Transcription

Connor
You’re listening to The Bible Guys, a podcast where a couple of friends talk about the Bible in fun and practical ways.

Jeff
Hey, Chris. It’s good to be back.

Chris
Jeff. It is great to be together.

Jeff
Here we are, man. Well, hey, today is one of those that you are going you are eminently qualified to speak about on this lesson today.

Chris
I am more qualified on this topic than any other human in the world.

Jeff
Maybe better than anybody.

Chris
That’s a big topic. It’s huge, it’s.

Jeff
Huge, and you’re the best at it. Maybe nobody will ever talk about is.

Chris
Better at me than humility.

Jeff
That’s right. So the whole topic today is Jesus is teaching on humility and you are the most qualified to talk about. Thank you so.

Chris
Much. And I’ll accept that title. Yeah. Well, hey, today we’re going to be doing something that, uh, Desiree likes to call lore or floor.

Jeff
Lore or floor. Oh, these are neat ones.

Chris
We say floor just because it rhymes with lore. Yeah, yeah, that’s right. But it’s either a lore or it’s not a lore. That’s right. All right, so here it is. So there’s five of them and you have to guess. Okay. You ready? Yes. In California, it is illegal to use a gas powered vacuum cleaner.

Jeff
A gas powered vacuum cleaner. Never even heard one of those. Uh, I’m going to say, lore. Everything’s against the law in California.

Chris
Yeah, yeah, it is a law. Because. Because, uh, of the emissions standard in California is so much higher. Did you know that? Okay. Uh, do you ever see The Price is Right?

Jeff
Yes.

Chris
I have, when they actually sell a car. Uh, he actually says you listen for it. Uh, the announcer, Rod Roddy, or whatever his name is, he always says, uh, complete with California emissions. That’s right. Because their standard is so much higher, I know. All right. Number two, I can imagine.

Jeff
Our listeners are riveted.

Chris
Uh, I bet you they are.

Jeff
They are. I know that’s what I’m saying.

Chris
All right. In Arizona, it is illegal to feed garbage to a pig unless you have a permit or the animal is your own pig.

Jeff
What? Uh.

Chris
You have to have a permit or you have to own. So.

Jeff
Yeah, that’s so precise. I’m going to say law.

Chris
It is very much a law. A law, is it.

Jeff
Yeah, yeah. All right. I’m two for.

Chris
Two. You are too.

Jeff
Yeah, baby, maybe I should be the one talking about humility today.

Chris
Yes. Yeah. Maybe so. Uh, number three in Colorado, it is illegal to use indoor furniture outside of your house, but.

Jeff
I’m going to say FLA.

Chris
It is a law. What? Which by the way that should be a law everywhere not allowed.

Jeff
To use indoor furniture outside.

Chris
Because I grew up in an area where people would take a couch that is designed for the inside and put it on their front lawn.

Jeff
Sure, sure, sure not.

Chris
Granted it wasn’t. And you’re not a fan. Well, you’re not a fan.

Jeff
Not not not a fan.

Chris
No, no, no, I’m not not a fan of that at all. Okay. All right. So anyway that’s hilarious. Okay. Not a.

Jeff
Fan. What about wicker?

Chris
Well, see, that’s the thing. I don’t know what is indoor outdoor, I guess. I mean, wicker is definitely outdoor, but.

Jeff
It can be indoor if you have like a sunroom.

Chris
Yeah. Three seasons room.

Jeff
Yeah yeah yeah.

Chris
Yeah.

Jeff
Or a solarium controversy. You know, in your big mansion, in your solarium. You could have, uh.

Chris
That’s hilarious. All right, ready for this? Number four in Iowa, it is illegal to pass off migraine. No, sorry. Migraine. Margarine. Margarine doesn’t even look the same. Okay? It has the same letters. Margarine. Uh, it is illegal to pass off margarine as real butter.

Jeff
I’m going to say law.

Chris
Is a law.

Jeff
Yeah. Wow. So you.

Chris
Are three for.

Jeff
Four.

Chris
And then finally in the last one, it says in New Hampshire it is illegal to carry away or collect seaweed at night.

Jeff
What?

Jeff
I’m going to say law.

Chris
All five of these.

