Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:06):
guys, welcome back to
navigate trust and here with me
.
Yeah, how are you, buddy?
Speaker 2 (00:10):
I'm doing pretty darn
good.
I'm getting over a slight coldTim yeah, this is the season, so
if I, if I sounded a littlenasally, is the season.
I showed up for you today.
Okay, because I want you tohear well thanks and no, no, not
, not you.
Tim the listener, oh thelistener.
Speaker 1 (00:24):
Oh, the listener, the
listener.
Yeah, that makes more sense,whoever you are Not, tim, though
.
That makes more sense.
I wanted to talk today excuseme of one of my favorite books
in the Bible.
Can you guess what it is?
Speaker 2 (00:39):
Ecclesiastes,
ecclesiastes, not Ecclesiasticus
.
For the record for youCatholics out there
Ecclesiasticus, yeah.
Speaker 1 (00:48):
Is that an actual
name?
Speaker 2 (00:49):
It's another book,
yeah.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
Oh, it's a book.
Yeah, it's like shoot, have ason.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
I know what I'm going
with.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
What do you call him?
Get over here, get over here,ecclesiasticus.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
Khaleesi, khaleesi,
khaleesi, khaleesi, khaleesi,
khaleesi.
Oh my God, no, I'm sorry.
Speaker 1 (01:09):
I remember reading
this book back when I got saved.
After you go through theProverbs, the Psalms, the Songs
of Solomon, Khaleesi's hit andit's a very different tempo than
you would get from likeProverbs.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
Yeah, yeah, it is,
this is 12 beers deep solomon.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
Yeah, okay, that's a
good point.
Um, I remember reading thisbecause I went through this
super, like depressed state inhigh school, like before I even
knew what depression was.
People were just calling methat.
You know what I mean, yeah.
And then you get over that hump, got saved all that fun stuff,
started reading this, like, yeah, no, like yeah, no.
Because the very first line inthis book is meaningless, Life
is meaningless says the preacher.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
This is an important
reminder.
Man I'm like, do I go?
Down the wormhole already Tim.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
Do you want me to
jump in?
I think it's important torealize that meaninglessness
ultimately comes from not havinga direction or a particular
focus.
Yeah, like a vision.
Yeah, I mean, we find meaningwhen we know what we're trying
to accomplish.
There is no meaning if you haveno idea what you're trying to
accomplish.
So imagine having rungs for aladder but no sides.
What do I?
(02:30):
Great, I accomplished this step.
Where does it go?
What am I doing with this?
Like, where do they?
You just clang them in the airtogether.
What is the point of havingthese if you don't have a
direction, of having these ifyou don't have a direction?
And especially in the book ofEcclesiastes, everything that
(02:53):
you know Solomon is writing isultimately like for his sons, so
they could understand how toperceive wisdom, how to get what
to do, how to like actuallylive your life.
And he's pointing in thisdirection and saying listen,
this is, these are all the rungson the ladder.
Things come and go to createsomething more than just this
(03:25):
vapid, random experience thatyou can have outside of that.
But meaninglessness ultimatelyis ultimately means I don't
actually have a focus or adirection, and so what I see in
the world is chaos instead oforder.
I can't make sense of it.
I can see fragments and smallvignettes here and there of
(03:50):
maybe things that were supposedto be something.
This is the postmodern artmovement.
You know what I mean.
Who's the guy Picasso?
You know what I mean?
It's like, okay, there'ssomething there, I know there is
.
Speaker 1 (04:06):
What is it?
What is it I?
Speaker 2 (04:08):
think it's a face,
but also it might be something
grotesque.
You know, yeah, if you don'thave a clear direction, you end
up with meaninglessness.
And this book really resonateswith people who have found
themselves at the bottom of theglass, yeah, who are like I
don't know what I'm doing, Idon't really know where I'm
(04:30):
going.
In fact, all the things that Ithought were solid have kind of
evaporated.
Yeah, they've fallen apart andthey start to read this book and
they're like finally, somebodyelse agrees.
Yeah, they're seeing this.
And you know we love theterminology of woke or un-woke
or whatever.
But ultimately, when you have amoment in your life that's, um,
(04:52):
I'm trying to get the best wayto say this some catalytic
moment, it usually starts withyour brain changing the way it
fundamentally perceives life.
And at some point in your lifeyou're going to have this moment
where you're like okay, I don'tget it.
What I thought was thedirection I was going, what
appeared to me like the rightthing to do, or how I was going
(05:14):
to do it, or God, where are you?
You know what I mean that kindof moment.
Ecclesiastes is a fantastic bookand oftentimes I'll recommend
it to people who are.
You know, if you want to saylooking for God or not quite in
the faith.
You know what I mean,especially if they're a little
bit more on the intellectualside, because if you plumb the
depths of something but don'thave a direction for it, you
(05:37):
feel like you just are spiralingdown this meaningless staircase
.
The only thing that is not theonly thing that seems to be
something you can actually graspis meaninglessness itself, and
so you just, you know you walkdown that staircase again and
again, and again.
So this book is a great way tohelp people connect with the
reality of something that thesmartest guy on the planet is
(06:00):
saying.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
I think that's why I
like this book so much, because
I hear a lot of pastors talkingspiritual most of the time.
But I like this book so muchbecause I hear a lot of pastors
talking spiritual most of thetime?
Yeah, but Solomon in this bookreally kind of brings it down to
a level of understanding ofthis is real life.
Yeah, this is what's reallygoing to happen.
And like he talks about, why dowicked people prosper?
Good people die, right?
