses, a witness of thecloud of witnesses.
And we have, you know,thousands of years of history of
our family of God, startingwith, you know, adam, and then
Abraham and Moses in the Bible.
But we also now have, you know,a couple thousand years of
history of of saints, of peoplewho have been in Christ.
(36:56):
And I don't know about you,josh, but there's something so
encouraging for me aboutremembering those who have come
before, about you, josh, butthere's something so encouraging
for me about remembering thosewho have come before.
Speaker 2 (37:03):
Yeah, yeah, I don't know if one, one way that we
might think about it is like ifyou you've done any family tree
work for your own family, ormaybe you even have like a
father or grandfather orgrandmother, somebody kind of
closer that you may have evenknown, who did remarkable things
.
Like you know, they're knownfor x, y and z.
They started this foundation.
Like you know they're known forX, y and Z.
They started this foundation.
(37:23):
Or they, um, you know, earned apurple heart and whatever the
war was.
Like um, you hear the stories,it wasn't you.
But you feel something insidelike, hey, that's my, it's my
granddad.
Like that's my grandmother,that's um, or that's my great,
great, whomever I mean.
(37:50):
Like we kind of by um, byassociation, we feel something
like raising up in us, like,like I have his or her blood in
me, like, and I think, um,that's, that's the way we're
meant to think about our, ourquote unquote spiritual brothers
and sisters who have gonebefore us.
Like, um, I've got um, yeah,I've got the, the, the, the, the
same spirit I'm, I'm, I'm partof the family.
I'm part of the lineage of all,of Peter, of John, um.
(38:14):
I'm part of the lineage of ofCorey Ten Boom and Jim Elliott
and, um, I mean the the theseheroes that I would, that I
would think about and look toand go like, I want to be more
like that.
And, um, I've got in myheritage Jesus Christ, because
he wasn't a phantom, he wasn'tuh, he, he wasn't just just kind
(38:39):
of artificially here, he washere in the flesh and we are
baptized into his family.
He is the last Adam and we aresons and daughters of the last
Adam.
Speaker 1 (38:52):
And that's exactly how we've been ending every
single episode in this shortseries.
He remembers us.
I want to ask you to pray in asecond, josh, but I just want to
read, from Our Church Speaks,this little quote from Polycarp,
and I don't know if thewaterworks will come out as I
read it, but I was cryingearlier as I read it, because
I'll just let it speak foritself.
And the picture, by the way andwe'll have this in the show
(39:15):
notes is him holding up hishands, like you know, kind of in
front of him, and flames,flames enveloping him, and it
says 80 and six years I haveserved Christ and he has never
abandoned me.
How, then, can I abandon myKing and my Savior?
(39:35):
So, friends, whether you're inthe flames of betrayal, trauma,
sexual sin, you just can't seemto stop past trauma.
Wherever you're at, jesusdidn't abandon polycarp and he
doesn't abandon you.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
Yeah, jesus, thank you.
Thank you that you don't createus as little solitudes, but you
create us for relationship.
You create us from relationship, lord, of the very fact that we
are created, from the union ofFather, son, holy Spirit, the
(40:27):
overflowing love of you, lord,that's why we exist, that's what
we image, that's who we are,and as we walk this path
together, as the church, as welook to our left and our right,
Lord, would you fill us with adeeper sense that we belong,
(40:47):
that you made us to belong withyou and with one another, and
would you lead us away fromtemptations to go solo or to
grasp at false intimacies, tograsp at false intimacies.
And, lord, heal us, open us,charge us, help us to move
towards the intimacy, the unionwith you and your body that
(41:10):
we're made for and that we arein by your grace.
And we pray these things in thename of the Father, son and
Holy Spirit, amen, amen.
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