Jeff
All five of those were laws. Yeah, yeah. Okay. That’s how I picked it actually was.

Chris
Because the fact that.

Jeff
It sure seemed like. Yeah, it seemed like there was a pattern.

Chris
Yeah. So I didn’t know. Think about this. It’s illegal to carry away or collect seaweed at night, that you could do it during the day.

Jeff
During the day. Day is totally fine, but.

Chris
Not at night.

Jeff
Enough of that seaweed carrying at night. We’re done with that.

Chris
I wonder if it’s to prevent, like, accidents happening at night. Like like animals come out at night or something, or poisonous frogs.

Jeff
Or it might be, you know, stepping on baby turtles or something.

Chris
Could be maybe.

Jeff
I don’t know. Yeah. Or it could just be. So, ruckus, maybe. Maybe it’s the kind of people who pick up seaweed that they’re just party animal types, and it just gets too loud at night.

Chris
There’s all sorts of scenarios that we can create.

Jeff
I don’t know. Okay, man. Well, there you go.

Chris
Which, by the way, I don’t have to worry about this law because I will never go collect seaweed. I don’t think I.

Jeff
Am either for.

Chris
The rest of my.

Jeff
Life. That’s correct. Yeah. Okay.

Chris
By the way, uh, somebody tried to give me seaweed to put into a shake one time and just give me powdered powder to kill you. Seaweed. And they said, oh, just use this. It’s so healthy. It’s so good. And I put a little bit of powdered and I swear they were trying to kill me. It was the worst thing I’ve ever tasted.

Jeff
It’s so healthy. It’s so good. Oh, yeah.

Chris
That’s terrible.

Jeff
Yep.

Chris
So today, Jeff, we’re talking about Jesus teaches about humility. This is only found in Luke, the book of Luke. It’s not found in any other gospel.

Jeff
Yeah. This specific illustration, this specific.

Chris
Well, yeah. He teaches.

Jeff
About he talks about humility.

Chris
Elsewhere. But this particular.

Jeff
One is this your favorite one is this is this passage, the passage on humility that you’re best at.

Chris
That’s the one that I master the most.

Jeff
Yeah.

Jeff
Okay, so here we go. Luke chapter 14, verse seven says, When Jesus noticed that all who had come to the dinner were trying to sit in the seats of honor near the head of the table, he gave them this advice. When you’re invited to a wedding feast, don’t sit in the seat of honor. What if someone who is more distinguished than you has also been invited? The host will come and say, hey, give this person your seat, and then you’ll be embarrassed and you’ll have to take whatever seat is left at the foot of the table. Instead, take the lowest place at the foot of the table. Then when your host sees you, he will come and say, friend, we have a better place for you and then you’ll be honored in front of all the other guests. For those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted. And then he turned to his host. When you put on a luncheon or a banquet, he said, don’t invite your friends, brothers, relatives, and rich neighbors, for they’ll invite you back and that will be your only reward. Instead, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. Then, at the resurrection of the righteous, God will reward you for inviting those who could not repay you. Yeah. Really good. There you go.

Chris
And by the way, I mean, think about how controversial this is. Invite the poor, the crippled, the lame and the blind. See, back then they thought that, uh, people were cursed because of sins, right? Right, right, right. So if somebody was born blind, I mean, isn’t there a there are places elsewhere in Scripture where they said, why was this man born blind because of his sins? Or because of his parents sins? Right, right, right. So, so they thought a lot of times that if you had leprosy or if you were crippled or if you sat outside the city gates, you weren’t able to work. A lot of times it was because of God’s punishment, which, by the way, is pretty crazy. Yeah, if you think about it.

Jeff
Well, even in the world today, in a lot of the developing nations out in villages and stuff, if there’s somebody who’s different from the rest, they’re concerned it might be a demon or something that made them made them do that. So yeah.

Chris
Yeah. And uh, and didn’t you say what was it, what was it, was it Egypt? Where, where if there was a yes, it was Egypt. We went to we went to Egypt one time and, uh, we were working with those who were handicapped. And those who are handicapped are looked at as that. Yeah, we looked at it. So they don’t have courtesies like wheelchair ramps, right in Egypt. And so a lot of times if you have a handicapped sibling out.