(06:21):
Yeah, he's like this is amystery.
What's the point?
Chance happens to us all.
Yeah, you know there's no laborunder the sun.
It hasn't already been done.
You know your hard work isgoing to go to the person who
did not work for it.
Speaker 2 (06:32):
when you die Like he
talks about all these, and even
that it doesn't matter, becausewhat does it matter?
What does it matter?
Speaker 1 (06:39):
It's all the yeah it
gets into.
You know, eat, drink, be merry.
You know I quote that a lot.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
All of Ecclesiastes,
chapter 2, tim is fascinating to
me.
All right, because he basicallygoes through this.
Let me tell you what I did,like it's his accolades, if you
want to think about it this way.
Verses 1 through 11, hereferences himself 42 times.
(07:07):
Okay, wow.
So he says I said to myself uh,enjoy yourself.
I said to myself and to my bodyand to my mind, and this was
guiding me and my mind andmyself, and myself, and myself,
and also I, and like he goesthrough this massive list of
trying to explain to peopleeverything that he did, and and
(07:30):
he there's probably roughly ninecategories that you could put
those verses in from.
I would say pleasure, like he's.
Like food, fun, I just, I justtried to enjoy myself, didn't
work.
Laughter, okay, I tried comedy.
You know, I just tried to enjoymyself, didn't work.
Laughter, okay, I tried comedy.
You know what I mean.
Like I, I, I, I tried to laughaway these things and see all of
(07:50):
it, the, the T losses is humor.
The point of it all is is humor, and it's funny Cause you think
about, like, how many comedianshave committed suicide?
You know what I mean?
Um, and then he talks about, uh, substance, substance abuse.
I try to drink myself away.
I try to find maybe if I takesomething it will make sense.
Speaker 1 (08:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
Right, and I see this
in people who are doing
ayahuasca trips and DMT andstuff.
Now they're like, oh, if youtake this, you can rewire your
brain so that your life won'tsuck so bad, right.
Then he talks about basicallyindustrialism.
He's well, so I builded thingsand I created things instead and
I, I, I came up with newinventions and new stuff that I
wanted to do and and that didn'twork.
(08:29):
And then he gets intomaterialism, like, well, and I
had the greatest castles and Ihad the you know, the gardens
and the armies, and uh, and andthe gold and this.
And then he talks aboutentertainment, like, so I try to
distract myself with other,maybe other people are the point
, and it's not myself and youknow.
And then he gets into, ofcourse, his, his specialty,
(08:50):
immorality, which is, you know,I had all the women wives,
concubines, it was uh, you know,he basically drowned himself in
a, in lascivious living, andthat doesn't work.
And then he talks aboutaccomplishment, like, okay, so
the life that I now have, well,look, at least other people
respect me, at least otherpeople see my achievements and
(09:12):
my titles and my degrees and myawards and look how many
followers I have.
And then he gets to this placeat the end, which I think is
fascinating, he basically saysdid I increase more than blah,
blah, blah?
All my eyes decided not torefuse them.
I did not withhold anythingfrom my heart.
My pleasure, my heart, wasbecause of the labor.
Okay, for my heart was pleasedbecause of all my labor and this
(09:35):
was my reward for all my labor.
Thus I considered all myactivities, which my hands had
done in labor, which I hadexerted.
So what?
What is he saying?
Well, all the sin, all thethings that I did.
Ultimately I should get thosethings and it should be okay
because of all the work that Iput into them.
All right, it's a kind ofrationalization.
(09:56):
Okay, so I would say the lastthing that he does is basically
look at his life and try toatone for his sins by saying
well, I did all the work and Iaccomplished all these things
and I made it happen.
So that that basically makesthe sin and the wrong things I
did, okay, yeah.
So from this spectrum ofpleasure, laughter, substance,
(10:17):
industrialism, materialism,entertainment, immorality,
accomplishment, atonement, hewalks through every possible
lens or you could say it thisway every possible set of bars
on the side of the rungs of theladder, and none of them work,
none of them fit, and he'strying to explain to them how
freaking frustrated he actuallyis.
(10:38):
And I get it.
Yeah, I mean, I get it.
Yeah, you know.
Don't you think that people tryto pursue those things though?
Oh, 100%.
Speaker 1 (10:46):
Like I read you that
list 100%.
You know, and I just and what Ifind more fascinating with this
is that what Solomonpotentially gets through too, is
that you can do all the rightthings and you won't find
success.
Speaker 2 (10:57):
Yeah Well, it's not
guaranteed to you.
And what is success?
Speaker 1 (11:02):
What's the success?
Speaker 2 (11:03):
Yeah, what, what.
This is why I was saying that,the whole meaningless point,
what are you actually trying toaccomplish?
And his point was like I canaccomplish lots, but what am I
ultimately?
What is it for?
Yeah, yeah, what is the purposeof anything?
And you can distract yourselfwith pleasure, laughter,
(11:24):
substance, et cetera.
You can do all of that.
But it's not going to fix likethe, it's not going to help.
You feel like you're actuallygetting to a place where you
have done the thing that youwere meant to do.
Speaker 1 (11:37):
Yeah, it's not going
to cast a vision that you want
for your life.
Speaker 2 (11:39):
And meant right is a
root for meaning.
You know, yeah, it's not goingto cast the vision that you want
for your life, and and andmeant right Is a is a root for
meaning.
You know, yeah, but why am Igoing this direction?
Okay, I think what's fantasticin this book of Ecclesiastes is
he's trying to dissuade peoplefrom this idea that you can
recreate yourself or that youcan make yourself into whatever
(12:01):
you want yourself to be.
All right, I brought this up onthe show, I think, before, but
we've talked about Tim, like theidea of being preceding essence
, or essence preceding being, iswho you are, something that is
actually set in stone and thenthat comes out of you, who you
(12:21):
are, comes out of you or are yousomething, and then you create
your own being.
I become the thing that I wantto be.
This is Walt Disney's idea thatyou can be whatever you want.
You can become whatever youwant.
You are not restricted by thephysicality that you have.
You are ultimately becomingwhatever you want to be.
And I think, when we talk aboutmeaning and when we talk about
(12:46):
this idea of like the T, loss ofour existence, why am I here,
unless we have a, why the what'sdon't matter Unless you have
and I would say this too if youhave a good why you can walk
through a lot of pain and stillfeel like fulfilled, yeah, and
you know what you're doingmatters and you're going.
(13:08):
This is why you know.
You can see some people who haveeverything and are absolutely
miserable, and one guy who hasnothing and an incredibly hard
life, with a smile on his face.
This is the classic picture ofthe Christmas Carol.
This is the classic picture ofthe Christmas Carol Tim.
You got Ebenezer Scrooge, whois wealthy beyond anyone's
dreams, hobbled over.
Basically, you know, might aswell be a corpse now, stingy
(13:33):
with every penny, everything andevery person.
And then you have Bob Crotchet,who has a little crippled son
who is happier with his wholefamily that he's struggling to
feed than the guy who literallycould do anything that he
absolutely wanted.
Why one has meaning and knowswhy he exists.
The person who doesn't couldhave everything that he wanted
and would feel like he was in uh, he would feel like he was in
(13:56):
his own coffin.
Speaker 1 (13:57):
Yeah you know yeah so
so I mean, is this all about
the pursuits of what you'retrying to gain out of life here?
Speaker 2 (14:04):
Yeah, yeah, I mean,
the whole book of Ecclesiastes
is this giant reminder to people, ultimately to establish the
reason for life and living insomething.
Or you can accomplish anythingyou want and you will find that
it is a vapor that justdisappears.
(14:24):
It doesn't matter it.
Literally it will be.
Where did the money go fromthis person?
What did they leave behind?
What did they actually?
What was it for?
We don't know.
Well, did they enjoy themselves?
Does it matter that theyenjoyed themselves?
What is the?
What is the point of any ofthis?
He's trying to tell his sons hey, and this is why the last
chapter of this book hammers onremember your creator before it
(14:49):
is too late.
The beginning of this booktells people here's the problem.
The end of the book actuallygives him the answer, which is
you, you have to remember Godbefore you get to the day when
the grasshopper drags himselfalong and the almond tree
doesn't bloom anymore and peopleare singing and the glass bowl
(15:10):
is shattered.
And he's basically sayingbefore everything falls apart in
your life and tastes like ashin your mouth, remember who made
you.
Well, what is he actuallysaying?
Remember that you have anidentity and a purpose before
you accomplish anything.
That God is calling you to walkout, Lest you live a life that
is totally disconnected from themeaning that it is meant to
(15:33):
have.
You cannot create your ownmeaning apart from God.
You can't do it.
It, yeah, yeah, you know whatthat's called Tim Exhaustion.
Speaker 1 (15:45):
Yeah, Tell me about,
I think, pursuing that meaning
in someone's life, that can alsodrive you freaking crazy.
Speaker 2 (15:52):
Just finding meaning.
You mean, yeah, I agree, Iagree, I think sometimes we want
specific details, not about themeaning of our life, but
whether or not we deem it asworthy.
Yeah, you know, I said itearlier.
Right, like, if you truly knowwhat God has created you for and
(16:14):
why this matters, then you canendure almost anything.
Like Jesus says, for the joyset before him, he endured the
cross, scorning its shame.
Well, what does that ultimatelymean?
If you have something worthdying for, it makes the dying I
don't want to say less painful,but you're able to walk through
(16:35):
it because you can see to theother side.
And ultimately, what is that?
Well, it's hope, right, if Ihave hope that something
beautiful is coming, that I canwalk through whatever I need to
walk through today to actuallyget there.
Um, people that are depressed,frustrated, anxious usually are
people who have lost hope, andthey think it's just hope in one
(16:57):
of these categories that I justgave you.
Well, if I just had morelaughter in my life, if I just
had the right relationship, if Ijust had the right money,
that's their hope is that I'llget one of those things tomorrow
, and the problem is they'll getit and it doesn't work.
And now they're thinking, oh,the problem is existence itself,
it's just, it's just me, butbut it's not.
What you're ultimatelyexperiencing is the problem in
(17:19):
the garden?
It's not that my soul died, mypersonality, it's not that my
body will die, but because,ultimately, I've been
disconnected from God, who isthe telos of my very existence.
Yeah, all right, we see this inadopted kids.
Adopted kids, especially, havethis existential crisis.
(17:40):
Almost every single one of them, at some point in their life,
have this existential crisis ofwho are my parents and why did
they not want me?
Yeah, and they can go.
I mean, it can spiral.
It can be really bad.
Some of them come out of it andit's okay, some of them it's.
It jacks them up for the restof their life.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
My little.
My older brother adopted.
You know that?
Yeah, and he reached out to hisbirth parents years ago.
Speaker 2 (18:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:03):
And it's actually a
good thing for him, because he's
like no, I had it better offwith you guys than I did with
whoever my real mother is.
Speaker 2 (18:09):
That's cool, that's
cool, yep.