Jeff
In the villages, like you get in the city and they will. Yeah. Cairo, but out in the villages they don’t.

Chris
You’re right. Yeah, yeah. And uh, but uh, but anyway, the bottom line is, is, uh, it would often prevent even the siblings from getting married. So I remember I heard a story about a girl, and she was, uh, uh, you know, dating a guy. And then he found out that she had a brother in a wheelchair that was born lame and, you know, crippled. And he said, well, your family’s cursed. Therefore, I’m not going to marry your family. Right. And apparently that’s sort of like a widespread sort of thing. Yeah. Whereas we’re appalled and and they were just like, what? What do you mean? Yeah. And it’s like sort of widely accepted.

Jeff
Yeah. It’s kind of a fearful thing. You know, they’re afraid that genetically I don’t know that they’re thinking genetics, but it’s an instinct, that, boy, if there’s some kind of anomaly in the family, then we don’t want to pass that on in our family. And so they blame it on demons or they blame it on some kind of other thing. But yeah, that’s it. So Jesus is telling, um, you know, he’s talking to two different groups of people here. He starts off talking to the guests, right? And he finishes talking to the host who were.

Chris
Racing for the best seat.

Jeff
Yeah, yeah, they’re pushing for the very best seats. And to the host, you know, he’s he’s talking about, um, not being exclusive. That’s really it. Um, you know, you get rewarded back when you invite the people who are just like you and they have the ability to give to you what you just gave to them, you kind of scratching each other’s back. And Jesus said, you know, there’s something special for you. Uh, God will reward you in a special way when you include everybody and when you make room for the people who can’t be a benefit or blessing to you.

Chris
Well, you know, this is sort of it’s sort of reminds me of, like, you know, how Jesus says, hey, if you love those who are who love you, then what reward do you have? Because even even the pagans do that, even the Gentiles do that. Those who don’t even know God do that. Uh, you know, it’s easy to love those who are nice to you, but to love your enemies, that’s a whole different thing altogether, because then your father will reward you in heaven. And that idea of, uh, you know, inviting those to the banquet that can repay you, knowing that you’ll get something back. He says, you know, if you really want to do something worthwhile, do something where you’ll not. Get any reward, right? And not like that, but like then. Then it’s a true act of giving as well, isn’t it? Right. Because those people never get invited to anything. Right. And so it’s sort of A12 punch. Right. And uh, and by the way, I think that it’s interesting how he first, uh, sort of not scolds, but sort of, uh. Yeah. I don’t know if scold is the right word, but corrects. Yeah. Uh, gives advice to points out the flaws of, uh, of those who are the guests. And then he turns around and then he talks to the host. And so the guests themselves are, you know, at this point, he says, don’t invite friends or relatives or neighbors. So you would imagine that the guests are probably of the same social status. Yeah, right. And so there. And guess what? Those are the people that always are concerned with keeping up with the Joneses, aren’t they?

Jeff
Absolutely. Yep.

Chris
Yeah. And it’s sort of that way today too, isn’t it?

Jeff
I think in this he’s not saying never invite your neighbors or your friends or the rich. Right, right. He’s trying to say, also invite the lame and the sick and the, the blind and the poor and the crippled, right. That that’s what he’s trying to do here. Uh, otherwise, if you read that, then you could never have friends and family over, right? Right, right. But in other places in the Bible, it says we’re supposed to take care of and love our friends and family. Right? So it’s just that what he’s saying is it’s easy to do the ones that are just like you, and it’s hard to remember the people who are different from you. So it’s not never invite over your friends and family and always only invite the cripple and the lame and the poor. It’s more of an also do both, right? Right. Uh, don’t just think about the one.

Chris
So, uh, you know, I was thinking more about that statement I just made about keeping up with the Joneses. Yeah. And, you know, the idea that, like, when you’re in that rat race and you have, you know, probably I’m assuming that, you know, this, it’s easy to assume that they have a little bit of wealth they’re holding. They’re holding a banquet. You know, friends and neighbors are probably at that same social class, uh, you know, and they’re all fighting for the for the seat, which means they care. They really do care about being important, right? Right. That’s that’s what’s on their mind. And being seen as somebody who’s prominent. Um, uh, I have a friend of mine who, uh, has millions of dollars. Okay. And, uh, and, uh, and I’ve known him for 20 years, and he is the poorest millionaire you’ve ever met in your life.