Which is pretty neat, which iscool for you guys, but actually
almost worse for him.
Yeah, in a way Right, becausefor him what he just realized is
oh man, what I'm made of mysubstance, where I've come from,
is that what is actually deeplyconnected to me internally is
(18:31):
actually far worse.
Speaker 1 (18:33):
You know what I mean?
Speaker 2 (18:34):
Yeah, I can't blame
you right now.
Yeah, and it's like when youfind out what my identity is
connected to, sometimes that'sworse for you.
You know what I mean myidentity is connected to.
Sometimes that's worse for you.
You know what I mean.
Which is why this idea of ifI'm not connected to my creator,
if I'm not finding my identityfrom him, I'm going to try to
end up creating my own, and it'snot going to be pretty and it's
(18:55):
not ultimately going to have ameaning, or I'm going to have to
fool myself with positivity forthe rest of my life to try to
get myself to like.
I don't know how people whoaren't Christians do it, tim, to
be honest with you, I don'tknow how they do it Like.
I realized that it's one giantdistraction, but most of these
philosophers that are atheistsare more depressed than anybody
(19:17):
on the planet.
Right, it's because they'relike well, I'm deeply thinking
about things, but it'sdisconnected from meaning itself
.
And so now I'm just.
What am I doing?
You know what's what's?
What is the point of this?
Where?
Where's all this going?
That's right, um.
Speaker 1 (19:31):
I think expectations
play a part in.
You're talking about anxietyand depression.
You have expectations of whathaving kids would be like, or
what your job would be like, orwhat marriage would be like,
yeah, and those things don'twork out the way you expected
them to work out or or you haveideas about the feelings that
they will produce in your head,that they don't produce when you
(19:54):
have them.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
Yeah, you ever like,
uh, you ever woke up in the
morning tim after you, you know,maybe you got a new car or a
new job or something and you'retrying to remember why you're
excited.
You know you're like wait, whyam I?
Why am I waking up so happy?
Oh, I got that cool thing.
Yeah, all right, you know whatI mean.
You're like, you're, you're uh.
Your brain has to catch up toyour feelings sometimes.
You know what I mean and um.
Speaker 1 (20:16):
For me this isn't
healthy in many means, but I
will.
Speaker 2 (20:22):
It's a confession.
It is what it is.
It really is.
Speaker 1 (20:24):
But I will pretend,
let's say, we won the lottery
right and I will just go downthat wormhole and I get super
happy and super excited and thenI get home I'm like none of
this was true, yeah.
Speaker 2 (20:39):
I lived in a fiction
to stimulate my brain for a
little bit to get in asimulation on my way home to
work from work.
Honestly, what that?
And I don't think you're alone,Tim.
I think that's a lot of peoplewho are trying to conjure up
this idea of how they would feelif things were the way they
wanted, yeah, and so they givethemselves the emotions that
(21:01):
they believe those circumstanceswould create.
And what's two things here?
One, like those circumstancesdon't necessarily mean you're
going to conjure up thosefeelings, yeah, okay.
Two, your brain is anincredibly powerful thing that
can conjure up all thoseemotions all by itself, without
those circumstances, right, true, and conjure up all those
(21:21):
emotions all by itself withoutthose circumstances, right?
So, like, because we have abelief in hope, that this is a
certain way, our brain willliterally follow along and
convince ourself okay, thishappened until harsh reality
hits.
Yeah, so what happened there?
Well, I convinced myself ofsomething that produced hope in
(21:45):
me, and then, when the hope wastaken away, it evaporated again.
Well then, the goal should beto convince your brain of the
thing that you actually shouldhave hope in that is not tied to
your circumstance, because,ultimately, what that reveals is
we believe that our hope istied to our circumstance, and if
our circumstances don don'tchange, then my hope will
(22:05):
evaporate, it will go away, yeahyeah yeah, and I I think, um, I
want to walk through something.
is that okay?
Sure, um?
When I think about this idea ofwhat um solomon was trying to
accomplish and what he's chasingafter, I think about everything
that we lost in the Garden ofEden.
(22:26):
All right, so think about thisbeing.
That comes Satan.
He offers this alternatereality.
Instead of having to rely onGod, how about you just be like
God yourself?
Instead of having to have afather that gives you your
(22:51):
identity and existence and rulesand all these things, how about
you create yourself as thatdeity and live out however you
want, and then you could be likehim?
Instead of doing this, do that.
Well, the problem is forcreation.
That doesn't work.
Imagine trying to convince adog to be an owl.
(23:14):
Right, yeah, and is a brain astrong thing?
Is it possible to eventuallyconvince a dog you know what I
mean that he's an owl?
You know.
You've probably seen some ofthese things, tim, where it's
like pig gets raised with cats.
You know what I mean.
Speaker 1 (23:28):
It's a cat.
Speaker 2 (23:29):
It's a kitten, right
right, but does it have nine
lives?
No, breakfast is coming, okay,like it's a reality, but think
about this.
What I would say is things thatwere exchanged in the garden.
One is this dependence on Godthat we're supposed to have gets
exchanged for an autonomousingenuity.
(23:50):
Here's what I mean.
Their ability to accomplishlike life on their own became a
necessity because I've cutmyself off from God and his
power and his sustaining abilityand his achievement being.
You know what he's created inme and how I live those things
(24:11):
out, now that even the theground is cursed and I have to
come up with on my own, throughingenuity, ability to sustain
myself apart from God.
Right, I have to become thisthing.
I have to rely on my ability toaccomplish and build and work
the ground, not as an extensionof the work of God, but to
(24:34):
supplement my own identity,because I've lost my
relationship with God.
So, instead of building afamily because God has told me
to have a wife and have kids andsubdue the earth, I'm building
a family because I needvalidation and to feel like
people love me.
Yikes, like that's a problem,but like I've gone from.
I'm doing this because I alreadyhave to.
(24:56):
I'm doing this because I needand if, if you have ever seen a
uh, maybe a good way to put thisis this way Shepherds shouldn't
eat their own sheep.
If you need your own sheep tosurvive, shepherds shouldn't eat
their own sheep.
If you need your own sheep tosurvive, eventually you will
have no flock.
And if you are relying onrelationships for your own
(25:17):
identity, eventually you willhave no relationship.
But it's that autonomousingenuity.
I need things.
I got to create these things tobe able to sustain my own
autonomy because I'vedisconnected myself from from
the source of life.
Own autonomy because I'vedisconnected myself from the
source of life.
The next thing that happens isintellectual ascent, or descent,
if you want to think about itthat way.
Wisdom suddenly, instead ofbeing connected to God and his
(25:40):
understanding of the world,becomes this I have to come up
with every potential idea toreinterpret the world around me.
2 Timothy 3, 7 talks aboutpeople who are always learning
and never coming to a knowledgeof the truth.
Yeah, okay.
So think about Ecclesiastes.
I did this, I did that, Ithought through this, I thought
(26:01):
through that.
Where is the truth?
What is the point?
What is all this man?
But he did some thinking.
Speaker 1 (26:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
You know what I mean
and think about how often we
have to rationalize, living alife apart from God and come up
with reasons for why.
And ultimately it's constantlytrying to void out like
immovable truths.
(26:27):
We know about ourself, but wehave to convince ourself, aren't
the case?
So you have this.
Start with okay, I will buildthings around me to give myself
an identity, right, thisautonomous ingenuity.
And then that has to befollowed by this intellectual
descent into I will think inevery other way and come up with
reasons for why the world istotally different than actually
how it is or how we got hereapart from the grace of God,
than actually how it is or howwe got here apart from the grace
(26:49):
of God.
And then we pitch it as aliberation.
Okay, so every blue-hairedfeminazi barista right, I'm
always picking on them has thisidea that they have to be
liberated from the patriarchy,liberated from this toxic idea
of God and religion and all thisstuff.
Why?
Because I need to be God myself.
(27:10):
Ultimately, we'll get intopersonal deification, which is
where I started with, butnaturally denying God's command
as a type of oppression.
I don't want to do what Godsaid.
That doesn't allow me to be Godif I'm being commanded or told
what to do, it makes theirperfect relationship with God a
type of familial manipulation.
(27:31):
So my dad is ultimately thatwas just trying to oppress me.
He wasn't trying to protect mein the same way that God was
trying to oppress me and notprotect me.
And breaking the rules of theirheavenly father becomes this
version of freedom right.
So then, breaking the rules ofany father or any actual
(27:51):
authority in their life becomesfreedom.
And and think about this, for asecond Virtue is replaced by
license in our culture andrelationships based on standards
, uh, to relationships based onmutual sin.
So, like it used to be, youhave a father and a mother and
they love each other and theyknow who they are in Christ, and
we have kids and there's ruleshow we play and what we do and
(28:14):
what we don't do to support whatwe're trying to ultimately
accomplish.
Now relationships are built on.
This is my sin and my truth,and you have your sin and your
truth, and as long as your truthand your sin accepts my truth
and my sin, then we're good.
But they've changed the rulesnot from what I'm created to be
and what I'm supposed to do.
You know which is the way to goto this idea of I'm going to
(28:40):
create myself and if you put anyrules on me, I will see it as
oppression and I'm the one thatcreates the rules.
Why?
Because I'm God, not you, andyou can be God as long as I get
to make the rules.
Still, which is another way ofsaying not, which is ultimately
why that personal deification isthat it's the final state
you're shooting for.
Nature abhors a vacuum.
(29:00):
That which is finite and fadingmust utilize personal ingenuity
, intellectual assent andprofane liberation to achieve a
personal deification.
If I kill God in my own life, Ihave to do all these things to
create myself as God, which wasSatan's lie.
Right, right, you'll be justlike him, yeah, and so when I do
(29:22):
all those things, now Iunderstand or at least if you
walk through this process, youstart to understand what is he
getting at in Ecclesiastes.
If I've lost meaning and myconnection with the Father, if
I've lost who I'm supposed to beand I'm pushing against any
laws or anything else, what willI do?
Well, I will eventually try todo everything that I can with
(29:44):
the work of my own hands, bypushing off any rules, any law
or anything that would inhibitme from getting what I want.
And Solomon says I did all ofit.
I tried to be God and let metell you it was meaningless.
There's nothing there.
It's vapid, it's a mist.
You could sleep with whoeveryou want, you can get as much
(30:06):
money as you want.
And I'm telling you, right nowthere is, there's no light at
the end of that tunnel, it'sjust more tunnel and it never
stops.
And I think we need to, like,get that into our bones.
Um, when we think through thiswhole idea of what are we
actually chasing?
What's the point of our life?
Well, what you're focusing onmagnifies.
(30:26):
And so, if you're, this is whythe Bible is constantly telling
you uh, look, look to Christwhere he seated in the
heavenlies.
Look to God, get your eyes upon him, pay attention to what
he's doing, what he said, why?
Cause it's saying, the moreyou're connected to and seeing
God, you'll understand how youwere created and what you were
(30:46):
meant to be.