Chris
Right? The only thing he is consumed with and talks about are the people richer than him. And he. And he’s like, oh, you know, uh, you know, you think you think I have money. Let me tell you about this. You know, all these people I run with. And I’m telling you what, man, the more you you know, you’re putting kids through college and you’re doing this. You’re doing that. I’m telling you, man, it’s just where does it go? And and he’s just he’s constantly poor mouthing everything, right? Oh, I did this remodel in the kitchen, you know, and spent $40,000 on cabinets. And I got to tell you, you know, but I know a guy who spent $80,000 on cabinets, right? And I’m like, you have got to be kidding me, dude, you were the poorest multimillionaire that I know of. Yeah, but that’s just the way it is. We just get consumed. And by the way, that that’s the same with Americans, right? Versus, uh, places you travel to, right?

Jeff
Oh, absolutely.

Chris
Absolutely. So what would what would you say? Like Americans like, if we were to wake up and travel to a third world or, you know.

Jeff
Developing country.

Chris
Developing country, uh, you know, what would you say? You know, we need to wake up to well.

Jeff
Well, almost everything, uh, the fact the, uh, the regularity of our food, the clarity of our water, the, uh, medical accessibility, transportation accessibility, um, a roof over our head. I mean, you just go on and on and on and on. The fact that you have you had to decide what clothes to wear today. Mhm. Um, right. Uh, what shoes should I wear today? Uh, I literally stood there and tried to decide which one matched my clothes better today. Right. Which which pairs of shoes? Uh, you can just go on and on and on and on and on. The blessings that we have in America are just almost incomprehensible to the rest of the world. Now. We just feel that’s normal. It’s just normal. It’s not like I’m trying to decide between 2000 pairs of shoes. I’m, you know, they’re both Skechers, right? But but I have multiple pairs of shoes. I have, uh, I can make up my mind on how I want to spend my free time. And in most, in most developing nations, there isn’t any free time. Right? Uh, the decision of whether or not Mom and dad get to eat dinner tonight, or do the children eat dinner tonight, you know, those kinds of things. You just go on and on. So. So, yeah, the learning to be grateful for what God’s given us is so incredibly important. You know, I look at that that beginning though, and he talks about putting yourself out in the front, uh, scrambling for all of the advantages, uh, maybe one of the most dangerous moments in my life. And I didn’t realize it at the time. Um, you know, uh, I have a music degree, so I actually was a worship leader for 15 years, and, um, I was a trumpet player, uh, also through college. Jeff
That’s how I paid my way through college. I had a scholarship for trumpet, and, uh, so, uh, not to overly brag, but I was the best trumpet player I knew, right? Right. Um, at the time, everywhere I played, I was always the first trumpet. And so I had had several years where I hadn’t played in any group, uh, because I was only doing church work. And then realized I didn’t know anybody who wasn’t a Christian. Right. It’d been several years and all of my friends were Christians, and it just dawned on me I hadn’t let anybody to Jesus in a while, and it’s because my entire life was insulated inside the church. So I started to try to think of ways to get out and meet, you know, friends that weren’t automatically, you know, just assumed to be Christians. And I wound up getting invited to a group, uh, brass group, one of the top brass groups in America. And, um, here in Detroit. And, um, the guy who invited me had introduced me to the director. Director was like, oh, I really need a new solo trumpet player. And went on and on and on about it, and I said, oh, hey, I’d be happy. So I’m pulling into the driveway all excited for this rehearsal, all excited about, you know, this opportunity and thinking, man alive, I’m going to meet a bunch of people and it’s one of the best brass groups in the country. I’m super excited about this. And, uh, just before I walked in, this passage came to mind where Jesus said, when you go to a party, don’t go up and sit at the head of the table. Sit at the end, and it’s better to be invited to the head of the table.

Chris
Right?

Jeff
So when I walked.

Chris
In, in other words, don’t walk in and sit in the first chair. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Jeff
So when I walked in, the director handed me the first chair. Music.

Chris
Yeah, yeah.