And then, when you turn and youlook at the world, you'll
actually begin to see thepurpose and meaning and created
order and what's actuallysupposed to happen, in a way
where you can have tainted bythis personal deification
(31:15):
mentality which is perhaps bestpersonified in the sports world.
Right, yeah, you know everybody.
I'm the greatest of all time.
I'm the best of everyone.
You know what I mean.
Or, however you want to do it,rock stars can have the same
mentality All of them thinkthey're God.
And oh how, best day ever, what.
You know what I mean.
Or, however you want to go todo it, rock stars can have the
(31:36):
same mentality All of them thinkthey're God.
And uh, oh, how far we fall.
Right.
But we are no different when weare conjuring up ideas in our
head, right, about how thingswould be so much better if I
could do this and do that, andthen we convince our minds to do
those that will.
Ultimately, what are we doing?
Well, we're rebelling againstGod's order.
We're rejecting his goodcreation.
I'm rejecting my connectionwith him and what I was meant to
do.
I'm angry at the oppressiverules and laws and that I can't
(31:57):
go do the things that I want todo.
Why?
Because I want to be God andmake the rules, and I would do
this differently, yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:03):
Right, the world
would be better if they just
listened to me.
Speaker 2 (32:05):
Yeah, yeah, that's
unfortunately is probably.
Speaker 1 (32:09):
I think that focus
part is interesting because you
go down these wormholes onYouTube a lot, yeah, and I would
watch all the like woke liberalfreak out moments or top Karen
blow ups.
But the more you watch theseand talking about your focus,
then I start kind of I mean, Idid this with cop videos too.
I still I watch a lot of likecops violating people's rights,
(32:32):
you know a lot of stuff outthere and I find those
interesting.
But I started figuring, like myconcept of police started being
like, well, all cops are bad,now, right?
Or all woke people are evil,right?
Speaker 2 (32:43):
Or like you start
kind of categories start getting
tighter and tighter categoriesnow.
Speaker 1 (32:48):
So I had to stop
because I'm like this isn't my
calling for what Christ has forpeople.
Yeah, I'm already written thesepeople off, if I ever come
across them now.
Because of the video I saw twoweeks ago of someone else
similar.
Speaker 2 (33:01):
It's true.
It's true.
You stop actually treatingpeople from God's perspective,
yeah, but you allow other peopleto shape how you see the world
instead.
And now I'm actually, what am Idoing?
In a sense, you're playing Godand I want to like, I want to
(33:23):
spend, I'm like man.
We could spend so much timetalking about this, but
ultimately, tim, like, theantidote to this, to
meaninglessness, is laying somethings down.
All right, the world is broken.
We have distanced ourself fromGod.
We are often trying to do ourown thing.
We are experiencing thebrokenness of everyone else also
(33:45):
trying to do their own things,the brokenness of everyone else
also trying to do their ownthings, and we are plagued all
of us, myself included by dayswhere I just simply believe that
I, god, I probably would havehad a cooler idea for my life
than you.
I could think of some reallycool things that would be super
awesome.
And we believe that Not all thetime Our best moments, we lay
(34:06):
it all down, or worse, we getour way and realize, man, he
really was right.
This is not better.
I am so sorry.
I don't want this.
I don't want anything to dowith this.
Do what you want.
You know we have these again,these meaningless moments where
we realize, oh, the ladder I wasbuilding was built on the wrong
wall.
You know what I mean.
It's just not where we'retrying to go.
Speaker 1 (34:25):
Ecclesiastes 5, he
talks about that too, about not
offering the same sacrifice offools when you go into the house
of worship as in don't go intoworship and church and pray
prayers of God.
I know better than you, yeah,so fix this.
Yeah, that's my prayer, totally.
Speaker 2 (34:39):
You know what I mean.
Speaker 1 (34:40):
Yeah, and just
rambles Well, and he makes the
point yeah he's like yeah, godis in heaven.
Okay, yeah, and shut up, soyeah.
Speaker 2 (34:49):
Yep, yeah, quit
demanding God, help you be God.
Yeah, that's not how that works, yeah, so, so the couple of
things I was going to say, tim,in light of this, in light of
the kind of the four things thatI was just getting at, you have
to lay down your intentionaldistance from God.
Right, to lay down yourintentional distance from God,
all right, if you haven'tthought about this, the fact
(35:11):
that Jesus is calling people tohimself, saying come to me, all
you who are weary and laden, orheavy laden, I'll give you rest.
Or this idea of even I was justreading in Malachi, he says
return to me and I'll return toyou.
Malachi, chapter three, I thinkit's somewhere in gosh, what is
it?
Verse six or seven or somethinglike that.
But he's like return to me andI'll return to you.
Malachi, chapter three, I thinkit's somewhere in gosh, what is
it?
Verse six or seven or somethinglike that.
But he's like return to me, Iwill return to you.
(35:33):
This idea that, hey, payattention for a second.
There's distance between us.
You're not closing the gap,you're not.
And what does that lead me to?
Well, that autonomous ingenuity.
Speaker 1 (35:46):
Well, what's that
return your talk?
Is it like start getting backto basic disciplines here?
Speaker 2 (35:51):
Yeah, that's exactly
where I'm going.
He's saying hey, you're notspending time with me, you're
working really hard to buildsomething so that you feel
better.
Yeah, okay, I got you.
Come to me Like, this is whereyou get filled.
You using your family to feelbetter about yourself actually
will end up ruining your familyIf you're using your kids to
feel better about yourselffather at the baseball game,
(36:15):
getting pissed off at the umpireand demanding your child do
better.
Okay, stop, you got to get thatfrom God.
And everything in scripture istrying to remind us there is a
distance between us and God, andGod has removed the barrier
from us and him, but you'restill pointed the wrong
direction.
You need to turn around andcome to him, and so I would say
(36:36):
one of the things to kill thisdesire for autonomous ingenuity
we have is closing the gapbetween you and God.
Like, shut that down, walk backtowards him.
The second thing is yourthought life.
Yeah, all right, cause.
The second thing is yourthought life.
Yeah, all right.
Because if the second thingthat you got going on is this
intellectual dissent, or now I'mcoming up with all these effing
ideas and what if this and whatif that?
(36:57):
I make the joke all the time.
Somebody comes to me and saysI'm really struggling with my
faith.
I'm really doubting this.
I'm like who's the girl?
I realize she's not savedalready.
Who is she?
Why?
Because you're trying tojustify living a certain way by
asking questions and coming upwith other hypothetical
realities that make you feelbetter about you wanting to do
(37:18):
whatever you want to do.
Speaker 1 (37:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:19):
Yeah, 2 Corinthians
2.14 reminds us that God has
actually given us his mind.
Like I have revealed to you howyou're supposed to think, how
you're supposed to process.
God didn't give you a mind sothat you could use it to rebel
against him.
He gave you a mind so that youcould actually have peace, you
could actually have hope, andyou will punt on these things,
(37:41):
trying to find reasons to findthem in the wrong places.
So you have to.
You got to lay down yourthought, life.
You do.
This is the finding thatwhatever is true, whatever is
lovely, whatever is excellent oradmirable or praiseworthy is
the Philippians 4.8.
Think on these things.
I don't want to Right.
That's the problem.
I don't want to do.
(38:02):
I don't want to lay down mythoughts.
I want to continue to think theway that I want to think.
And we don't like this.
We don't think God has putrules on how I think.
Yes, and perhaps that is wherewe break more laws and
commandments and sin more thanany other place, and we feel the
best about it.
Isn't that strange?
Speaker 1 (38:21):
It's very strange.
There's a verse in Proverbs too, that always stuck with me.
It was only a fool's mindwanders to the ends of the earth
.
Speaker 2 (38:28):
Totally.
Speaker 1 (38:28):
And I correlate that
with, like, all the daydreams
and all the envious and just theif I won the lottery type of
mentality that I was talkingabout earlier you know to me,
it's the, it's the, it's thespace thing, tim.
Speaker 2 (38:42):
The idea is that
we're going to continue to send
people into space.
We're going to send themmillions and millions of miles
away and the hope is that we getmore answers, and the irony is
the answers are right here.
Idiot, we're this.
Look at God's creation, look atwhat he's done.
You can look out there andlearn and explore and great.
But the problem is these people.
(39:02):
This is how their minds work.
I'm going to look for any otherexplanation than what is
clearly to be seen in front ofmy face and I will literally
search deep space for the restof my life.
Never land on a single planetand act like that was more
honorable than actuallyacknowledging what was in the
front of my face.
This is from your intellectualdescent.
(39:25):
It is an endless wormhole.
If you want to find other waysto get around what God has said,
you can, but it's rebellion.
You have to.
You got to lay down yourthought life.
The third one, tim, is we haveto lay down this idea of of
license.
Okay.
So if you think you're beingoppressed by what God is doing
(39:48):
in your life, if you think, likeI, wish God would do it this
way or that way, or I wish hewould let me do this.
We want to push off the God whoactually commands us to do
certain things and live certainways, and we want to connect it
to this idea of freedom and livecertain ways.
And we want to connect it tothis idea of freedom, all right.
(40:10):
It's pretty wild to me howpersonal autonomy, you know, has
become like freedom.
Tim, you used to think aboutfreedom, all right, when you
were growing up and I wasgrowing up, you hear an eagle
screech in the background.
You think about the 4th of JulyFireworks.
Yeah, you think about the 4thof July fireworks.
Yeah, you think about likefighting for freedom.
(40:31):
It meant, like, I'm going to goto war so that I can have kids
in a family and plant corn in myground.
You know what I mean it was.
It was drawing hard lines sothat somebody could not take
from you the things that youwere meant to do.
Okay, that's.
That's actually more along thelines of virtue.
I have a right to do what isright.
(40:53):
I have a right to live the wayGod told me to.
And when he put me in a gardenand he gave me a bride and he
told me to fill the earth andsubdue it, and he told me to
plant food in the ground andtold me to live in a way that
would honor him, I'm supposed tofight for that.
And if somebody tries to comein and tell me not to do what
God told me to do, it isvirtuous to go to war against
(41:14):
that.
When we say the word freedom now, or rights now, we're talking
about killing babies.
We're talking about, um, youknow the the transgender
nonsense that's going on withour children, and how, if they
think that they're a boy, thenwe should put them on hormone
(41:34):
blockers or whatever.
Why?
Cause it's their right.
They're free.
Okay, freedom has becomelicense, not virtue.
Freedom has become I get to dowhatever I want, because
whatever I desire is ultimatelysomething you shouldn't be able
to say no to, because it's mydesire.
Thomas Hobbes was the guy whoreally put this on the map, this
(41:57):
idea of Leviathan.
Your primitive desires are whoyou were made to be and so,
ultimately, it is your right tohave everything that you desire.
And then the only time we caveon those desires is when we get
into a society where we willmutually agree on taming some of
our desires so that we can havethe other benefits that we want
(42:18):
.
It's not virtue, it's license,and it's demonic, it's not true.