Jeff
The solo music. Not not first chair soloist, the top lead and I, I, I was like, hey, you know what? This is my first time with you guys, and I’d really like to wrap my head around what you guys are doing. Why don’t you give me a third? I’ll go sit down in third chair and I’ll just learn what you guys are doing, figure out what you’re about, and figure out maybe how I can help best. And he’s like, oh, wow. That’s wow. I’ve never had anybody do that. Okay. And so he took his second chair and moved him up to solo. Put me down on third. He goes, okay, we’re going to do number, whatever, whatever. We pull out our music and he goes and we go ripping and tearing through this piece of music. I couldn’t believe how hard it was. We get done and I lean over to the other third chair and I was like, wow, that was incredible. I’ve never played that before. And the other third chair goes, oh, none of us have. It was. And they played it flawlessly, right? And I went, oh my goodness. So through the rest of the rehearsal, the solo and first chair stuff, I could get to the point where I could play it, but they were all sight reading it first time they’d ever seen it, and they were playing it flawlessly. And boy, I dodged a bullet that day, right? So when I got done after rehearsal, I went up to him and he says, so what do you think? He says, you can play the music. He said, you sound good. Everything’s sound great. Uh, he said, next week, maybe solo. And I said, well, let me ask you this. Jeff
What do you need more than a solo trumpet? And he goes, oh, man, I need a tenor horn so bad I can’t get anybody to play it. I said, I don’t have one, but I would. I’d be willing to serve you there. I really felt like in the middle of the band you were missing something. Anyways, I’d be willing to help. And he goes, you’re kidding me? He said, I’ve got one. He handed it to me, and from that point on, I was like, the savior for this guy. This guy was so glad. And so now here I am. I feel like a fraud now. I could play that music, but it would have been a tremendous amount of work. Yeah, to get to that level. And instead I wound up doing 54 concerts with one of the top bands in the country, 12 concerts with the Detroit Symphony. You just go on and on all this stuff all around the country. I got to play with these people an incredible level of music, um, without shaming or embarrassing myself because the instrument I wound up playing in, the music I played was way easier than that solo trumpet spot. So I got in to this really great group. Um, but had I pushed myself to the front, I would have been dismissed and said, oh, thank you for coming. We’ll call you later.

Chris
Well, it’s exactly what Jesus said. That’s exactly. It is better to be invited to the head of the table. Yes, than to assume that you’re the best person in the room. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That is that is a tremendous story.

Jeff
I’ve had that thought many times, walking into rooms where it was like the first time I was walking into a room, and I knew that there was opportunity in the room and, um, uh, another another area is, you know, now I’ve had an opportunity to be the chairperson of several different boards, but both of the boards that I’m, I’m chair of now, I came into the the opportunity telling the leader, hey, listen, um, I’m here to serve you. And I only have three people I say yes to all the time. So Chad, my executive pastor and I, we’ve made a determination. We have these three people, and you’re one of them. You’re one of the people that if you ask and it’s possible, I’ll say yes, because I want to serve you. You know, as long as it’s legal and ethical and moral. Right? And, uh, all three of those coming in to serve and then eventually getting elevated to, you know, a significant position, I wasn’t doing it in order to get elevated. But Jesus says those things tend to get rewarded. Right. And so I would say those three times have been times when I dodged a bullet. If I’d pushed in, no opportunity would have been there. Yeah, but by coming and sitting at the end of the table, you know, you get elevated.

Chris
So that’s awesome. Yeah.

Chris
That’s great.

Jeff
Um, which may make me the humblest person at the table now that I think about it. Yeah. The most humble I may be may be the best at being humble. Absolutely. I want a trophy for being humble. One time.

Chris
Yeah, yeah. What happened to it?

Jeff
Well, they had to take it away. I kept showing everybody.

Chris
Uh, but, um.

Chris
So, uh, so, uh, real quick, I got a quick story about this. Um, so I taught I taught humility from here, and then I bet from.

Jeff
I bet you did teach humility.

Chris
I taught it really good.

Chris
Uh, I taught humility to my youth group when I was a youth pastor. I was a youth pastor for about 11, 12 years, and, uh, with high school students. And we did this whole study on Philippians two and then this passage here, and then, uh, just a couple other different passages, you know, and, um, and so the idea was, uh, the phrase was race to the back of the line. Oh, yeah. So, you know, we had a small church. It was just like less than 200 people, you know, and once a month we would do dinner on the grounds, you know, and I said, I’m just tired of teenagers running to the front of the line whenever they say, hey, you know, soup’s on. So I just said, I said, wouldn’t it be great if you guys waited to the back of the line every single time? What if you, you know, let others go before you? And we just like literally gave example after example of how to put into practice humility so that people would notice. And so I remember at that one point, uh, I remember them getting into the back of the line and all the adults in the church, like, like something’s going on with the teens, right? Like, like they’re they’re super, like, humble, like what has happened.

Jeff
The adults are starting to worry now. Is it some kind of prank?

Chris
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, then then here’s. But here’s the point of my story that leads up to this moment. So I go to take them to summer camp, and we had a, uh, like a big pavilion oratorium. And there’s like 1500 people. So imagine how big a crowd is a 1500 people. And, uh, what he had, what he had wanted was he had wanted for every youth group, every church that brought their kids to sign up for KP duty, to do the dishes for at least one shift. And, um, but because we had just arrived there and we had just eaten lunch, they had nobody for the very first KP duty. So they wanted to just see if anybody wanted to volunteer. So he looks at it, this crowd, we’ve only been there literally like an hour. Right. And you know, you know how excited we are. Everybody’s excited. You know, we’re sitting in our little seats and he goes, hey, is there anybody out there that I brought like 60 kids. He goes, is there anybody out there that wants to volunteer for KP duty? Uh, right now and just leave right now? And you’re going to miss this session. And all 60 of my students, the only ones, by the way, in the whole 1500 people shot up within a half of a second, they all went home and they just stood up. And I remember all the other youth pastors looking at me with envy, saying, your kids are better than my kids. And I remember thinking, that’s right, baby.

Jeff
That’s right.

Chris
And but, you know, it’s because they have.

Jeff
The most humble leader.

Chris
That’s right, that’s right. But listen, all kidding aside, I was so proud of them. Yeah. And I thought, man, this is amazing. And I’m telling you, there’s power in it because everybody in the room was moved. They were like, wow.

Jeff
Right.

Chris
And uh, yeah. And I told them I was like, hey, we’re just we’re just studying about humility, right?

Jeff
That’s great.

Jeff
Really cool. That’s fantastic. So the race to the back of the line, it’s not about being self-effacing or always talking yourself down, right? I mean, when I went to that rehearsal, I knew I was good, I was I’ve done the work, but what I decided not to do was push myself to the front. Instead, I raced to the back and thank God I did. Right. Um, uh, your kids, your kids knew that they they were, you know, uh, great kids and all that kind of stuff, but they decided, hey, we’re willing to serve this time rather than. And so that race to the back of the line thing is good. It’s not that you don’t deserve to be in the room. You were invited to the party, right? It’s that you’re not forcing yourself to the front. You’re going to you’re going to allow the leaders to discover your character.

Chris
Yeah, right.

Jeff
You’re going to demonstrate it.

Chris
Yeah. Humility is one of the most honorable traits, especially for people who lower themselves. And you wouldn’t expect them to. Right? When you see somebody very prominent being humble. Uh, it’s like when Drew Brees told my son, oh, don’t worry about the pens. I spoke for him for a chapel, and my son put the pens down and Drew Brees goes, uh, yeah, don’t worry about it. And he and he gets on his hands and knees and Drew Brees is picking up the pens. And I slapped my son in the arm. And I go don’t make Drew Brees pick up the pens. I’m like get on your hands and knees son. And get the pens right. Yeah yeah. And and but you know but you know it was just a great example of somebody who’s worth millions of dollars and somebody who’s really prominent and well known. And I still.

Jeff
Solid Christian.

Chris
Yeah. And I still remember that moment. Yeah. Because he was that humble to serve me and my son, who he didn’t even know.

Jeff
The note in the Life Application Bible we can finish with this says humility is not self-degradation. It is realistic self-assessment and commitment to serve. Yeah that’s great. That’s really it. Being willing to.

Chris
Serve well hey, that’s a great place to end and we will see you next time on The Bible Guys.