So whatever is in you thatthinks like I have to live this
particular way, or if I havethis desire, I should get it,
you're talking about license,not freedom.
This is why I wanted to sayEdmund Vance Cook, but it's
Edmund Burke.
(42:38):
He talks about it all the time.
Right, our passions forge ourfetters.
The less pressure on theoutside of somebody, the more
internal pressure.
He's going to have to bedisciplined, because the less
internal discipline he has, themore pressure on the outside.
We'll have to discipline him orelse he'll go wild.
Though there's a, there's a lawthere of internal discipline,
(43:00):
more freedom, uh, less internaldiscipline.
More external discipline willneed to be applied, because that
person will go as far as theywant to.
This is why he says theirpassions forge their fetters.
Your desire for things willultimately be the things that
enslave you.
Jesus is trying to give youvirtuous freedom and that
actually happens throughcommands and living how he told
(43:20):
you to command, how he told youto live, not doing whatever
thing you feel like you'reentitled to in the moment.
Augustine, in Confessions tohim, he said the more one is
free from sin, the more one isfree, for what is free is that
which exists for its own sake.
Like that's what it's supposedto look like.
(43:42):
Listen, if you're free from sin, then you're able to live and
use things to the fullness ofwhat they were meant to be for.
From sin, then you're able tolive and use things to the
fullness of what they were meantto be for In the, in the Summa,
for freedom is not given to usthat we might live in sin, but
that we might live inrighteousness.
Right, yes, right.
That's what it's actuallysupposed to look.
Like man I want to get into,like James and stuff, but I'll
(44:04):
just, I'll just give you thefourth.
The last is is ultimately, wehave to lay down our pride and
choose humility, and that meansyou have to acknowledge that you
are not God, and I think that'sactually harder for us than we
want to admit.
Speaker 1 (44:19):
Yeah, that's the kind
of thing, that kind of sneaks
up on you.
Speaker 2 (44:23):
I'm afraid that our
hearts, although longing for
rest and this cessation ofanxiety and depression and this
meaninglessness that we canoften find ourselves in,
ultimately people won't find itbecause they have the ulterior
motive of ultimately being God.
This is why so many people arelike they're seeking truth,
(44:49):
they're seeking the faith, theywant Jesus, but they don't
really want Jesus.
They want all the things Jesuscan give them, as long as Jesus
doesn't have to be God.
So I'll come to your services.
I'll accept the truths that arethere, that are so good.
I really love the community andfellowship.
You'll hear nonbelievers saythings like this but it's like
right, but do you understandthat Jesus is Lord, that he like
(45:12):
gave his life?
That's the part I struggle with.
Why?
Because they don't want anybodyto be God but them.
Yeah, deep down, it's thepoison and the whisper from the
serpent back in the gardensaying if you do it this way,
you'll be like God and you canuse his creation, you can use
the ground, you can have theworld, but you get to be God and
(45:35):
interpret it the way that youwant to.
And so many people are like I'lltake all the good things God
has created, but I don't want.
I don't want him.
I mean, what is?
What is alcohol addiction?
But an attempt to recreate theworld the way that you want,
simulate feelings, right?
What's laziness, if not thisattempt to say I'm just going to
push off what God told me to doand I'm going to use, you know,
(45:57):
license instead of freedom, andI'll call it the same thing
this is my right?
What's materialism, if not anattempt to create the world that
I want around me in aparticular way and I will make
myself in a particular way and Iwill make myself feel a
particular way?
I can get into all this stuff,but Jesus in Philippians 2 tells
us that, even though he was God, he didn't live like God.
He didn't come down.
(46:19):
It says that he didn't regardequality with God a thing to be
grasped.
What does that mean?
Stop chasing after the wind.
Stop chasing after the wind.
Your goal is not to be God,your goal is to obey God, and
(46:48):
that's actually the pinnacle.
The difference between happinessand meaninglessness, or you
could say purpose and despair,is are you trying to be God?
Are you trying to obey God?
Because, literally, jesus, theone who was himself God, came
down and modeled for us how tofind joy and all of us, to this
day, still fight against it bythis thing that is in our guts
telling us well, yeah, but doyou want to?
And this is again.
This is why, in chapter 12, hesays remember also your creator
in the days of your youth,before the evil days come in,
(47:08):
the years drawn near, when yousay I have no delight in them,
why?
Because you tried to be Godinstead of obey God.
Vanity, is that so, man?
I realized I went on like a lotof tangents today but I was
recently thinking about thisparticular topic and then we
just like stumbled right into itand you brought up, uh,
ecclesiastes.
(47:28):
So I had to.
I hope it's maybe at least a athoughtful wormhole to take
people down today.
Speaker 1 (47:35):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (47:35):
I would think so Cool
.
Well, guys, uh, my hope andthought for you is this it might
be good to take this podcast,check your heart, analyze some
of the things that you're tryingto exercise that autonomous
ingenuity you know what I meanor that intellectual dissent.
Am I constantly coming up withways for why this is okay,
(47:58):
outside of what God has actuallysaid?
Am I the person who seesfreedom as license, less virtue,
and am I the person who,ultimately, is trying to deify
myself?
I am trying to recreate theworld in my image, the way that
I would want, instead of livingout the reality that I am made
in the image of God and I needto go to him for sustenance.
(48:18):
So just a good reminder for allof us today Awesome.
Speaker 1 (48:21):
Cool man, thanks man.
Speaker 2 (48:22):
All right, you guys
have a good week.
Speaker 1 (48:23):
Catch you all next
time.